ORONO – A power outage Thursday afternoon at the University of Maine forced some masters track and field athletes and their families to relocate to a different dorm, UM spokesman Joe Carr said Thursday.

The outage at about 2:15 p.m. affected eight buildings on campus, including Aubert, Wingate, Oak, and Hancock halls, he said. Power was restored to all buildings except Hancock by early Thursday evening, but several employees were sent home early because of the outage.

“Because of the way that the system is set up, it’s not possible to restore power to Hancock today,” Carr said. The cause of the outage hadn’t been determined, Carr said.

The athletes and their families were scheduled to be told about the power outage and change in quarters at about 6 p.m., after the competition of the USATF National Masters Championships, which continues through Sunday.

“We didn’t want to distract people,” Carr said.

UM was expected to provide transportation to assist with the move to Androscoggin and Stodder halls.