HARRISBURG -- It's called the "power hour" and it's on the rise on college campuses in Pennsylvania and across the nation -- sometimes with deadly results.

A young man or woman who is turning the legal drinking age of 21 begins downing 21 shots of whiskey, scotch, vodka and/or other distilled spirits just after midnight on their 21st birthday.

Sometimes the goal is to see if the new drinker can consume all 21 shots in one hour. Sometimes the drinking goes from just after midnight until the bar or tavern closes, usually at 2 a.m. Sometimes it's to see how much the newly legal drinker can consume before collapsing or running to the toilet to be sick.

Whatever form it takes, the results are usually bad, said Beth DeRicco, associate director of the Center for College Health and Safety in Newton, Mass., who came here for a two-day conference with college officials from across Pennsylvania.

The event, which ended yesterday, was sponsored by the Pennsylvania Liquor Control Board, the National Alcohol Beverage Control Association and the Pennsylvania League of Cities and Municipalities.

"Power hour" drinkers who are lucky end up with just vomiting, DeRicco said. But sometimes the outcome is a lot worse, with the young person choking to death on his own vomit, dying of alcohol poisoning or getting killed in a drunken driving accident on the way back to a dorm.

"The power hour was not considered a rite of passage for youths as little as two years ago, but now we're hearing about it all over the country," DeRicco said, with college officials nodding in agreement. "Students are consuming alcohol in a risky way."

Friends of the person turning 21 sometimes videotape the drinking bout and put it on the Internet, glorifying it, she said. Picture phones are used for the same purpose.

One bar in Minnesota got into trouble for providing a silver bucket to a student turning 21 so that after drinking 21 shots "he'd have something to vomit into," she said. The boy's girlfriend videotaped the episode and police found out. The boy didn't die but was very sick, DeRicco said.

Most bar and tavern owners are responsible and don't serve underage students or overserve those turning 21, but a few bars have shown definite culpability in promoting power hours, DeRicco said.

And it's not just students turning 21 who abuse alcohol. The college officials at the conference told DeRicco that underage students, freshmen and sophomores, are frequently getting drunk on beer, malt liquor or vodka, which is easy to carry around in a backpack and mix with beverages like cola.

The Pittsburgh area is not a stranger to fatal outcomes with college students and alcohol.

In March, Meredith Kenneff, a 20-year-old Duquesne University sophomore, died of alcohol poisoning after drinking in Market Square, Downtown, and on the South Side. And alcohol was cited by an Ohio sheriff as "definitely" a factor in the death in early April of Colin Boyarski, 19, of Point Breeze, a freshman at Kenyon College.

College officials at the conference said liquor companies' sophisticated advertising and packaging of alcohol products can fool young people into thinking there's no risk from abusing alcohol.

"Vodka didn't come in 15 or 20 flavors 20 years ago," DeRicco said. "There has been a demographic change as [alcohol use] has creeped into a younger population."

College officials at the conference said budget cuts at campuses can hamper efforts to reduce students' drinking. The staff member in charge of developing programs to fight alcohol abuse often has multiple other duties that take up his time.

Also, colleges often want to increase publicity about programs to help students who abuse alcohol but are afraid that news about drunken students who get arrested by local police will make it into newspapers or on TV, hurting the college's reputation.

A new technique for sober students to help drunken ones is called the "good Samaritan," officials at the conference said. The idea is to remove the fear a student might have of taking his or her drunken friend for help.

If a roommate or friend calls a city hospital, college infirmary or emergency medical service to get help for a friend who's had too much to drink, there won't be disciplinary action taken against the alcohol abuser. But the abuser will have to attend classes about the dangers of drinking and his parents will be notified.

The state Legislature is getting involved in the issue. Hearings soon will be held by Sens. Sean Logan, D-Monroeville, and John Rafferty Jr., R-Montgomery, on a bill to punish parents or other adults who provide liquor to minors.