Substation fire brings power blackouts

Palmerston North residents were today being asked to save electricity after a fire in a substation cut power to the city's central business district (CBD) yesterday.

Power was fully restored to about 8000 homes and businesses last night but Powerco said that full repairs could take several weeks.

Powerco network operations manager Ross Dixon said today that the burnt out substation, which caused the outage at 1.55pm yesterday, was the primary source of power for the CDB and asked businesses to save power wherever possible.

Palmerston North chief fire officer Rodger Calder said his fire crew had been confronted with a "severe fire in the main wiring area from the two main power transformers".

The fire had been bought under control quickly but it took another two hours to ventilate the heavily smoked-logged building to allow safe access, he said.

A total of 16 firefighters attended the fire which one firefighter said was not suspicious and looked like it had started in amongst the cables.

A Palmerston North spokesman said despite the extensive nature of the outage -- which disrupted traffic lights -- there had been no reports of any accidents.

Police had taken to the streets to ensure the roads were kept clear especially at high profile intersections, he said.

- NZPA