Posted on 10/04/2001 9:44:00 AM PDT by chance33_98
Several buildings in downtown Oklahoma City, including City Hall, were without power for an hour Wednesday. People were trapped in elevators and hundreds of workers exited down dark stairwells.
Oklahoma Gas and Electric Co. officials said a squirrel got into the system at the Robinson Avenue substation downtown and tripped a circuit breaker. Power went out at 11:30 a.m. and returned at 12:25 p.m.
"A squirrel shouldn't cause power to be shut off to half of downtown Oklahoma City," OG&E spokesman Tim Hartley said. "It was just one of those fluke situations."
Firefighters rescued three people from elevators in the county courthouse, and were working on freeing one person trapped in an elevator in the federal courthouse when power was restored. No one was injured.
The outage also shut down traffic lights.
Police headquarters and the Oklahoma City municipal courts also were affected by the outage. Police were without power for about 30 minutes. Some phone lines were knocked out of service.
Emergency 911 services were still available, a police spokeswoman said. The municipal courthouse was dark for about an hour. Backup power maintained emergency lights and security systems.
In the county courthouse and county office building, many jurors, lawyers, judges and employees left early for lunch, shuffling down the darkened stairways.
Employees used candles and flashlights to help people leave. Others stayed put.
"We just opened the curtains and kept going," said District Judge Ray Elliott, who is presiding over a trial.
An emergency back-up system at the county courthouse and county building did not work after a battery failed to start the generators. County officials said they plan to add self- sufficient lighting, which would work even if the back-up system doesn't.
Hartley said OG&E workers were doing routine maintenance on one of three circuit breakers Wednesday, so when the animal tripped the second breaker, it left one breaker to handle 69,000 volts of electricity.
"It's designed to do that to keep from damaging equipment and having a prolonged outage," Hartley said.
Nope, you're not seeing things!
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