Flashes of light and clouds of smoke filled the air during a fire at a PPL electric substation in Allentown Wednesday night. Crews were able to restore power to those customers in about 45 minutes. The cause of the fire is unknown.
There was a power outage in the City of Allentown that left thousands without power and impacted street lights and traffic lights Wednesday night.
At approximately 5:32 p.m. 8,450 PPL customers lost power after a transformer at a substation at 13th and Washington streets blew, according to PPL and the City of Allentown.
This caused a fire within the substation which has since been put out, officials said.
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All customers that were affected by the outage were restored on or before 6:16 p.m., PPL said.
The areas impacted by the power outages were center city and Allentown's west end. The City of Allentown said on Facebook that they are working to get as many temporary stop signs up as possible.
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“If you get to an intersection and a traffic light isn’t working, it should be treated as though it is a 4 way stop sign,” the city said in a social media post.
Officials said there were no injuries and the cause of the outage is being investigated.
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