Residents left in the dark (From Wilts and Gloucestershire Standard)

Residents left in the dark

HUNDREDS of people in Cirencester were left in the dark on Thursday night after a major power failure.

Houses in Arnolds Way and Fosse Close were left without electricity after a small fault in a sub station knocked out the supply to 90 properties.

The first power cut was caused by a blown fuse and only affected five houses but electrical engineers called to repair the fuse found a larger fault on the cable.

And it was this second fault that caused the power to fail across almost the whole estate leaving families with no way of cooking dinner and streets and alleyways unlit.

Children enjoying their Easter holidays were left playing out in the fading light and many people arrived back from work to an eerie scene with all the houses plunged into darkness.

One Fosse Close resident, who did not wish to be named, arrived home from work to find the electricity was off.

She said: "I couldn't work out why the lights wouldn't go on. It was a real pain because I couldn't make my dinner or anything. In the end I went and stayed with my sister."

"I rang the electricity company and the woman said there had been a small underground explosion but not to worry because the power would be back on by midnight but I wasn't prepared to sit in the house in the dark all night. When I pointed out that I couldn't cook my tea she suggested I should have fish and chips."

Alan Young, spokesperson for Southern Electric, said: "There was a low voltage knockout at 3.55pm which caused a fuse in the sub station to blow.

This was repaired at 5pm. The replacement of the fuse exposed a fault in the underground cable in Arnolds Way and this became apparent at 6.30pm.

"The fault made a noise and basically it failed. The underground cable was then repaired and the electricity was back on by 9.30pm."