Squirrel Knocks Out Power To 1,300 Homes In Fairfield

FAIRFIELD, CT — The mysterious power outage that knocked out power to more than 1,300 homes in Fairfield on Wednesday morning was caused by a pesky squirrel. United Illuminating reported at about 9 a.m. that it had 1,323 customers out of power in Fairfield.

The Fairfield Fire Department alerted residents to the power outage on its Facebook page and said UI crews were in the area trying to find the source of the outage. UI representatives termed it a “cable fault” and continued patrolling the circuit in order to find the source of the problem, according to the fire department.

Less than an hour later, UI restored power to all but 216 customers but were still searching for the source of the outage.

Power was restored to all customers around 10 a.m. and the mystery was solved — a squirrel shorted out the circuit, according to the fire department.

It wasn’t immediately clear where the outages took place.

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