Town centre loses power

HUNDREDS of homes and businesses in the centre of Stowmarket lost electricity today at the heart of the rush hours.Shops in the main street were unable to open because they had no power to operate their tills and all the town centre traffic lights were blacked out.

HUNDREDS of homes and businesses in the centre of Stowmarket lost electricity today at the heart of the rush hours.

Shops in the main street were unable to open because they had no power to operate their tills and all the town centre traffic lights were blacked out.

By the middle of the morning there were still nearly 50 properties without power - all in the town centre.

Initially 750 customers were cut off when an underground cable failed at 7.42am. A larger number lost power for less than a minute before emergency circuits cut in.

Within two hours power had been restored to nearly two thirds of the properties affected - but by 9.30am today there were still 291 customers in the centre of Stowmarket without power. By 10 all but 47 had been reconnected

Engineers from EDF were on the scene within a few minutes, but were still working to isolate the exact fault.

While some of the larger stores - like Asda in Wilkes Way - were able to continue working on back-up generators, others were having to turn customers away on what should have been one of the busiest days of the year.

Roads affected by the power cut included Needham Road, Lime Tree Place, Bridge Street and Ipswich Street.

A spokeswoman for EDF Energy said: “Our engineers are working as quickly as possible to restore power to the remaining customers affected.

“We do appreciate how difficult it is to be without power, and would like to apologise for the inconvenience caused.”