BELLA VISTA — Seven electrical substations failed at 10:46 a.m. Wednesday, leaving roughly 20,000 people here without power for 13 minutes.
“While in the normal course of switching substations, we ran in to a fault,” said Clay Starkey, public relations coordinator for Carroll Electric.
The fault caused the seven substations to shut down.
Substations are tested on a regular basis to ensure they will function or switch properly during outages, Starkey said.
The electrical outage was widespread across Bella Vista.
“As far as I know, the lights were out all the way down (U.S.) 71,” Police Chief Ken Farmer said.
The Bella Vista fire and police departments have backup generators, said Bryan Wolfgang, Bella Vista Fire Department battalion chief.
Farmer said the department did have a small issue with its backup generator as it did not cycle properly, but the department was only without power for a few minutes. Telephones continued to work throughout so there was no interruption in emergency services.