For the first time in more than 20 years, both transformers at the City of Powell’s electrical substation were tripped simultaneously this morning.

A squirrel is to blame.

“I’ve been here for 21 years, and I’ve never had a squirrel get in the substation and interrupt both transformers and interrupters at the same time,” said Larry Carter, city of Powell electric superintendent.

At around 9:25 a.m. this morning, Carter heard a loud bang in his office, located about a block from the substation. Then the lights flickered off.

“When we went in (to the substation), everything was real quiet, so that makes you nervous,” Carter said.

Initially, Carter assumed it was an issue with the Western Area Power Administration’s main transmission feed.

“Normally when it drops out, that’s what it is,” he said.

However, Garland Light & Power confirmed they had still had electricity, so the city knew it was a problem with its substation.

“We started looking around,” Carter said. “We found the fuzzy little guy.”

City Administrator Zane Logan said the squirrel got on the line above the circuit breaker and tripped the main circuit interrupters, shutting down power across the whole city.

“As an analogy, in your house if you overload a circuit, you trip that breaker for the circuit,” Logan said. “But in this case, it was like the main breaker being tripped.”

It’s the first time since 1993 that both of the main circuit interrupters went out, Logan said.

“It tripped both of them,” he said. “We’ve never seen that before. It was just the level and location of the fault, unfortunately for this squirrel ... the whole substation was killed right there.”

To have both transformers go down is really unusual, Logan said.

“It was definitely the wrong place at the wrong time for that squirrel,” Logan said.

The equipment did exactly what it’s supposed to do in this situation, shutting down “to protect the equipment and protect people," he said.

Power was restored to the city within about 20 to 25 minutes.

“In this case, it looks like the only thing that got damaged was the squirrel,” Logan said. “We haven’t seen any equipment damage at this point.”

He said the city appreciates everyone’s understanding.

After power was restored, it appeared everything was running smoothly again at the substation.

“If we didn’t have the squirrels, that would help,” Carter said.