Squirrel Caused Power Outage

West Penn Power officials tell WJPA Radio that a brief, but mighty power outage occurred Wednesday morning when a squirrel somehow got into a sub-station in the city of Washington.  Spokesman Todd Meyers says the outage occurred mid-morning and affected some three-thousand customers in the city of Washington and several surrounding communities.  Meyers says the outage though, was very brief, because West Penn had crews in the area and they were able to get to the site quickly and fix the problem.  Meyers says squirrels and small animals and birds are big causes of power outages.  He says they have rubber guards around the live equipment, but many times, small animals, particularly squirrels, manage to bypass them and then come into contact with wires and other equipment.