Raccoon causes large power outage in Sugar House

Traffic signals went out during the afternoon commute in the busy Sugar House neighborhood of Salt Lake City after a power outage Tuesday.

As of 5:30 p.m., nearly 5,000 customers were without power, according to Rocky Mountain Power . It was restored by 6:15 p.m.

RMP said a raccoon got into a transformer, which caused a surge. The surge then tripped the system, which is a safety precaution.

The raccoon also died as a result.

The Utah Department of Transportation said the outage impacted traffic signals in the Sugar House and South Salt Lake areas.

An accident involving a UTA train on the S-Line and a vehicle is also causing delays of up to 60 minutes. It's not known if the accident was related to the power outage.

Stay with fox13now.com and FOX 13 News for the latest on this breaking news story.

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