Squirrel leaves 10,000 Wichita, Kan., customers without power

The wrath of Mother Nature comes in many forms.

About 10,000 Wichita, Kan., energy customers lost power Monday afternoon when a squirrel climbed into electrical substation equipment, officials said.

It took about an hour for Westar Energy, which has 700,000 customers, to restore power.

Outages often stem from thunderstorms, high winds, or fires, but squirrels regularly play a role.

In the past month, the rodents have knocked out power to a Roanoke, Va., airport; the City Hall, police station and courthouses in Lynchburg, Va.; 4,500 customers in southern Colorado; 3,200 customers in Austin, Texas; 7,000 customers in central Tennessee; and thousands more people across the country. Squirrels also gnaw through signal wires for trains in Philadelphia.

(In an unrelated incident, a raccoon knocked out power for about 2,800 customers in Casper, Wyo., for seven hours on June 5, causing traffic slowdowns and interrupting breakfast plans.)

According to KAKE-TV, the Wichita squirrel caused a transformer to blow out and sparked a fire that had to be put out by firefighters.

There was no official word on the squirrel’s condition, but it almost certainly was fried.

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