SDG&E; Blames Power Outage on Navy Test

Tests by the Navy to check a system designed to baffle enemy radar were blamed Thursday for a power outage that left 65,000 homes without electricity and put a television station off the air.

An SDG&E; spokeswoman said the outage was caused by “powder-like metal particles” which were dropped over the San Diego area by Navy planes.

The particles are designed to block enemy radar and help Navy planes avoid detection.

The particles “ionized the air around our wires and made everything short out,” the spokeswoman said.

No Soap

The information released by SDG&E; on the cause of the outage was confirmed by Navy officials at Miramar Naval Air Station, the spokeswoman said. She said there was a similar situation in the Camp Pendleton area several years ago.

The outage, which began at 1 p.m., left viewers of Channel 10, KGTV, wondering what happened next in the soap opera “General Hospital” as the station went off the air. A total of about 65,000 residential and corporate customers of San Diego Gas & Electric Co. lost power. Affected business customers included Channel 10, Cox Cable of San Diego and at least one hospital.

Traffic became temporarily snarled at several major intersections in the city when traffic lights began failing. However, San Diego police reported no major traffic accidents.

Power at Sharp Memorial Hospital went off about 2:10 p.m., but was restored immediately via the facility’s emergency generator. No surgeries or other medical procedures that were going on at the time were disrupted, said hospital spokeswoman Roseanne Galegher.

Cable Service Disrupted

Service to more than 100,000 of Cox Cable’s 250,000 subscribers was disrupted for about an hour. Steve Gautereaux, Cox’s vice present for operations, said dozens of angry subscribers telephoned in complaints.

“A lot of people see their lights working and don’t understand why their television set isn’t working, too,” Gautereaux said. “We have 13 operators and they were really busy with calls. It was going bananas there for a while.”

But if anyone was miffed because of the power outage it was probably the die-hard fans of General Hospital, who let Channel 10 know what they thought when Rick, Bobbi, Lorena and the gang got zapped off the air.

It was 3:55 p.m. before Channel 10 was able to resume its programming.

“We got some calls,” one Channel 10 employee said. “People were kinda mad.”