Eyewitnesses report ‘fireball in the sky’ after substation fault in St Ives

There were reports of a fireball in the sky above St Ives on Sunday (May 8) following a fire at an electricity substation.

The incident came about after a fault at a substation in London Road at around 8.15pm, which caused more than 3,000 people to be left without electricity.

One eye witness told The Hunts Post: “There was a big bang from the substation and there were many of my neighbours outside their houses and some from the Dolphin Hotel to look at what had happened.

“Then about 20 minutes later there was another explosion and a massive fireball in the sky – it was really quite dangerous.”

Firefighters were at the scene of the blaze before the second explosion and created a cordon around the zone until UK Power Networks arrived.

Residents living near the affected substation have said that oil from the fire covered the road and the trees around station were also burnt.

Following the incident some residents and businesses were left without power until Monday morning.

A spokesman for UK Power Networks said: “UK Power Networks engineers are working to repair a fault on a piece of equipment at a substation in St Ives which caused a power cut on Sunday evening.

“Initially 3,199 customers lost electricity supplies at 8.23pm but 2551 had their power restored within 10 minutes.

“The remaining customers had their electricity supplies restored in stages throughout Sunday night and into the early hours of this morning.”