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Curiosity killed the power: Cat in substation blamed for city outage NICE KITT Y
By CINDY KLEPPER, City Editor
If your microwave quit with the bag of popcorn half-inflated Sunday evening, it didn't matter anyway -- the cable was out, too.
And you can blame the cat.
The feline, of the dark tiger variety, wandered into the Cinergy substation north of town, darkening many city homes and most city TV sets. And then -- after an unhealthy jolt of electricity had coursed through its body -- the cat wandered away.
"It must have had one more life," said Animal Control Officer Sheryl Arnold.
The cat's curiosity apparently led it into the substation near Johnson Junction on Guilford Street around 7 o'clock Sunday evening. At 7:05, the north end of the city was plunged into darkness.
"He touched two of the wrong wires at the same time, I'm guessing," said Arnold.
The cat's adventure left 2,516 Cinergy customers in Huntington without power. One of those customers was Comcast Cable, and when Comcast's power was interrupted, television screens all over Huntington went dark.
The power went out at 7:05 p.m. and was restored at 8:36 p.m., said Rob Norris of Cinergy's corporate office in Plainfield.
Arnold was called to the substation when a scorched cat was spotted at the scene.
"I came very close to catching the little stinker," Arnold said. "But everything was black up there, even the cat. It took off running lickety-split."
The cat ran into a field behind the substation.
"He seemed to be OK, but it seemed to have a bald butt," she said. "We could smell cooking fur."
Arnold planned to return today to look again for the cat, and she's asking area residents to be on the lookout for a medium-sized dark feline with a hairless rear end. If anyone does spot the animal, she asks that they call the Huntington County Humane Shelter at 356-0355 during its business hours, noon to 6 p.m. Outside of shelter business hours, they should call city police at 356-7110 so Arnold can be paged.
Norris was surprised to learn that the cat survived. He said the cat had wandered into a 12-kilovolt temporary regulator, one of the devices used to reduce the voltage of the electricity being brought into town.
While the substation is fenced in, the equipment inside the fence is not enclosed.
"That's why we tell people to stay out," he said. "You don't want to touch two of some things at the same time."
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