Power was cut off for more than nine hours to about 950 PPL Electric customers located in South Tamaqua, West Penn Township and Walker Township starting Monday around 3 p.m. PPL crews worked to replace high voltage power lines and a utility pole that caught fire on Chestnut Circle in South Tamaqua (near the old Leiby's Restaurant on SR309).

Volunteers from the West Penn fire police said the top of the pole was on fire when they arrived. Most of the homes affected ranged from South Tamaqua and other areas in West Penn Township.PPL's power outage website listed customers without power as 944 from Tamaqua and 12 from Walker Township.Some local residents without power said they opted to purchase lanterns and other similar emergency supplies, as they weren't sure of the reason for the power outage or if the power would be back on before morning. Fire police spent more than nine hours managing traffic by connecting their 2,000 watt emergency generator to the traffic lights at the intersections of SR443 and SR309 until power was eventually restored at 12:37 a.m. today.