The lights were back on over most of South and Central Florida after after a massive power outage left thousands in the dark Tuesday afternoon.
As many as 3 million people were affected at the height of the outage, stretching from Daytona Beach all the way south, to the Florida Keys.
The outage caused some chaos in South Florida Tuesday after traffic lights at some busy intersections went dark for hours.
The state also activated its emergency operations center, but despite what happened, the Department of Homeland Security said the outages had no connection to terrorism.
Power Problems
Florida Power & Light said equipment failure and a fire at a Miami substation led to the massive power outage.
"We lost two generators in south Florida," said FPL spokesman Bob Coleman. "These are very large nuclear units, and when that happens, the entire state of Florida's power begins to sink, and your automatic devices throughout the state will disconnect the major circuits, so we don't have a cascading effect like they had in Cleveland a couple of years ago."
Coleman said for safety reasons, FPL shut down two power generation units at Turkey Point.
In a domino effect, the loss of power at Turkey Point affected eight power plants across the state. Coleman said the failures were not weather related.
FPL issued a statement Tuesday afternoon, saying the failure tripped the electrical system in accordance with its safety procedures. Read the full statement.
The company said it was trying to determine what caused the failure and fire.
FPL said this kind of equipment failure should not have caused the widespread blackouts, and exactly what happened remained a mystery.
"It's difficult, and we don't want to speculate -- there is equipment within the substations -- and at this point in time, I don't want to speculate. As soon as we have this information available, we will bring it to you," said FPL spokeswoman Karen Vissepo.
If you know of any power outages that are still lingering, contact FPL by calling (800) 4-OUTAGE.
Central Florida In The Dark
The power surge was felt across Central Florida, with many areas losing power.
The Orlando Utilities Commission said its generating system automatically began at 1:09 p.m. to shut down 13 circuits at 11 substations across the Orlando metropolitan area, leaving over 11,000 customers, mostly residential, without power for between two and 20 minutes.
About 7,600 customers of Kissimmee Utility Authority lost power for about 20 minutes early Tuesday afternoon.
A KUA spokesman said the system shut itself down to protect the equipment, and then went back online.
Progress Energy said 153,000 of its cusomters also lost power, but all those lights have since been restored.
Some Walt Disney World resort hotels and a few backstage areas lost power for 20 to 30 minutes. None of the theme parks was affected. Universal Orlando and SeaWorld reported no power outtages.
Police in Brevard County had to man several intersections after they were left in the dark.
Florida Institute of Technology closed its campus early Tuesday, and Palm Bay police headquarters had to operate on a backup generator.
Melbourne fire crews were on the scene of the Osler Medical Center in downtown Melbourne, which houses critical care patients. The Fire Department said the facility had no backup generators.
"Out here in the open air, it's comfortable. Can't go home -- power's out there -- so let's sit out somewhere where we're at least out of the rain," said Roger Schenk, a Melbourne resident who lost power.
Air traffic at Melbourne International Airport was not affected by the outage.
Walt Disney World told News 13 that it dropped its power for 20 minutes in accordance with a state plan in place to help with loadbearing. The parks were not affected, but resorts and support areas were without power for approximately 20 minutes. Their power was completely restored by about 1:30 p.m.
Joe Brown, a spokesman for Orlando Regional Medical Center, said the hospital was not affected by the power outages. The hospital is a customer of OUC.
Hospitals throughout Central Florida were able to stay up and running during the outage, though some, including Florida Hospital in Ormond Beach, did lose its regular power, but quickly switched over to a backup generator.
Ormond Beach City Hall also switched to a backup generator. Deltona City Hall was on generator power for 45 minutes.
Callers to 911 said traffic lights were down in Ormond Beach, Port Orange, Daytona Beach and South Daytona as well in Deltona and DeBary during the height of the outage.
Airports Respond
Orlando International Airport never lost power , but it did have some delays because of the outage.
Airport officials told News 13 they initiated a Ground Stop, meaning no flights were permitted to depart from the airport between 1 p.m. and 2 p.m., because of a threat of an outage.
Arrivals continued throughout the outage. It took a few hours for all flights to catch up and get back to normal.
Schools Affected
Several schools in Volusia County were affected. Power has since been restored to the following schools:
- Deltona: Deltona Lakes Elementary
- Deltona: Heritage Middle School
- Deltona: Pine Ridge High School
- Ormond: Tomoka Elementary
- Ormond Beach: Osceola Elementary
- Port Orange: Atlantic High School
Additionally, six schools in Orange County were affected by the outages. Power has since been restored to the following schools:
- Maitland: Dommerich Elementary
- Maitland: Maitland Middle School
- Orlando: Lake Weston Elementary
- Orlando: Riverside Elementary
- Orlando: Wekiva High School
- Zellwood: Zellwood Elementary
Traffic Lights Affected
In Palm Bay, a number of traffic signals were knocked out. They were mostly concentrated in the southeast area along Babcock Street, San Filippo, Foundation Parkway, Eldron and Bayside Lakes.
In Orlando, lights on East Colonial near Alafaya Trail were out for some time.
Several accidents were reported. See a list of reported incidents.
Outages Affect Elections
In Brevard County, precincts No. 197 in Cocoa Beach, and No. 12 in Merritt Island told News 13 they had lost power, and went to battery backup on their machines.
Election officials were ready to switch to paper ballots. Turnout Tuesday was reportedly low, so the elections were not greatly affected.
Gov. Crist Reacts
Gov. Charlie Crist said the Turkey Point Power Plant did exactly what it was supposed to do -- shut down in the situation.
Crist said an investigation would be done by the power companies, as well as the Public Service Commission, but overall, things happened as planned Tuesday.
"Obviously we're a growing state. We continue to grow by about 700 new people every day. So we're going to continue to have to have a lot of power to keep the juice on in Florida," Crist said. "What today proved: Our utilities are up to the task. When they have a fire, they respond quickly, they respond appropriately, and the power is back on in Florida."
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