Possum blamed for power outage near Hastings

Power was cut to about 875 homes south of Hastings for a brief period on Wednesday morning - a possum the likely suspect. Photo / File

A_HBT16242811.JPG Power was restored to the homes within about a half an hour. Photo / File

By Gianina Schwanecke

A possum has been blamed for an early morning power cut which affected close to 900 households south of Hastings.

About 875 homes between Havelock North and Te Hauke were without power for up to half an hour about 4am on Wednesday.

A Unison spokesman said they suspected a possum or rodent may have made its way on to the lines and caused the outage.

"That's impacted on the live assets and caused a trip on the network."

He said such incidents were "very rare" as they used possum guards around the poles to prevent them climbing up.

It is believed the possum might have jumped from a tree branch, he said.

"Possum guards do the trick. They are very, very effective."

Power was restored to most of the affected homes within about 15 minutes, he said.