Did you notice it? What caused a power flicker across the North Island

The North Island experienced a sudden power flicker last night. Photo / File

If you noticed your power flicker on Wednesday night you're not alone.

Most of the lower and central North Island experienced the random event around 9.25pm.

Thousands reported losing power for a matter of seconds with reports of flickering lights and TVs spontaneously turning off then back on.

The event affected the North Island, with people in Whanganui, Wellington, Upper Hutt, Hawkes Bay, Gisborne and Ruapehu reporting the brief loss of power.

Many social media users speculated on what the cause could be, with wild suggestions from aliens to solar flares.

"Who's the idiot that put the knife in the toaster?" one user commented.

But any fears of extraterrestrial life or celestial fluctuations have been rubbished by Transpower, which said the incident was simply an accidental drop in voltage.

"What occurred last night was due to a drop in voltage. While we understand it was felt across the North Island, to our knowledge it did not result in any loss of electricity to consumers," Transpower general manager of operations Stephen Jay said.

Jay said the cause of the sudden drop was a recently repaired circuit returning to the grid.

"A circuit that had been out for maintenance was being returned to service. One step was incorrectly carried out which meant the circuit tripped and voltage dropped momentarily."

"People will have experienced this as a momentary flicker of lights or distortion of quality, but the issue was resolved automatically and we have no reports to date of any impact beyond what has been described."