Follow-up on South Bend power outage

A utility official says an unlikely set of factors led to an underground fire and a downtown South Bend power outage in May. Indiana Michigan Power CEO Paul Chodak III says a company investigation found a low-voltage cable overheated at one of the spots where most of the downtown grid’s largest cables feed into a transformer. Chodak says the utility has never seen a similar problem with its system. The May 15 failure left many businesses and residents without electricity for more than three days. The outage forced many businesses to close during the busy University of Notre Dame commencement weekend. Some resorted to gas-powered generators to stay open. Downtown South Bend Inc. estimated the outage had an economic impact of at least $3 million.  (AP)