A large portion of downtown Toronto experienced a power outage on Tuesday and it took approximately 4.5 hours for power to be fully restored.
When it began just before noon, up to 2,000 customers were impacted, with the number dropping soon after as crews worked to resolve the issue.
Hydro One said in a post on X that they responded to a fire at the Terauley Transmission Station near Bay and Dundas Streets in the downtown core. They later added that it was a small fire and crews onsite were assessing damage to determine the repairs that will be required.
The outage affected traffic lights in the downtown core as well as at least one TTC subway station along with all Toronto Metropolitan University buildings and the Eaton Centre. The Ontario Ombudsman’s office near Bay and Albert streets closed for the day due to the outage.
A number of Toronto hospitals also experienced the power disruption, but the impacts appear to be minimal.
In a statement, the University Health Network (UHN) said that Toronto General Hospital as well as Princess Margaret Cancer Centre lost power temporarily while all other UHN sites were not affected. Back up generators were in place to mitigate the effects of the outage.
SickKids as well as St. Michael’s Hospital also experienced the power disruption.
Around 4:15 p.m., Toronto Hydro posted an update on X saying power was fully restored for all affected customers.
“We sincerely apologize for the disruption this outage caused and thank our customers and the community for their patience and understanding while crews worked to safely restore service,” they said.