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Washington (CNN)Widespread power outages hit across Washington, D.C. on Tuesday, affecting government and privately-owned buildings and the city's public transit rail system intermittently early in the afternoon.
The power outage, which is affecting about 2,000 customers in the Washington area was caused by a small explosion and fire at a power substation in southern Maryland, according to local and U.S. officials.
Charles County Fire & EMS dispatched firetrucks to the Southern Maryland Electric Cooperative's Ryceville power substation shortly after 12:45 p.m. on Tuesday, when 9-1-1 calls came in reporting the incident, said Bill Smith, the Fire & EMS department's public information officer. The station is partly operated by PEPCO, the electricity utility in Washington, D.C.
Fire officials extinguished the "small fire" that sparked off at a transformer at the power station in about 35 minutes, Smith told CNN. There were no injuries, he added.
"The power has been shut down [at the station]. Any fires that we had are out," he said.
By 2 p.m., most power was back on, SMECO said. It explained the outage on Twitter.
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