BREAKING NEWS: Scattered power outages hit key government buildings in Washington D.C., including: the State Department, White House, U.S. Capitol and Justice Department, news reports say.


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.

Smith added that the incident was likely an accident and there is no indication of arson or a terrorism connection and County fire officials have handed over the scene to PEPCO and SMECO.

"At this time, there is no indication that this outage is the result of any malicious activity," a Department of Homeland Security official told CNN, adding that the department is monitoring the power outage.

The outage struck everything from the White House to the State Department, where government employees and reporters saw lights and power flicker out.

Power at CNN's D.C. bureau twice flickered off and on early in the afternoon.

The power went out during the daily State Department briefing, with Deputy Spokesperson Marie Harf using a phone light to continue taking questions from reporters. Power remained off for the State Department as of 1:15 p.m., though most other affected buildings appeared to have power restored within seconds of it going out.

A spokesman for Pepco, the city's major electric utility, told CNN that the company is aware of the outages and is investigating the source of the problem.

Capitol Hill Police spokeswoman Kim Schneider said power has been restored to all buildings on Capitol grounds.

"As Pepco attempts to resolve the problem, we are prepared for any further power outages and/or surges that may occur," she said.

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favrefan said:"Chris Coghlan isn't gonna pay your rent, Jimmy."

it could be that americas electrical grid is archaic and these things happen all the time

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the world will always the world. your entire existence is defined by your response.

Dont these government buildings all have backup power?

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CSFMB 2014 Nascar Pick 'em Champion

We don’t have a trillion-dollar debt because we haven’t taxed enough; we have a trillion-dollar debt because we spend too much. — Ronald Reagan

That was my first question to myself.

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Elections have consequences.

Guessing the backup systems are from 1957.

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"That's what the internet is for. Slandering others anonymously." Banky
“Been that way since one monkey looked at the sun and told the other monkey ‘He said for you to give me your fuckin’ share.’”

Such as?

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Good people drink good beer - Hunter S. Thompson

<º)))><

Waiting for the time when I can finally say
That this has all been wonderful, but now I'm on my way

yup when we had trickle up economics we had nice things

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the world will always the world. your entire existence is defined by your response.

The security involving the electrical grid has been increased dramatically in the last ten years. Several events including the East Coast rolling blackout and Fukushima have increased awareness of the mass chaos that a long-term loss of power can cause.

I suspect that the really important DC buildings have backup power, like WH security, etc. While it appears to be a routine equipment issue, it could have been something, just not likely something successful.

What I don't quite get is the focus by any group on anyone working in the US government- I can't name more than a few in the last 40 years who have been anything but a detriment to the greatness our country once had. I would think terrorists would encourage more of the same

i didnt see anywhere it said the whitehouse's backup generator system didnt work.... that is something that is buried 1/2 mile underground with enough gas to run 3 years and its maintained meticulously. im sure it worked fine.

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the world will always the world. your entire existence is defined by your response.

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Gas goes bad after a while. Even with fuel stabilizer, you can't keep that gas for that long. I'm sure they pump it out and refill it every couple of years. But to pump 3 years worth of gas has to take a while.

Gennies can run on natural gas.

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"Play until it hurts, then play until it hurts to not play."
http://soundcloud.com/darkside124 HOF 2013, MM Champion 2014

i completely made up the number, but you know those guys have hidden nuclear power backup as well... you can pick any length of time within 100 years and they have a plan for it.

you know how this stuff works darkside. the power grid is like any other infrastructure... it breaks down and we never upgrade it we just patch and patch until its eventually a new piece but its still a cobbled mess that will deteriorate once again. and any time there is a problem its a bitch to reroute services to keep everyone thinking energy on demand is crucial to every moment of life.

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the world will always the world. your entire existence is defined by your response.

Oh yeah, our power grid is a X class solar flare away from putting us back into the 19th century overnight. THis happened in like 2000 or 2001 over a pretty significant portion of eastern canada and I want to say the north east American coast...??? Was only like 20 hours outages but it wasn't that bad a flare, at least, by historical standards.

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"Play until it hurts, then play until it hurts to not play."
http://soundcloud.com/darkside124 HOF 2013, MM Champion 2014

Might be better to spend money on grid solutions than climate change in my opinion.

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Elections have consequences.

Backup generators, either diesel or natural gas, sure. Solar panels on the roof of the WH, Carter put them up. Super deep, super secure emergency line from remote switchyard, probably. Backup nuclear, definitely not. Kinda like the end of Christmas Vacation, when Clark finally gets the lights to go, and they cut to a hand closing a disconnect marked "Emergency Nuclear", total fallacy. Commercial nuclear power is base load, heat it up and cook for 1.5 to 2 years straight. But not on-off-on-off quickly.