PIQUA — A power outage hit the city of Piqua on Tuesday morning.

Miami County 9-1-1 dispatchers began receiving calls around 8:15 a.m. of multiple “blown” transformers in the area of Camp Street and Washington Avenue.

Piqua Fire Department and Piqua Power Distribution were dispatched.

The initial outage affected 6,164 customers, according to Ed Krieger, Piqua Power Systems director.

The cause of the outage was determined to be a squirrel “that somehow managed to work its way around and through the animal proofing that was installed on the pole to prevent such an event,” said Krieger.

The squirrel caused an explosion in the alley near Washington Avenue and Camp Street.

Crews immediately went to work to replace damaged equipment and restore power.

Krieger said service was restored to the first 2,255 customers by 8:30 a.m. and another 1,628 customers by 8:32 a.m. The final 613 customers served by Substation #3 were restored at 8:40 a.m.

Customers served by Substation #1 saw 928 customers restored by 8:58 a.m. and the remaining 740 customers saw service restored at 9:11 a.m.