Calendar An icon of a desk calendar. Cancel An icon of a circle with a diagonal line across. Caret An icon of a block arrow pointing to the right. Email An icon of a paper envelope. Facebook An icon of the Facebook "f" mark. Google An icon of the Google "G" mark. Linked In An icon of the Linked In "in" mark. Logout An icon representing logout. Profile An icon that resembles human head and shoulders. Telephone An icon of a traditional telephone receiver. Tick An icon of a tick mark. Is Public An icon of a human eye and eyelashes. Is Not Public An icon of a human eye and eyelashes with a diagonal line through it. Pause Icon A two-lined pause icon for stopping interactions. Quote Mark A opening quote mark. Quote Mark A closing quote mark. Arrow An icon of an arrow. Folder An icon of a paper folder. Breaking An icon of an exclamation mark on a circular background. Camera An icon of a digital camera. Caret An icon of a caret arrow. Clock An icon of a clock face. Close An icon of the an X shape. Close Icon An icon used to represent where to interact to collapse or dismiss a component Comment An icon of a speech bubble. Comments An icon of a speech bubble, denoting user comments. Comments An icon of a speech bubble, denoting user comments. Ellipsis An icon of 3 horizontal dots. Envelope An icon of a paper envelope. Facebook An icon of a facebook f logo. Camera An icon of a digital camera. Home An icon of a house. Instagram An icon of the Instagram logo. LinkedIn An icon of the LinkedIn logo. Magnifying Glass An icon of a magnifying glass. Search Icon A magnifying glass icon that is used to represent the function of searching. Menu An icon of 3 horizontal lines. Hamburger Menu Icon An icon used to represent a collapsed menu. Next An icon of an arrow pointing to the right. Notice An explanation mark centred inside a circle. Previous An icon of an arrow pointing to the left. Rating An icon of a star. Tag An icon of a tag. Twitter An icon of the Twitter logo. Video Camera An icon of a video camera shape. Speech Bubble Icon A icon displaying a speech bubble WhatsApp An icon of the WhatsApp logo. Information An icon of an information logo. Plus A mathematical 'plus' symbol. Duration An icon indicating Time. Success Tick An icon of a green tick. Success Tick Timeout An icon of a greyed out success tick. Loading Spinner An icon of a loading spinner. Facebook Messenger An icon of the facebook messenger app logo. Facebook An icon of a facebook f logo. Facebook Messenger An icon of the Twitter app logo. LinkedIn An icon of the LinkedIn logo. WhatsApp Messenger An icon of the Whatsapp messenger app logo. Email An icon of an mail envelope. Copy link A decentered black square over a white square.

Power cut hits thousands of homes and businesses across north-east

Hundreds of homes left without power following a serious of faults on the grid.
Hundreds of homes left without power following a serious of faults on the grid.

Thousands of homes and businesses across the north-east were hit by a major power cut yesterday afternoon.

More than 3,600 people in Peterculter, Milltimber and Drumoak were without electricity from around 2pm, while SSE engineers battled to restore power to the area.

Last night, a garden centre manager said he was forced to turn away hundreds of customers after the power outage, which occurred during one of their busiest periods.

Craig Forbes, manager of the Mains of Drum Garden Centre in Drumoak, said: “All the power went out at about 2.10pm and we had to stop trading and get everybody out – it lasted for about 45 minutes.

“We lost a lot of business and our customers were very frustrated – it was the worst time it could have happened, between 2pm-4pm is our busiest time.

“There was a bit of panic when we thought it might be out for the full day.”

Business at the neighbouring Drum Castle, a popular tourist destination, was also affected as staff were forced to close the building due to health and safety concerns.

Kris Bruce, senior assistant for functions and events, added: “We had our wedding open day taking place today, and we did have a period where we thought we wouldn’t be able to invite anybody in.

“But thankfully, we were able to take them to the outside areas, and show them around.

“From a general visitor point of view, we have managed to let most people in.

“It was about half an hour with the power out, so it wasn’t too bad, it’s just one of these things – we still had a good turn-out.

“There was maybe 60-80 people in the castle when it happened and we had to ask them to leave and restrict access to the building temporarily.

“But the positive was it meant some of our suppliers who have stalls outside got to take advantage of the situation, with more potential customers.”

SSE engineers managed to restore power to the affected areas by 3.45pm.

Last night, a spokesman confirmed the company was still working to establish what had caused the power cut in the first place.