3 fuses blew on utility pole in Ottawa leading to outage

Three fuses blew at the top of a utility pole Tuesday morning on the 600 block of Columbus Street in Ottawa, leading to an outage that shut down the downtown La Salle County Courthouse, Ottawa High School and other downtown businesses for the day.

Ottawa firefighters responded to a report of an explosion in a manhole. Smoke was coming from the manhole in the parking lot on the east side of the 600 block of Columbus Street as well as the power pole. No crews were working at the scene at the time of the incident, firefighters said.

Firefighters inspected two businesses, Edward Jones and Thai Cafe, next to the power the pole and no problems were found. Ameren was called to the scene for repairs and the parking lot was closed.

Ottawa firefighters also were called to assist Ameren after a hydraulic line had blown and leaked fluid on the parking lot. The fluid had not gone into any storm sewers and bags of oil dry were used to clean up the spill.

Power was restored to downtown areas Tuesday evening, Ameren said.