Power outage cripples downtown Columbia after areas go dark for over 3 hours

COLUMBIA, S.C. (WIS) - Parts of downtown Columbia, including the WIS News 10 studio, lost power for more than three hours last night.

Dominion Energy reported more than 1,000 customers were impacted by an equipment failure, according to a spokesperson for the energy company.

Areas near the statehouse along Gervais and Assembly streets suffered through the outage. Street lights were also out during this time.

Dominion Energy restored all the power around 8:30 p.m.

Into the night, downtown looked more like a ghost town.

The Columbia Police Department had officers downtown to help drivers make their way through city streets safely.

Wednesday nights are typically very busy for restaurants in and around the Vista area.

Area businesses that are usually busy serving people had to shut down because they did not have power.

WIS News 10 caught up with a man just looking to grab a bite to eat.

“I went to an Italian restaurant across the street,” Chris Carr said. “Being from out of town, I’m from Atlanta, I wasn’t sure what was going on. I was really looking forward to the Chia Peni. It was closed, dark tables up. It looks like most of this area is dead tonight.”

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