A NAKED man was seen driving around in a JCB in a Worcestershire village on the same evening a crash left hundreds of people without power.

Shocked neighbours reported to police a man in a "state of undress" had been spotted before the crash.

Hundreds of residents were left without electricity yesterday (Sunday) while staff from Western Power Distribution repaired the shattered box.

People living in the village said the vehicle crashed into the 11,000 volt substation on AB Lench Road at around 9pm.

The electricity supply to 554 homes in the area went off at 12.38pm yesterday (Sunday) to enable repairs.

While 336 customers had their power back within 18 minutes, 218 residents were without electricity for longer - with some waiting until 9.09pm.

All the equipment at the substation had to be replaced and Western Power also say houses in the area were damaged.

A police spokeswoman confirmed that during their enquiries it was mentioned that a naked man was driving a JCB in a state of undress earlier on Saturday evening.

It has not been suggested the damage was caused by the vehicle.

Celia Hall, who lives in Main Street, said: “The police said a naked bloke was in the JCB.

“The box was in a mess, it had taken a corner off. It was bashed and mashed and there were lots of little bits.

“There was a lot of damage and there were lots of Western Power Distribution staff here.”

Ms Hall, 69, said she came down to the Lenches club for a drink at just after 11.30am and heard burglar alarms going off.

Ms Hall thinks the burglar alarms were set off by the electricity company turning off the power to allow staff to repair the box.

“We were all clustered around the substation yesterday lunch time. There was at least six staff fixing it up,” she said.

“The electricity people turned the power off and it was off for eight hours.”

A resident who lives near the substation said: “It was a brand new box that was put up a few months ago.

“It’s the first time this sort of thing has happened here. We didn’t even hear it happen.

“There were lots of people here fixing it up yesterday.”

Upon restoring supplies, WPD tweeted: "All supplies in the #Pershore #WR10 & surrounding areas have now been restored. Apologies to all customers affected."

Earlier, a spokesman for WPD said: "A vehicle has struck one of our substations. Our substation was quite badly damaged.

"We have had to make it safe and isolate it.

"We have currently got engineers on site trying to do remedial repairs to get supplies back on."

A further incident on Sunday happened in Evesham, where 90 homes were affected by an unrelated power cut.

Their power went off at around 8.30pm and was all returned by 9.50pm.