A BLACKOUT caused chaos across Bromsgrove on the busiest shopping day of the week.

The town centre and surrounding areas were plunged into darkness last Saturday afternoon after a power failure forced many High Street stores to close. The power cut also left some homes without electricity until the following morning.

An underground cable fault at a sub-station in Upton Warren is believed to have caused the first loss of power at around 3pm. This saw a blackout of around 3,500 homes for nearly two hours.

A small fire at the School Drive sub-station in Bromsgrove followed soon afterwards, leaving more than 1,000 customers in darkness until 8.20pm. A further 53 homes were without power until 11.47am the following morning.

Thresher's off-license, in the High Street, was one of the businesses affected.

A spokesperson said: "Our electricity went off, came back on again for half an hour, and then went again completely just after 4pm.

"We sent our staff home at 6.30pm and we lost quite a lot of trade."

A spokesperson for electricity suppliers Central Networks said: "Around 3,500 customers were without power from 3pm, with half being back on within half an hour, and they were all back on by 4.50pm.

"There was also a very minor fire at the School Drive station, and half of the 2,200 people affected had their power returned within three minutes.

"We would like to apologise to our customers for the inconvenience."