Naughty possum blamed for Sydney power outages

A power outage affecting three suburbs in Sydney’s north overnight was triggered by a lone possum, energy provider Ausgrid has revealed.

The electricity network’s Twitter account attributed last night’s power cut – affecting an estimated 8000 people in Belrose, Davidson and French’s Forest after 11pm – to a marsupial crawling on a powerline.

“When wildlife such as possums touch two wires it creates an arc of electricity between them,” the tweet explained.

“The powerline involved tonight was a high voltage cable. Protection systems kicked in automatically to limit damage to the network.

“Our crews restored power within an hour.”

Twitter user @andymcblane inquired about the unlucky creature’s fate.

“Is the possum okay?” he tweeted.

“Unfortunately the possum did not survive,” Ausgrid confirmed.

“Did the crew at least say a few words?” quipped Twitter user @xyozzman.