Raccoon Causes PATH Service Disruptions, Thousands to Lose Power in Jersey City

A raccoon severely disrupted PATH train service and caused close to 10,000 PSE&G customers to lose power in Jersey City for almost two hours Friday night, officials said.

According to PSE&G, the outage occurred when the raccoon made contact with electrical equipment inside a switching station just after 7:30 p.m. Crews responded to the station and restored power by 9:20 p.m. The animal died.

Service on all but one PATH train line was suspended for a time because of the outage. Service on all lines has since resumed, though delays persisted late into Friday night, the Port Authority said.

One witness described the scene on twitter as frustrated commuters in Jersey City struggled to board crowded buses in the dark.

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