A roughly 5.5-foot snake bridged two energized pieces of equipment inside the Cedar Lake Primary substation in Decatur, Alabama, triggering an outage that affected more than one-third of Decatur Utilities customers, officials said. Decatur Utilities posted a photo of the snake and said it was "just long enough" to contact both energized components; the utility did not identify the species. Because Decatur's grid uses a radial design, crews rerouted electricity through alternate feeds to distribution substations and restored power to customers while repairs continued at Cedar Lake Primary. Separately, severe thunderstorms moved through Northeast Ohio Friday, leaving thousands of customers without power across multiple counties, local officials reported. Utilities in affected areas were performing restoration work as crews responded to storm-related damage and outages.
