Another meter catches fire in Regina, SaskPower urges public to stay vigilant

Persisting hot, dry weather has caused another SaskPowermeter box to catch fire in Regina, the utility providerconfirms.

A meter caught fire at a home on 3438 Parkland Drive on Sunday around2 p.m.

Tina Munro was at home with her two sons watching a movie when they heard two loud thuds.

"The kind of sound when a bird flies into a window," she recalled, while standing outside her home Sunday afternoon.

"My husband and I went into our sunroom where we expected to find the cat trying to get out of the window at the birds and we saw a small blaze on the side of the house where there is the power box and a bush."

• Dry weather causing ground settling, pulling cables from SaskPowerboxes
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"The bush was on fire and it did eventually smoke itself out and we called emergency services and we evacuated the house," said Munro.

Both fire and SaskPowercrews responded to the scene.

Crews inspecting homes

Leanne Persicke, a spokesperson for SaskPower, confirmed there was a failure with the box, attributable to the electricalcables being pulled down as a result of ground settlingcaused by dry weather.

She said over the past few days, crews have been proactively inspecting homes in older neighbourhoods in the city,such as Normanview, Uplands and Glencairn, to see if cables have been compromised.

Sunday's blaze wasn't in one of those neighbourhoods and the home not been recently inspected. Munro said the meter is in a spot she and her husband don't pay attention to.

Numerous failures

"We have had failures across the city," said Persicke.

SaskPowersaid fire crews have responded to five box failures since last week. But since Friday, the utility provider has received 23 calls from homeowners, mostlytriggered by partialor complete electrical outages.

Persickeencouraged residents to check their power meter boxes to see if it has tilted, which may indicate a cable has shifted.

In that case, residents are asked to contact SaskPower at 1-888-757-6937.