Morristown firefighters and police responded to reports of a blown manhole shortly after 6 pm on Thursday at the busy intersection of Washington and Bank streets.
No injuries were reported in this explosion, which differed from others downtown because there was no smoke and no heat, said Acting Fire Chief Robert Flanagan.
“Usually there is smoke and fire. Probably there was some sort of pressure buildup,” said the Fire Chief, who estimated the incident happened around 6:15 pm.
Motorists were being detoured around the stretch of Washington Street between Court and Bank streets. Jersey Central Power & Light crews were on the way, Chief Flanagan said. Between 50 and 500 customers were out of power, according to a JCP&L outage map.
A manhole cover appeared to be slightly dislodged on the sidewalk on Washington Street, near the corner of Bank Street, around 6:30 pm.
JCP&L recently announced it had completed a number of upgrades to Morristown’s underground network, in response to a series of incidents stretching back years. The utility was directed to take action by the state Board of Public Utilities. Almost exactly one year ago, a Morris Township woman sustained burns to her arm when a manhole exploded near her car at the intersection of James and South streets.
A powerful explosion that seriously damaged the Morristown & Township Library in May 2010 remains unsolved. JCP&L and Public Service Electric & Gas have said they were not responsible for that blast.
Chief Flanagan said there was a transformer fire on American Road in Morris Plains sometime before Thursday’s manhole incident. He did not know if there was any correlation between those occurrences.
The same block in Morristown experienced a smoky manhole incident two or three years ago, before Christmas.
