Black Friday Power Outage in McMinnville

Crash puts shopping on hold for dozens of McMinnville stores.

Photo: Kelsey Johnson, YamCo Facebook page

(McMINNVILLE, Ore.) - “Black Friday” was darker than expected for shops and shoppers in McMinnville today.

The power went out after a vehicle apparently crashed into a power transformer. The non-injury accident cut off the traffic lights working between 19th Street and Winco on 99W.

Officials reminded people to treat intersections as 4-way stops, as it took over an hour to restore power, but there was at least one accident at an intersection.

According to reports from customers, no one was allowed in Walmart until power was back on. Big 5 and Staples continued to let customers shop, but JC Penny and Izzy’s Pizza put everything on hold until the lights came back on.

Power was restored before 2 pm today, and the biggest shopping day of the year was back underway in McMinnville, Oregon.