May 31 (UPI) -- St. Thomas and St. John were hit with blackouts over the weekend, as the U.S. Virgin Islands combats its energy insecurity issues.
The Virgin Islands Water and Power Authority said in a statement that the power issues stem from operational instability at a power plant. It said the outage was caused by a mechanical fault, and personnel were working to bring every customer back online.
The first blackout was reported Saturday followed by one on Sunday.
As of Sunday night, nearly 60% of St. Thomas was without power while St. John appeared to be back online, according to poweroutage.us, which said Virgin IIslands Water and Power Authority ranks second for total power outages and second for percentage of customers affected among all utilities nationwide.
Those without power Sunday night accounted for about 22% of the U.S. Virgin Islands' 54,667 customers, it said.
