(La Porte, IN) - Power has been restored following a large outage in La Porte and the surrounding area yesterday afternoon that, at one point, left more than 5,000 NIPSCO customers without electricity in the utility company's La Porte service area. 

Traffic signals without power resulted in the U.S. 35 overpass resembling a parking lot due to the stop-and-go traffic at Lincolnway and Indiana Avenue, which took drivers on the overpass about 10 minutes to get through the intersection.  

A blown transformer is believed to be the cause of the outage. Several people reported hearing an explosion at about 4:30 p.m. in the area of NIPSCO’s substation close to the county complex building in downtown La Porte.