Explosion at Reno Facility

A transformer explosion this week caused the evacuation of 200 South Virginia (The Wells Fargo Building) in Reno, a carrier hotel that houses numerous telecom and Internet companies. A transformer exploded about 4 p.m. Tuesday, sending flames shooting up the side of the eight-story building. Oil used from the transformer caught fire and ran down the street. A passerby was slightly burned in the explosion. "I was walking along looking at the big building when suddenly there was an eruption from behind the brick area," Chris Christiansen told the AP. "It was a big explosion, and a fireball shot across at me burning me on my face and neck and my ears are rumbling from the noise. The fire came down the curb and glass started shattering. Papers were flying out of the broken windows. The trees were on fire and were burning pretty good."

The building lost grid power for about 10 hours, but several larger telecom tenants, including Advanced Telecom Group and MCI/WorldCom, continued to operate as their generators took over, according to posts on the mailing list for the the North American Network Operators Group (NANOG). There were reports that some smaller telecom tenants were knocked offline during the incident. The building regained power at about 1:30 am Wednesday after the transformer was replaced.