SOME 70 homes are without power around the Salterns Road area of Ashley Cross – and the cut is expected to continue until 3pm this afternoon.

A spokesman for Scottish and Southern Electric told the Echo the power cut hit 40 homes just before 5am – and a further 30 were taken off supply at 9.30am to allow engineers to fix the fault with an underground cable. Everyone was expected to have their power back on by 3.30pm.

She added: “We would like to apologise for the inconvenience and thank our customers for their patients while we work to get power restored as quickly and as safely as possible.”