MOST of Ringwood is affected by a power cut this morning, it is understood.

The leisure centre has been evacuated. Swimmers and gym-goers were asked to congregate outside.

Ringwood School has also been affected.

A spokesperson from SSE has apologised for the lost of supply and said engineers are on site.

"The power cut is the result of a main network fault caused by damage to an underground cable, which was done by a third party," the spokesperson said.

"Originally this took 1,491 customers offline.

"Our engineers are on site working to restore power safely and have now got more than a third of customers back online.

"They are working to restore power to the remaining 842 customers and estimate that this will be completed by 12.30pm today."

Bosses at the leisure centre said: "Our centre is currently closed due to a total power failure across the Ringwood area.

"The outage could last up to eight hours."

Some 86 postcodes are affected.

A post on Ringwood School's website reads: "Like half of Ringwood, we are suffering a total power outage."

A spokesperson from SSE said: "We’re sorry for the loss of supply.

"We currently have a fault affecting the areas listed.

"Our engineers are on site working hard to get the power back on as quickly as they can."

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