Fire atop utility pole snarls traffic in downtown Barrington

Fire knocks out power to some homes

Posted 7/12/23

A utility pole caught fire on Wednesday afternoon, July 12, and knocked out power to sections of Barrington.

The pole was located on County Road just west of the intersection with Mathewson …

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Fire atop utility pole snarls traffic in downtown Barrington

Fire knocks out power to some homes

Posted

A utility pole caught fire on Wednesday afternoon, July 12, and knocked out power to sections of Barrington.

The pole was located on County Road just west of the intersection with Mathewson Road. 

Police officers, firefighters, and crews from Rhode Island Energy were on the scene at about 4 p.m. The fire had been extinguished by that time, but portions of the Rumstick and Mathewson neighborhoods were without electricity. That information was confirmed by the sound of generators running as far away as Ferry Lane. 

Police confirmed that the pole fire had also knocked out the traffic light at the intersection of Rumstick Road and County Road. 

A check of the Rhode Island Energy outage map at about 4:50 p.m. did not show any outages in Barrington.

Traffic was slowed throughout the center of Barrington, and motorists funneled into Hampden Meadows to avoid the backups. 

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A lifelong Portsmouth resident, Jim graduated from Portsmouth High School in 1982 and earned a journalism degree from the University of Rhode Island in 1986. He's worked two different stints at East Bay Newspapers, for a total of 18 years with the company so far. When not running all over town bringing you the news from Portsmouth, Jim listens to lots and lots and lots of music, watches obscure silent films from the '20s and usually has three books going at once. He also loves to cook crazy New Orleans dishes for his wife of 25 years, Michelle, and their two sons, Jake and Max.