Emergency officials responded to a fire on the grounds of a Bartow County power plant, a Bartow County sheriff’s official said Thursday afternoon.
The fire call came in at 2:42 p.m., according to spokesman Jonathan Rogers. He said there were no injuries or evacuations.
A transformer caught fire, Georgia Power spokeswoman Ashley West said. There was no fire in the plant itself and the flames were nearly extinguished about 5:20 p.m.
Plant Bowen, which is located in Cartersville, is the nation’s ninth-largest power plant in net generation of electricity.
“We can confirm that there was a transformer fire contained within the switchyard at Plant Bowen today — there is no fire inside the plant structure itself,” West said.
The term "switchyard" refers to an enclosed area, similar to a substation, in which the energy is moved from the plant itself to the power lines, according to Georgia Power.
Deputy Chief of Operations Dwayne Jamison said six Bartow County Fire stations responded along with Bartow County EMS, Cartersville and Paulding County fire departments.
The fire reached the roof of the building, causing moderate damage to the building and extensive damage to the transformer yard, Jamison said.
Two Bartow County firefighters were taken to Cartersville Medical Center with minor injuries, Jamison said.
Plant Bowen opened in 1975 and employs about 400 people, according to Georgia Power. It is bordered on two sides by the Etowah River and Euharlee Creek.
Federal officials discovered 17 safety violations in the plant in 2013 after an explosion that hurt three workers, The Atlanta Journal-Constitution previously reported.
West added that the “power delivery system functioned as designed and there were no customer power outages as a result of this incident.”
An investigation into the cause of the fire is ongoing, but West said initial information points to equipment failure related to the transformer.
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