Electrical Fire Forces NBC 5 Off the Air

Employees at NBC 5's Fort Worth studio were forced to evacuate Thursday night because of an electrical fire.

A fire in the electrical room interrupted the newscast at about 10:08 p.m. An electrical panel that was part of the station's power backup system caught fire.

Everyone was evacuated safely, and no injuries were reported.

"The producer came in here screaming, 'Get out. Get out of the building,'" anchor Jane McGarry said. "We didn't know if things were blowing up. It was the weirdest feeling to have everything blow at once."

The fire was out by about 11:30 p.m., and workers began the process of restoring power to the building. By 2 a.m., most systems had returned to normal operation. But the station's computer systems weren't fully back to normal until after lunchtime Friday.

The station had been evacuated earlier in the night when a fire alarm went off at about 9:30 p.m.

The cause of the fire was not immediately known.

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