Car wreck triggered power outage at refineries

HOUSTON, April 24 (Reuters) - A car accident triggered a power outage that shut two refineries on Puget Sound in Washington state, electric utility Puget Sound Energy said on Friday.

A car struck a power pole Thursday night along Washington State Highway 20 as maintenance was being done at another location on a transformer bank that would have re-routed electrical supply to the refineries and about 100,000 other customers, said Puget Sound Energy spokeswoman Dorothy Bracken.

"Because of very unusual circumstances, we lost power," Bracken said.

Electricity was restored within about two hours to most customers.

On Friday, Shell Oil Co (RDSa.L) said it was restarting its 145,000 barrel per day (bpd) Anacortes, Washington, refinery.

Tesoro Corp (TSO.N) said power was restored at its 120,000 bpd Anacortes refinery where workers were checking for damage before beginning the restart process. (Reporting by Erwin Seba; Editing by David Gregorio)