Officials were working to restore power to about 3,500 homes in North Long Beach after the power went out in the area of 55th Street and Atlantic Avenue around 7 a.m. Saturday.

They were able to restore power to all but 363 homes in the area by about 10 a.m., Southern California Edison spokeswoman Susan Cox said. Those homes will likely be without power until the afternoon because crews have to keep the power off while they make repairs to the damaged power line.

The exact cause of the outage is still under investigation, but it appears “some kind of animal” was on top of a power line, she said.

The homes affected are between Atlantic Avenue and Long Beach Boulevard and South Street and Plenty Street, according to Cox.

Fire Station 11 is in the affected area and is was on generator power, a spokesman for the Long Beach Fire Department said. 

Public works is in the process of getting several blacked-out traffic lights restored, police officer Ben Hearst said.

“Anyone driving is reminded to use caution when approaching an intersection without power and come to a complete stop to ensure the intersection is clear before proceeding through,” Hearst said.

Editor’s note: This story has been updated to reflect that power has been restored to most of the homes initially affected.