Report: The large American flag at WWE headquarters knocked out power for thousands of people

A large American flag was torn from the roof of WWE’s headquarters in Stamford, CT during Saturday night’s storm and became entangled in high-voltage power lines near the Stamford Train Station, leading to widespread power outages across Stamford and Greenwich.

Stamford Deputy Fire Chief Matt Palmer said firefighters responded to the scene, but “there’s very little we could do other than monitor it and notify utility companies.” While the flag caused some electrical arcing, there was no fire. The flag was removed early Sunday morning and was reportedly severely damaged.

According to Eversource spokesperson Kaitlyn Woods, about 5,000 Stamford customers initially lost power when the flag made contact with the lines, though power was restored to roughly 3,000 customers within 20 minutes. Later Sunday, while crews worked to remove the flag and repair the affected transmission structure, the flag shifted and caused another major outage affecting Greenwich.

Woods explained, “There are two separate transmission circuits on the structure. While our crews were working to remove the flag, it shifted and made contact with the energized line that was keeping power flowing to our customers. The outage impacted more than 20,000 of our customers in Greenwich. Our crews just safely restored one of the lines in the past few minutes, and we’ll start getting the power back on soon for our customers impacted.”

She added, “Our crews were coordinating to remove the flag when it shifted on its own and made contact with the line that caused the outage. Approximately 40,000 of our customers were impacted this afternoon, and we isolated the outage, and restored power as quickly and safely as possible.”

The outages also forced multiple road closures throughout Stamford. Power was largely restored by Sunday evening and mostly resolved by early Monday morning.