Sandys Parish to St. George's and leaving Belco -- at Press time -- still in the dark over the cause.

Electricity suddenly went out at around 8.30 p.m. with the western area from Warwick and the eastern area from Smith's Parish being particularly badly hit.

The central parishes were first to regain some service but recovery was sporadic.

A Belco spokeswoman said: "It's a major fault -- it's affected much of the Island from east to west.'' However she was unable at Press time to explain what the problem was or to give details on the location or full extent of the power outages.

At around 9.30 p.m. a Harbour Radio spokesman said: "It looks as though it is Island-wide.

"From up here the only lights are at the airport, which has its own generator and on the cruise ships.'' At around 11.30 p.m. Police were reporting a very gradual restoration of the service with parts of Sandys and Warwick coming back on line.

But the East End and many other areas were still in darkness.

One angry Belco customer told The Royal Gazette : "It's deplorable that with all the millions of dollars they make they can't provide a proper system.

"These people should get their act together -- they can't give us a decent service.

"I live in Hamilton parish and I am looking out at Harrington Sound and the only lights I can see are car lights and unless you have a portable radio you don't know what's going on.

"We are all in the dark literally.'' The caller said the Bermuda public should protest about the lousy service by withholding payment of electricity bills.

He said: "They couldn't take everybody to court.

"It's so annoying.

"My daughter is doing a project on the Internet but she can't carry on and my mother is baking cakes for a wedding but she's had to stop.

"These things happen so frequently -- it's at least four times a year, but once is too much.'' And a caller from Southampton questioned why the emergency radio was not broadcasting.

She said: "It is absolutely black here and my mother is in Paget and she says it looks like the whole of Hamilton is out.

"So why is there no information on the radio -- people have no idea what's happening? "Surely that's when the emergency radio has to kick in but it sure as hell hasn't.'' A spokesman for the Fire Service said the outage had hit the dispatching and radio system.

He said: "It's been out for 45 minutes.'' H.Q. had kept in touch by pagers and cell phones.

Gibbs Hill Lighthouse also suffered a failure when the generator tripped out.

It came back on half an hour later after an electrician was called in.

One Ferry Reach householder also slammed Belco for poor service. He said street lights were constantly out in his neighbourhood: "There's no control over it, it seems.

"They should make Belco liable if there's an accident.''