Hundreds of customers, most of them businesses in the old market, were still without power Tuesday at midday. It's all due to an early morning fire that damaged OPPD's underground cable vaults.

The fire broke out in an underground electrical vault shortly after midnight and quickly spread between the four circuits in that vault.

The affected area stretches from the river to 14th Street and from Dodge to Jones.

The fire was so intense crews could not even get into the vault to assess the damage until several hours after it burned itself out.

Now many of the people and businesses in the Old Market are without power.

Michael Pivonka knows he won't be opening his Old Market Candy Shop for business today but he still has to check on the chocolates.

Michael Pivonka says, "I just don't even want to think about how much you could lose out of your cases here since we make our own chocolate here we could whip up more stuff but you'd still hate losing all the stuff you've got on your shelves now just sitting there getting warm."

Pivonka hopes his coolers stay cool enough to keep his inventory in bite size pieces.

They are concerned over at The Stadium Club as well. This is the time of the day they would normally be setting up for the lunch crowd but with no power there is no use.

Bryan Gudmundson says, "Warm food, no power, no electricity, no air conditioning, no micro systems, nothing, so no business today."

Most people turned their Old Market lunch date into a window shopping excursion then went to eat somewhere else.

O.P.P.D. crews are working to restore the power as quickly as possible but the very nature of the fire; that it was underground, that it burned very hot and charred the entire vault, crews basically have to start from scratch.

O.P.P.D. says after the initial assessment the repairs may not be complete until into tonight.

Michael Pivonka says, "It's kind of scary because you see the whole Old Market down here everybody is shut down all the restaurants and everything else and all the refrigeration and freezers and stuff like that so it's kind of scary."

For now Pivonka will lock up his store and hope the power returns before his candy melts.