Transformer blasted in Vavuniya

[TamilNet, Monday, 13 September 1999, 11:29 GMT]
An electricity transformer by a Sri Lankan Police checkpoint blew up in the heart of Vavuniya town this afternoon around 3 p.m. There is another Police post opposite the transformer at the Sri Lanka Telecom office building. A time device fixed inside the transformer may have set off the explosionsources said.

Another transformer in Pandaarikulam, a suburb of Vavuniya town, was fired upon by unidentified gunmen around 1 a.m. in the early hours of the morning. The oil leak in the transformer caused by the gunfire made it explode later.

The two transformers, according the Ceylon Electricity Board engineers, cost more than 1.4 million rupees.