Amsterdam power outage halts trams, forces museum evacuation

AMSTERDAM – A power outage has hit parts of central Amsterdam, halting trams in the streets and forcing the evacuation of the popular Rijksmuseum.

The outage struck Friday morning, according to the website of power network company Liander. The company could not immediately be reached for comment.

Amsterdam police spokesman Nabil Ou-Aissa says the outage may have been caused when an overhead power cable was hit during construction work, but that was not confirmed by Liander.

He says some 28,000 homes are without power and several tram lines through the city have been halted.

The Rijksmuseum, whose vast collection includes Rembrandt van Rijn’s “The Night Watch,” tweeted late morning that it would likely be closed for hours.