EDITORIAL IN THE DARK.

ONE power outage now and again is normal. Two in a row and it begins to seem like someone's asleep at the switch. Three outages in less than a month - which is what Los Angeles has experienced with Tuesday's Civic Center blackout - is time to worry.

Maybe it's all coincidence, these blackouts. Tuesday's was attributed to a short-circuit failure at Hill and Third streets. But maybe it is symptomatic of a serious breakdown in how the Department of Water and Power is managed and operates. The public has a right to full accounting of the state of the utility, especially in light of the recent controversy concerning big raises for DWP employees and even bigger rate increases.

Mayor Antonio Villaraigosa and City Council members who called for an investigation into the outages are right to be concerned. And they ought to follow through on that request before Los Angeles is plunged completely into the dark.