Spain, Portugal hit by major power outage expected to last hours
CBC
Spanish power distributor Red Eléctrica said that restoring power to large parts of the country after a massive and unprecedented outage Monday that also hit Portugal could take six to 10 hours.
The company declined to speculate on the causes of the blackout. The Portuguese National Cybersecurity Center issued a statement saying there was no sign the outage was due to a cyberattack.
Eduardo Prieto, head of operations at Red Electrica, told journalists it was unprecedented, calling the event "exceptional and extraordinary."
The outage hit across Spain and Portugal, including their capitals, knocking out subway networks, phone lines, traffic lights and ATM machines.
Play at the Madrid Open tennis tournament was suspended. The ATP men's tour said that two singles matches and one doubles match were in progress when power went out.
Authorities said the cause was not immediately known.
The Portuguese cabinet convened an emergency meeting at the prime minister's residence, and Spanish Prime Minister Pedro Sanchez visited power distributor Red Electrica to follow efforts at restoring grid operations.
The countries have a combined population of over 50 million people. It was not immediately clear how many were affected.
It is rare to have such a widespread outage across the Iberian Peninsula. Red Electrica said the incident was being assessed.
A couple of hours later, Spain's electricity network operator said it was recovering power in the north and south of the peninsula, which would help to progressively restore the electricity supply nationwide.
Portuguese distributor E-Redes said the outage was due to "a problem with the European electricity system," according to Portuguese newspaper Expresso. The company said it was compelled to cut power in specific areas to stabilize the network, according to Expresso.
Spain's public broadcaster RTVE said a major power outage hit several regions of the country just after midday local time, leaving its newsroom, Spain's parliament in Madrid and subway stations across the country in the dark.
A graph on Spain's electricity network website showing demand across the country indicated a steep drop around 12:15 p.m. local time from 27,500 megawatts to near 15,000 megawatts.
Video aired on Spanish television showed people evacuating metro stations in Madrid and empty stations with trains stopped in Barcelona.
