What to Know About the Power Outage that Hit Spain, Portugal, and France
The outage caused disruptions to travel and other essential services. The cause remains unknown.
A countrywide power outage impacted Spain—as well as swaths of Portugal and smaller portions of France—Monday afternoon, affecting essential services and wreaking chaos across the Iberian Peninsula.
The cause of the outage is currently being investigated by Spanish and Portuguese officials and ministers. But in the interim, residents are experiencing traffic delays as traffic lights stopped functioning, the shutdown of nearby grocery stores, and other disruptions. [time-brightcove not-tgx=”true”]
Spanish officials have asked residents to steer clear of the roads and only request emergency services in serious cases. Similarly, Portuguese police asked locals to only travel if necessary, warning that street and traffic lights could collapse.
“Something like this has never happened before,” Spanish electricity company Red Eléctrica told El Pais. Eduardo Pietra, director of operations for the electricity grid added that there was “no record of the cause of the incident” and that the company could not “speculate about its origin.”
Red Eléctrica shared that there was a drop in power at about 12:30 p.m. local time. While some power began to be restored by 1:00 p.m. local time across the northern and southern portion of the peninsula, electricity will only return gradually. The company estimates that power will return throughout Spain between 9:00 p.m. to 1:00 a.m.
While hospitals will continue operating thanks to generators, other sectors remain impacted. Transportation has been temporarily paused across airports and train stations. In a post on X, Spanish train company Renfe said that all trains are detained and will have no departures, citing the fact that the national electricity grid was cut. Portuguese airline TAP Air asked its customers to not go to the airport as flights remain suspended.
Neither Renfe nor Red Eléctrica responded to TIME’s request for comment.
The outage also prompted the suspension of the international tennis tournament Madrid Open.
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