Massive power blackout brings chaos to Spain and Portugal

Power went out across Spain and Portugal on Monday, halting train traffic, clogging roads and trapping people in lifts before electricity started to return to some areas after hours of disruption.

As Spain’s government scrambled to find the cause of the outage, which hit at 12.30pm local time, ordinary people were left in the dark – often literally – as to what was happening.

“People were stunned, because this had never happened in Spain,” Carlos Candori, a 19-year-old construction worker who had to exit the paralysed metro system in Madrid, said.

“There’s no [phone] coverage, I can’t call my family, my parents, nothing: I can’t even go to work,” he said.

Spain’s Interior Ministry declared a state of emergency and said the emergency status will be applied in the regions that request it.

So far, Madrid, Andalusia and Extremadura have asked for the central government to take over public order and other functions.