Power supply is gradually being restored across Spain and Portugal following a widespread outage that disrupted transportation networks, impacted hospitals, and led to the closure of essential services on Monday.
Spanish authorities have declared a state of emergency, while both countries are working to fully assess the causes of the disruption. Initial reports suggest the blackout may have been triggered by extreme atmospheric conditions causing “induced atmospheric vibration” on high-voltage transmission lines, leading to synchronisation failures in the European grid. However, the Spanish government has cautioned against speculation and said a full investigation is ongoing.
“There were anomalous oscillations in the very high voltage lines (400kV),” some reports stated, pointing to cascading disturbances across the interconnected European electricity system. Officials in Madrid have ruled out a cyberattack as the cause.
The outage led to significant disruptions. In Spain, some hospitals cancelled non-urgent services, mobile and internet networks experienced outages, and schools are expected to remain closed on Tuesday. Madrid’s mayor urged residents to avoid unnecessary travel and to limit non-critical calls to emergency services.
In Portugal, traffic lights failed, and metro systems in Lisbon and Porto were temporarily shut down. Flight and rail services in both countries were also affected, with outages spilling over into Andorra and parts of southern France.
Spanish transmission system operator RedElectrica said efforts to restore electricity were progressing steadily. “Electricity is now available in parts of Catalonia, Aragon, the Basque Country, Galicia, La Rioja, Asturias, Navarre, Castile and León, Extremadura, and Andalusia,” the company said in a statement. “We continue to work in coordination with companies in the sector to gradually restore service throughout the peninsula.”
RedElectrica warned that full restoration could take up to 10 hours. In Portugal, grid operator REN confirmed it was activating phased restoration plans and coordinating closely with national emergency authorities. “The possible causes of this incident are being evaluated,” REN said.
Officials have not provided a timeline for when the investigation into the outage will be completed.
