April 28, 2025 — Large areas across Spain and Portugal have been hit by a widespread power outage, leaving cities in chaos as traffic lights and public transport systems came to a standstill. Reports indicate that parts of neighbouring Andorra and France were also affected.
The sudden loss of electricity caused major disruptions on the streets of Madrid, where video footage showed cars jostling at intersections without traffic signals.
Spanish news agency EFE reported that the metro systems in both Barcelona and Valencia were forced to shut down entirely due to the blackout.
Spain’s national power grid operator, Red Eléctrica, announced that it is working closely with energy companies to restore electricity, though many areas remained without power.
“The causes are being analyzed and all resources are being dedicated to solving it. We will continue to report,” the company said in a statement.
Spanish national newspaper El Mundo described the blackout as affecting “all of Spain,” while also noting that parts of France experienced similar disruptions.
In Portugal, residents reported similar scenes of chaos. Lottie Feist, a 23-year-old translation student at Nova University in Lisbon, described the situation as “terrifying.”
She said: “There is no electricity, nothing is working. We don’t know what’s happening or why we are having a blackout. The roads are absolute carnage as no traffic lights are working. Businesses are being impacted, and people are stuck in elevators.”
Despite phoneline outages, many residents were still able to use their mobile devices, leading to a flood of messages on social media platform X, as users sought information about the situation.
darkness.
Spanish media, including Cadena Ser Radio, reported that parts of Madrid’s underground network were being evacuated, and heavy traffic jams were forming in the city center.
E-Redes, a Spanish electricity grid monitoring company, confirmed it was working to reestablish connections gradually, aiming to restore services across the affected areas as quickly as possible.
The exact cause of the outage remains under investigation as authorities work to bring systems back online.
