On Monday, at 12:33pm Spain time, 4:33 am Mountain time, Spain, out of nowhere, suffered a disturbance in their electric grid which ultimately turned into a nation wide blackout affecting also Portugal and parts of France, Andorra, Germany and Italy.
After the first shock, the grid recovered but a second later a second shock disconnected the whole grid. In a few seconds, 15 gigawatts of energy disappeared from Spain’s energy supply, which was 60% of the energy being used at the time. As a result, the whole Spanish grid collapsed.
This collapse also affected Southern France, Andorra, Germany, and Italy but they quickly recovered unlike Spain who took longer. France rerouted energy in order to help their neighboring countries. The fact that so many countries were affected, show how tightly Europe’s power grids are linked.
All of a sudden in the middle of the day the power went off in all of Spain, and this caused a pause of the Madrid Open, transport was stopped along with many flights being canceled or delayed. Businesses and schools closed until the power could come back.
The cause of it is still not known, but Spain has created a commission that is investigating the cause of the blackout. Spain also has their cybersecurity authorities investigating if the cause was a cyberattack. One cause is said to be “atmospheric vibration” that is said to have caused oscillations disrupting the high-voltage lines, but it is not known yet.
Lasting 23 hours, this blackout was one of the most devastating to occur in Europe. The nations around that were affected got their power back after a few hours of the blackout but Spain and Portugal took longer to restore the energy.
Europeans are questioning the cause of the blackout but they are also questioning how this could be prevented from happening again.
