A large-scale blackout has occurred in Europe — subways, airports, and the Internet are down

On Monday, a large-scale blackout occurred in several European countries. First, a massive power outage occurred in large regions of Spain. Later, the problem spread to Portugal and France, causing disruptions to businesses and transportation infrastructure.

Lisbon, Madrid, Seville, Barcelona, and Valencia were reportedly affected. The outage began at approximately 12:30 CET (13:30 Kyiv time).

BREAKING: Massive — really, massive — electricity outage hits Spain, which large part of the country suffering blackouts (including Madrid and Barcelona).

Data from Spain's national grid shows a lost of >10 GW of demand, from ~26GW to ~12GW in a few seconds. Reason unknonw. pic.twitter.com/KwvDxOOLQJ

— Javier Blas (@JavierBlas) April 28, 2025

Subway trains stopped running due to the power outage. The Madrid metro has been evacuated, and traffic lights in the city are not working. The outage also affected airports in Spain and Portugal. Backup generators are currently operating at the affected airports. Madrid’s emergency services also continue to operate on backup power.

The Portuguese police report that traffic lights are not working across the country. Lisbon and Porto subways have also stopped working, and trains are not running.

Spain’s General Directorate of Traffic urges drivers to refrain from traveling due to the outage, as traffic lights and electronic road signs are not working.

Spain’s national power grid operator Red Eléctrica said it is working with energy companies to restore electricity supply in the affected regions.

The cause of the accident is currently unknown. The material will be updated as new details become available.

Earlier in Ukraine blackouts were observed because of the Russian occupiers’ attacks on Ukrainian energy facilities.

Source: The Verge