Total blackout hits La Palma as storm knocks out island's power

A general power failure left the Canary Island of La Palma completely without electricity on Monday morning after heavy rain and an electrical storm struck the island, grid operators said. The blackout, which Spanish officials called a "cero energetico", cut all 50,508 electricity supplies on the island at 06:38 local time, utility Endesa and national grid operator Red Electrica said.

The Canary Islands regional government declared an emergency alert and activated its civil protection plan to coordinate the response and assess the risk to essential services, the regional emergencies office said. Canary Islands president Fernando Clavijo said he was closely following the situation and that no injuries had been reported, though flooding had caused problems in several areas.

The outage was linked to the failure of the Guinchos-Valle line, the only 66-kilovolt transmission line serving La Palma, which Red Electrica operates; the line had already suffered a separate fault earlier that night, before the island lost power completely, Red Electrica said. The exact cause of the failure had not been established, though Red Electrica said it may be related to the heavy rain and lightning hitting the island at the time.

Power was restored gradually through the morning as generators were brought online at the Los Guinchos power station and Red Electrica repaired the high-voltage line. Endesa said about 40% of affected customers had power back by mid-morning, with roughly 32,781 supplies still cut at that point, before the company confirmed full restoration across the island by mid-morning, after an outage of almost four hours.

The storm that caused the blackout also triggered Canarias' highest rain alert for La Palma from 02:00 on Monday, with rainfall of up to 62 litres per square metre recorded in a single hour in parts of the island, and flooding reported in the municipalities of Brena Baja and Brena Alta, where water had to be pumped from homes and businesses. Neighbouring island El Hierro also reported power cuts and a landslide on two roads during the same storm.

Spain's minister for territorial policy, Angel Victor Torres, said the national government was in contact with Canary Islands authorities over the storm and the blackout.