At least 1.4 million customers in Puerto Rico lost power as the entire U.S. territory was hit by an island-wide blackout.
The outage occurred at 12:38 p.m. on Wednesday, according to Luma Energy, the company responsible for power distribution and transmission across Puerto Rico, noting that it’s working to restore electrical systems.
The massive outage led to disarray across the island. Hundreds of thousands of people were without water, train passengers were forced to walk along the rails after power was lost, and unlit traffic lights triggered major gridlock. The blackout occurred days before the largely Catholic island celebrates Easter.
And it may be days before the lights come back on.
“This is unacceptable,” complained Josué Colón, the island’s “energy czar” and former executive director of Puerto Rico’s Electric Power Authority, the Associated Press reported.
Luma Energy is prioritizing restoring power to “critical facilities,” like Centro Médico hospital, while 90 percent of customers’ electricity will hopefully be restored within 48 to 72 hours, the company estimated in an 8 p.m. update posted to X.
By 11 p.m. Wednesday, about 100,000 customers had their power restored.
“This event once again highlights the fragility of the electrical system, something LUMA has pointed out since the beginning of its operations,” the company said. “We remain committed to transforming it into a safer and more reliable system for all customers in Puerto Rico.”
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Puerto Rico residents are no strangers to massive blackouts; the most recent occurred just months ago on New Year’s Eve.
“It is unacceptable that we have a failure of this magnitude in the electrical transmission system,” Puerto Rico Governor Jenniffer González-Colón said Wednesday.
She was on vacation when the territory went dark, but returned Wednesday night, according to AP.
Both Interim Governor Veronica Ferraiuoli and Energy Czar Josué Colón are “working diligently” with the energy sector to resolve the issue, the governor said in a statement.
Both the island’s hospitals, according to Ferraiuoli, and the Luis Muñoz Marín International Airport were relying on generator power.
"Flights are operating normally and are uninterrupted," the airport announced at 1:20 p.m. on X. "We recommend passengers to arrive to the airport with sufficient time."
The cause of the outage is under investigation, power generator Genera PR said Wednesday on X.
