Paksitan Totally Darkness
Written on: January 10, 2021
A night in total darkness Electricity cuts out for a "whole country"
In a rare incident, a major technical fault in the power generation and distribution system caused a major blackout in Pakistan, plunging almost the entire country into darkness on Saturday night.
After hours of power cuts late on Saturday evening, Energy Minister Omar Ayoub said on Twitter that the electricity was returning in stages, starting with Islamabad.
Later on Sunday, he added, electricity had been restored to a large part of the country.
The blackouts were initially reported on social media by residents of major urban centers, including Islamabad, Karachi, Lahore and Multan.
Then the minister and his spokesman took to Twitter to update the country on the latest developments.
Ayoub urged citizens to be patient, and said that the cause of the power outages is being investigated, and work is underway to operate the main "Tarbela" power station in the northwest of the country, which will lead to restoration of electricity in the rest of Pakistan in stages.
Ayoub said in a press conference, on Sunday, that a failure in the "Godo" power station in the southern province of Sindh occurred at 11:41 pm, which led to the closure of other power stations in a few seconds.
Later, a spokesman for the Ministry of Energy, Zafar Yap, said that the "Tarbela" and "Warsak" stations, both in the northwestern Khyber Pakhtunkhwa region, had returned to work, and electricity had been restored to the transmission system.
However, Yap said it will take time to restore electricity to all parts of the country.
