https://arab.news/yn3zb
- Officials say they have started system maintenance work which is ‘progressing rapidly’
- The country witnessed a similar nationwide outage due to drop in frequency two years ago
ISLAMABAD: Pakistan experienced a massive power breakdown on Monday morning, confirmed the energy ministry, as the national grid malfunctioned after a sudden drop in frequency.
This is not the first time the country is witnessing a nationwide electricity outage. A similar situation also emerged two years ago in January when there was a countrywide blackout which was attributed to the same technical problem by former power minister Omar Ayub Khan.
Pakistan’s southern region also plunged into darkness last October, and it took about a day for the authorities to restore electricity to major urban centers like Karachi, Hyderabad, Quetta and other places in Sindh and Balochistan province.
“According to initial reports, the system frequency of the National Grid went down at 7:34 this morning, causing a widespread breakdown in the power system,” the energy ministry said in a Twitter post, adding that system maintenance work had already begun and was “progressing rapidly.”
The ministry did not specify the reason behind the plunge in the frequency.
A laundryman uses cell phone as he sits at his shop during country-wide power breakdown in Peshawar, Pakistan January 23, 2023. (REUTERS)
Meanwhile, the chief executive of Lahore Electric Supply Company (LESCO), Chaudhry Amin, said in a statement the authorities had started restoring electricity from the federal capital, Islamabad, and would take care of Lahore and its adjoining areas soon.
He confirmed that all LESCO grid stations had tripped, “depriving industrial, commercial and domestic consumers of electricity.”
Students attend a class at a government high secondary school during a nationwide power outage in Rawalpindi on January 23, 2023. A massive power breakdown in Pakistan on January 23 affected most of the country's more than 220 million people, including in the mega cities of Karachi and Lahore. (AFP)
A K-Electric spokesperson, Imran Rana, said on Twitter there were “multiple outages” in different parts of Karachi and the power generation company was “investigating the issue.”