What’s happening in Spain and Portugal? Will my holiday be affected?

Ellen O'Donoghue

There’s never a good time for a power cut, but the week of the May bank holiday weekend is, for holidaymakers, almost as bad as it could get.

With many Irish people hoping to take advantage of the long weekend by jetting away for some sun, the power outage which hit Spain, Portugal, and some of on Monday has undoubtedly heightened anxiety.

However, thankfully the problem seems to have subsided for the most part, with nearly all of Spain regaining power by Tuesday morning.

More than 99 per cent of the country’s power was recovered by 6am on Tuesday, according to Spanish power distributer Red Electrica.

Spain's Prime Minister Pedro Sanchez earlier vowed to have the entire country of 48 million with their lights back on by the end of the day.

Portugal's grid operator REN said that all its power sub-stations were back "on stream" before midnight last night.

The Portuguese government said trains are back working and "all 6.4 million electricity clients", have had their supply "normalised".

Red Electrica head of operations Eduardo Prieto said the event was “exceptional and extraordinary”.

The Portuguese National Cybersecurity Centre, in a statement, said there was no sign the outage was due to a cyber-attack.

At 12.22pm on Monday, Spain’s power grid lost 15 gigawatts, the equivalent of 60 per cent of its national demand, in a matter of five seconds.

As of Tuesday afternoon, power has returned to almost all, if not all, areas.

But what does this mean for those of us hoping to head off this week?

Graeme McQueen, media relations manager at DAA, the operator of Cork and Dublin airports, said that in total on Monday, 13 flights in and out of Dublin Airport, and four flights in and out of Cork Airport were cancelled due to the power outage.

“Thankfully, the issues which affected airports in Spain and Portugal on Monday have subsided and flights are operating as normal this morning,” Mr McQueen said.

“At both Cork and Dublin airports, we've seen a full schedule of first wave flights depart, including many to Spain and Portugal, and we're pleased to report no delays of note so far today.

“We're expecting a busy but smooth weekend at both Cork and Dublin airports this weekend, as many head overseas for the May bank holiday and with thousands of visitors set to come to Ireland for the long weekend.”

As always, however, Mr McQueen added that engers should check directly with their airline for updates regarding their flight.

But what happened? What caused the power cut? Could it happen again?

Mr Sánchez said what happened "cannot happen again", adding that his government would hold private firms to .

So, on the plus side, if you haven't yet commenced your Spanish holiday, a nationwide power cut has now become less likely than it was yesterday.

Portugal's Prime Minister, Luis Montenegro has said there was no indication of a cyberattack, but both countries are still looking at all hypotheses.

Spanish grid operator Red Electrica, in a statement on Monday night, pointed to a "strong oscillation in the power flow, which triggered "a very significant loss of generation."

This loss of generation went beyond what the electrical systems are designed to handle, and the Spanish grid was disconnected from the European system.

The electrical system then collapsed, leading to voltage losses in the supply points of both the Spanish and Portuguese peninsular electrical systems, Red Electrica said.

What causes power outages?

The most common cause of an unplanned power cut which disables electricity on a large scale is extreme weather such as storms, lightning strikes or high winds.

They can also happen when there are faults at power stations, power distribution lines, substations or other parts of the electricity transmission system or grid.

Most power cuts typically last between a few minutes to several hours, so hopefully, anyone heading on holiday in the coming days should arrive in a country with power.

I can get to the airport, but can I get any farther?

Spain’s transport minister has said that, after the widespread disruption led to trains being cancelled and, in some regions, evacuated, a number of train lines are cancelled until further notice.

This mainly affects commuter trains in places like Bilbao, Cadiz, Seville, Zaragoza, Vigo and San Sebastian.

Commuter services in Madrid and Valencia are returning to normal, but with reduced services.

For long distance trans, services from Madrid to Barcelona, Valencia, Malaga, Santander, Granada and the Basque Country are “progressively returning to normal”.

However, trains from Madrid to Huelva, Cadiz, Salamanca, Badajoz and Galicia remain cancelled until further notice.

The Madrid Metro has fully reopened except for Line 7A, which connects the north of the city to the east via Atletico Madrid’s stadium.

As for flights, there are under 500 cancellations across Spain and Portugal on Tuesday.

So, as of right now, normality seems to be returning to the Iberian Peninsula after what can only be described as chaos on Monday.