Major electricity outage in France's Alpes-Maritimes region, Cannes festival also impacted

The Alpes-Maritimes region in France is undergoing a major power outage, local authorities of the area said on Saturday.

Parts of the French Alpes-Maritimes region has been impacted by an electricity outage, they said, which has also been extended to the town of Cannes. This comes at a time when the crucial Cannes Film Festival is underway.

France's electricity transmission system operator is working to restore the power, Reuters reported.

As per a report by Deadline, the powercut occurred just a few hours ahead of the Cannes Film Festival’s closing ceremony. The whole town of Cannes was out of electricity, with lights going off in shops and restaurants that could only accept cash payments as a result.

The festival said it had “switched to an alternative electricity power supply, which enables us to maintain the events and screenings planned for today in normal conditions, including the closing ceremony”, as per AFP.

WhatsApp services were also affected in the region, with internet being down, as per the Deadline report.

The cause of the power cut, which began just after 10:00 am (0800 GMT), was a fire in a substation in the nearby village of Tanneron, probably an arson attack, police sources who did not want to be named were quoted as saying by AFP. RTE confirmed that 1,60,000 houses were hit due to the power cut.

April power outage in Europe

A widespread and unprecedented power outage hit Spain, Portugal, and parts of southern France on Monday (April 28) severely disrupting daily life of millions. The outage, which began around midday, left millions without electricity, affecting subway networks, phone lines, traffic lights, and ATMs.

Shortly after 12:30 p.m. local time, Spain lost 15 gigawatts of electricity — or roughly 60 per cent of demand in the country of 49 million, Prime Minister Pedro Sánchez said.

As metro service stopped, train stations cleared out and shops and offices closed, and thousands of people spilled onto the streets of Madrid. Some resorted to hitchhiking. Others walked hours just to get home.

The blackout turned sports centers, train stations and airports into makeshift refuges.