It was a typical Monday, start of the week, in a beautiful April springtime. Like a usual Monday, it was a working day and a school day. The streets were busy, you can hear the vehicles honking, the train sounds signalling the arrival and departure of the trains. From our windows, you can see the people crossing the streets, trying to beat the stoplight to get to the bus stop, to enter the metro/train station and in our neighborhood, you can see the small and medium enterprises opening their stores. It was business as usual.
I set-up my workstation at home, connected my work laptop and started to work. Like any ordinary Monday, I connected to my conference calls, I got in touch with my colleagues via the different collaboration tools at work, I read and answered emails and I worked on my deliverables. I was on my 4th call at past 1215 when all of a sudden, my call was dropped, internet connection was cut and in our apartment and in our building, our electricity was cut. Our first instinct told us to go out. So I did go out, feigning throwing the garbage to get an idea of what has happened and from there, I realized that it seemed to be a massive, generic blackout. Even if the skies were clear, the friendly neighborhood enterprises had their lights off, the drugstore signage is off and the clients of the nearby salon were in the middle of their hair treatments.
I went back home and realized that very minimal work can be done; only the documents and tasks that I can do offline and within my local access. The collaboration tools (MS Outlook, MS Teams) and internet platform such as WhatsApp were all unavailable. I reviewed the battery charge of my personal and office celfones and my office laptop. All good so far so I was able to play some Spotify music to help soothe my emotions.
I thought of my son who was at school at that time. I was grateful that I cooked food the day before (Sunday) and that there were left overs which was our food for the day with tomato and green salad on the side (no cooking needed!). I looked at the pile of clothes that I put inside the washing machine but can´t load the program due to the power outage.
I sat in silence and then stood up to talk to my husband who is in his study room, still working. I chatted about my theory of a potential cyber attack and the potential consequences thus the need to revalidate our bank accounts when the power resumes. I was quite uneasy and discomfort started to sink in me. But I still tried to pacify and control myself. I continued to work (whatever can be accomplished) and just walked inside our small apartment. Around 1345, I went out on purpose to check the nearby metro stations because my son sometimes takes the metro on his way home. I went in the metro station and it was all dark and I started to see more people out on the streets. People with their laptop bags, the streets busier and the bus stops started to have longer queues. people have decided to go back to their respective homes.
After an hour, I heard the voice of my son and as I looked out from our window, thank God, my son was back home and he asked for the key as the door buzzer is not working thus he can´t ring our doorbell. We had lunch together and we processed the black out.
My last known experience of blackout was in the Philippines, triggered by strong rains, howling winds and typhoons. My emotions as I went through this blackout was of confusion, disbelief, fear and at the same time putting a brave front for my son. Even if there was growing fear and uncertainty inside of me, I wanted to assure my son that this is going to be brief and that everything will turn out well. We were able to get bits and pieces of updates from international news agencies, depending on the speed and availability of the internet. But it was confirmed! It was a massive power outage impacting Spain, France and Portugal. We were informed that the estimated time to recover power is a maximum of 10 hours. This was a good information as it helped manage our expectations. As it was spring, the sun is expected to totally set much later, around 21h or past 21h.
With these updates, we went on with our regular Monday but without the power, without being stuck at work be it conference calls, meetings, support work, emails; without internet connection, without access to television nor music. I started to prepare our flash light knowing that the power outage is going to take long.
To alleviate our discomfort and to make good use of our time, my son and I decided to get out of our apartment and walk within the neighborhood. We went to our assigned clinic as we had our scheduled medical appointments with our family doctor. We already know that our appointments are cancelled because our medical records are not accessible, internet connection is down, but we decided anyway to kill time by walking. We were surpised and at the same time delighted that there are many people out on the streets, walking with their bags and our assumption is they would rather walk than wait in the bus stops which now has longer queues later in the afternoon. It was also surprising to see that there are queues in the supermarkets as some people opted to do "panic buying". Bottled water, tasty bread, snacks such as chips, cookies, soda were sold out The friendly neighborhood pastry shop also sold all of its bread!!
My son and I arrived home at around 18h. My son continued to read his books, did some review while my husband and I played scrabble, a board game. After I won the scrabble with a large margin ✌😃, I continued reading the book There are No Falling Stars in China by Marga Ortigas.
It is now almost 20h and my son finished his school work, took a bath and we sat in our sofa and we played word games such as Name a Country, Name a Food and we just chatted and chatted. As there was no electricity, there was no big appetite for dinner so my son just ate an apple for dinner. It was getting darker and it was already past 2130h. My husband and I were talking as I switched on our flashlight and lit a candle from my altar when I heard my husband screamed, "Ya tenemos luz" (meaning, our power/light is back). I let go a big sigh of relief and said my prayers and thank you to the Lord Almighty. It was indeed true that power was off to approximately 10 hours.
Even if electricity was resumed at past 2130h, internet connection was not stable until the next 2 hours. But at least, we switched on the tv, listened to the news and we were informed about the status of the power outage (its cause, what the government leaders and the power/electricity vendor are doing etc). The impact was huge especially to the commuters who were stranded in the metro, train tunnels and had to be evacuated. The trips via high speed trains were cancelled so the government provided assistance and logistics to the passengers in the train stations as they await the rescheduling of their trips.
Cyber attack was ruled out as a potential major cause and it was more attributed on the capacity of the enery supplier of Spain. To date, a week later, there are still ongoing discussions, analysis, investigations and post mortem related to thsi extraordinary power outage.
After almost 10 hours of power outage, we had our electricity back. Even if Madrid was one of the last regions to have its electricity restored, I was very grateful to have it back just before I went to bed. I gave my son and my husband tight hugs and kisses. I slept with a very grateful heart and renewed spirit grateful for the resilience, agility, kindness and depth of the human spirit.
Note: I do not own these photos. They were lifted from the internet. Credit to the owners. Thank you.
