​The ​blackout ​that plunge​d the Iberian ​peninsula into ​chaos​

Out of the blue, two mysterious consecutive “disconnection events” cut the electricity supply across the Iberian peninsula on Monday, triggering Europe’s worst outage in recent history.

The dramatic loss of power started shortly after 12.30pm and continued into the night. Tens of millions of people were left without power, many trapped in lifts or on trains that had ground to a halt. Hospitals had to rely on generators, shops and restaurants closed as payments systems crashed, ATMs went down and confusion reigned.

By Tuesday morning the worst was over – and there were joyful scenes across Spain and Portugal as the lights flickered back on. But there is still no complete explanation and no guarantee there won’t be a repeat.

Moreover, the chaos that led both countries to declare national emergencies – and cost the Spanish economy at least €4.5bn – came as a spectacular warning to the rest of Europe about its preparedness, or lack of it, for civil contingency events where critical infrastructure is at risk.

Ashifa Kassam detailed some of the wilder situations people found themselves in, quoting a pair of tourists trapped on the high speed train between Madrid and Barcelona for nine hours as the temperature inside their wagon rose, drinking water ran out and the restrooms became unusable. Eventually making it back to Madrid station at midnight unsure what to do, they told Eldiario.es: “We’re shipwrecked in the 21st century.”

The Guardian’s Madrid correspondent Sam Jones sensed a mix of pragmatism and “polite panic” as the consequences of zero power sank in with a shocked population.

Columnist María Ramírez wrote about joining a huddle of people around a car radio for news updates. In her neighbourhood of the capital she noted a mass outbreak of patience and common sense.

But what caused the blackout?

That remains unknown. Sam Jones reports that the boss of Red Eléctrica, Spain’s electricity operator said in a radio interview on Wednesday the company knew what had caused the blackout but was still examining all the data. Energy operators in Spain and Portugal had earlier dismissed unusual weather or a cybersecurity incident, although on Tuesday the Spanish prime minister Pedro Sánchez insisted that “no hypothesis” was being ruled out.

With opposition politicians stepping up attacks against Sánchez, both for the blackout and inadequate comms around it, the prime minister has launched an inquiry that he said would look, among other things, at the role of private energy companies. Spain’s highest criminal court has also said it will investigate any involvement of cyberterrorism and or “sabotage”.

Renewable energy, predictably, has come into the frame with some opposition voices blaming Sánchez for prioritising renewables over nuclear energy – Spain and Portugal were sourcing almost 80% of their electricity from solar and wind energy when the blackout struck.

The Guardian’s environment reporter Helena Horton spoke to experts for this explainer who discounted any inherent instability stressing that blackouts can occur when a grid relies entirely on energy from fossil fuels. However, the Spanish grid operator said it was “very possible” that a sudden loss of solar power had occurred.

Patchy upgrades to the infrastructure that carries renewable energy could emerge as a weakness as renewable-reliant grids can be less resilient to sudden shocks.

Either way, our collective internet and power dependency leaves European governments now facing calls to do more to protect electricity supplies and to strengthen emergency services.

Emergency kits

Will the images of Spain’s mass chaos jolt citizens elsewhere, Esther Addley asked, to get prepped for emergencies where there is no light, no access to phones or other devices and no cash?

Last month, the European Commission had urged individual EU households to prepare emergency kits with 72 hours of emergency supplies in the event of floods, fires, military attacks or other national crisis.

María Ramírez says the initiative, modelled on thinking in the Nordic countries, drew a mix of derision, laugher and disbelief in Spain. The Spanish foreign minister said the advice from Brussels, which included stockpiling canned food, bottled water, matches, a Swiss army knife, cash, and a small radio, was a way to “worry citizens needlessly”.

Maybe you need to be in a war zone to understand fully. President Zelenskyy’s offer of assistance to Spain on Monday was borne of bitter recent expertise in coping with blackouts caused by relentless Russian bombardment of Ukraine’s energy infrastructure.

Vatican diplomacy

Pope Francis was buried with a minimum of pomp last Saturday – but his funeral, attended by world leaders and heads of state, appeared to open space for a miraculously benevolent meeting between Donald Trump and Volodymyr Zelenskyy.

The two leaders – who clashed publicly in the Oval Office recently – appeared, from the photo supplied by the Vatican, to be reconciling. As Orysia Lutseyvich wrote: “The image of Presidents Zelenskyy and Trump leaning toward each other, under Carlo Maratta’s late-17th-century fresco, The Baptism of Christ, rekindled hopes that the US might, at last, hear Kyiv out.”

Later, Trump seemed to acknowledge that Putin had been “tapping him along” and threatened more sanctions after a Russian air attack on Kyiv last Thursday that killed 12 people. That violence, which the Ukrainian novelist Oleksandr Mykhed described chillingly, was the biggest and deadliest for Ukrainian civilians this year.

But a day after the Rome meeting, Trump caused fresh consternation by suggesting that Kyiv was ready to surrender Crimea and other seized territory back to Russia as part of the US ceasefire plan.

As Trump marks a significant milestone this week (one we in turn marked with a glorious interactive on what he has achieved and what he has destroyed in just 100 days) there is mounting anxiety among European officials that the impatient US president may abandon negotiations altogether.

Putin has announced a three-day ceasefire over the 8-10 May holiday that marks the 80th anniversary of the Soviet Union’s victory in the second world war. A similar truce at Easter was immediately violated. For columnist Nataliya Gumenyuk, Ukrainian fears are crystallising into something else: that the US will use its ownership of the Patriot missiles, and the critical associated technology that Ukraine needs to operate its air defences, as leverage to force Kyiv into accepting peace on the worst terms possible.

Thanks for reading, scroll down for more highlights and until next week.

Editor’s picks

Opinion and analysis

Life, arts and culture