By Yuliia Dysa and Alexander Tanas
KYIV/CHISINAU, Jan 31 (Reuters) – Parts of Ukraine and Moldova, including the neighbouring countries’ capitals, were plunged into blackouts on Saturday caused by a malfunction of high-voltage power lines, officials said. Power was restored later in the day.
Officials did not directly link the accident to war damage, although Ukraine’s power grid has suffered from the accumulated impact of Russian airstrikes, leading to severe restrictions on electricity supplies in recent weeks.
President Volodymyr Zelenskiy blamed ice buildup on power lines and ruled out a cyberattack.
“In the morning, a technological accident occurred on the power grid: two lines between Romania and Moldova and within the territory of Ukraine stopped operating,” he said in his nightly video address. “The causes are being thoroughly investigated.”
He said Ukraine had increased power imports to meet demand.
MOLDOVA: DISRUPTION TRIGGERED BY UKRAINE PROBLEMS
Ukrainian Energy Minister Denys Shmyhal said the two incidents occurred within a minute of each other, “leading to a cascade of shutdowns in seven regions of the country.”
Moldova’s Energy Ministry said the disruption there was triggered by problems in Ukraine’s grid that led to a voltage drop on the line connecting Romania and Moldova.
Romania’s Energy Ministry did not immediately respond to a request for comment.
The system is under greater pressure as forecast night-time temperatures of -13 degrees Celsius (9 Fahrenheit) in Kyiv are due to sink to -22 C on Monday.
Zelenskiy said nearly 3,500 apartment buildings lack heating in the capital.
“The city and utilities and energy experts are promising to fix the heating situation by tomorrow morning,” he said. “But the pace should be faster.”
Russia agreed to halt strikes on energy infrastructure until Sunday at the request of U.S. President Donald Trump. Kyiv said it would reciprocate, and the countries did not report major attacks.
Regions in both Ukraine and Moldova were affected after the malfunction at 10:42 a.m. Kyiv time. Officials in both countries said power was restored later in the day following efforts to stabilise interconnected grids.
Officials in Moldova said it took 3-1/2 hours for power supplies to return to normal in the country lying between Ukraine and Romania.
PASSENGERS LED OUT OF METRO STATIONS
The metro in Kyiv suspended operations and water supplies in the city were cut temporarily.
The state emergency service said its teams led 500 stranded passengers out of metro stations. Some passengers were seen waiting at a station with dimmed lights in anticipation of electricity being restored.
Traffic lights and some public transport in Chisinau were not working, according to the city’s mayor, and most districts did not have electricity.
The accident caused a shutdown on Ukraine’s side, triggering automatic protection at substations and the temporary disconnection of nuclear power plant units from the grid, Shmyhal said.
(Reporting by Yuliia Dysa, additional reporting by Pavel Polityuk in Kyiv and Luiza Ilie in Bucharest; Editing by Daniel Flynn, Hugh Lawson, Peter Graff, Ron Popeski, Rod Nickel)
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