A monkey that intruded into an electrical grid substation triggered a nationwide power outage in Sri Lanka on Sunday, DECENCY GLOBAL NEWS reports.
According to government officials, the blackout which began at approximately 11:30 a.m. local time (0600 GMT), affected the entire island and had yet to be fully restored after three hours.
“A monkey has come in contact with our grid transformer causing an imbalance in the system,” Energy Minister, Kumara Jayakody told reporters.
He stated that the incident occurred in a suburb of south Colombo. While electricity was restored in some areas, authorities could not immediately determine how long it would take to fully resolve the outage.
“Engineers are attending to it to try and restore the service as soon as possible,” Jayakody added.
The disruption comes as Sri Lanka continues to grapple with energy challenges. In the summer of 2022, the country suffered prolonged blackouts due to an economic crisis that led to fuel shortages.
At the peak of the crisis, thermal power stations were forced to ration electricity for up to 13 hours a day.
