Your entire nation of Sri Lanka is facing blackouts – and it’s all right down to the actions of 1 cheeky monkey.
The island nation of 22million people is counting on generators to power hospitals and water purification plants.
Air-con units can not run, leaving residents sweating in temperatures of greater than 30°C.
Engineers have scrambled to revive power across the island, prioritising facilities like hospitals, and a few areas regained electricity inside a couple of hours.
Nevertheless some parts of the country, and households without their very own generators, were still at nighttime throughout the night.
The Sri Lankan energy minister has little doubt as to the reason for the energy crisis.
Kumara Jayakody said: ‘A monkey has are available in contact with our grid transformer, causing an imbalance within the system.’
The Ceylon Electricity Board said the ability cut was brought on by an ’emergency’ at a substation south of Colombo, the country’s capital.
Local news outlets say engineers have been warning consecutive governments ‘for years’ to upgrade its power grid amid the danger of frequent blackouts.
An anonymous senior engineer was quoted in a Sri Lankan newspaper as saying: ‘The national power grid is in such a weakened state that frequent island-wide power outages could also be expected if there may be a disturbance in one in all our lines.’
The blackout began at about 11am local time on Sunday, and residents are criticising the country’s infrastructure.
Mario Nawfal said on X: ‘A rogue monkey knocked out Sri Lanka’s entire power grid after triggering a complete failure at a substation in Colombo.
Follow Metro on WhatsApp to be the primary to get all the most recent news
Metro’s on Whatsapp! Join our community for breaking news and juicy stories.
‘One monkey = total chaos. Time to rethink infrastructure?’
The authorities have warned people to expect more power cuts over the following few days, after the outage caused a breakdown on the Norochcholai coal power plant.
This isn’t the primary time Sri Lanka has faced widespread blackouts.
In 2022, a significant economic crisis and fuel shortages forced rolling blackouts as authorities rationed electricity for as much as 13 hours a day.
Get in contact with our news team by emailing us at webnews@metro.co.uk.
For more stories like this, check our news page.
MORE: ‘Largest great white shark ever’ present in the Atlantic
MORE: I flew 5,500 miles to Sri Lanka and made the best discovery of my life
MORE: Mystery after canal turns blood-red and ‘smells like rubbish’
