Power goes out in Pakistan

Islamabad: A major technical fault in Pakistan’s power generation and distribution system have caused a massive power outage that plunged the country into darkness overnight, the energy minister says.

Hours after the late Saturday (local time) outage, Energy Minister Omar Ayub said on Twitter power was being restored in phases, starting with Islamabad. He said yesterday power had been restored to much of the country.

Ayub said the cause of the power outage was being investigated and work was being done to fire up Pakistan’s main Tarbela power station in the northwest, which would lead to a restoration of power in the rest of the country in phases.

He said the Guddu power plant in southern Sindh province developed a fault that triggered the shutdown of other power plants in seconds. — AP