A major blackout swept across large parts of the Czech Republic on Friday, temporarily paralyzing public transport, halting factory operations, and prompting emergency rescues as firefighters freed people trapped in elevators.
The outage, caused by a fallen power line, affected eight of the country’s 44 power distribution points, according to national grid operator ČEPS. In a statement on X (formerly Twitter), ČEPS said the failure impacted “a significant portion of the Czech Republic” and lasted several hours.
In the capital, all three lines of the Prague metro were brought to a standstill for about 30 minutes, the city’s transport company DPP confirmed on its website.
Czech media reported widespread disruption across multiple regions. Public transport services were interrupted, shops closed temporarily, and hospitals switched to backup generators. Several factories and refineries were forced to suspend operations.
Emergency services responded quickly, with firefighters rescuing people stranded in elevators during the outage.
“Most of Prague has been affected, primarily on the right bank of the Vltava River,” said Karel Hanzelka, spokesperson for the Prague electricity distributor PRE, in a statement to AFP.
The incident follows a similar large-scale blackout in April that hit Spain and Portugal, caused by inadequate voltage control and cascading failures across the grid.
