Which Map Did You Use On The Day Your Internet Connection Disappeared?
Posted by Graeme Herbert on 26 May 2025 in English.El Gran Apagón
Many people around the world will have heard about the serious power outage that Spain and Portugal had a few weeks ago, as the power grid for almost the whole of the two countries failed for the best part of the day. I know, first world problems for those who live in countries where electricity network failures (or even availability) are still a regular feature of daily life. But the event was still a useful wake-up call on just how dependent we have become on that network for so much of our daily activity, not least because the outage also left people with very limited or non-existent mobile phone and internet coverage.
The blackout happened in the middle of the day when a large part of the adult population was at work, getting home for those whose journey depends on electrified train or underground Metro services turned into a problem for so many. With bus transport and other road transport services overwhelmed by demand the only solution for a lot of people will have been a perhaps unfamiliar walk through a large city like Madrid or Barcelona. And then we get back to the collapse in the mobile telephone network, those mapping services that so many instinctively use for navigation were suddenly just as unavailable as anything else dependent on the internet.