Lisbon, Jan. 28, 2026 (Lusa) - More than 850,000 electricity customers were without power at 7:00 a.m. on mainland Portugal on Wednesday morning, with Lisbon, Guarda, Coimbra, Castelo Branco, Portalegre, Leiria, Santarém and Setúbal being the most affected regions.
"We saw a peak of around one million customers affected at 6:00 a.m., and at this moment there are around 855,000 customers without power, with the main regions impacted being Guarda, Coimbra, Castelo Branco, Portalegre, Leiria, Santarém and Setúbal," the electricity distributor, E-Redes, said in a note sent to Lusa.
In information sent to Lusa, E-Redes reports that the electricity grid was impacted by adverse weather conditions, indicating that at 1:00 a.m. today, around 40,000 customers were without power, with the region of Viana do Castelo being the most affected.
E-Redes said that the intervention of the operational teams mobilised on the ground was hampered by adverse weather conditions, but that conditions are now suitable for resolving the faults that occurred in the high, medium and low voltage networks.
According to the company, the electricity grid was very severely affected by the adverse weather conditions caused by the Kristin depression, causing extensive damage to the physical electricity distribution infrastructure.
Mainland Portugal is being affected by the effects of the passage of the Kristin depression, with rain, wind, snow and rough seas, and several warnings have been issued by Portugal's national meteorological institute (IPMA).
The bad weather has already caused one death in Povos, Vila Franca de Xira, in the Lisbon region, after a tree fell on the light vehicle in which he was travelling, according to the National Emergency and Civil Protection Authority (ANEPC).
Between midnight and 6 a.m. today, ANEPC recorded 655 incidents, with a particular incidence in the region of Lisbon, the Setúbal Peninsula and the western region.
"We had 217 incidents in the Lisbon region, with the exception of the municipality of Lisbon, which is covered by the fire brigade, 104 in the Setúbal Peninsula and 82 in the West region," Paulo Santos of the ANEPC told Lusa at around 6 a.m. today.
According to Paulo Santos, most of the incidents involve fallen trees and structures, with roads blocked and power outages in many regions.
In Leiria, the sub-regional commander of Emergency and Civil Protection for the Region today asked people not to leave their homes, given that the city's streets are "practically all impassable".
"The streets are practically all impassable, there is still a need to cut down many trees, clear many roads, and only for strictly necessary, very urgent reasons should people try to drive their vehicles," he said.
According to the sub-regional commander, "all the roads here in the Leiria area are affected by many fallen trees and debris on the road".
DD/AYLS // AYLS
Lusa
