There was a huge electricity outage on the Thai island of Phuket this evening which, according to Thai TV news, also affected around 14 southern provinces, all of whom suffered what is being called ‘the biggest blackout ever’. Although news outlets are only reporting southern areas of the country as having lost power, up in northern Bangkok we lost power as well.
The electricity outage in Phuket began sometime around 7pm and, in some areas, lasted approximately 45 minutes. According to social media and to comments on the Bangkok Post’s website, however, other areas of Phuket are still in complete darkness, more than three hours after the initial electricity outage took place. Surat Thani too apparently is still in darkness.
Phuket, of course, is one of Thailand’s major tourist destinations so for the island to lose power completely and still have power off more than three hours later is quite a serious occurrence. It’s also likely to cause a major loss of income for bars, restaurants, shops, clubs and hotels all over the island.
Egat says technicians are currently fixing and assessing the situation, with a more in-depth situation about the cause of the blackout expected from them on Wednesday.
As for my area of Bangkok which also lost power at the same time, our electricity was only off for around 15 minutes so we were luckier than millions of other people.