In an address to the nation, Boric said the outage affected eight million homes and held private companies responsible for the disruption.

“What happened today is outrageous because it’s not tolerable that one or several companies impact the everyday life of millions of Chileans, and that’s why it’s the state’s duty to hold them responsible,” Boric added.

The president noted that the state of emergency was necessary to guarantee the safety of citizens, given the possibility of the outage continuing for longer.

The Chilean government has also announced a curfew from 10 p.m. Tuesday to 6 a.m. Wednesday (0100 to 0900GMT).

Earlier, Interior Minister Carolina Toha called for calm, saying the outage was not due to an attack but a disconnection in the transmission system in the Norte Chico region.

“I call for calm, to understand that it is a failure in the system, that we are not the object of an attack, that the service should be restored promptly,” she said.

Through social media, Ernesto Huber, executive director of the National Electricity Coordinator, confirmed the source of the blackout as a fault in the power grid at Norte Chico and said that efforts are underway to restore power.

"The disconnection of the 500 kV double circuit in the Norte Chico area, specifically between the Vallenar and Coquimbo power stations, caused a disturbance in the national electrical system, from Arica to the Los Lagos region, resulting in the complete loss of power in the national electrical system," he said.

The outage occurred amid a heat wave in Chile, and in small towns such as Lo Barnechea, Talagante and La Florida, authorities promptly established supplies of drinking water.

After the blackout hit, subway services were promptly evacuated. Traffic lights were knocked out, causing traffic jams in the country's largest cities, while a fleet of electric buses was deployed to assist with inner-city mobility.

AzVision.az

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