Blackout: Curfew in Chile after nationwide power outage

Due to a practically nationwide power outage in Chile , the government of the South American country has imposed a curfew . It applies in the affected regions from Arica y Parinacota in the north to Los Lagos in the south between 10 p.m. and 6 a.m., the Interior Ministry announced. The affected area stretches over a good 3,000 kilometers. Around 98 percent of households are without power, reported the newspaper La Tercera .

"Our greatest concern is the safety of the people," said Interior Minister Carolina Tohá. "We don't want anyone to take advantage of the power outage to commit crimes." The Defense Ministry announced that 3,000 soldiers would be sent onto the streets to reinforce the police and ensure security.

Reason for the blackout: In the Chico Norte region, a high-voltage line went offline unexpectedly, the power grid regulator announced. Subsequently, other lines were switched off, which led to the widespread power outage. The exact causes are still being investigated. "There is no reason to believe or assume that an attack is behind it," said Interior Minister Tohá.

"This is an extraordinary event, an atypical system failure," electrical engineer Humberto Verdejo of the University of Santiago told radio station Cooperativa. "Due to the scale and complexity, it will probably take a long time to restore power."

The subway in the capital Santiago de Chile stopped operating. The Transport Ministry warned drivers in the greater Santiago area to be careful because many traffic lights were out of order. "It's a huge problem and we're trying to solve it as best we can, but we can't do magic," Transport Minister Juan Carlos Muñoz told the radio station Cooperativa.

The operation of important copper mines was also affected. Chile is the largest copper producer in the world. The state-owned copper producer Codelco said some of the mines were being operated with emergency generators.

Because of the power outage, Latin America's most important music festival - the Festival Internacional de la Canción - in the coastal town of Viña del Mar was also interrupted. Some of the planned performances by the band Morat and the singer Sebastián Yatra are now scheduled to take place next Saturday. The popular festival is a kind of Latin American counterpart to the Eurovision Song Contest .