TAP Air warns passengers to not travel to Portugal airports
A Portuguese airline has warned passengers to avoid going to the country's airports as it deals with a widespread power cut today (April 28).
The outage is also impacting parts of Spain with supermarkets, transport, schools and more affected.
Phone lines, traffic lights and ATM machines are also affected and such a widespread outage is rare.
Spanish generator Red Electrica said the incident had affected the Iberian peninsula and is being assessed.
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The Portuguese Cabinet convened an emergency meeting at the prime minister's residence, and Spanish Prime Minister Pedro Sanchez visited Red Electrica to follow efforts to restore power to the grid.
TAP Air warns passengers to stay away from airports
If you are travelling to Portugal from the UK or trying to get back home, the power cut might affect your plans.
Portuguese airline TAP Air has asked passengers due to fly to avoid the airports in Portugal until they are told otherwise, reports the BBC.
The broadcaster added: 'In a statement on its Facebook page, the airline says some services are not operating as usual and asks passengers to await more information.'
The Express reported that British tourists have been affected by the power outage as trains and flights have been cancelled.
It added that some of them had shared on social media that they were 'stuck in Spain' in places such as Valencia Airport.
Parts of France were also briefly affected by the outage but the issue has been resolved there.
In Portugal, a country of some 10.6 million people, the outage hit the capital, Lisbon, and surrounding areas, as well as northern and southern parts of the country.
Portugal's government said the incident appeared to stem from problems outside the country, an official told national news agency Lusa.
'It looks like it was a problem with the distribution network, apparently in Spain. It's still being ascertained,' Cabinet Minister Leitao Amaro was quoted as saying.
A video shown on Spanish television showed people evacuating metro stations in Madrid, and empty stations with trains stopped in Barcelona.
Spain's traffic department asked citizens to avoid using their cars as much as possible due to the power outage, which affected traffic lights and electric road signs.
In Terrassa, an industrial town 31 miles (50km) from Barcelona, stores selling generators were out of stock after people queued up to buy them.
Portuguese police placed more officers on duty to direct traffic and cope with increased requests for help, including from people trapped in lifts.
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