Another Monkey? Kenya Hit By a Power Blackout

An early morning power outage has left most Kenyans grumbling, adding to the woes caused by the Coronavirus pandemic that has kept most of them at home. Across section of Kenyans woke up to dark rooms and silent electronics this morning.

It appeared like a normal blackout until Kenyans across the country started complaining of ‘no power’ on social media. Being a Saturday, most Kenyans are at home and hard hit by lack of power to heat their bath water, power fridges and other electronic equipment.

Those running electricity-powered business are already counting losses.

Kenya Power has confirmed that it lost power supply in the national grid due to a “system disturbance:” that occurred on its transmission network at 5.49 am.

It says in a statement that its engineers are working to identify and address the hitch to restore normal electricity supply.  

“We wish to apologize our customers for the inconvenience caused,” the statement says. “An update on restoration progress and cause of the power outage will be issued later.”

The blackout rekindled memories four years ago when the country experienced a nationwide outage caused, according to power producer KenGen, by a rogue monkey that fell on a crucial equipment at it Gitaru hydroelectric power station.

The transformer then tripped, resulting in the loss of 180 megawatts of energy and triggering a blackout across Kenya. Power was restored almost four hours later and the monkey survived its adventure.

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