Lightning strike at power plant causes blackout

A wide-scale blackout was reported in local media Thursday morning, with sources saying a lightning had struck the Vasiliko power plant in Limassol causing outages in several areas.

According to local reports, two units at the power station went out of service just after 10am, causing power outages in several areas in addition to cuts in other locations from the previous day. 

A spokesperson for Cyprus Electricity Authority (EAC), Christina Papadopoulou, said she was optimistic that power would be restored to the areas directly affected by the lightning.

In the meantime, crews are said to be working in areas where power went out on earlier this week due to severe weather. Reports said trees were downed by heavy winds while in another case a driver had struck a utility pole.

Locations affected by the Vasiliko lighting strike included two rural areas in Nicosia, while more local communities were affected in Paphos, Limassol, Larnaca.