Puerto Rico's power grid collapses, leaving island in dark on New Year's Eve

Puerto Ricans were without electricity early on New Year's Eve after a grid failure left nearly all of the island without power.

Around 90 per cent of clients were without power at 9.30am (5.30pm in UAE) on Tuesday, according to energy distribution company LUMA Energy's real-time portal.

It will likely take 24 to 48 hours to turn the lights back on, "conditions permitting," LUMA said in a statement.

"While the cause of the outage is under investigation, preliminary findings point to a failure in an underground line," LUMA added.

Ivan Baez, a spokesperson for power generator Genera, called the grid failure a "major incident" in a local radio interview.

He said that the line believed to have failed was operated by LUMA and brought down plants belonging to Genera as well as private generators.

Puerto Rico Governor Pedro Pierluisi said in a post on social media that his administration was "demanding answers and solutions" from LUMA and Genera.

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