Massive Blackout Engulfs Makhachkala After Substation Blaze

Approximately 90,000 residents in Makhachkala, the capital of Dagestan, experienced a power outage over the weekend due to a fire at a substation, as reported by the regional Ministry of Energy.

The fire erupted at the Novaya substation at 4:48 a.m. Moscow time on Saturday, caused by a technical failure linked to overloaded transmission lines, according to Dagenergo. The outage mainly impacted the central areas of Makhachkala.

Emergency response teams from Dagenergo, aided by eight specialized units, were deployed to the scene. By 9:00 a.m., electricity had been partially restored to more than 36,000 households.

Power was systematically restored throughout the morning, with nearly half of the impacted customers reconnected by 11:00 a.m. Authorities reported that a total of 23 cable lines were damaged.

This incident is the latest in a series of power outages occurring in Dagestan.

On June 15, a separate electrical incident resulted in power being cut off in 27 locations, affecting around 10,000 individuals.

Similar blackouts have also occurred in central Russia this summer, including a cyclone-induced outage on July 9 that left over 25,000 residents without electricity in the Yaroslavl and Ivanovo regions.