Metro services in the Ukrainian capital were suspended due to low voltage in the network, wrote Mayor Vitali Klitschko on Telegram. The stations had backup power and could be used as shelters, but passengers on the trains had to be led out through dark tunnels.
On Saturday afternoon, trains were able to start rolling again after several hours of being halted. This is the first time since 2022 that all subway traffic has been shut down for such a long time.
"We were stuck underground for two hours before we were rescued. There was no panic," 27-year-old Kateryna Maliuha told the Kyiv Independent.
Everyone is in shock, of course. There is almost no cell phone coverage. Now I wonder how I will get home.
According to Energy Minister Denys Shmyhal, widespread power outages are occurring across the country. A "technical fault" has caused major power lines linking plants in neighboring Romania and Moldova with western and central Ukraine to shut down, he wrote on Telegram. In addition, nuclear power plants have reduced output due to the outages.
The power outage hits particularly hard as winter in Ukraine has brought night-time temperatures of around -20 degrees Celsius across large parts of the country.
"All necessary measures to restore power supply are underway," President Volodymyr Zelenskyy wrote on social media.
