Ecuador's public works minister said a nationwide power outage occurred on Wednesday afternoon, claiming the emergency was caused by a breakdown in a major power line.
In a statement, Minister Roberto Luque said he had received a report from state electricity company CENACE that “a fault in a transmission line has caused a cascade of outages, resulting in a nationwide power outage.”
He said officials were working to resolve the outage “as quickly as possible.”
The South American country of 18 million people has been plagued by energy crises for years, with aging infrastructure, lack of maintenance and reliance on imported energy contributing to rolling blackouts, but none as widespread as this one.
Most of Ecuador's population was hit with a power outage around 3:15 p.m. on Wednesday.
Most of the country's energy comes from neighboring Colombia, which is struggling to meet its domestic consumption needs.
China's $2.25 billion Cocacodo Sinclair Dam, a hydroelectric plant built by the country at a cost of $2.25 billion, was supposed to help solve Ecuador's problems. Located 62 miles east of the capital, Quito, on the Coca River in Napo province, the dam is Ecuador's largest energy project.