The Greek island of Santorini was gradually regaining access to electricity after a 24-hour blackout, its mayor said Wednesday.
The Greek
island
of
Santorini
was
gradually regaining access to electricity after a 24-hour blackout, its mayor
said Wednesday.
Santorini, one of the country's premier tourist destinations, was hit with a
power shortage on Tuesday after a fire at the Aegean island's main electricity
plant.
Mayor Nikolaos Zorzos told AFP: "Generators and repair equipment arrived
Wednesday morning and the outage is gradually getting better.
"The situation is improving by alternating the power flow to different
areas," he said.
The mayor didn't specify the cause of the fire, but said the "priority was
to deal with the power outage," at the height of tourist season with
120,000 visitors on the island.
The Public Power Corp.,
Greece
's
main power provider, said Tuesday that a fire at a power plant in the island's
capital of Fira had knocked out one of the generators.
Kimon Steriotis, director of communications at the corporation, told local
radio that a technical problem had arisen in a new engine and that the blackout
wasn't due to a maintenance issue.
"This is a chance incident... similar failures can happen anywhere in the
world," he said.
But local government officials denounced the state of the electricity grid on
Greek islands, especially in summer.
"We must modernise existing units on the islands and link them to the
mainland network," vice-governor of the Cyclades George Poussaios told
Greek daily Ta Nea.
Poussaios called for cables to be laid under the sea to connect the islands to
the main grid, a longstanding plan that has yet to be implemented.
Santorini is one of
Greece
's
most popular travel destinations, drawing hundreds of thousands of visitors
annually.
Greece has seen a 10% increase in foreign visitors compared to last year,
mainly due to a stabilization in its political situation and from tourists who
have shunned Turkey and North Africa because of political unrest.
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