Power Surge Sparks Sudden Midnight Evacuations Amid Scorching Heat

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Blackouts hit apartment complexes across the Seoul metropolitan area last night (August 5). Residents had to spend a sleepless night in the tropical night heat without even being able to turn on air conditioners or fans.

Reporter Lee Se-hyeon has the details.

[Reporter]

An entire apartment complex is plunged into darkness.

Amid a tropical night as stiflingly hot as midday, the only light inside the homes is a single candle placed on a dining table.

Around 10:30 PM last night, a blackout occurred at an apartment complex with 1,000 households in Suwon, Gyeonggi Province.

[Resident: It is extremely hot. Sweat is just pouring off. They said it would take a long time to restore, so I found an unmanned coffee shop that stays open 24 hours. So I sat over there....]

Power was fully restored 10 hours later at 8:30 AM today, but refrigerators were packed with spoiled food and ingredients destined for the trash.

[Ju Young-soon / Resident: The refrigerator goes out. The kimchi refrigerator goes out. Everything just stops.]

Residents had to endure a sleepless night worrying about their families.

[Lee Su-yeon / Resident: I was worried whether the puppy might get dehydrated, or whether the child might get dehydrated.]

The cause was pointed to a transformer breakdown triggered by a power overload as the use of cooling appliances surged.

Last night, a blackout also occurred due to an electrical facility failure at a 500-household apartment in Ansan, Gyeonggi Province, causing inconvenience to residents.

Blackouts during the summer season are rapidly increasing every year.

During this week, which recorded historic heatwaves, power demand surged by more than 8% compared to the same period last year. Meanwhile, the power reserve ratio, which soared to a high of 61.1% on February 17, plummeted to 12.9%.

[Gong Ha-sung / Professor of Fire and Disaster Protection at Woosuk University: Older apartments were constructed with capacity calculations appropriate for the time they were built, but power consumption has increased sharply in the current situation. Therefore, the contracted current capacity needs to be increased to fit current realities....]

As the heatwave continues and power consumption is bound to surge, prompt inspections appear necessary for aging transformers and power distribution networks.

(Video by Yang Ji-hoon | Video Editing by Ahn Yeo-jin | Design by Lee Ga-jin)
※ Please note: This article was translated by AI and may contain errors.