SAN JUAN, Puerto Rico — More than a million customers in Puerto Rico remained without electricity on Thursday after a fire at a main power plant caused the biggest blackout so far this year across the U.S.
“We urge you to stay home if possible,” said Puerto Rico Justice Secretary Domingo Emanuelli, who is serving as interim governor since Gov.
Those who could not afford generators and have medical conditions such as diabetes, which depends on refrigerated insulin, worried about how much longer they’d be without power.
“No one can say exactly when” power would be fully restored, said Kevin Acevedo, a vice president of Luma, the company that took over transmission and distribution from Puerto Rico’s Electric Power Authority last year.
The outage further enraged Puerto Ricans already frustrated with an electricity system razed by Hurricane Maria in 2017.