The nationwide blackout the Dominican Republic suffered as of the afternoon of Tuesday, 11 November 2025, highlights the importance of alternate power systems. The Dominican Republic is one of the most resilient to power outages because past frequent blackouts resulted in the generalized practice of businesses installing backup systems.
On Tuesday, 11 November 2025 at 1:23pm, the national power grid suffered a massive blackout caused by a malfunction at the 138/69 kV SPMI–138 kV SPM-Cumayasa substation. The failure occurred during the manual opening of the 138 kV line switches connecting San Pedro de Macorís and Cumayasa, triggering a chain reaction that led to a nationwide power outage. Power was fully restored by 2:30am on Wednesday, 12 November, but was out for most of the country all throughout the afternoon of that Tuesday.
The blackout paralyzed mass transportation systems, including the metro and cable car, disrupted production sectors, and caused widespread inconvenience across the country.
As explained in an article by journalist Andres Tovar in El Caribe, the systemic checks built in the national grid promptly entered and protected the system. He also writes that hydroelectric power was the first to kick after the national grid was impacted by the private power plant shutdown that tripped the entire system. He highlights the key role of hydroelectric plants as a vindication of a diversification strategy.
The Abinader administration has not continued with the program to build small hydroelectric plants. At present, efforts are being carried out to remove the sediment and use the sand deposited in the hydroelectrics to replace sand dredged from rivers for construction works.
On the negative side, the shutdown had a high economic cost while creating chaos when the mass transit metro back up power systems did not enter and thousands were left stranded without the service. The Metro Office said that the backup power did not respond because the power plant system was coincidentally out for maintenance purposes, as reported in Diario Libre.
The report in the Listin Diario discards speculations there was terrorism behind the collapse of the system.
While Electricity Superintendent Andres Astacio says the government’s final report on the blackout will take time, Listin Diario publishes leaked findings from the preliminary report. The report states that the incident was directly linked to a shortage of qualified technical personnel for high-voltage operations, the absence of continuous training protocols, and inadequate operational supervision.
The technical report further indicates that human error and lack of oversight caused the blackout. The manual procedure at the San Pedro de Macorís substation caused a severe disturbance, destabilizing the electrical system and resulting in the total blackout.
Read more in Spanish:
Presidency
Presidency
El Caribe
Listin Diario
Diario Libre
Noticias SIN
Noticias SIN
Noticias SIN
Noticias SIN
CDN
CDN
En Segundos
El Nacional
El Nacional
13 November 2025