Tuesday, April 29

Power has returned after a massive blackout hit the entire Iberian Peninsula yesterday, knocking out electricity across Portugal and Spain.

At 12:33 pm local time, Spain's electrical grid experienced a massive failure, losing 15 gigawatts of energy-- equivalent to over 60% of the nation's demand. The outage affected the entire country, bringing everything to a halt. Portugal reported that the outage was due to an external problem, but did not give much information.

Airports had to shut down due to a lack of power, stranding air travelers. Trains stopped in the middle of the tracks, leaving passengers stuck in the middle of nowhere, and subway systems also came to a halt. Spanish officials said that over 35,000 people had to be evacuated from over 100 trains across Spain, and people were left inside for hours as they waited for emergency services to arrive.

Traffic was equally bad after every signal in every city became temporarily dysfunctional-- in some places, civilians stopped their cars and directed traffic, but roads were still a mess across major cities like Madrid and Barcelona.

Communication services were also brought down by the outage, preventing stranded travelers from contacting their friends or family. While some homes and important services like hospitals had generators, the outage lasted for a large portion of the day.

Thankfully, the outage did not last for too long. Spain was able to restore power to most of the country before the end of the day, pulling extra energy from surrounding countries and ramping up energy production at renewable energy plants to make up for the power loss.

As for the cause of the massive blackout, authorities have been left puzzled. After investigating for over 12 hours, officials could still not determine a cause-- Russian sabotage was originally thought to be the most likely cause, but any sort of cyberattack or sabotage has been ruled out.

Canada elected Mark Carney as their next Prime Minister during elections yesterday, bringing his Liberal Party into control of the country.

Canada's Liberal Party took home the win in the Canadian elections yesterday, beating the opposing Conservative Party. The Liberal Party's leader, Mark Carney, will now become Prime Minister of Canada after Justin Trudeau resigned earlier this year, beating the Conservatives' Pierre Poilievre. In fact, Poilievre even lost his Parliamentary seat, which he has held for over 20 years.

The election's primary focus was the United States and Donald Trump, who has imposed major tariffs upon Canada. Due to this, the Liberals, who hold more of an anti-Trump stance, completely flipped the election. The Conservatives were initially thought to be more likely to win the elections, but Trump's repeated threats and the imposition of tariffs quickly erased their lead. The Liberals emphasized this, connecting Trump and the Conservative Party as being on the same side and bringing them ahead.

Carney will now work to carry Canada through these tough times, which includes problems like high cost of living along with the threats of Trump. However, Canadians clearly think that he is worthy of the challenge-- he attended both Harvard and Oxford University for economics, served as the governor of the Bank of Canada for five years (including during the 2008 financial crisis), served as the governor for the Bank of England for seven years (including the time after Brexit), and served as the chair of the Financial Stability Board for seven years.

However, it is currently unclear whether the Liberals will have a majority in Parliament, as the Canadian government has not completed collecting all of the votes yet. This will be crucial, as a majority will enable the Liberals to make laws on their own, while a minority government would require the help of other parties as well.

Fact of the Day (Today): Almonds are seeds of the fruit of the almond tree, meaning that almonds are actually closely related with other fruits like peaches, plums, and cherries.

Quote of the Day (Gracious Quotes): Even a small amount of power can have a great effect when concentrated on a certain area. (Satoru Iwata)

Word of the Day (Merriam-Webster): Alacrity (noun, uh-LAK-ruh-tee) - Alacrity refers to a quick and cheerful readiness to do something.

In a Sentence: She accepted the invitation to go on the trip with an alacrity that surprised her parents, who had assumed she wouldn’t be interested.