An underwater power line between Finland and Estonia went down on the afternoon of December 25. The head of the control room, Arto Pahkin, said the cause of the outage was under investigation. He said terrorism or vandalism could not be ruled out.
Points of attention
- The underwater power line between Finland and Estonia was damaged, leading to an interruption in electricity transmission, with possible causes being terrorism or vandalism.
- The incident is under investigation, with concerns raised about the impact on the electricity supply of both countries sharing the Estlink connections.
- Prime Minister of Finland reassures that the power outage will not affect the electricity supply of the country, with Estlink 1 operating normally while Estlink 2's capacity being 658 megawatts.
- Ships above the submarine cable at the time of the transmission link loss raise questions, with vessels like Xin Xin Tian 2 and Eagle S mentioned in connection to the incident.
- The search for the fault in the Estlink 2 power line will continue, with updates awaited on the investigation and restoration progress.
Underwater power line between Finland and Estonia damaged
Pahkin told Yle on Wednesday evening that there were two ships above the submarine cable at the same time when the transmission link was lost.
According to Iltalehti, according to the MarineTraffic service, which monitors ship traffic, the Hong Kong-flagged container ship Xin Xin Tian 2 was near an electrical cable at the same moment when communication was lost.
According to the Swedish Aftonbladet, the Xin Xin Tian 2 is a sister ship to the Newnew Polar Bear. The Chinese Newnew Polar Bear damaged the Balticconnector gas pipeline in October 2023.
Additionally, Aftonbladet says that another vessel that could be seen near the Estlink 2 cable today would be the Eagle S, which flies the flag of the Cook Islands.
The search for the fault will continue tomorrow morning.
Damage to the Estlink 2 power line: what is known
According to Fingrid, the Estlink 2 connection was interrupted on Christmas Day at 12:26 p.m. According to the company, the connection's power transmission at the time of the outage was 658 MW from Finland to Estonia.
Prime Minister Petteri Orpo commented on the issue in X. According to him, the power outage will not affect the electricity supply of Finns.
Finland and Estonia jointly own the Estlink 1 and Estlink 2 connections. Estlink 1 is operating normally.
The electricity transmission capacity of Estlink 2 is 658 megawatts, while the capacity of Estlink 1 is smaller — 350 megawatts.
The total length of Estlink 2 is about 170 km. About 145 km of the cable runs along the seabed.
