00:00Tens of thousands of homes in Berlin will remain without electricity until Thursday as authorities race to repair severely damaged power cables following a suspected arson attack.
00:14Officials warned that some residents may also be left without heating as the outage has disrupted local systems amid snowfall and near freezing temperatures in the German capital.
00:24Emergency services were alerted early Saturday after several high voltage cables caught fire on a bridge near the Lichterfelde heat and power station.
00:33While firefighters quickly extinguished the blaze, the damage left about 45.500 households and 2.200 businesses in southwest Berlin without power, according to grid operator Stromnetz Berlin.
00:47Das bedeutet eben, dass 45.000 Haushalte keinen Strom haben bei Temperaturen um den Gefrierpunkt bei Schneefall im heutigen Tage.
00:56Des Weiteren sind mehrere Krankenhäuser und Pflegeeinrichtungen in diesem Gebiet, die eben auch davon betroffen sind.
01:02Und wie wir auch vor kurzem erfahren haben, wird sich dieser Stromausfall hier noch mehrere Tage ziehen,
01:07so dass wir also einen langwierigen Einsatz vor uns haben und dann auch vor allem die Versorgung der Patienten und Patienten in diesen Krankenhäusern und Pflegeeinrichtungen bei uns in den Vordergrund rückt.
01:18Affected hospitals and care facilities have been supplied with emergency generators as authorities prioritize patient care.
01:26Berlin authorities later said around 35.000 households are expected to remain without electricity until Thursday afternoon,
01:33while power should be restored to other homes by early Sunday.
01:38The outage has also affected mobile phone services, landlines, and the district heating network, which relies on electricity.
01:46Local train stations were also impacted as electronic displays and ticket machines stopped working, although train services continued.
01:55Stromnetz Berlin warned that repairs would take considerable time, with cold weather complicating efforts to replace underground cables.
02:02Wir sind hier im Bereich eines unserer Umspannwerke und hier werden wir in den nächsten Stunden und wohl auch Tagen eine große Reparatur machen müssen,
02:13weil um die Haushalte wieder zu versorgen, müssen wir unser Hochspannungskabel mindestens eines reparieren.
02:20Das ist eine große Herausforderung, nicht nur bei den widrigen Umständen, die wir momentan haben, sondern in dem Fall auch technisch eine hochkomplexe Aufgabe.
02:27Police have deployed about 160 officers to the scene and are investigating the incident as a suspected arson attack.
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