Power failure in Madrid: « Hundreds of taxis, but everyone is already full »

I was in Madrid for a few days at the weekend, on Saturday evening my favorite band Mägo de Oz played, which also comes from there. That means I arrived in Madrid on Friday evening, and I wanted to go back on Monday.

And everything was great, I was in the Hotel Palacio San Martin, in the middle of the center, close to the Plaza Mayor, 200 meters from the palace, exactly right in the middle of it. The concert was fantastic after a day with perfect weather in a concert hall with 10,000 people, a great evening.

Then came the first surprise on Sundays, because in Madrid there was marathon – which I did not have as a sports editor of all people on the piece. And I still thought, but that’s stupid for the people who have to go to the airport today, because everything was cordoned off. And I was glad that I was only flying on Mondays.

Dark shops, cold cola

On Monday morning everything was still relaxed, I went for a walk and ran out of the city a bit. And on the way back I wanted to buy drinks and noticed that everything was dark in the small shops. Everywhere. The drinks I bought were still cold, so the current must have been gone. But at first I couldn’t find out what’s going on.

And then everything suddenly became more and more hectic: a lot of police, military, fire brigade, but still not that I would have become restless. But: In front of every restaurant, all the waiter, all the chefs, were at the door. It looked like a general strike. Crazy.

At that point, the gran was already tight, that was still at the very beginning, but the traffic lights had already failed. And little by little a lot of cars and people thawed, that was incredible. Then word got around like this: power failure in Spain, Portugal and France.

At first I waited in the hotel, but after an hour it was clear that it was probably not done so quickly. My flight went at 8:00 p.m., my plan was to drive to the airport around 4 p.m., but of course that didn’t work anymore – no cell phone network, no telephone, and a huge traffic jam. So I am on foot to the retiropark and Puerta de Alcalá because I had hope to get a « real » taxi.

However, more people had the idea, it seemed to me that there were hundreds of thousands of people on the street. Unimaginable. The police cordoned everything off, including the roundabout, so I went on a taxi hunt, but they were all full. Then I wanted to go to the bus, when the army had set up such grids to organize the snakes, the ones were over two kilometers long, through entire blocks of flats.

Then I teamed up with an Italian who also wanted to go to the airport – his wife stood on the other side of the street and tried it. Occupied taxis passed every second. And the time became scarcer and the streets were incredibly full.

Help in Italian

So at some point my new colleague got a 50 euro note and wanted to pay normal drivers to take us to the airport. But that didn’t work either. Then at some point a young teacher who had studied in Italy and lived near the airport. He was then able to convince them without the fifties in Italian that she takes us and we still collect his wife. And in the end she drove us three to the airport – Carmen, the rescuer in need.

And interestingly, everything was free on the way out of the city – only through the city everything was full. And at the airport was a ghost mood because many simply didn’t make it until then. Most flights have still started, only partially late because not all gates worked. My plane was also sent from one gate to the next. That took about an hour and a half, but was very well organized.

The plane itself was only half full. The pilot has announced that the luggage system had completely failed, the luggage was then checked manually. And then I was in Luxembourg shortly before midnight. With sunburn and pretty tired.

At that time I would describe the mood in Madrid as hectic, but not as panicked. In retrospect, it was already a very tense situation, no phone, no cell phone, no ATM, nothing of the one otherwise relying on. And this completely bizarre picture that all terrace tables are fully occupied, but there is no food anywhere. Some have made hamster purchases. My neighbor in the plane said that the subway simply stopped and then all had to run back through the dark tunnel.

This impression does not go past one very trace – I have been thinking a few thoughts since then.

Source: recorded by Tom Rüdell