Accident on power line leaves Georgia without power

Electricity went out in former Soviet republic of Georgia late Wednesday, leaving hundreds of people stranded in halted subway trains in the capital and sending authorities scrambling after an accident on a power line.

Photo: Accident on power line leaves Georgia without power

The outage hit most of eastern Georgia, including the capital, Tbilisi, said Energy Minister Nika Gilauri. He said it affected some 2.5 million people.

Gilauri told The Associated Press the outage was caused by an accident on a power line, but he gave no details and said the cause of the accident was not immediately known.

Most of Tbilisi appeared to be without power following the outage, which occurred shortly before 11:00 p.m. (1900GMT). A subway system official said engineers were planning to use diesel engines to haul stranded subway trains to stations so that passengers could get out.