Fathallah Shalaby, head of the Egyptian Electricity Transmission Company, said that a sudden malfunction in main transformers was behind the power outages in a number of Upper Egypt governorates Wednesday evening.
Governorates in Upper Egypt experienced a wave a blackouts Wednesday evening, leading shops to close.
Qena, Red Sea, Assiut, Sohag, Minya Luxor, Aswan and New Valley experienced power outages lasting between several minutes to more than half an hour.
Minister of Electricity Ahmed Imam announced the formation of a technical committee to study the causes of the incident, Shalaby said.
At 6:37 pm Wednesday four circuits malfunctioned at Samalout power station, he said.
Edited translation from Al-Masry Al-Youm
