2nd LD: South Australia blackout due to monstrous storm

The entire state of South Australia has been without power supply as the state was hit hard by a monstrous storm on Wednesday afternoon, South Australian Power Networks confirmed.

SA Power Networks said on its official twitter account that the outage is due to upstream supply.

"We are not receiving upstream power supply from the transmission network and as such the whole state is currently without supply," it twitted.

South Australian Premier Jay Weatherill twitted the outage news and urged residents to use battery-powered radio and tune in to local station to get information that the government has to announce.

SA Department of Transport said all the electric trains and trams have been stopped service. It is learned that the power supply to the Adelaide Airport and hospitals in the state has been cut.

Witnesses told Xinhua that the traffic lights in downtown Adelaide are not working. Drivers on the road are urged to drive carefully. Fixed telephone lines have been down while the internet is still working.

Office buildings all went dark. There have been incidents where people got trapped in elevators when the power supply was cut. Fortunately, those trapped managed to free themselves later.

There have been no report about casualties so far. SA residents are warned to be prepared for more severe thunderstorm and wild wind. Endite