By Alex Pios @ Adobe Stock
When the lights go out, like they did last week in Spain and Portugal, you don’t want to rely on being able to beg your way for food and water. Which is why having cash on hand may be your saving grace to remove some of the uncertainty in desperate times.
Many Spaniards and Portuguese took the power outages in stride, settling in to enjoy some time without the pesky internet bothering their day. They enjoyed a glass of wine or beer in the local park, as developer Alex Socoloff explained in a post on X.com:
Massive power blackout in Spain and Portugal! No internet, payment are off and flights are cancelled.
Media: Chaos! People are in Panic!
What really happened: We just took blankets, beer and had a great time all together. pic.twitter.com/VQsxXexmEc
— Alex Socoloff (@socoloffalex) April 28, 2025
But for people stuck in airports, and train stations, and those who needed basic supplies, things were trickier. Some shoppers began panic buying, and riders were forced to walk through tunnels on metro systems.
The large, massive power outage that broke out in Portugal, Spain, and parts of France just shows the chaos that will occur when the Earth’s magnetic field totally diminishes, as we are currently in a geomagnetic excursion.
The super markets are using electricity from their… pic.twitter.com/TcnxFvw5BA
— Open Minded Approach (@OMApproach) April 28, 2025
Spain in chaos after massive power blackout.
— Defiant L’s (@DefiantLs) April 28, 2025
Up on the surface, most traffic situations were reportedly handled with courtesy, but as you can see in the video below, there were some snarls.
No power in Portugal and Spain!! Wow!! Chaos pic.twitter.com/STgIt1xcx9
— Sonto Ndlovu❤ (@sontondlovu) April 28, 2025
The most frightening outcome of the blackout, even after power was restored in many areas, was that digital payments became impossible while the internet was down, and cash was, once again, king. Watch below as Euronews reporter Sándor Zsíros describes the situation:
“Card payments aren’t working. You can’t buy food without cash.”
Euronews reporter @EuroSandor, in Valencia for the EPP Congress, reports on the nationwide power outage in Spain. pic.twitter.com/kO6wggLmMI
— euronews (@euronews) April 29, 2025
Action Line: How much cash do you have on hand? Is it enough to buy your groceries for the week? How about a taxi ride home from work without access to a payment app? Do you have enough to pay for your next prescription refill? Think of your cash in terms of categories. You need survival cash. That’s cash that will be there for you when the power goes out. Maybe start with a month’s worth of essentials (food, medicine, gas, tolls, etc.). The other category is your lazy cash. This is cash that’s sitting in your accounts, not earning you anything. Put that cash to work. When you want to talk about putting your lazy cash to work, and about how Your Survival Guy is preparing with his own cash, email me at ejsmith@yoursurvivalguy.com. And click here to subscribe to my free monthly Survive & Thrive letter.
Originally posted on Your Survival Guy.
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