Finnish Prime Minister Petteri Orpo announced on Wednesday that a power cable connecting Finland and Estonia beneath the Baltic Sea has experienced an outage, prompting an investigation into the incident.
In a statement on X, Prime Minister Orpo confirmed that power transmission through the Estlink-2 cable stopped on Wednesday and that authorities were investigating the issue.
He reassured that the disruption would not affect Finland’s electricity supply.
According to public broadcaster ERR, Estonian network operator Elering stated that there was sufficient spare capacity to meet Estonia’s power demands despite the outage of the Estlink-2 cable.
Concerns over undersea infrastructure in the Baltic region have intensified following recent incidents.
In November, two data cables—one linking Finland and Germany, the other connecting Lithuania and Sweden—were severed.
Germany’s defense minister suggested that the incident might have been “sabotage,” though no evidence or specific culprits were identified. This comment was made during a speech on hybrid warfare threats from Russia.
The Nord Stream natural gas pipelines, which once carried gas from Russia to Germany, were damaged by underwater explosions in September 2022.
Authorities have classified the incident as sabotage and launched criminal investigations.
Meanwhile, the Estlink-2 cable had been out of operation for much of the year due to damage from a short circuit, possibly caused by the cable’s complex positioning, according to ERR.
