The Kenya Airports Authority (KAA) has apologized to passengers and stakeholders for the Sunday night power outage at Jomo Kenyatta International Airport (JKIA).

The airport outage was caused by a statewide blackout, which the Kenya electrical and Lighting Company (KPLC) blamed on a "suspected fault affecting the power system."

According to KAA, the airport was in darkness due to the outage because backup generators failed to activate promptly. 

PHOTO | COURTESY JKIA in darkness

“Over the past week, our generator system at JKIA has undergone rigorous testing to ensure continuous and reliable power supply. Despite these efforts, during tonight's power outage, two of our four generators, specifically those serving Terminals IA and 1E, failed to immediately activate,” KAA said in a statement on December 10, 2023. 

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“Our technical team responded swiftly to the situation, and we are pleased to report that the fault was rectified quickly. Power was fully restored to the affected terminals,” it stated, adding that they have “have initiated a comprehensive investigation to identify the root cause of the generator failure.”

PHOTO | COURTESY JKIA 

As this is the airport's third power outage in three months, KAA said it will take the required steps to maintain and improve its infrastructure and services.

In its update at 2.17 a.m., KPLC stated that normalcy had been restored in the Mt Kenya region, South Nyanza, Western, Central, North Rift, North Eastern, and most sections of Nairobi.