British News Agency

The Finnish grid company Fingrid announced in a press release that electricity flow between Finland and Estonia through Estlink 2 is currently unavailable.

Arto Pahkin, the control room manager at Fingrid, told the Finnish broadcaster Yle that the cause of the fault is being investigated. According to Pahkin, the possibility of terrorism or vandalism cannot be ruled out.

Pahkin told Yle on Wednesday evening that at the time of the disconnection, two ships were over the submarine cable. However, he did not disclose their names.

The underwater power cable malfunction occurred weeks after another underwater internet cable was cut in the Baltic Sea.

According to the newspaper Iltalehti, the MarineTraffic service, which monitors ship movements, reported that the container ship Xin Xin Tian 2, sailing under the Hong Kong flag, was near the cable at the time of the disconnection.

Additionally, the Swedish newspaper Aftonbladet reported that another ship seen near the Estlink 2 cable might have been the Eagle S, sailing under the Cook Islands flag.

According to Fingrid, the Estlink 2 connection was severed at 12:26 PM on Christmas Day. At the time of the disconnection, 658 MW of electricity was being transferred from Finland to Estonia.

The Finnish and Estonian grid companies announced that the work to locate and fix the fault will continue early Thursday morning.