Hundreds of millions without power after Indian grid goes down for second time in 2 daysRajesh Kumar Singh / AP
Heavy traffic clogged streets in central New Delhi, India, on Tuesday following power outages and rain.
By NBC News and wire reports
Updated at 8:05 a.m. ET: NEW DELHI -- Half of India's 1.2 billion people were without power Tuesday as the grids covering 19 states broke down, the second major blackout in as many days.
Stretching from Assam, near China, to the Himalayas and the deserts of Rajasthan, the power cut was the worst to hit India in more than a decade. The power loss includes grid failures in northern, eastern and northeastern India.
Trains were stranded in Kolkata and New Delhi and thousands of people poured out of the sweltering capital's modern metro system when it ground to a halt at lunchtime. Office buildings switched to diesel generators and traffic jammed the roads.
Miners trapped
Two hundred workers were stranded in three coal mines after the blackout cut off electricity to elevators in their underground pits, a mining company official told Reuters.
"We are waiting for the restoration of power to bring them up through the lifts, but there is no threat to their lives or any reason to panic," said Nildari Roy, a senior official at the mines' operator, Eastern Coalfields Limited.
The power outage is likely the largest ever in India, the Economic Times
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