Leiria, Portugal, Feb. 18, 2026 (Lusa) - The president of Portugal's Central Region Reconstruction Mission Structure, Paulo Fernandes, revealed on Wednesday that there are still almost 84,000 people without communications following the recent bad weather.
"As of today, we have around 84,000 customers who do not have communications. We started on the 30th [of January] with 307,900, including mobile and landline users," Paulo Fernandes told journalists in Leiria, in an update on the damage and the work underway for recovery, three weeks after the Kristin depression hit the country.
Paulo Fernandes clarified that, in about 40% of cases, the problem is due to the "arrival of electricity" to the antennas.
"We have been distributing “starlinks” [equipment] so that people in these more grey areas can have some response, and we have also redefined with the intermunicipal communities all the advanced Citizen Service vehicles, so that they can gather and adjust, every two days, the routes to the dark areas," i.e., those without telecommunications, he said.
The Mission Structure leader explained that the National Communications Authority had reported the activation of national roaming, something that "could help."
"There are several operators, and not all operators have suffered the same damage, meaning that as long as one antenna was working, it could be shared, which could speed up the process of reducing the number of grey areas in our territory," he said.
E-Redes, the main operator of the electricity distribution network in mainland Portugal for high, medium and low voltage networks, reported that at 8 a.m., "in the area most critically affected by the Kristin depression, there were around 7,600 customers without power".
Paulo Fernandes clarified that "these 7,600 customers who currently have no power are in Leiria, Pombal, less so in Marinha Grande, but mainly in Leiria and Pombal" where the numbers are highest in absolute terms.
The leader also clarified that, in the medium voltage area, there is already a schedule in place, according to which "from next Sunday until the 23rd, which is Monday, all medium voltage for businesses will be connected".
Paulo Fernandes noted that "of the 140 businesses that were not connected to medium voltage, 77 were in industrial areas".
"The problem of being in industrial areas without medium voltage in itself highlights the enormous difficulty of bringing medium voltage, also through high voltage, to the industrial areas themselves, but it also means something else in this territory that should make us reflect: we have a very large percentage of large companies that are outside industrial areas," he observed.
Paulo Fernandes also assured that "in the coming days, it will also be announced when all local authorities will have zero problems in terms of low voltage."
"I asked E-Redes to present the final schedule for the total restoration of power to the affected local authorities."
Eighteen people have died in Portugal as a result of the Kristin, Leonardo and Marta storms, which also left many hundreds injured and homeless.
The total or partial destruction of homes, businesses and equipment, fallen trees and structures, the closure of roads, schools and transport services, and power, water and communications outages, flooding and extreme rainfall are the main material consequences of the storms.
The Central, Lisbon and Tagus Valley and Alentejo regions were the most affected.
The state of emergency covering the 68 most affected districts ended on Sunday.
SR/AYLS // AYLS
Lusa
