The nationwide blackout which left all of Trinidad in darkness on Wednesday, caused multiple closures of businesses and public sector offices in Port of Spain starting from around 2 pm.

Stores such as Sacha Cosmetics, Payless, Wonderful World, and the smaller stores on Frederick Street, closed immediately.

Other stores like Miguel Moses, ABC Enterprises, and Courts waited to see how long it would take for power to return, finally giving up around 3 pm in some cases.

Stores which had generators, such as UA Enterprises, Tech Access in Aboutique Mall, KFC Independence Square, Jimmy Aboud and related stores, and others remained open, with a slow trickle of customers in most. Managers and owners of those stores said they would remain open until the generators failed or a security risk was posed.

Most banks also remained open as they had generators.

On Frederick, Henry, and Charlotte Streets, roadside vendors continued business as usual with customers stopping to buy as they made their way home. Most stores, with and without generators, remained open. At Wang Li and Sons Supermarket, the manager said the store had closed but customers kept knocking at the door asking to come in to buy their groceries, so they reopened using the generator.

Office workers were seen bustling home almost immediately after the power outage happened. Schoolchildren began to trickle out around 2 pm.

At City Gate, lines for the PTSC routes to Arima and Chaguanas had begun to build around 2 pm.

Speculation and rumour ran rife concerning the cause of power outage. Some people said it was sabotage by T&TEC workers as part of a protest against the government's vaccine mandate for public service workers.

Another theory was that the trade unions were involved, for the same reason. Others compared it to the 2012 outage which left large parts of the island without power.