When Spain and Portugal Went Dark, Starlink Kept Users Online: It Was ‘Even Better Than Usual’

First, the power went out. Then mobile networks connection dropped, and people couldn’t make calls. Something big had happened.

Starlink was the exception. With no Wi-Fi or cellular service, many people in Spain were completely cut off. While some operators managed to partially restore service using backup cell tower generators, only Starlink users who could power their routers and antennas enjoyed a stable, fast connection throughout the day.

With more than 7,000 Starlink satellites in orbit, SpaceX’s constellation over the Iberian Peninsula operated without significant issues. The satellites communicate with each other, and while they rely on ground stations to access the Internet, those stations come equipped with generators, solar panels and batteries to handle power outages.

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A YouTuber in Málaga stayed online during the blackout. Alex, a YouTuber known as Redskull, lives in the Axarquía region of Málaga. He lost power between 12:30 and 17:45 but didn’t regain mobile connectivity until the following day. Starlink, however, kept him online.

“It worked for the entire blackout duration,” he told Xataka On. “Download and upload speeds were even better than usual: about 300 Mbps download and 30 Mbps upload.”

The improved performance likely came from fewer users being online during the outage. “Normally, Starlink speeds are slower at night because the network is more congested. That wasn’t the case yesterday,” Alex added.

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He powered his setup with the Jackery Explorer 1000 V2 Power Station, a large external battery that gave him 12 hours of use, including enough juice to run a mesh Wi-Fi network in his home. Thanks to a 100W solar panel, he didn’t use up the full battery during the day.

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A connected family in Barcelona. In L’Ametlla del Vallès, a village in the province of Barcelona, the Graells family also stayed connected. Their detached house runs on solar panels and Tesla batteries, and two members of the household work remotely. They learned of the outage only through a notification from the Tesla app—because their Internet stayed up via Starlink.

“The connection was the same as every day, very good for individual use,” Eduardo Graells told Xataka On. “Ping of 22 milliseconds. Download about 150 to 200 Mbps. Upload about 15 Mbps. We used it continuously from early morning until 6 p.m. At 8 p.m., we were watching YouTube and some shows. The power came back in our area at 2:30 a.m.”

Despite the 14-hour outage, the Graells family experienced a normal day, keeping an eye on their battery levels. Their Tesla battery dropped from 70% to 40% during the blackout.

“Starlink can have a one- to two-second interruption when it switches satellites, and it’s very occasional. You only notice it during a video conference. If you’re watching movies, soccer, Formula 1, etc., you don’t notice it—probably due to buffering,” he explained.

Five ground stations in Spain. Starlink recently opened two more ground stations on the Iberian Peninsula: one in the province of Barcelona and another in Santa Olalla, Toledo. That brings the total to five, adding to existing stations in Madrid, Huelva, and Alicante. These facilities proved resilient during the blackout.

The stations are relatively small but easy to recognize by their many phased array antennas, housed in white domes. They connect the satellite constellation to Starlink’s control centers and act as gateways, transmitting client data to the wider Internet. In effect, they serve as critical intermediaries, keeping Starlink’s customers online even when the rest of the grid falters.

Image | Evgeny Opanasenko (Unsplash)

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