462 pigs at a hog farm in Harbin, Northeast China's Heilongjiang Province, suffocate to death due to unbearable heat after a sudden power outage. Photo: Sina Weibo

A late-night power outage in Harbin, Northeast China's Heilongjiang Province, which lasted for about five hours, has sadly caused the death of 462 pigs at a local hog farm, as they were not able to survive sustained elevated temperatures. The economic loss stands at about one million yuan ($139,000), according to the person in charge of the pig farm.

The local power grid confirmed the sudden power outage that happened at 11:30 pm on Saturday. Following emergency repairs, power supply was restored at about 5 am on Sunday, according to media reports on Thursday.

The cause of the malfunction was a tree branch that had fallen onto a household's power line, resulting in a mainline trip, according to a power maintenance worker who reported the incident.  

The person in charge of the pig farm, surnamed Liu, said the temperature in her pigsty that night rose to over 60 C. "My 462 pigs suffocated to death due to the unbearable heat. I have raised them for 150 days and they were ready to be sold to market. But now, overnight, I inexplicably ended up with a debt of about one million yuan ($139,000)," Liu said helplessly. 

Liu added that her pigs have been disposed of properly, but she has not received any reply from the power grid over the matter. "They came over and said they are not responsible for this. No one can prove that my pigs died because of the power outage, and I have to bear all the consequences on my own." 

Grid officials told media that Liu did not have commercial insurance, arguing that she has her own power generator on the pig farm but did not use it that night during the power outage. 

Local government departments are currently coordinating the matter, and Liu said if negotiations fail, she intends to file a lawsuit. 

A similar tragedy took place in Suizhou, Central China's Hubei Province, on Sunday, when the power to a fan at a chicken farm was accidentally cut off, resulting in a sharp temperature increase that turned the chicken farm into a "steamer," causing more than 4,000 chickens to perish from heat. The accident has led to heavy losses expected to exceed 200,000 yuan ($27,794).

As China stepped into "sanfu," the dog days of summer, on Tuesday, the National Meteorological Center extended an orange alert - the second-highest alert - for high temperatures, as heatwaves scorch vast swathes of the country. 

Meteorologists warned that persistent stifling temperatures, after a slight decline this week, are expected to last until the end of this month. They expressed concern over electricity shortages in China because of the persisting heatwave and suggested "rational power consumption" be practiced by the public.

Global Times