Sweltering Iranians were warned by their rulers Friday to shut off their air conditioners during peak hours as the country’s power grid came under strain from US attacks.
Tehran’s Ministry of Energy said in a statement that shutoffs were necessary “to help ensure a stable electricity supply in the southern provinces, which are currently facing extreme heat and attacks on electricity supply facilities.”
The statement did not specify whether power plants, transmission lines or other equipment had been attacked.
Temperatures in the capital were forecast to hit triple digits Friday with highs of 102 expected on both Saturday and Sunday.
In the port of Bandar Abbas, focus of the latest American bombing campaign, temperatures were predicted to hover in the high-90s and top out at 105 on Sunday.
The overnight strikes into Friday hit road and rail bridges with the goal of cutting off Bandar Abbas from the rest of Iran.
The attacks also collapsed a tower at Iran’s Chabahar port on the Gulf of Oman, a key trade route for landlocked, neighboring Afghanistan, the state-run IRNA news agency reported.
Chabahar, which Iran had been running with support from India, has been a repeated target of American airstrikes.
Friday marked the sixth consecutive day of US airstrikes, which Iran’s Health Ministry claims has killed at least 38 people and wounded more than 400.
Tehran retailiated by attacking US partners in the region with missiles and other projectiles. In Kuwait, authorities said Iran attacked a power and water desalination plant, causing widespread damage to the station.
About 90% of drinking water comes from desalination — and any disruption can threaten life.
The Kuwaitis said they had extinguished the blaze and was working to assess the damage and get the station working again.
In Qatar, the public was warned twice to take shelter as air defenses fired to intercept the missiles. Doha’s Interior Ministry said falling debris wounded a child.
Jordan’s military said it intercepted three incoming missiles Friday morning launched by Iran.
Explosions also could be heard Friday morning in Irbil and Sulaymaniyah in northern Iraq’s semiautonomous Kurdish region as air defenses targeted incoming fire. The attack apparently targeted the Iranian Kurdish dissident group Komala, killing at least nine people and wounding others, said an official who spoke on condition of anonymity for security reasons.
Iran did not immediately claim the attack but has targeted Komala in the past.
Also on Friday, a tanker came under attack traveling through the Strait of Hormuz taking the route closest to Oman, the British military said.
The report from the United Kingdom Maritime Trade Operations center said the ship sustained minor damage without any of its crew being injured.
With Post wires
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