(Montreal) Hydro-Quebec expects to have restored power to 85% of homes without electricity due to the thunderstorm on Thursday evening. The others might have to wait until Saturday or even Sunday.
At the height of the storm on Thursday, 390,000 Hydro-Quebec customers were without power. As of 4:30 p.m. Friday, nearly 55,500 subscribers still had no power due to the elements that raged during the previous hours.
About 800 workers from the state-owned company are mobilized on the ground to restore power.
Intense rain coupled with violent gusts on Thursday evening is the source of the many outages, said the head of emergency measures at Hydro-Québec, Maryse Dalpé, in a press briefing on Friday.
“It made the trees come into contact [avec les fils électriques]. When a tree collapses on our network, we can think of very strong damage, ”she described.
“These are works that are, in some places, very severe,” also explained Maryse Dalpé, adding that around 70% of breakdowns concern 50 customers or less.
On Thursday, the triggering of defense mechanisms on supply lines whose source is in James Bay had plunged nearly 500,000 customers into the dark. All of these outages have since been restored and therefore any remaining outages are due to the extreme weather conditions on Thursday evening.