More than 400,000 Hydro-Québec customers, including nearly one in two Laurentians, were still without power the day after violent storms in southern Quebec.
Posted at 8:50 a.m.
Roads strewn with trees, collapsed electric poles, gutted house roofs: the significant damage left by the extreme meteorological phenomenon was numerous, and this, in several regions of the province.
In Val-Morin, in the Laurentians region, where nearly one out of two Hydro-Quebec customers was without power on Sunday morning, uprooted trees were visible on almost every street corner.
-
PHOTO Dominick Gravel, THE PRESS
An uprooted tree fell near a house in Val-Morin, in the Laurentians.
-
PHOTO Dominick Gravel, THE PRESS
Two men discuss the day after the violent storms that hit Val-Morin.
1/2
“It lasted 30-40 minutes, very strong wind with rain. From my window, I saw a fallen tree, then two, then it was a domino,” says Michael Manouk, a resident of rue Morin whose gleaming red Lexus was flattened by a spruce.
Lifted at the end of the evening, the severe thunderstorm alert sent by Environment Canada on Saturday extended from Haute-Gatineau, through Greater Montreal, to the Laurentides wildlife reserve.
This last region was the most affected in terms of power outages according to Hydro-Quebec’s report on Sunday morning.
Number of customers without electricity
“Yesterday’s weather events caused significant damage on the ground, which led to outages in several regions of Quebec,” said the state corporation on Sunday morning, specifying that it had deployed 361 teams on the ground in to restore the situation.
Five dead in Ontario
In Ontario, where the storm started, five deaths were reported in addition to a few injuries, due to strong winds from a line of destructive gusty thunderstorms, according to Environment Canada.
Photo martin roy, the law
Cars were damaged near Merrivale Road in Ottawa.
In Gatineau, a 51-year-old woman lost her life after sinking into the Ottawa River. Gatineau police have confirmed that a drowning that occurred around 5 p.m. in these waters is under investigation.
In Quebec, gusts with a maximum speed of 144 km/h were recorded at Lake Memphremagog, while they reached 128 km/h in Shawinigan, 100 km/h at Quebec Airport and 96 km/h in Trois-Rivieres.
In Quebec, gusts with a maximum speed of 144 km/h were recorded at Lake Memphremagog, while they reached 128 km/h in Shawinigan, 100 km/h at Quebec Airport and 96 km/h in Trois-Rivières, according to Environment Canada, late Saturday evening.