Hydro crews across eastern Ontario and western Quebec are working to restore power to more than 100,000 residents after a severe storm on April 29.
Strong winds and heavy rain resulted in trees and branches falling on power lines and breaking poles and wires. Entire trees were uprooted in areas with very wet or soft ground.
An outage map showed roughly 30,000 Hydro One customers still without power across Ontario as of 3:30 p.m. on April 30. Nearly 76,000 Quebec residents were still without power as of 10 a.m. on April 30, with most of the outages affecting the Laurentians north of Montreal as well as the Montérégie and Outaouais regions.
“We have mobilized additional crews from unaffected areas, along with contractor support, to assist with restoration efforts,” Hydro One said on social media. “As work is completed in some locations, crews will be redeployed to areas still without power.”
Hydro One estimated that most customers would have power by the end of the day on April 30, while some areas had longer waits ahead.
“Damage assessments are ongoing so we can assign estimated restoration times to each outage,” Hydro One said. “Restoration times for some outages in the Strathroy and Guelph areas are being reassessed and may be updated as repairs progress and additional damage is found.”
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Hydro Ottawa crews were also working to repair damages caused by the storm and to restore power for their customers.
“Our crews are working hard to restore power to the approximately 400 customers still without electricity following yesterday evening’s severe weather,” Hydro Ottawa said on the morning of April 30 on social media.
Significant progress was made to restore power in the areas of Woodroffe, Lincoln Heights, Twin Elms, Epworth, and Ramsayville by late morning on April 30, the utility provider said.
An outage map showed less than 40 customers were still without power in Ottawa as of 3:30 p.m. on April 30.
Quebec
Hydro Québec said it had more than 500 crews working to restore power to customers.
The storm caused major power outages in Western Quebec, with 144,000 customers losing power, Hydro Québec said. Wind gusts of more than 100 kilometres per hour in some areas caused significant damage to equipment, which is now in need of repair.
Warnings by Environment Canada were made on the day of the storm to alert Quebec residents that thunderstorms consisting of large hail, heavy rain, and strong wind gusts were heading east through Quebec.
In the Ahuntsic-Cartierville borough of Montreal, a 15-year-old boy became stuck under a fallen tree during the storm. He was seriously injured.
Montreal’s Maisonneuve-Rosemont hospital lost power for part of the evening on April 29, and a piece of infrastructure in Laval caught fire in the storm. The next morning, Montreal’s Highway 19 in Laval was closed in both directions to repair the infrastructure damage.
The Canadian Press contributed to this report.
