Tens of thousands of Hydro-Québec customers were without energy on Monday morning as a result of frozen rain.
The vast majority of these clients were in Lanaudière and Laurentians, and the public services company said that the areas around Rawdon and Saint-Jérôme were among the most affected.
To the south of the city of Quebec, the number of interruptions in the Chaudière-ApalaACHES region reached its maximum point in 17,000 on Monday morning, but that number had fallen to only two at 3:30 pm
This weekend, Environment Canada issued an frozen rain warning for western, central and southern parts of Quebec. The areas covered by the warning were expected to receive between five and 10 millimeters of ice accumulation.
According to Hydro-Québec, half of the interruptions in Lanaudière and Laurentians were caused by tree branches that fell into electric lines after being overwhelmed by the accumulation of frozen rain, but added that other interruptions were due to the switch of the stumbling system.
At 11 am, around 50,000 clients in those two regions were still without energy, below several hours before.
At 4:30 pm, just over 12,600 remained without energy.
Despite an improvement in the number of affected customers, the public services company said it is difficult to say when energy will return to all.
“Our teams are doing everything possible to restore power as quickly as possible,” says a message on the Hydro-Québec website.
“Given the volume of interruptions, the estimated restoration times for households without energy in the regions of Lanaudière and Laurentidides can take a little more than usual to communicate.”
On Monday morning an frozen rain warning had risen in the city of Quebec and Trois-Rivières on Monday morning at 3:30 pm other regions, including Saguenay, Lac-Saint-Jean, Bajo St. Lawrence, the areas of the Jaspé and North Shore Peninsula were still under a meteorological advisor.
“Our teams will be ready to intervene in the regions where the system could affect our network,” said Hydro-Québec spokeswoman, Caroline Desrosiers.
The ice rain also arrived in Ontario this weekend, where 390,000 clients were still without energy to Monday morning. The public services company in Ontario said it could spend days before the energy restorates for each client affected.
