Achi news desk-
A total of 85,000 customers remained without power across Quebec after snow blanketed the province on Thursday.
More than 20 cm of snow was recorded at Montreal-Trudeau Airport and over 30 cm in downtown Montreal.
“In some places, power lines are down due to strong gusts of wind or the weight of broken tree branches,” notes Hydro-Québec. “We are mobilizing all available teams to work on restoring service as quickly as possible.”
According to Hydro-Quebec, 85,019 customers were without power as of 8:15 p.m
The hardest hit areas are Lorraine (32,631), Ottawa (11,086) Laval (10,639) and Monterrey (10,595). Montreal still has 4,243 Hydro-Québec customers in the dark.
“For public safety, it is essential that people stay away from power lines,” the Crown Corporation emphasizes. “If you see power lines on the ground, please stay away from the area and call 911 to secure the area.”
Part of the issue, according to Hydro-Québec, is the consistency of the snow that falls.
“The snow is actually three to six times heavier than it would normally be, so it has an impact on trees, of course. Branches broke and fell on our network and caused outages,” said Cendrix Bouchard, a spokesperson for Hydro-Québec.
A pedestrian crosses the street through the snow as a spring storm dumped over 20 cm of snow, Thursday, April 4, 2024 in Montreal. (Ryan Ramuge/The Canadian Press)At the height of the outage, Bouchard says 600,000 customers were affected.
Of that number, the utility says about 400,000 connections have been restored.
“Some people will have to wait tomorrow,” Bouchard acknowledged, though he noted that Crown Corporation believes most people should have their power back by the end of the day.
“There are 1,200 people on the ground as we speak,” he said. “We knew the weather was approaching and we were prepared and deployed our workers as soon as possible.”
The snow is expected to start melting over the next few days, as the forecast calls for warmer weather by the end of the week.
Hydro-Quebec adds that people are “absolutely not to use outdoor equipment and devices indoors,” as fuel-burning heaters, lights, generators and portable stoves designed for outdoor use can cause suffocation or poisoning if used indoors.
Snow in April is not unusual, CTV News’ Lori Graham notes.
Montreal typically sees about 13 cm of snow during the month, and the largest snowfall recorded in one day was 33.9 cm on April 9, 2000.
A man shovels snow to clear his car in Montreal (CTV News)
closing schools
- Laval School Service Center
- School service center for the wealthy
- Alf Haim School Service Center
- Summers School Service Center
- Lester B. Pearson School Board
- Sir Wilfrid Laurier School Board
Riverside School Board
- Courtland Park International School
- Harold Napper School
- Mountainview School
day care
- CPE les Bois Verts
- CPE Dollard
- CPE Hebrew Foundation
- CPE Lachine
More closures
- Fournier Academic Center
- School Integration Center Ltd
- Graves Adventist Academy
- The Hebrew Fund School
- JEM workshop
- Marianopolis College
- Miss Edgars and Miss Crumps School
- Peter Hall School
- Rotiwanhaka School
- Vice: High school
- Holy Heart School
- Psega School
- Vanguard School
Trafalgar Girls School says today will start late, at 10am
The school states that “the doors and supervision will be as usual for anyone who arrives earlier. The regular classes will be held according to a different schedule.”
