The violent winds that swept the Pontiac on Friday evening brought trees and other debris crashing down on powerlines across the territory, leaving over 10,000 residences in the dark that night.
In an email Saturday, Hydro-Québec spokesperson Annie Beaudoin said 67,231 customers across the province were affected by the outages at their peak, 23,000 of which were in the Outaouais and 10,100 of which were in the Pontiac alone. In a statement on its website, Hydro-Québec said outages were caused by wind gusts reaching up to 90 km/h in some areas.
“Significant damage was caused to Hydro-Québec’s power grid,” Beaudoin said. “Broken trees that had fallen onto power lines, poles that needed replacing, and downed wires made our workers’ task more difficult.”
She said more than 200 crews were deployed across the province to restore service to customers, though the utility provider did not provide a number for how many were working in the Pontiac region specifically.
By Monday morning, 391 Pontiac homes were still without power thanks to 20 outages that were unresolved between Sheenboro and Luskville.
