MONTREAL, July 22, 2013 /CNW Telbec/ - Following the severe thunderstorms that swept through southern Québec during the evening of Friday, July 19, causing numerous outages and extensive damage in certain locations, Hydro-Québec has restored service to over 90% of its affected customers. All crews were mobilized to restore service as quickly as possible.
By 11 a.m. on Monday, July 22, there were still over 1,500 outages affecting about 44,000 customers throughout Québec. Given the high number of outages, our crews are required to carry out several operations to restore power to a limited number of customers at a time.
Hundreds of employees and contractors are continuing their efforts to rebuild heavily damaged portions of the power system and restore service as quickly as possible. Hydro-Québec would like to thank all affected customers for their patience and understanding.
Contrary to certain allegations reported in the Journal de Montréal, Hydro-Québec has not reduced its vegetation control budget in recent years. The current situation is unique given that, in many cases, the trees and branches that fell on the power system were not near the distribution lines. Hydro-Québec has a cyclical pruning program in place and dedicated teams that carry out this work. The company ensures the work is conducted in accordance with all applicable requirements.
Hydro-Québec expects to restore service to the various regions as follows:
Laval: service has been restored to close to 85% of affected customers. In some of the hardest hit areas, service is expected to be restored by some time Tuesday. In some isolated cases, the work could go on until Wednesday.
Outaouais, Laurentides and Lanaudière: service has been restored to over 80% of affected customers. In some of the hardest hit areas, the work could go on until Wednesday.
Montréal, Montérégie and Saguenay-Lac-Saint-Jean: service has been restored to all affected customers.
At the height of the disturbances, nearly 560,000 households were without power. In total, Hydro-Québec had to deal with approximately 6,000 outages.
Hydro-Québec would like to remind its customers to stay away from power lines and to exercise caution when working near its facilities.
SOURCE: Hydro-Québec
Media Team
514 289-5005
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