BC Hydro: Outages on Van Island and Gulf Islands restored by Dec. 31
Posted December 26, 2018 9:54 am.
Last Updated December 26, 2018 3:28 pm.
This article is more than 5 years old.
VANCOUVER (NEWS 1130) — BC Hydro says it has restored service to 99 per cent of customers whose power went out after the wind storm last Thursday.
The utility expects to have power for the remaining 6,500 up and running by Dec. 31., relying on some 120 crews on Vancouver Island and the Gulf Islands. In total 900 crews have been working around the clock to get British Columbians their power back. They repaired 1,100 spans of wire, 350 power poles, 500 cross-arms and 200 transformers.
“The vast majority of customers on Vancouver Island will be restored by Dec. 27, with the exception of Bamfield, which will be restored by Dec. 28,” and where BC Hydro says the damage is so extensive that portions of the distribution system have to be rebuilt.
“Many of the southern Gulf Islands were the hardest hit areas. The storm damaged hundreds of power lines, poles, cross-arms and transformers and left roads completely covered by trees and vegetation.”
According to a BC Hydro press release, the following islands are still waiting for restoration:
Mora Scott with the utility says last Thursday’s wind storm was one of the worst they’ve ever experienced, and caused devastation across Southern BC. She says some areas are severely impacted by uprooted trees, and toppled wires…which means power won’t be up and running anytime soon.
“We’ve made some really good progress over the past several of days and have restored power to more than 97 per cent of customers impacted,” Scott tells NEWS 1130. “That includes all customers in the Lower Mainland and the Fraser Valley.”
Scott adds many crew members have been pulled off their own holidays to deal with the outages, with more than 800 field workers around the clock, and crews from Alberta and the East Coast have also been called in to help.
“Some of the customers in the hardest hit areas — places like Bamfield, Cowichan and many in the southern Gulf Islands — are going to be without power through at least a few more days,” she says.
” To replace something like a power pole and restring wires, that’s technically a mini construction job for us and it can take up to eight hours, so when you have hundreds of these individual outages, it does take a lot of time to get everybody back up.”
BC Hydro estimates it will restore power to all of Vancouver Island by Thursday, while the Gulf Islands will have to wait until Dec. 31.
— with files from Taran Parmar
