B.C. Hydro scrambles to restore power to thousands of South Coast customers
Wind and heavy rain across the South Coast of British Columbia have resulted in tens of thousands of residents losing power.
B.C. Hydro said the number of outages peaked at close to 100,000 overnight on Tuesday on Vancouver Island, the Gulf Islands, the Sunshine Coast and the Lower Mainland.
As of 8:30 a.m. PT, B.C. Hydro said about 26,000 customers remained without power, primarily in Duncan, Ladysmith, Maple Ridge and North Vancouver.
Updates about the pace of restoration can be found here. Crews are expected to bring all disrupted customers back online Wednesday.
"It was heavy winds and rain that contributed to the outages and after a drought-ridden summer and early fall there was a lot of vegetation and trees that were damaged and that came down into power lines, causing outages," said spokesperon Susie Rieder.
B.C. Hydro has a vegetation management program which identifies dead or weakened trees that can pose a danger to transmission lines in the fall and winter.
"So, we have been incredibly proactive on that," said Rieder.
B.C. Hydro is advising residents to be prepared for more storm-related power outages this fall and winter by having an emergency kit with 72 hours worth of supplies in it.
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Environment Canada is forecasting winds gusting up to 50 km/h in many parts of the South Coast on Wednesday.
Eastern parts of Vancouver Island, meanwhile, are under a rainfall warning.
WATCH: Rainy conditions across southern British Columbia
This article was originally published for CBC News.
Thumbnail image courtesy of B.C. Hydro via CBC.
