The impact of the heavy rainfall left by Storm Debby was still being felt in many parts of Quebec on Monday, but power is gradually returning to normal.
According to Hydro-Québec, only ‘a few hundred’ households that lost power as Debby swept through on Friday still had power on Monday.
In some cases, these were more isolated homes or cottages. In other cases, reconnecting is more complex, as the utility’s crews are having difficulty getting to the site due to road damage.
“We go where we can, but we always have to go where it’s safe. We have bucket trucks that weigh a certain amount, so the roads have to be repaired by the municipalities before we can get there,” explained Pascal Poinlane, spokesperson for Hydro-Québec, in an interview.
At the height of the event on Friday evening, 550,000 Hydro-Québec customers were plunged into darkness across the province.
On Monday, most of the remaining outages affected fewer than five customers (5,000 total), so teams of fitters had to work harder to reconnect just a few addresses.
– This report by The Canadian Press was first published in French on Aug. 12, 2024.