A fallen tree rests in the front yard of a house on Wallace Avenue in Fredericton on Dec. 19.Stephen MacGillivray/The Canadian Press
A powerful storm that lashed the Maritimes this week has left tens of thousands of customers facing prolonged power outages as crews rush to repair lines ahead of more severe weather forecast for the region in the coming days.
New Brunswick fared the worst with strong winds and heavy rain causing “severe and widespread” damage throughout the province, especially in Charlotte County and southwestern parts.
“Some roads are impassable. Many buildings have been damaged and there are many power lines down. The impact is extensive,” Kyle Leavitt, director of emergency management for New Brunswick, told reporters at a news conference Tuesday.
The storm was the result of a low-pressure system colliding with a massive high-pressure system in the Atlantic Ocean. It created a slow-moving storm with powerful winds that snapped trees and downed power lines.
NB Power vice-president of operations Nicole Poirier said customers should be prepared for prolonged outages. “It’s too early to give you an exact date,” she said, when asked if the power would be restored in time for Christmas. “We need to take the time to assess the situation.”
Ms. Poirier told reporters that 700 crew are working to restore power first to critical services such as hospitals, police and fire, and respond to emergency calls that affect public safety before turning to dense residential areas and then rural communities. About 87,000 customers were without power as of mid-afternoon Tuesday – at the darkest time of the year.
Warming centres will stay open throughout the province as temperatures are expected to drop this week, said New Brunswick Minister of Public Safety Kris Austin, who is helping co-ordinate the response. “If you don’t have to travel and you’re in an area that’s been hard hit, probably best to stay home,” he said. “We’re just a few days away from the holidays and we know people are travelling and wanting to visit their loved ones.”
Several school districts closed schools in Nova Scotia and New Brunswick on Tuesday because of power outages caused by winds gusting up to 100 kilometres an hour in some parts.
Environment Canada meteorologist Ian Hubbard said another storm is forecast to strengthen as it moves up the coast and will likely pummel some eastern and northern parts of Nova Scotia and Newfoundland and Labrador with rain this week, before changing to snow late in the day Friday. Early forecasts for Newfoundland show the rainfall amount could be 100 millimetres or higher, he added.
“It’s going to be a messy situation, probably with some significant snow accumulation, strong winds and reduced visibility. We’re looking at a period of freezing rain as well. It’s shaping up to be quite a weather maker,” said Mr. Hubbard.
In preparation, Newfoundland has activated the Provincial Emergency Operations Centre and asked local service districts to review their emergency management plans. In a statement, the government said it’s monitoring the approaching weather system, which is expected to bring heavy rainfall and potential localized flooding to the southwest and western parts of the province – with more than 200 millimetres forecast from Cape Ray to François between Tuesday and Friday this week.
The area includes Channel-Port aux Basques, a town at the southwestern tip of the province, which was battered by post-tropical storm Fiona in September, 2022, which wiped out 100 homes and killed one woman.
Mayor Brian Button said the rugged coastal community is still picking up the pieces, building a new subdivision, repairing the sewer system and completing erosion mitigation measures. Just recently, another 57 homes were condemned – which makes the approaching storm weigh on everyone’s minds even more.
“Today now when we talk about storms, people have a different feeling. You can feel the anxiety in the community. You can feel the worry from some people wondering: What’s this particular storm going to cause?” said Mr. Button.
“It just seems to be storm after storm now that we seem on an alert and that gives a lot of anxiety for us all.”
Nova Scotia also had tens of thousands in the dark after the storm.
In August, Nova Scotia’s privately owned electric utility was fined $750,000 for failing to meet 2022 performance targets set by the provincial regulator.
The Nova Scotia Utility and Review Board said Nova Scotia Power Inc. had increased investments in transmission infrastructure to deal with increasingly powerful storms but had failed to achieve certain reliability targets in each year since the standards were established in 2016.
In an interview Tuesday, Matt Drover, the manager of storm response at the utility, said it has invested more than $32-million in tree cutting and trimming this year and that the work has been making a difference, particularly around transmission lines.