KAWARTHA LAKES-Thousands of people lost power during the height of last night’s storms that swept across the region.
Hydro One says 5,596 customers in Minden, 1,700 customers in Fenelon Falls and the area surrounding Indian Point Provincial Park has around 1,300 customers out at this point.
On Thursday evening, a severe storm caused downed powerlines and trees in northern, central, and southern Ontario. Crews are out in full force assessing damage so an estimated time of restoration can be assigned to each outage. There are currently 33,701 customers without power in the province according to Hydro One.
“We have mobilized crews from other parts of the province to assist with restoration efforts and will continue performing all-hands-on-deck restoration throughout the day,” said Bianca Teixeira, Media Relations, Hydro One. “We know being without power is challenging”
Woodfield Drive in the Burnt River area was hit hard. Residents say a tree was twisted and snapped. Trees landed on vehicles and a shed was destroyed.
Hydro One provided the following tips on preparing for a storm or extended outage:
- Restock your emergency kit with items like water, nonperishable food and portable chargers.
- Stay clear of fallen power lines. If you spot a fallen line, keep at least 10 metres back even if it does not appear to be live, report it to the police and call Hydro One at 1-800-434-1235.
- A full checklist of what to have on hand and what to do before/during/after a storm can be found here.
We have a number of easy-to-use outage tools available for customers to report their power outage and to stay up to date. This includes reporting an outage by texting 92887 (WATTS) and visiting our outage map or app which is updated every 10 minutes.
