Watch above: Jumbo crews are now getting some help from the province cleaning up debris, as hundreds are still without power in Calgary Saturday.As Carolyn Kury de Castillo reports some are on day six of living without electricity.
CALGARY- Another busy day for firefighters, Enmax crews and now provincial help, as the city continues to recover from the summer snowstorm.
Enmax reports that 250 customers remain without power, as of 5:30 pm Saturday.
In total, Enmax says 57,000 customers were impacted throughout the storm, double the number affected by last year’s flood.
An extension cord has been a life line for the three roommates living in a home in Mission, who have been without power since Monday night.
“Our beautiful angel neighbors, love them they are helping us out I guess,” Benoit Crawford Leblanc said.
Leblanc has been living in primitive conditions since a tree landed on a power line beside his home. The same house, that sat vacant for a year because it was damaged in last year’s floods.
“It’s basically the same temperature as it is outside. it’s been chilly let’s just say that.”
“It’s been hard. Everybody is sleeping with sweaters on and parkas and doubling up on the blankets long johns,” Leblanc said.
Doris Kaufmann Woodock, with Enmax said crews are working as fast as they can in challenging situations, but admits there is room for improvement.
“We did have a breakdown though with the communications process and this is a takeaway for us to really take a look at and see how we can do it much better the next time around,” Woodcock said. “To put in perspective, in comparison with the flood we actually had twice as many customers out from this event as we did during last year’s floods.”
But those left in the dark, just wish they could have been given some sort of heads up that it would have lasted this long.
“Basically the most they could tell me was we put the call through hopefully someone gets a hold of you. And I said basically that’s the most assurance you can give me?” Leblanc said.
Provincial crews are helping with the mess. Forty wildfire management members have come to the city from Hinton.
“It was a shocker. It’s kind of devastating all the trees you got to cut up and stuff,” said Ben Bartlett with Alberta Environment and Sustainable Resources.
Many homeowners need electricians on site to repair damaged before being hooked back up to the grid. But if it was a city tree that ripped a line down, then Enmax will take care of it.
Councillor Peter Demong has been hearing from people in his ward still without power.
“It has been truly treemagendon.”
Demong said there’s not much more the city could have done to prepare for this. “The city has done actually quite a good job on the pruning of trees. This has been devastation the likes of which I don’t think we’ve seen before.”
Calgary firefighters continue to respond to calls of downed trees on power lines and another 100 provincial environment personnel are expected to arrive in the city on Sunday.
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