Remote Vancouver Island community loses power for days due to copper theft

Residents of a remote Vancouver Island community are used to losing power because of a storm.

But for the past few days, the village of Ditidaht, on the west coast of the Island, has been in the dark and nearly cut off from the rest of the world.

Not because of mother nature, but the rampant problem of copper theft.

Since Friday, power in the village has been cut off after BC Hydro acted on a series of complaints. It was restored at about 5:30 p.m. Sunday evening.

“People are getting shocks from off the ground, and touching metal fences, and so forth like that, ” said resident Philip Edgar. “I guess it was getting enough because it was getting dangerous.”

Crews arrived to find a substantial theft of copper grounding wire, ripped from 300 utility poles along a remote 62-km stretch of power line.

BC Hydro spent the day on Sunday finding the source, turning the power on and off.

Copper wire theft cost BC Hyrdo more than 1 million in 2011.

200 people live in the community, and not everyone had a generator.