With more than 23,000 customers still without power on Vancouver Island and the Southern Gulf Islands, BC Hydro says it is mobilizing crews from the Lower Mainland to help with the final push of power restoration.
“They work around the clock, there are people giving up their Christmas holidays, they’re going to be working through Christmas and Boxing Day and as long as necessary,” Public Safety Minister Mike Farnworth told Global News on Monday.
WATCH: Tens of thousands remain in the dark after Thursday’s windstorm (Aired Dec. 23)
The utility says more than 600,000 people have had their power turned back on since Thursday’s powerful storm shook the region. Fewer than 500 people remained without power in the Lower Mainland as of Monday.
BC Hydro says it has more than 800 personnel working to restore power, and has also secured contract crews from Alberta and the East Coast to help the hardest-hit areas.
However, in a message posted to Twitter on Monday, BC Hydro president and COO Chris O’Riley acknowledged that the job would be too big to complete before Tuesday.
READ MORE: Gulf Islands could be without power for several days following powerful storm
“We know this is an important time, we’re working around the clock to ensure as many people as possible have power back for Christmas, but as we do our planning for the coming days we know many customers will be out of power through Christmas,” O’Riley said.
“I want to assure you that we’re working until all of our customers are restored.”
The utility says restoring power continues to be a major challenge due to the extent of the storm damage. It says hundreds of outages remain, each of them requiring individual repairs of power lines, power poles or transformers.
WATCH: Pender Island ravaged by B.C. storm
The Crown corporation has previously described Thursday’s storm as one of the worst in the last two decades.
On the Gulf Islands, which remain among the hardest-hit areas, DriveBC said many roads remain affected by storm debris or downed power lines.
READ MORE: 3 days after storm, BC Hydro warns of prolonged power outages
According to DriveBC, there remain roadway obstructions of some kind on 95 per cent of roads on Pender Island, 80 per cent on Salt Spring and Galiano Islands, and 50 per cent on Saturna, Thetis and Mayne Islands.
Residents of the islands have been relying on wood stoves and generators to stay warm, but visitors to Pender Island say the community’s gas station ran out of fuel on Saturday.
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Farnworth said many of the remaining outages are in remote areas, and that hydro crews are dealing with challenges more severe than just downed power lines.
“It didn’t just knock down power lines, but in fact, it destroyed hundreds and hundreds of power poles,” he said.
READ MORE: Vancouver Island cleanup continues after intense windstorm sweeps across region
“There are thousands of trees down blocking roads and streets, making access to be able to do the repairs extremely difficult. Those trees have to be removed first — more than 170 transformers have been destroyed.”‘
Farnworth said the hope is to have power restored to the bulk of those affected by Monday evening or Tuesday.
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