Post-tropical storm Dorian may have departed Atlantic Canada but the scars it inflicted across the region with its hurricane strength wind gusts and torrential rain will take some time to heal.
Utility companies in Nova Scotia, New Brunswick, P.E.I. and Newfoundland and Labrador are facing a massive task in restoring electricity to hundreds of thousands of customers left in the dark as Dorian flattened trees that pulled down power poles across a vast area. And the huge amount of tangled debris littering streets is now making the work of utility crews that much harder.
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Nova Scotia Power reported early Monday morning that nearly 200,000 of its customers were still waiting to be reconnected, while thousands more in the other Atlantic provinces faced a similar fate.
On Sunday N.S. Power C.E.O Karen Hutt called the situation a “worst case scenario.”
She said that even with the help of utility crews from Quebec, Ontario, New Brunswick, Florida and Maine it would likely be next week before the lights are back on in all areas of the province.
Those crews are also being assisted by Canadian Armed Forces personnel who are helping clear roads so utility vehicles can get to job sites.
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Many schools across Nova Scotia are closed on Monday, and emergency officials have been urging people in hard hit areas to stay home – both for their own safety and to give cleanup crews more elbow-room to work.
In New Brunswick, more than 80,000 homes and businesses were without electricity at the peak of the storm on Saturday.
NB Power spokesman Marc Belliveau said that had been reduced to about 10,000 by midday Monday, and he expected most of those would have been reconnected by Monday night, but others would take longer.
“The damage is widespread, so you might have one area where there are several hundred people that can be re-energized with one repair, but in another area that’s going to take you just as long to cut trees and do repairs there might be one or two houses. That’s going to be the ongoing challenge in the next couple of days,” Belliveau said.
On Prince Edward Island, Maritime Electric said efforts to restore power were slow-going as a result of trees on power lines.
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“Due to the nature of the work some customers may be without power until the end of the week,” the utility wrote on its Twitter feed.
Meanwhile, many marinas around the Maritimes were battered by post-tropical storm Dorian’s storm surges.
Boat owners at the Shediac Bay Yacht Club in New Brunswick were assessing damage Monday after the high winds and waves tossed boats around like toys.
“This is the worst we have ever seen,” said Gilles Brine, a member of the club executive.
“There are three boats that are on the rocks from the marina side, and on the slip side, there are about 20 boats that are on top of each other,” he said.
Brine said waves were crashing over the breakwater around the marina at the height of the storm. Crews were removing boats and damaged sections of the wharf Monday.
Brine said the club intends to rebuild a stronger wharf in time for next summer.