Although most people had their power back on by Tuesday morning (Nov. 5), pockets of Surrey and White Rock remained without.
After a windstorm wreaked havoc Sunday night and Monday throughout southern B.C., as many as 290,000 people were left without power, but BC Hydro said Tuesday morning that power had been restored to 95 per cent of those impacted.
The hydro company also posted a reminder to homeowners on X, after an errant patio furniture cover wreaked havoc for nearly 14,000 customers because of the wind.
After Environment Canada issued a special weather statement Sunday evening and cautioned Monday morning commuters, power outages besieged Surrey, South Surrey and White Rock, spanning from the Surrey-Langley border to the White Rock-Surrey border, stretching even to the U.S. border, with many more throughout Metro Vancouver, Langley, the valley, Sechelt and Vancouver Island throughout the day Monday.
City Hall in White Rock lost power around 9 a.m., but city services are operating normally as they have a generator, the city's manager of communications and government relations Robyn Barra confirmed via email.
In Surrey, Clayton Community Centre, Ocean Park Library and Kensington Prairie Community Centre experienced outages; council meetings in both Surrey and White Rock went ahead as scheduled.
Although the wind warning/extreme weather cancelling Bear Creek Lights Monday night, there were no alerts or warnings from Environment Canada as of Tuesday morning.
BC Hydro's outages map still showed small pockets of customers without power in White Rock, Surrey and throughout Metro Vancouver and the island, with the company reporting about 16,000 customers are without power as of 6 a.m. Tuesday morning – about 11,000 customers in the Lower Mainland and on the Sunshine Coast, and about 5,000 on Vancouver Island and the Gulf Islands.
Crews have been working around-the-clock to restore power, replacing dozens of spans of power line as well power poles and other electrical equipment, a BC Hydro statement noted, and added hydro crews will continue to work throughout the day.
"BC Hydro expects to have the majority of the remaining customers restored today – with the possible exception of small pockets of customers in areas with significant damage," the statement said. "BC Hydro wants to thank its customers for their patience."
View updates at bchydro.com/outages
