Canada was unprepared for the snowfall
It's never happened before, and here it is again.
The first major snowfall of the season knocked out infrastructure in the province of Quebec. More than 27,000 homes were without power on Tuesday, Dec. 5. The vast majority of them (more than 15,000) are in the Montérégie area, on the south bank of the St. Lawrence River.
More than 8,500 households without electricity are located in the East Cantons, in the Estrie region. In Montreal, only 11 people reported such a problem.
Hydro-Quebec, the state-owned company responsible for this area, explained what is happening as follows:
"This snow breaks branches and trees which come into contact with the power grid, causing power outages."
Heavy snow has been falling in Quebec since the weekend, at which time the first reports of power problems appeared. According to Hydro-Quebec's statements, 65% of the cases have already been resolved — power was back on by Monday morning. However, it appears to be taking much longer in some regions. There are 220 crews working to fix the problems in the province.
So far, Hydro-Quebec has not said when it will be able to fully restore power to the region, nor how it is that the electrical infrastructure in one of the snowiest countries in the world is out of service due to snowfall. Whether it could be related to the public sector working conditions that hundreds of thousands of Quebecers are on strike over remains to be seen.
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