Strong winds caused damage Monday in southeastern Alberta and left thousands of Medicine Hat residents without electricity.
About 5,600 Medicine Hat homes were without electricity at 4 p.m. MT, according to Merrick Brown, director of emergency management at the City of Medicine Hat. According to the city’s website, electricity had been restored to some 1,700 homes northeast of Crescent Heights.
In a post on Facebook, the city said the infrastructure had been damaged in several places.
“We have quite significant damage to our electrical distribution system. The current goals right now are obviously safety, to look at road closures, to know the situation, and then we’ll move on to repairing and restoring them,” Brown said. . dit.
The crazy storm has just hit pic.twitter.com/hLLkIWAOtS
– @ joeyj992
Earlier Monday, Environment Canada warned that southeastern Alberta is likely to have strong winds and heavy hail this afternoon.
A tornado alert was also issued near Medicine Hat, Alta., As Alberta’s emergency alert system says a tornado landed around 1:50 p.m. Monday.
He later described the weather event as a “storm with dangerous and harmful winds” that occurred in the vicinity of Highway 523 and Highway 1, causing damage to homes and vehicles.
Dark storm clouds descended on Medicine Hat, Alta., Amid a violent storm. (Submitted by Travis Meier)
He also noted that there was a detour along Township Road 122, east to Range Road 71 and south to Highway 3.
Strong winds left thousands of Medicine Hat residents without electricity on Monday, damaged infrastructure and cut down trees. (Submitted by Dana Marshall)
Terri Lang, an Environment Canada meteorologist, said there had been no confirmation of a tornado. There has been damage as a result of strong winds, Lang said.
Around 4:30 p.m., the Alberta Emergency Alert website stated that there was no electricity in the town of Redcliff, which is located northwest of Medicine Hat. There was no estimated repair time.
The Redcliff RCMP said there were no reports of injuries or missing people in Cypress County.
‘I was freaked out’
Riesa Hertz, a resident of Cypress County, said the storm caused extensive damage to her property.
“I went out on our deck, and as soon as I got out, a lot of rain fell with the wind. It all happened in a second,” Hertz said.
“Then I went in and our barbecue also flew out of the deck and took out some of the siding.”
Hertz said she and her family were not injured and were safe inside. But the whole incident was horrible.
“I was freaked out. The house was shaking. So I wasn’t sure what would happen. Some of the windows in the house were open, so the doors were closing.”
Bad weather in Cypress County on Monday afternoon caused damage to resident Riesa Hertz’s property, blowing up the barbecue and patio furniture on her deck. (Submitted by Riesa Hertz)
Tanya Croft, Fortis Alberta’s corporate communications manager, said the electricity provider sent equipment to assess the damage to the areas it serves around Medicine Hat.
By 5:30 p.m., Fortis confirmed it had between 15 and 20 sticks down that needed repairs. The damage occurred in a concentrated area, Croft said in an email to CBC News.
“We were able to section the outage using our distributed automation system … which allows us to isolate the fault and restore most customers.”
About 118 customers were still without electricity in the service areas at 5:30 p.m., according to Fortis.
Echo Dale Regional Park suffered “significant damage” and is now closed to the public, according to a Facebook post from the City of Medicine Hat.
“The clearing of tree branches and the remains of our parks is expected to begin on Wednesday after a full assessment has been completed,” the publication said.
More to come.