Four massive steel transmission towers that are ruined around Ottawa hint at the scope of the challenge facing crews in the wake of Saturday’s massive storm as they work to restore power to tens of thousands of customers.
Those Hydro One towers, or what’s left, are also proof of how fierce the winds that hit the region were and how vulnerable the city’s power grid can be.
These are evidence of a weather event that Hydro Ottawa CEO Bryce Conrad said was worse than the 1998 ice storm and tornadoes that tore the area apart in 2018.
“These [towers] they are meant to withstand the load of ice and massive winds, and they collapsed like children’s toys, “he said.
A vehicle is seen between power lines and utility poles downed after a major storm on Merivale Road in Ottawa on Saturday. (Justin Tang / The Canadian Press)
Although the 24-year-old ice storm swept through areas of eastern Ontario and also tore down towers, it was largely a local rural event, Conrad said, when asked why the storm on Saturday it was worse.
The six tornadoes that cut across the Ottawa-Gatineau region about four years ago ended Merivale’s transmission station and damaged some dust, leaving Barrhaven and other places in the dark.
But Conrad said they knew it was only a matter of reclaiming energy from the provincial grid to enlighten the community.
This storm was different.
“Not a single square inch of our service territory has been negatively affected by this event,” Conrad said.
“This is as bad as it gets.”
TARGET | Some of the storm damage captured on video:
A severe storm leaves a trail of damage in the Ottawa area
Saturday’s storm tore down trees, damaged homes and downed power lines, leaving more than 100,000 customers in the dark. The strongest wind gust at Ottawa International Airport was 120 km / h.
An estimated 110,000 customers are still waiting for the lights to come back on, officials told a news conference Monday afternoon. That number was about 75,000 at 7 a.m. Tuesday.
The hardest gust measured at Ottawa International Airport on Saturday was 120 km / h. Although storms do not always reach the airport with full force, this is the strongest gust measured since 1962.
Water infrastructure and fallen trees are on a street in Carleton Place, Ontario on Monday. Hydro One, which covers much of eastern Ontario outside of Ottawa, says it also faces significant challenges in regaining power. (Sean Kilpatrick / The Canadian Press)
All available employees and contractors have been working all day, said Joseph Muglia, Hydro Ottawa’s director of system operations and network automation.
Reinforcements have been called from Kingston, Ontario, the Toronto area and New Brunswick.
They have focused on restoring energy to critical institutions such as hospitals and the water treatment plant, before turning to large neighborhoods where they can get “the best benefit,” Muglia said Sunday.
Both the local and provincial networks have suffered significant damage, he added.
“This storm, however brief, was very destructive.”
Hundreds of broken sticks
Hydro Ottawa has provided estimates ranging from 160 to 200 broken poles, listing fallen trees and damaged infrastructure among other obstacles to restarting energy.
Conrad suggested it could take two to four more days of work all day, but even then there will be pockets of homes so damaged that teams won’t risk re-energizing them.
Hydro One is struggling with its own damage. Spokeswoman Tiziana Baccega Rosa said Tuesday that there are about 1,400 broken poles across Ontario.
One of many pic.twitter.com/0dsez9pEFb
– @JimmWatsonOttawa
The huge transmission towers now bent over as if they were “made of paper” were part of the system that supplies power to Ottawa, he said, before being distributed through the local grid.
“It’s like the superhighway, it’s like your 400 series,” said Baccega Rosa. “It’s about shifting energy from where it is generated to where it needs to go.”
While they are not the only reason power has been cut, they are an important piece of the puzzle, he said.
Baccega Rosa compared the repairs of the building to Lego bricks, and explained that fixing a power outage is not as simple as taking a hydraulic truck home.
Instead, it has to be done in sequence or the teams will work in reverse.
“We need to lay the groundwork,” he said. “We have to repair the main lines first, in order to repair the secondary ones and then the one you see on your street.”
Hydro Ottawa crews are working Sunday to restore power in Ottawa’s Carlington neighborhood after a severe storm ravaged the region the day before. (Kristy Nease / CBC)
No correct answer
According to Conrad, as more fallen trees are removed in Ottawa, workers are discovering more and more damage.
Even when they are confident that the power line is ready to be fed, they are being “very cautious” and will patrol the area again instead of endangering someone to die or cause a fire, he said.
The scale of the damage has led some to suggest that there must be a better way of doing things, but Conrad said the lines buried in Ottawa’s Trend-Arlington were also destroyed by the 2018 tornado.
And while it’s easy to grab wooden poles, a more robust and more expensive alternative along Hawthorne Avenue also fell during Saturday’s storm, he noted.
“We don’t really know what the hell hit us,” Conrad said. “Whatever it was, he knocked down 65-foot-tall composite poles.”
Asked what could prevent future mass disruptions in the future, he let out a sigh.
“I would love to tell you that I have a perfect plan so that this never happens again,” Conrad said. “I wish I had the right answer. I shouldn’t be working.”