As the sun set Saturday evening, thousands of Quebecers felt the chill as the blackout stretched into a third full day.
Over 1.1 million customers across the province lost power at the height of the outage following Wednesday's deadly ice storm.
As of 10 p.m. on Saturday, that number had dropped to around 135,000.
The bulk of the outages remains in Montreal (over 90,000), Monteregie (13,000+), Laval (10,000+), Outaouais (15,000+), the Lower Laurentians (1,600+) and Lanaudiere (200+).
Hydro-Quebec officials said they hoped to have everyone's lights on by Sunday but that it may take a little longer for some.
"We are now entering the phase in our restoration plan where the bulk part of our distribution system has been restored," said Hydro-Quebec director Maxime Nadeau.
"Now we are doing some work on outages with a smaller amount of customers attached to them, so when we restore, and outage, fewer customers regain power."
- SEE THE MAP: Hydro-Quebec power outages
Hydro-Quebec is restoring power based on four priority levels. Outages that threaten public safety, such as emergency services, and those that affect the most people are prioritized first. Commercial and residential outages are last.
BEWARE OF TOXIC FUMES
Energy Minister Pierre Fitzgibbon reminded residents to stay away from wires and dangerous branches and to leave barbecues and generators outdoors.
He referenced the death of a 75-year-old man who was found unconscious near a diesel generator in Saint-Joseph-du-Lac. It was the third death (second in Quebec) associated with the storm.
"We had one death yesterday; that's one death too much," said Fitzgibbon. "Barbecues, they like to be outside. Let's leave them outside... Security is very, very important."
A man in Les Coteau, Que. died on Thursday while attempting to cut down tree branches on his property, and a man in Ontario was also killed by a falling tree branch on Wednesday.
Montreal public health reported that dozens of people have been assessed or treated for carbon monoxide poisoning since Wednesday.
POWER RESTORATION SLOWING
The rhythm of restoration, Nadeau said, will be slower as some of the outages take longer to repair. He added that the major cause of the outages was tree branches falling on power lines.
More than 1,500 Hydro Quebec workers remain in the field.
"Our goal is to restore a million customers for tomorrow, but as we said in the previous days, we will be left with customers without power on Monday," said Nadeau.
According to Hydro-Quebec's latest estimates, 100,000 to 150,000 customers will have to wait until Monday, or even "a few days" later, before being reconnected.
"There's a special priority on those seniors homes, and we're working very hard to restore those types of priorities as fast as possible," said Nadeau.
Hydro-Quebec said 10 per cent of the workers were private contractors, and they haven't requested help from other provinces.
In a press scrum in Montreal on Saturday afternoon, Public Safety Minister François Bonnardel acknowledged that the situation is not easy for people without power since Wednesday.
"We learned about emergency situations, like the pandemic, so we were able to put measures in place to meet their needs, so they can warm up, power their appliances and even sleep inside," said Bonnardel during his visit to the Centre Lasallien, which serves as a temporary shelter in the Saint-Michel borough.
"We're doing everything we can to make life a little more pleasant, but I know that everyone wants to be reconnected as soon as possible."
OPEN SUNDAY
Many people were left without power for days meaning food spoiled heading into the Easter weekend and in the middle of Ramadan.
"We're going to help six regions in Quebec letting the food stores open tomorrow because one of the issues is people not being able to keep food in their fridges," said Fitzgibbon.
Fitzgibbon said grocery stores typically closed on Easter Sunday can reopen in Montreal, Laval, Lanaudiere, Monteregie, Outoutais, and the Lower Laurentians.
In response, Metro Inc. announced some Metro, Super C and Adonis locations in the affected regions will be open from 9 a.m. to 6 p.m. Sunday.
People are advised to check the list of open stores on each retailer's website and Adonis' Facebook page.
With files from The Canadian Press and CTV's Keila DePape
