Power mostly restored after outage affects 200,000 Hydro-Quebec clients in Montreal

A widespread power outage affected large swaths of the western side of Montreal Thursday afternoon. By early evening, most of the outages had been resolved; around 350 customers were still affected by Friday morning

On the Island of Montreal, more than 198,000 customers were affected by 169 different outages. Another 17,500 clients were affected in Montérégie.

The West Island is said to have been the hardest hit by the 170 or so separate outages affecting the region.

The outages came on a day many Montrealers are using air conditioning and fans to keep cool: temperatures in Montreal are reaching 33 C, which will feel like 40 C with the humidity.  

"Our teams are mobilized to restore service as quickly as possible," said Hydro-Québec on its Twitter page, 

WHAT HAPPENED?

An incident on a transmission line coming down from Laval into the West Island triggered a protection mechanism that resulted in approximately 200,000 clients without power in the West Island. "We unfortunately do not have the cause at the moment. Our teams are working hard to figure out exactly what happened," Hydro-Quebec spokesperson Louis-Olivier Batty told CTV News.

"We can’t rule out anything right now," said Batty, who added that this type of incident does not usually take too long to restore. He could not give an exact time however.

"We know it is a very hot day and a lot of people depend on electricity," he added, saying that anyone severely impacted by the heat should reach out to someone close to them or public security, if necessary.

FLIGHTS DELAYED

Flights departing to Montreal are halted "until futher notice," according to a YUL spokesperson. 

Aircraft are able to take off, and planes already in the air will be able to land, though the airport says people should expect delays.

"We are expecting delays for some flights," wrote spokesperson Eric Forest, adding they "invite all travellers to check the status and schedule of their flight before heading to the airport."

SIMPLE FIXES

Another Hydro-Quebec spokesperson, Caroline Des Rosiers, said that while the cause of the incident is unknown, it was relatively simple to fix. 

"There was an automatic mechanism that was triggered, and that resulted in outages," she said. "That's why incidents like these are usually faster to restore."