Thousands of New Brunswick residents are still without power today after the powerful windstorm that blew through the region Thursday.
Gusts of up to 100 kilometres per hour left behind plenty of downed trees and the sounds of chainsaws rang through the Kennebecasis Valley today as residents attempted to clean up after the storm.
“As you can see, the wind took her down,” says area resident A.J. Arsenault, pointing to a downed spruce tree. “She came crashing on the garage. That was it for that tree.”
Next door, another large spruce snapped during the storm, narrowly missing a house but taking down a power line and cutting electricity.
“I was talking to an engineer from NB Power last night and he told me it could be anywhere from now until next Monday,” says George Earle.
A handful of schools were also closed Friday due to power outages.
Power crews are working around the clock to restore electricity. At the height of the storm, 40,000 people were without power across the province.
Extra crews are being brought in from Nova Scotia, Prince Edward Island and Quebec to help out.
Saint John Energy had reconnected their customers by Friday morning, despite some large outages in the city, including one resulting from dangling power poles on Bayside Drive.
“These were all poles that had multiple circuits on them, so getting all those circuits transferred over took some time and effort,” says Ray Robinson of Saint John Energy.
The morning commute was disrupted in Saint John due to key street closures where power poles had collapsed.
Meanwhile in Halifax, crews are salvaging what they can from a home under construction that collapsed under yesterday’s powerful winds.
In Quispamsis, large sections of roofing shingles are missing atop a seniors’ facility, and a dry-cleaning business in Moncton is also doing roof repairs after its roof blew off at the height of the storm.
As of 5 p.m. Friday, over 10,000 NB Power customers were still without electricity, with most outages reported in the Rothesay, Moncton and Sussex areas.
With files from CTV Atlantic's Mike Cameron
