In the aftermath of Hurricane Humberto, our crews continue to make good progress in restoring power to our customers.
Work continues on main branch lines and crews are working on smaller pockets of outages in neighbourhoods in all parishes.
However, over-grown vegetation that was broken, uprooted, and hitting power lines during the storm, is making the restoration process much more time consuming, as it takes a few hours to reconnect small pockets of customers. In some cases customers who have had their power restored will have it switched off temporarily so that other lines can be safely repaired.
While our crews are making good progress they are also facing setbacks. On Monday evening there were a number of pole fires due to salt that had been deposited by Humberto combined with a light rain, which knocked out power to a number of areas that had been restored. Dealing with these priority emergencies has slowed progress on planned restorations.
Thankfully, with the assistance of our retirees, as well as extra linesmen from Algonquin Power & Utilities Corp, we have 75% more linesmen working to restore electricity to our remaining customers without power.
With the approach of Tropical Storm Jerry, our crews are replenishing supplies and equipment in staging areas across the island to prepare for any further damage to the grid.
Our crews will continue to work between 8am and midnight across the island to restore power. As Tropical Storm Jerry approaches, our crews will work until the weather makes it unsafe to continue. Crews will be back out as soon as the storm has passed and it is safe to recommence restoration.
We would like to thank all those who have been instrumental in getting the work done efficiently and safely. We ask for your patience as work continues.