SpongeG
Nov 14, 2007, 7:20 AM
anyone got any pics of the storm? i never heard it but there were some big branches in the driveway of my building and quite a lot of debris in the street out front
There she blows again
Wind's punch 'as bad as ... we had last year'
Tens of thousands of residents across a wide swath of B.C.'s south coast, including Vancouver Island and the Lower Mainland, were still without power this morning after a brutal windstorm battered the area over the holiday weekend, felling trees across highways, disrupting road, ferry and air traffic, and cutting telephone lines.
At the peak of the storm Monday, 196,000 BC Hydro customers were without electricity. Late Monday night, crews struggled to repair more than 500 separate power failures that darkened homes in Vancouver's suburbs, the Sunshine Coast, on Vancouver Island and across B.C.
As of 8:30 p.m., 132,000 customers were still without power and it will be one to two days until power is restored to everyone, said Gillian Robinson, a spokeswoman for BC Hydro.
http://a123.g.akamai.net/f/123/12465/1d/media.canada.com/idl/vasn/20071113/12068-4547.jpg
An area resident takes a closer look at the damage done by a large tree when it fell across St. George's Street in North Vancouver during the windstorm.
Photograph by : Ward Perrin, Vancouver Sun
About 53,000 customers in the Fraser Valley were without power Monday night, along with 32,000 in Metro Vancouver and 25,000 on northern Vancouver Island. The others without power were in the Okanagan and Kootenays.
"Based on the damage we are seeing ... we are advising customers it will be one to two days that the power will be out and to prepare for one to two days of outages," Robinson said Monday.
Robinson said the damage was so extensive that it nearly eclipsed the devastating wind- and snowstorms of December 2006 that left nearly one-quarter of a million customers without power.
"This is as bad a windstorm as we had last year," she said. "It isn't a picky storm."
Those left without power are being told not to use gas-powered generators or barbecues indoors because of the danger of carbon monoxide.
And Hydro recommends people use flashlights for light rather than candles, which need to be monitored.
Among the hardest-hit areas were large parts of Langley, Surrey, Delta and Richmond. Even after the storm peaked at midday Monday, large blocks of residents were reporting their power was out.
Hydro's tracking website told the story: At 11:15 a.m., as the storm was peaking, 258 separate power failures were reported, including 147 in the Lower Mainland and on the Sunshine Coast.
But the numbers continued to climb, even though skies began to clear. By 3:20 p.m., Hydro was dealing with 427 power failures, more than half of them in the Lower Mainland.
Lois Bresnick said the gusts were so strong that an 80-year-old Douglas fir in the backyard of the family's Surrey home was whipping back and forth at a 45-degree angle.
Her son joked to his brother that the 37-metre (120-foot) tree was going to fall down, and minutes later, it did.
It crushed the roof of the family's three-car garage, struck the deck off the kitchen and family room, and grazed the corner of the house before resting on two cars at about 9 a.m. Monday.
The crash caused an estimated $30,000 damage to the house at 15106 84th Ave., Bresnick said, and caused "quite a big bang."
The house is still livable, although the Bresnicks spent most of Monday trying to cut up the tree and cover the corner of the house with a tarp.
The storm wasn't all bad news, however.
Windsurfers and water sports aficionados flocked to Tsawwassen to enjoy high waves and rough surf. And staff at Whistler Blackcomb were considering opening early for the ski season after more than 80 cm of snow fell on the mountain.
But for virtually everyone else, the storm, which began Sunday night and lasted well into Monday, was a problem.
Observers in New Westminster watched the skies over Surrey light up throughout the night with bright flashes as falling trees and broken branches took out transformers and power lines. Debris blocked or clogged many municipal streets, and city crews in Vancouver urged residents to keep drains clear of leaves to prevent flooding. North Vancouver District closed some roads, and advised residents to stay out of parks and away from rivers that could flood quickly.
http://a123.g.akamai.net/f/123/12465/1d/media.canada.com/idl/vasn/20071113/12068-4548.jpg
Lions Bay resident Doug Miller walks his dog Buddy past downed trees and wrecked power lines on Mountain Drive. The village was hit by a heavy overnight windstorm that knocked out power for many residents.
Photograph by : Mark van Manen, Vancouver Sun
Environment Canada reported that between 4 p.m. Sunday and 4 p.m. Monday, the storm dropped 8.8 mm of rain at Vancouver International Airport and Pitt Meadows. Abbotsford got 4.9 mm, while Hope received 38 mm.
Several highways were shut down after trees fell across them or they were blocked by mudslides. Northern Vancouver Island was cut off from the south in three separate places. Trees also blocked portions of Highway 7 between Ruskin and Mission and Highway 101 on the Sunshine Coast at Earls Cove.
And heavy snowfall that accompanied the storm cut off remote Bella Coola on the mid-coast from the rest of the province, dropping trees across Highway 20 in several places.
As of Monday evening, most of the roads remained closed, although the highway to Mission was reopened by mid-afternoon.
Telephone services, both land and cellular, were also disrupted. More than 10,000 customers lost one or both telephone services, according to Jason Macdonell, the general manager of operations for Telus's Lower Mainland South region.
And more than 50,000 customers were at risk of losing telephone service unless crews could restore electricity to more than 130 telecommunications sites, many of which were running on auxiliary power, he said.
For travellers trying to get home after Remembrance Day, the storm was more than merely a nuisance. Almost every form of air and water transportation was affected.
BC Ferries cancelled all sailings on all of its major routes early Monday morning, and many of its small island routes too. However, shortly before 11 a.m., some smaller routes resumed service, and by mid-afternoon the major routes were reopened, just as the majority of vacation travellers were heading to the terminals.
But Deborah Marshall, a BC Ferries official, said the cancellations had clogged up major ferry terminals, causing delays of several sailings.
"Thankfully, the storm came earlier in the day before most people were heading home," she said.
Some weathered the storm better than others. At 1:30 p.m. Monday, Valerie Lawrie was still in the ferry lineup after arriving at the Tsawwassen terminal more than seven hours earlier. Lawrie, who lives in Tsawwassen, makes weekly visits to look after her father, who lives in Oak Bay.
http://a123.g.akamai.net/f/123/12465/1d/media.canada.com/idl/vasn/20071113/12068-4549.jpg
Photograph by : Ward Perrin, Vancouver Sun
She said she wasn't too worried about not being with her father.
"It's better to be safe," she said. "I've been on the ferries before when it's been very rough, and it was scary."
At 1:30 p.m., the Tardiff family from Lake Cowichan had been waiting to catch a ferry back to the island for more than three hours. But they were well-prepared for the wait. The three children, ages five, 11, and 14, were watching Spider Man 3 on DVD in the car.
"It hasn't been that bad," said father Brian Tardiff. "We heard there might be cancelled sailings, but we always travel prepared with stuff for the kids to do."
Harbour Air, the dominant harbour-to-harbour float-plane service between Vancouver and Victoria, cancelled all flights Monday morning. At Vancouver International Airport, all fights between Vancouver and Campbell River and Comox were delayed until the winds abated.
The only bright spot for travellers was Helijet's Vancouver-Victoria service. Jeff Murdock, the Victoria station manager, said all flights were operational since the helicopters aren't affected by wind. "In 21 years of service, we've never been shut down because of the wind," he said.
But Helijet, working on a reduced weekend schedule with only four flights each way, couldn't help many of the people who called for last-minute seats.
Meanwhile, coast guard officer Andrew Howell of the Victoria Rescue Coordination Centre said the extreme weather caused some boats to go adrift around Vancouver Island.
jefflee@png.canwest.com
POWER DOWN
The powerful winds peaked shortly after 11 a.m. Monday on the south coast, but the number of power outages* surged throughout the day.
OUTAGES BY REGION
Lower Mainland/ Vancouver Rest of Total
Time Sunshine Coast Island B.C. Outages
11:15 a.m. 147 72 39 258
1:20 p.m. 207 76 91 374
3:20 p.m. 232 78 117 427
5:20 p.m. 219 81 129 429
7:20 p.m. 232 113 163 508
9:20 p.m. 230 112 196 538
* Outage: a single failure that affects between a handful and thousands of customers.
Source: BC Hydro
http://www.canada.com/vancouversun/story.html?id=81327c24-cfbc-4455-9e51-beec107756f2&k=75746
There she blows again
Wind's punch 'as bad as ... we had last year'
Tens of thousands of residents across a wide swath of B.C.'s south coast, including Vancouver Island and the Lower Mainland, were still without power this morning after a brutal windstorm battered the area over the holiday weekend, felling trees across highways, disrupting road, ferry and air traffic, and cutting telephone lines.
At the peak of the storm Monday, 196,000 BC Hydro customers were without electricity. Late Monday night, crews struggled to repair more than 500 separate power failures that darkened homes in Vancouver's suburbs, the Sunshine Coast, on Vancouver Island and across B.C.
As of 8:30 p.m., 132,000 customers were still without power and it will be one to two days until power is restored to everyone, said Gillian Robinson, a spokeswoman for BC Hydro.
http://a123.g.akamai.net/f/123/12465/1d/media.canada.com/idl/vasn/20071113/12068-4547.jpg
An area resident takes a closer look at the damage done by a large tree when it fell across St. George's Street in North Vancouver during the windstorm.
Photograph by : Ward Perrin, Vancouver Sun
About 53,000 customers in the Fraser Valley were without power Monday night, along with 32,000 in Metro Vancouver and 25,000 on northern Vancouver Island. The others without power were in the Okanagan and Kootenays.
"Based on the damage we are seeing ... we are advising customers it will be one to two days that the power will be out and to prepare for one to two days of outages," Robinson said Monday.
Robinson said the damage was so extensive that it nearly eclipsed the devastating wind- and snowstorms of December 2006 that left nearly one-quarter of a million customers without power.
"This is as bad a windstorm as we had last year," she said. "It isn't a picky storm."
Those left without power are being told not to use gas-powered generators or barbecues indoors because of the danger of carbon monoxide.
And Hydro recommends people use flashlights for light rather than candles, which need to be monitored.
Among the hardest-hit areas were large parts of Langley, Surrey, Delta and Richmond. Even after the storm peaked at midday Monday, large blocks of residents were reporting their power was out.
Hydro's tracking website told the story: At 11:15 a.m., as the storm was peaking, 258 separate power failures were reported, including 147 in the Lower Mainland and on the Sunshine Coast.
But the numbers continued to climb, even though skies began to clear. By 3:20 p.m., Hydro was dealing with 427 power failures, more than half of them in the Lower Mainland.
Lois Bresnick said the gusts were so strong that an 80-year-old Douglas fir in the backyard of the family's Surrey home was whipping back and forth at a 45-degree angle.
Her son joked to his brother that the 37-metre (120-foot) tree was going to fall down, and minutes later, it did.
It crushed the roof of the family's three-car garage, struck the deck off the kitchen and family room, and grazed the corner of the house before resting on two cars at about 9 a.m. Monday.
The crash caused an estimated $30,000 damage to the house at 15106 84th Ave., Bresnick said, and caused "quite a big bang."
The house is still livable, although the Bresnicks spent most of Monday trying to cut up the tree and cover the corner of the house with a tarp.
The storm wasn't all bad news, however.
Windsurfers and water sports aficionados flocked to Tsawwassen to enjoy high waves and rough surf. And staff at Whistler Blackcomb were considering opening early for the ski season after more than 80 cm of snow fell on the mountain.
But for virtually everyone else, the storm, which began Sunday night and lasted well into Monday, was a problem.
Observers in New Westminster watched the skies over Surrey light up throughout the night with bright flashes as falling trees and broken branches took out transformers and power lines. Debris blocked or clogged many municipal streets, and city crews in Vancouver urged residents to keep drains clear of leaves to prevent flooding. North Vancouver District closed some roads, and advised residents to stay out of parks and away from rivers that could flood quickly.
http://a123.g.akamai.net/f/123/12465/1d/media.canada.com/idl/vasn/20071113/12068-4548.jpg
Lions Bay resident Doug Miller walks his dog Buddy past downed trees and wrecked power lines on Mountain Drive. The village was hit by a heavy overnight windstorm that knocked out power for many residents.
Photograph by : Mark van Manen, Vancouver Sun
Environment Canada reported that between 4 p.m. Sunday and 4 p.m. Monday, the storm dropped 8.8 mm of rain at Vancouver International Airport and Pitt Meadows. Abbotsford got 4.9 mm, while Hope received 38 mm.
Several highways were shut down after trees fell across them or they were blocked by mudslides. Northern Vancouver Island was cut off from the south in three separate places. Trees also blocked portions of Highway 7 between Ruskin and Mission and Highway 101 on the Sunshine Coast at Earls Cove.
And heavy snowfall that accompanied the storm cut off remote Bella Coola on the mid-coast from the rest of the province, dropping trees across Highway 20 in several places.
As of Monday evening, most of the roads remained closed, although the highway to Mission was reopened by mid-afternoon.
Telephone services, both land and cellular, were also disrupted. More than 10,000 customers lost one or both telephone services, according to Jason Macdonell, the general manager of operations for Telus's Lower Mainland South region.
And more than 50,000 customers were at risk of losing telephone service unless crews could restore electricity to more than 130 telecommunications sites, many of which were running on auxiliary power, he said.
For travellers trying to get home after Remembrance Day, the storm was more than merely a nuisance. Almost every form of air and water transportation was affected.
BC Ferries cancelled all sailings on all of its major routes early Monday morning, and many of its small island routes too. However, shortly before 11 a.m., some smaller routes resumed service, and by mid-afternoon the major routes were reopened, just as the majority of vacation travellers were heading to the terminals.
But Deborah Marshall, a BC Ferries official, said the cancellations had clogged up major ferry terminals, causing delays of several sailings.
"Thankfully, the storm came earlier in the day before most people were heading home," she said.
Some weathered the storm better than others. At 1:30 p.m. Monday, Valerie Lawrie was still in the ferry lineup after arriving at the Tsawwassen terminal more than seven hours earlier. Lawrie, who lives in Tsawwassen, makes weekly visits to look after her father, who lives in Oak Bay.
http://a123.g.akamai.net/f/123/12465/1d/media.canada.com/idl/vasn/20071113/12068-4549.jpg
Photograph by : Ward Perrin, Vancouver Sun
She said she wasn't too worried about not being with her father.
"It's better to be safe," she said. "I've been on the ferries before when it's been very rough, and it was scary."
At 1:30 p.m., the Tardiff family from Lake Cowichan had been waiting to catch a ferry back to the island for more than three hours. But they were well-prepared for the wait. The three children, ages five, 11, and 14, were watching Spider Man 3 on DVD in the car.
"It hasn't been that bad," said father Brian Tardiff. "We heard there might be cancelled sailings, but we always travel prepared with stuff for the kids to do."
Harbour Air, the dominant harbour-to-harbour float-plane service between Vancouver and Victoria, cancelled all flights Monday morning. At Vancouver International Airport, all fights between Vancouver and Campbell River and Comox were delayed until the winds abated.
The only bright spot for travellers was Helijet's Vancouver-Victoria service. Jeff Murdock, the Victoria station manager, said all flights were operational since the helicopters aren't affected by wind. "In 21 years of service, we've never been shut down because of the wind," he said.
But Helijet, working on a reduced weekend schedule with only four flights each way, couldn't help many of the people who called for last-minute seats.
Meanwhile, coast guard officer Andrew Howell of the Victoria Rescue Coordination Centre said the extreme weather caused some boats to go adrift around Vancouver Island.
jefflee@png.canwest.com
POWER DOWN
The powerful winds peaked shortly after 11 a.m. Monday on the south coast, but the number of power outages* surged throughout the day.
OUTAGES BY REGION
Lower Mainland/ Vancouver Rest of Total
Time Sunshine Coast Island B.C. Outages
11:15 a.m. 147 72 39 258
1:20 p.m. 207 76 91 374
3:20 p.m. 232 78 117 427
5:20 p.m. 219 81 129 429
7:20 p.m. 232 113 163 508
9:20 p.m. 230 112 196 538
* Outage: a single failure that affects between a handful and thousands of customers.
Source: BC Hydro
http://www.canada.com/vancouversun/story.html?id=81327c24-cfbc-4455-9e51-beec107756f2&k=75746