Thousands of Nova Scotia Power customers left without electricity Sunday after storm
About 4,000 customers were still without power at 7 p.m. Sunday
Widespread power outages following Nova Scotia's latest snowstorm left more than 20,000 customers in the dark early Sunday morning.
According to Nova Scotia Power's outage map around 8:30 a.m., there were 207 outages affecting more than 20,500 customers.
That number dropped below 4,000 by 7 p.m. Sunday.
Andrea Anderson, Nova Scotia Power spokesperson, said the weekend storm was the cause.
Most of the outages began around 4 a.m., and were in the northeastern half of the province. Cape Breton had the largest outage, with more than 6,000 customers without electricity around the Sydney area.
"The heavy, wet snow and the high winds were the cause of those outages," Anderson said. "Here in Halifax it doesn't seem like there's a whole lot down, but I think it was a different storm in Cape Breton."
Anderson said they mobilized crews from the mainland to go to Cape Breton and work on the issues there.
Eldon MacDonald, a Sydney municipal councillor, said it was an unusual storm given how much the weight of the snow bent tree branches.
Although it's hard to avoid such power outages when dealing with lots of snow and winds, MacDonald said equipment upkeep for the utility is important across the province.
The Mayflower Mall in Sydney also lost power according to their Facebook page, and was closed for the day.
MacDonald said he hoped that power would be restored for all businesses and shops by Monday morning, especially in a time when many have been struggling through the COVID-19 pandemic.
"We need to get them open as quickly as often as we can, so that would be a priority I'm sure," MacDonald said.
Estimated restoration times for the outages varied from afternoon to 11 p.m. Sunday depending on location.
Another power outage in Cole Harbour cropped up just after 2 p.m. Sunday, affecting more than 4,000 people. The outage map said it was caused by emergency line repair and most of the outages were restored by 6 p.m.
More than 30 centimetres of snow to Cape Breton
The winter storm landed in the province Saturday morning, lasting into the overnight hours, bringing rain, snow and high winds.
Environment Canada summaries for the storm say the Sydney airport saw 32 centimetres of snow by Sunday morning.
Other towns on the Northumberland Strait like New Glasgow and Pictou woke up to about 20 centimetres.