Gabriola Island residents hopeful BC Hydro repairs will mean end of power rationing | 24CA News

Residents of Gabriola Island are crossing their fingers that they’ll have the ability to cease rationing electrical energy Friday evening.

Global News spoke with quite a few residents on the island, who say they’re annoyed after being advised to chop all however important electrical energy use for every week.

The rationing is because of a storm final Friday that knocked down energy strains and snapped the island’s fiber optic cable, in accordance with BC Hydro.

That left the island with only a single circuit, relatively than the 2 that may usually hold the island electrified.

Ted Olynyk, group relations supervisor for the Crown Corporation, stated he understands residents’ frustrations, and that crews are grateful that folks have co-operated.

“It allowed us to keep power on to the whole island during this period, otherwise we might have had to have rolling outages on the island because there can only be so much capacity on the line,” he stated.

“We had to restring the line from Gabriola over to Mudge (Island), so it required a helicopter, we had to have co-operative weather, had to do it in daylight, want to make sure the job is done safely. Wasn’t just temporary repairs, we made complete repairs.”

In the meantime, Telus offered a sign booster outdoors of the island’s firehall in an effort to reinforce cell service for first responders.

The incident has additionally raised issues in regards to the island’s emergency preparedness.

According to the island’s fireplace chief, there have been 24 requires service in the course of the six-day span, one critical sufficient to require a helicopter.

Olynyk stated BC Hydro is cautiously optimistic the crews will have the ability to end their work Friday evening, permitting residents to get again to regular.

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