The entire North Island and surrounding areas will be getting hit with a planned all-day power outage (8 a.m. to 7 p.m.) on Sunday, May 26.
But that’s not all, the Village of Port Alice will also be getting a second all-day planned outage (8 a.m. to 7 p.m.) on Tuesday, May 28.
BC Hydro spokesperson Karla Louwers confirmed the news regarding the outages when contacted by the North Island Gazette, stating that their crews will be busy replacing end-of-life transmission structures.
“The outage will provide safe outage conditions for the crews to replace five end-of-life transmission structures along the transmission system that provides service to North Island customers,” noted Louwers. “The five transmission structures are located at various, different points. Three of them will be replaced using trucks, and the other two will be replaced using a helicopter in order to reach more difficult terrain.”
The two hard-to-reach areas are located along the transmission line between the Gold River substation and the Woss substation, and the other three replacements that are being done by truck are located on the line north of the Woss substation.
“We recognize the impact that an all-day power outage has on the communities, so to maximize the efficiency of the crews that are in the area, we have piggybacked other work on top of this outage, including work at our substations, vegetation work, and distribution work to lower voltage lines that provide service to homes and businesses,” added Louwers.
The May 26 outage will effect over 7,500 BC Hydro customers with 30 BC Hydro crews working on the transmission structure replacements, and they expect another 20 personnel will be in the area completing the substation work, vegetation work, and distribution work.
As for Port Alice’s all-day power outage that will be occurring on May 28, Louwers said crews will be in the area working on 10 structure replacements on the village’s service line.
660 BC Hydro customers in Port Alice will be impacted by the second outage.