B.C. storm: Tens of thousands without power on South Coast, schools delay opening

Tens of thousands of BC Hydro customers on the province's South Coast were without power early Tuesday morning as high winds swept through the region.

Tens of thousands of BC Hydro customers on the South Coast were without power early Tuesday morning as high winds swept through the region.

About 22,000 customers were in the dark in the Lower Mainland and on the Sunshine Coast as of Tuesday at 8 a.m.

A large portion of the outages were on the North Shore with BC Hydro listing a “transmission circuit failure” as the cause.

This type of outage occurs when a major transmission line is unable to deliver electricity.

“This could be caused by a variety of factors from a damaged transmission tower to a lightning strike,” says BC Hydro’s website.

The issue could be a challenge to restore.

“Repairs for this type of outage can be prolonged as it may be difficult to access the area to identify the problem and we may need to bring in specialized equipment. We'll often look to provide electricity to impacted customers via an alternate path through 'switching' while crews work on repairs,” reads the website.