Thousands without power as post-tropical storm Lee approaches Atlantic Canada
CBC
Thousands of homes in Nova Scotia and New Brunswick are without power as Hurricane Lee moves closer to making landfall in Atlantic Canada.
Lee transitioned to a post-tropical storm early Saturday but the winds remain at Category 1 strength of 130 km/h at its centre. The storm is still expected to bring heavy rain and strong winds to the Maritimes.
According to CBC meteorologist Ryan Snoddon, the storm track has shifted east since yesterday, and it is now expected to make landfall in the southwest of Nova Scotia, near Baccaro Point in the Municipality of the District of Barrington.
The storm is moving in faster than expected, says Snoddon, and the centre of the storm is now expected to move on land around mid-day Saturday.
Top wind gusts so far are in the 90-110 km/h range in southwestern Nova Scotia, and between 30-60mm of rainfall has fallen in that same area.
As of 9:30 a.m. AT Saturday, over 120,000 Nova Scotia Power customers were without power, with the highest concentration in the Halifax Regional Municipality, the province's South Shore, and the Annapolis Valley.
In New Brunswick, meanwhile, N.B. Power's outage map lists more than 25,000 customers without power.
In a release Saturday morning, Nova Scotia Power said the outages are the result of downed trees and strong winds of up to 100 km/h in the western part of the province, and up to 90 km/h in downtown Halifax.
Over 600 people, including power line technicians and forestry workers, are in the field today, but "conditions are getting worse" and in most cases, power won't be able to be restored until the winds recede, said Nova Scotia Power.
"Especially when winds are above 80 km/h, it isn't safe for our crews to be up in the buckets, so we focus on assessing damage and restoring power from the ground where possible," Matt Drover, the organization's storm lead, said in the release.
N.B. Power has a team of 700 on standby to help with electricity outages. Nova Scotia Power said Digby, Shelburne and Yarmouth are its biggest area of concern, so crews were sent there in advance of the storm. Maritime Electric, which provides power for P.E.I., said it had more than 100 people on its team waiting to respond.
Yarmouth Mayor Pam Mood says her town is bracing for impact.
"I think people have battened down the hatches," she told CBC News Saturday morning.
Many people in the area work in the fishery, however, and some people braved the early morning wind to go down to the wharf and check on their property.
This story is part of CBC Health's Second Opinion, a weekly analysis of health and medical science news emailed to subscribers on Saturday mornings. If you haven't subscribed yet, you can do that by clicking here.
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