Prince George, B.C. – it could be Thursday  before  power is restored to all areas impacted by the windstorm that swept across  B.C.  today.

BC Hydro spokesperson, Bob Gammer,  says there are more than 20 thousand  customers  without power this evening from the coast to the Alberta border,  as the windstorm  made trees come into contact with hydro lines,  or forced lines to touch each  other.

Crews are already working on repairs, but Gammer says they will have to take an 8 hour break once they have put in 16 hours. That means, in some cases, they will stop working around midnight tonight, and won’t be back on the job until 8 in the morning.

While BC Hydro’s latest estimate suggests power could be restored by around 4 tomorrow afternoon, it is possible, some customers may be without electricity until Thursday. 

Gammer says  as the storm made its way across the province,   the numbers  of  customers  impacted  continued to climb “When it  first started, Fort St. John didn’t have a problem,  and now they are in the thick of things”.  He says the  windstorm’s  impact on the  power lines was  like watching  dominoes  fall.