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Power outages affect 600 following gale force winds in Salmon Arm

Winds reached 84 km/h
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Over 600 residents have experienced a loss of hydro power due to a windstorm that reached 84 km/k the morning of Wednesday, March, 4, 2020. (Contributed)

More than 600 Salmon Arm residents have been left without power following a windstorm that took place the evening of Tuesday, March 2.

Two outages account for most of the power loss in Salmon Arm with 401 residents affected by an outage east of Lucerne Beach Rd. BC Hydro’s outage website reports that crews are expected to be on scene at 7:30 a.m.

Another outage affects 291 residents south of Lakeshore Rd, North of 28th Ave. with crews reported being already on scene. Both outages were caused by wires down in the area.

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According to Environment Canada meteorologist Jonathan Bau, the weather system responsible for the winds originated in Alberta and swept across southern B.C. just after midnight on Tuesday.

Winds typically reached between 20-50 kilometres per hour until peaking at 1:30 a.m. Wednesday morning at 84 km/h.

Bau says the direction the storm was travelling, southwest to northeast, may have magnified the storm’s effects as it came down nearby mountains and billowed across Shuswap Lake.


@CameronJHT
Cameron.thomson@saobserver.net

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