CHARLOTTETOWN, P.E.I. - Maritime Electric crews were ready to roll Monday as a winter storm hit the province.
A winter storm warning from Environment Canada forecasted snowfall amounts of 20-30 cm from Monday evening through Tuesday. The snowfall is also expected to be accompanied with some strong winds, up to 90 km/h northwest gusts today, resulting in reduced visibility due to blowing snow.
Kim Griffin, spokeswoman with Maritime Electric, said the utility always has crews ready to restore power in case of any outages.
“We kind of have to anticipate bad weather or other issues every day,” she said. “For this one, we’re watching it very closely and we sent around reminders and notifications to our staff, they tend to be aware anyway, but we just wanted to be sure.”
Griffin said she wouldn’t want to make predictions because of how many variables are in each weather event.
For example, light and fluffy snow tends not to stick to lines while wet, heavy snow on lines can cause outages. However, a storm with light snow and high winds could still result in trees coming down and causing an outage.
This storm was originally forecasted to include heavy snow that, at times, could mix with rain.
“It’s a concern for us with heavy snow,” Griffin said late Monday afternoon. “We’ll certainly watch and monitor until the storm hits and we see where it goes.”
Environment Canada also said higher than normal water levels and a rough pounding surf are expected for north-facing coasts Tuesday.
Northumberland Ferries was also bracing for the event. Based on the Environment Canada forecast, the service preemptively cancelled all crossings scheduled for Tuesday.
The weather agency advised Islanders to consider postponing non-essential travel until conditions improved.
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Related: Much of P.E.I. left powerless by strong winds, wet snow (Nov. 29, 2018)
