Power restored to most of the Caronport area after 44-hour outage

Caronport area deals with lengthy power outage WATCH: Following a snowstorm, Caronport and surrounding areas dealt with a power outage that lasted 44 hours. Luke Simard has the details.

Power and other utilities were restored to most the village of Caronport and its surrounding area following a 44-hour outage.

Several services in the area were impacted after Saskatchewan experienced its first snow storm of the season on Oct. 23.

Some areas of the southern half of the province ended up receiving over 15 cm of snow.

The wet, snowy conditions had an especially disruptive effect on the Caronport area, where power and landlines were disabled.

Caronport Mayor Daniel Buck said he is thankful crews were able to restore the power.

“We are thankful for all the men and women working to restore that power and we are hoping that they can get it back to other people also,” said Buck.

As of Monday night, over 3,600 residents in the Moose Jaw region remained without power.

As of 10 a.m Tuesday morning, SaskPower said there are still 700 residents in the Caronport area without power but are working quickly to resolve the issue.

Officials are aiming to have power restored for residents between 12 p.m. and 3 p.m. Tuesday afternoon.

The past two days were challenging, but Buck said he is thankful the community came together.

“We had the PHA hockey team and Briercrest College, men's hockey team volleyball team and even the youth around town they had the day off so they were out shoveling snow and helping out seniors,” Buck said. “But it's been a challenge to get the snow off the roads because it was so slushy.”

After experiencing the extended power outage, Caronport resident Glynn Wright noticed how dependant people are on power.

“You start recognizing how dependent you are on power, people were out in their cars just charging their phones just so they could get messages to their family,” Wright said.

SaskPower said it has been working with the Ministry of Highways to get crews on scene.

“We worked closely with the Ministry of Highways to help prioritize routes to get in there and make those repairs,” SaskPower spokesperson Joel Cherry.

Despite the long wait for power, Wright said she is thankful her services are back.

“I am so thankful for SaskPower and the crews that are going out and fixing things because it could have gone bad,” Wright said. “It really was a sigh of relief.”

SaskTel services were also unavailable due to the power outages.

“When the commercial power grid is impacted by a serious weather event, we have battery backups at all of our sites,” Greg Jacobs, an external communications manager at SaskTel explained.

“However, as these power outages linger, those batteries will deplete and over time we'll start to see those sites fail.”

With power now restored, services will be slowly become available in the region.

“We apologize for the inconvenience of service outages caused for our customers and we appreciate the patience but we work to restore services as quickly as possible,” Jacobs said.

According to SaskTel, as of 2 p.m. on Oct. 25, all of its services were restored around the communities of Briercrest, Buffalo Pound Lake, Caronport, Drinkwater, Marquis and Tuxford.

Buck also said it is important for the village to analyze what has happened over the last two days to make sure they are better prepared in the future.

“If it was colder, Briercrest College (is) right here in the town, and so they have 400 to 600 students and high school students and they have dorms so how are they supplying food?” Buck said. “So those are something we'll have to address in the coming days and think about how can we have backup power as needed for.”