Freezing rain leads to treacherous roads, thousands without power

Parts of Quebec arestill underwinter storm and snowfall warnings following a blast of wintry weather Tuesday that created difficult driving conditions across much of the province.

Hydro-Qubeccrews are also still working as of Wednesday afternoonto restore power to thousands ofQuebecers.

Ice accumulation on tree branches, caused by a few hours of freezing rainfall,weighed down those branches to the point where they touchedpower lines, knockingout electricityto a number of homes and businesses across the province.

• Consult Hydro's detailed outage map here

As of 11p.m.more than 61,000 clients were still without power across the provinceWednesday night.

The hardest hit regions are the Outaouais,Laurentiansand the western part of the Montrgie.

Hydro-Qubec spokeswoman Genevive Chouinard said crews were out allnight trying to restore power.

But despite their efforts, Chouinard said since the wind is picking up, that may cause more branches to break, whichin turn may causemore outages.

There are now 300crews on the ground, said the utility.

Quebecers digging out, again

8 years ago

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Quebec City got over 15 cms of snow overnight and there's more on the way.

More winter weather for central, eastern Quebec

Transports Qubec is reporting highways across the province arepartially or completely snow covered.

The Montreal area is being spared the worst of the storm,but other regions of Quebec can expect more snow throughout the day.

Those living anywhere from Trois-Rivires east to the Gasp coast are expected to get between fiveand 25 centimetres of snow by the end of Wednesday.

Quebec City residents woke up to 15 centimetres with another five to 10 on the way.

In addition to getting more snow and high winds, areas along the Gulf of St. Lawrence are also under a storm surge warning.

Environment Canada says strong waves could produce breaking sea conditions along the coast today, in some areas up until 8 p.m.

Sept-les,AnticostiIsland as well asPerc, on the Gasp Peninsula, are some of the placesthat are under the warning.

• Power outages, downed trees as freezing rain, snow hits Ottawa,Outaouais

Hard commute

OrlansExpress, the province's principal inter-city bus company, has issued a warning to people travelling to points east of Lvisto expect delays and cancellations on its network and in the Maritimes.

The ferry between Entry Island andCap-aux-Meulesis cancelled for the day. The weather has also led to the delayof ferry services between Quebec'sNorth Shore and Matane.

Departures between Tadoussac and Baie-Sainte-Catherinehave returned to theirregular schedule as of Wednesday afternoon.