Hydro One was replacing poles on the line that feeds the town, that means 650 homes served by Westario Power were without power between 6:30am and 11:00 am.
Westario Power Systems Manager Pat Protomanni says their crews had work to do as well, because their feeder lines are connected to the Hydro One line.
Protomanni thanks all of Westario’s customers in Port Elgin for their patience during the outage.
Protomanni says the work was more complicated because the location of the poles was in an area with not a lot of extra space.
Crews had to install the new poles in the exact same hole as the old ones.
Normally, new poles are just installed next to the ones being replaced.
Protomanni says the poles being replaced were in really bad shape.
The timing of the power outage had been controversial due to the Silver Stick hockey tournament taking place in town this weekend.
There was concern the 1200 people visiting Port Elgin for the tournament would be inconvenienced by the outage, because they were staying in motels and eating at restaurants.
Protomanni says the outage had already been rescheduled once. The original date was the weekend of Pumpkinfest.
He says if the poles weren’t changed soon, their extrmely poor condition might have caused them to fall down and potentially injure people.
He says that isn’t a situation Hydro One or Westario Power wants to be in.
Power was restored to Port Elgin residents in phases. Some homes and businesses were back on as early as 9:30 am.
