Cleanup from Fiona is extensive in PEI, and it could take months or longer to complete.
Premier Dennis King says it is going to be a long drawn out recovery process, “I don’t know, I think we are weeks or months until a total cleanup for sure, but our focus right now is to get PEI as operational as quickly as we can.”
As of noon on Tuesday, over 71, 000 Maritime Electric customers were still in the dark in PEI.
Spokesperson for Maritime Electric Kim Griffin says assessments have been completed, but there is still no estimation as to when power will be restored.
Eighty-nine were on the road as of yesterday, and more were coming to help.
Roughly 300 poles are down across the utility’s coverage areas.
“I don’t know how long it will take until we get to some semblance of normal. I don’t know if it’ll ever be normal driving into Charlottetown or Summerside and not seeing the trees or driving out to the North Shore and not seeing the Dunes,” King stated during an update to the province yesterday.
As for how the province will be affected economically, “There will be businesses that won’t be able to operate so we’ll look at how can we work with them to keep their staff paid and to keep those businesses functional until they can work their way through this. There’s an economic hit connected to that. Every time there is a slowdown or a stoppage in the day-to-day operations in government, that comes with a large cost. We’ll measure it in the multi-millions I’m sure,” King adds.
