An ice storm that left hundreds of thousands of Ontarians without power as it felled tree branches and downed power lines is headed east.
Environment Canada has issued ice storm warnings for parts of New Brunswick and Prince Edward Island.
The national forecaster says between five to 10 millimetres of freezing rain could fall in New Brunswick before a warm front moves in late Monday morning.
Back in Ontario, provincial utility Hydro One says says it’s already restored power to more than 100,000 customers, but about 350,000 are still in the dark.
Hydro One says in most cases, the accumulation of ice on tree branches caused them to snap, bringing power lines down with them.
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Kelly O’Loan in Barrie, Ont., says her power came back on this morning, but she spent the night bailing out her sump pump by candlelight every couple of hours.
“There’s still lots of people without (power),” she said. “It was a very scary and treacherous night, because you could hear the ice against the windows and any time the wind blew just a little bit, you would hear things move and you’re just praying that the trees don’t fall.”
Most of the power outages are in cottage country, but tens of thousands of customers between the eastern edge of the Greater Toronto Area and Kingston, Ont., also lost power overnight.
On Sunday afternoon, the City of Peterborough declared a state of emergency in response to the ice storm, with recovery efforts expected to extend over several days as Hydro One responds to power outages.
Environment Canada has issued freezing rain warnings for northeastern and southern Ontario, starting north of Timmins and extending as far south as Brantford.
The weather alerts say the areas hardest hit yesterday could see localized flooding today as the temperatures rise. That includes the Barrie region, where tens of thousands are still without power.
The warnings extend through Quebec, where freezing rain is expected to continue into the evening.
New Brunswick is also under freezing rain warnings, and Environment Canada says a Sunday snowfall could turn to freezing rain overnight before a warm front moves in late Monday morning.
The warning extends to Prince County, P.E.I., where Environment Canada says the freezing rain could last for four hours and bring five millimetres of ice build-up.
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Hundreds of thousands still without power as ice storm moves east
