Over 10,000 Hydro One customers in the areas surrounding Belleville, Quinte West and Centre Hastings areas will wake up tomorrow to find their clocks flashing.
Hydro One is reporting crews need to conduct emergency repairs to a transformer at the Belleville Transmission Station, which also affects some Elecixon Energy customers.
Staff at Hydro One say the transmission station must be de-energized while crews complete the critical work in advance of the winter storm expected this weekend.
The work will take place between 2 and 5 a.m. tomorrow (Saturday) and will eliminate the risk of further damage and a prolonged outage.
Belleville Mayor Mitch Panciuk elaborated at a press conference at City Hall Friday afternoon.
According to Panciuk, a porcelain insulator has been damaged and is compromised.
In the event of inclement weather, the device could break and cause multiple days of power outage.
Hydro One has decided to move forward with the repairs during the least intrusive time possible and all Elexicon customers in Belleville and 10,300 Hydro One customers in the surrounding area will be affected.
During that time, all power lights and street lights will be out.
Exercise caution and follow traffic procedures and yield the right-of-way to vehicles in the intersection.
If you see a flare at an intersection, please exercise extreme caution as the flares indicate the intersection is a high traffic intersection.
Belleville Police will also have additional staff deployed during these hours.
Residents are encouraged to unplug electrical devices to avoid damage when power is restored.
The outage will also affect alarms and sump pumps, so please plan accordingly.
