After hours of freezing rain, Montreal woke up and its citizens discovered many places of devastation.
Posted at 11:22 am
“Oh Cibole! Richard Pagé cannot hide his astonishment at the extent of the damage. He just saw a car that a huge branch from a tree fell on in the Ahuntsic neighborhood of Montreal.
With his granddaughter Julia he goes to the supermarket in constant ice damage. “The television doesn’t work, we do it like we used to,” says Mr. Pagé.
PHOTO MARCO CAMPANOZZI, THE PRESS
Richard Pagé and his granddaughter Julia appraise the storm damage.
Branches everywhere: on the sidewalks, in the streets, embedded in cars. There is something that brings back memories of the Montreal ice storm.
However, the order of magnitude is smaller. Depending on the industry, 30 to 40 mm of freezing rain fell in the Montreal area on Wednesday.
Frédéric Morin, owner of a piece of woodland, pulled out his chainsaw to clear part of the Rue de Châteaubriand. “A lot of old people live here. We’ll help if ambulances ever want to pass through,” he said, noting that workers must be “overwhelmed.”
His son Étienne, on vacation from school, helps him. “I’m a free, easily exploited worker,” he laughs. However, they console themselves: they are among the “lucky ones” who still have electricity. In Montreal, nearly half of Hydro-Quebec’s million customers are without power.