Snow time
A clearly unhappy Montreal Mayor Denis Coderre says he intends to get to the bottom of how 300 vehicles - and their occupants — were stuck on the lanes of southbound Highway 13 for close to 14 hours Tuesday night and into Wednesday morning.

"It was a minor problem but a major one for the people who were stuck in it on Highway 13," Coderre told a meeting of the city's executive committee Wednesday morning. "Personally, I find it unacceptable that people were stuck for 13 or 14 hours before things were unblocked.

"What's clear is that I'm going to shed some light on this. In 2017, 13 hours in the same situation. I know there was a big storm and a pile-up (on the highway). But I think we should be asking why it took so long to get things sorted out, especially since the northbound 13 was clear... We need some answers."

It all began with an accident on the highway Tuesday evening, but as traffic grew in the snowstorm, cars began to break down, and some ran out of gas.

Buses were dispatched to provide shelter for those motorists who, not having abandoned their vehicles last night, were essentially trapped inside them for more than 12 hours.


In Quebec City, a clearly irritated Premier Philippe Couillard indicated he too is not happy with the way emergency services performed in the storm - particularly when it comes to rescuing people trapped in their cars.

He said he knows from personal experience how traumatizing it can be to sit and wait, uncertain that anyone is coming to the rescue.

Hauling out his personal mobile phone out in front of the cameras, Couillard said we live in a modern world and there should have been better communications with those trapped.

He asked what the plan would have been if someone had taken ill in the car or a pregnant woman went into labour.

"I accept the fact that everybody knows and sees this morning that we're dealing with an exceptional situation but an exceptional situation demands an exceptional response," Couillard told reporters.

"We need to draw lessons from this and do better, much better next time."

He said he's old enough to remember the monster snowstorm of 1971 but said the fact such events don't happen very often does not mean "you shouldn't be better prepared when they do happen."

"We're going to take care of people today. Let's clear the snow in all meanings of the word and then we'll work to do much better."

He agreed Quebecers were let down by the services.

"People are always trying to do their best," he said. "I'm sure if you talk to all the people at the ministry of transport or at the (Sûreté du Québec), they all worked a lot of hours trying to get to people.

"But what has been lacking is coordination and communication with the involved people."

In the National Assembly, Parti Québécois leader Jean-Francois Lisée ripped the government, saying it was caught completely flatfooted by the snowstorm despite numerous warnings.

He said there were no ministers available at the crack of dawn to reassure the population and the first reaction they had when they showed up to address the media at 9:15 a.m. was to complain about the tone of their questions.

"This storm took nobody by surprise and should not have taken anyone at the ministry of transport by surprise," Lisée said. "I expect the ministry to give us a full report, what worked, what didn't work."

All morning Public Security Minister Martin Coiteux and Transport Minister Laurent Lessard came under a barrage of criticism and were scrambling to explain the shortcomings.

"We will be doing a postmortem of the situation," said Coiteux. "We deplore that such incidents took place repeating that the situation was unusual.

"We can always do better," he said. "Yesterday's storm was monumental, and caused serious problems. Was our response the best possible? This is what we are going to analyze to do better in the future."

Lessard sounded defensive when the stopped him in the hall of the legislature.

Asked what he had to say to people who were trapped for hours in their cars, Lessard responded: ""It's always deplorable, always deplorable that we were not able to intervene to maximum."

As for why workers didn't help sooner, Lessard said: "There are surely good reasons. We have asked questions about this case in particular.

"But in general we were able to respond and get them out in a safe and orderly manner."

He thanked people - in particular those who helped in a 50-car pile-up on Highway 10 near Magog Tuesday afternoon - for coming to the aid of other stranded drivers.

But Coalition Avenir Québec MNA François Bonnardel denounced the transport ministry's "chaotic management," of the storm.

"There are certainly people who deserve a kick in the butt today," Bonnardel said. "I can understand the storm of the century in 1971 but now we are in 2017. I would say one thing to the ministry, Get out the skidoos, the four-wheelers but go help people. It makes no sense that people wait 10 hours in their car and we are unable to get them."

SQ officers on snowmobiles, and safety crews try to clear up Highway 13 near Côte-de-Liesse Rd. March 15, 2017, following massive snow storm that left many motorists stranded overnight.