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Three days after devastating wind storms battered much of the province's power grid network and left nearly one million customers without electricity,
Hydro-Québec reported on Monday that power has been restored to 94 per cent of its clientele.
"And 1,400 workers are on the ground to reconnect those 56,000 clients still without service," the utility announced on its Twitter account. "Our teams will continue to work until all Quebecers are reconnected."
As of 7 a.m. Monday, 56,781 customers remained in the dark, most of them in the Eastern Townships, the Montérégie and Chaudière-Appalaches regions and the Laurentians.
On Sunday, Hydro-Québec president Eric Martel warned that some areas would not be back on the grid
before Tuesday or even Wednesday.
Martel said 70 per cent of the outages that had yet to be repaired affected no more than 20 clients each. He said power would be cut to some customers to allow repair crews to safely carry out their tasks.
The regions that remained without power Monday were those where high winds caused extensive damage to trees, which in turn fell on power lines. Repair crews in those areas prioritized the parts of the grid serving hospitals or water treatment plants.
About 50 schools remained closed on Monday because of the outages.
Comment: This quake occurred less than an hour after Chile was rocked by magnitude 6.0 earthquake.