The Willey Report on the Ottawa Ice Storm 1998

It started on a Tuesday morning and by the time it was finished more than 200,000 homes in Eastern Ontario and over 1,000,000 in Québec were without power...and heat.

"It" was what the local press are calling the "Storm of the Millenium".  The Ottawa Valley, Eastern Ontario and Southwestern Québec were hit with three freezing rain storms over four or five days.  In total close to 100 ml of rain fell.

Despite the beauty of ice-coated trees (see photo at right), the storm caused severe damage to trees resulting in many broken branches.   The falling branches and the weight of ice on power lines and the supporting poles and towers caused massive power outages throughout the affected regions.

Our neighbourhood has the best of both urban and rural life.  Only twenty minutes from Parliament Hill, we enjoy city water, natural gas and cable TV in addition to large lots and plenty of mature trees.   Many of the trees in our area lost branches but luckily I have not heard of any damage to homes or residents.

Being a newer development we have buried power lines in our neighbourhood.  However, since we are at the edge of the Ontario Hydro service area we are part of the largely rural power grid serving Eastern Ontario.  Right next to us is the City of Gloucester with its own hydro company.

We lost power for the first time on Tuesday, January 6th.  Losing power for even a small amount of time can be worrisome, particularly during a Canadian winter.  You quickly realize how much you rely on electricity for the necessities of life...such as running a furnace.  After several hours waiting for the power to return, we went to my ex-wife's house, which still had power, and camped there for the night.  After what seemed like an eternity, but was actually fifteen hours, the power was restored at home.   This turned out to be a short-lived respite.  Less than a day later our real saga began.   At 11:30 pm on Wednesday we lost power for the second time.

By now the number of people without power had escalated, particularly in the rural areas of Eastern Ontario, but also in older neighbourhoods in the urban area.  The Regional Government declared a "state of emergency" on Thursday.  Government offices, including mine, shut down.  With relatively mild temperatures and not expecting the outage to last much longer, we packed our bags and headed to my friend's place for a few days.

The magnitude of the damage and impact was evident on the evening news.  The sight of giant steel towers lying crumpled on the ground gave evidence to the weight of the ice.  I was not alone without power...millions of people were without power.

I constantly called home to see if the answering machine would kick in since this would indicate that power had been restored.  I made the daily trek back to the house to ensure that everything was okay, particularly the indoor temperature and the condition of the water pipes, my primary concern.  With temperatures hovering at about minus 2 celcius, the weather cooperated until Saturday night when it went down to about minus 13 celcius.

With the ice coating the snow I knew that the birds would be hard pressed to find nourishment so I ensured that my bird feeder was clear of ice and full of seed.  The chickadees were so hungry that they came to the feeder while I was filling it...and they are usually very nervous birds.

Up until this point and without providing any additional heat the house was holding its own at about 10 degrees inside.  However, with the call for colder weather I was starting to get worried about the pipes.  For the first time I started a fire in the fireplace and kept it going for about 4 hours.  I also shut off the water and drained the pipes before leaving for the night.

During the day on Saturday the army arrived in the neighbourhood with a supply of generators.  It was an unusual, but welcome sight, seeing the armed forces during peacetime.

Sunday morning I returned to the house and the temperature was a somewhat cool 6 degrees!  I now decided that I would remain in the house to ensure that it didn't freeze.  My son was staying at his mom's house so he was warm.  Like a lot of people just across the border in Gloucester she never once lost power.

I noted that the basement was the warmest part of the house which seemed strange given that heat rises, but it turns out that the gas-fired water heater was maintaining the water temperature and was providing heat to the basement.

As I took a walk I saw the soldiers making their rounds and I flagged them down.  They hooked up a generator to my house and my neighbour's house and let it run for 2 hours.  This was enough to raise the temperature of the house to about 18 degrees, not to normal but warm enough.

Another neighbour had placed his name on a waiting list and was fortunate to have received his new generator.  I suggested that we share the cost.  Knowing that I now had access to a generator took a load of my mind.  After using the generator for a few hours in the evening I settled in for a pleasant night's sleep.  Unfortunately, this good feeling did not last long.   I fired up the generator for a few hours in the morning when it suddenly stopped.   The oil seal had blown.  It turns out that this was one of at least 70 defective generators that were returned with the same problem.  I was now back to square one.

The heat in the house was slowly departing.  By the time I returned in the early evening the house was back down to 7 degrees.   With only a fireplace for heat, I managed to raise the temperature about 4 degrees.  With the forecast for warmer weather by morning I curled up in bed and hoped for the best.

Tuesday morning arrived with a shiver.  It was once again 7 degrees in the house!  The bad news was the forecast of minus 20 temperatures that evening and colder weather to stay for the rest of the week.

The authorities were telling us that we should have power by the end of the day but we had been told this for several days.  One of our beefs throughout this emergency was the lack of specific information from Ontario Hydro on the extent of damage and/or progress for particular areas.  The 1-800-565-2778 number might be okay for reporting isolated outages but it was not a good source of information during the crisis.  Change is needed in this area.

Without access to a generator I was starting to worry for the water pipes.  I planned to stay up all night with a roaring fire while constantly running the water.  I was worried, frustrated and tired.

While having lunch with my son, I called home and suddenly a familiar voice answered...the answering machine.  I had power!!  I quickly returned home and reconnected the furnace switch.

Now came the task of cleaning up.   The contents of the freezer and refrigerator were lost and had to be thrown out.   Since they don't pose a safety problem, the branches in my yard will probably wait until Spring before I clear them up.

As much as I am happy that I now have power and heat restored, I realize that there are still many people who still don't have power and I am thinking of them.  I know the feeling of despair you have when you feel that things are out of your control.  I know how the uncertainty drains you since I am very tired.  I hope that this does not happen again but I think a lot of people will reevaluate their emergency plans for the next time.