Ontario declares state of emergency | CBC News (original) (raw)

Canadian cities, including Toronto, Ottawa and Montreal, are hit by power outage, some people are trapped in subway cars in Toronto

As power returned to some parts of Ontario, the province's premier declared a state of emergency. Ernie Eves says the measure applies to the entire province.

There are reports some parts of the Kitchener-Waterloo area, Grimsby, Fort Erie, west Ottawa, Kanata and St. Catharines are back up.

Earlier in the evening, authorities in Sarnia told residents to stay home and keep their doors and windows closed. Eight chemical plants were spewing hydrocarbons into the air because their venting systems had shut down.

Bruce Campbell of the Independent Market Electricity Operator (IMO) said it could take as much as a couple of days to restore power in some areas.

"It's a process of gradually restoring the transmission system and gradually adding load to it."

Campbell warned even when power is restored, there could still be rotating blackouts for one to two hours.

As night fell in Toronto, the city seemed to be fairly serene.

There have been no major incidents reported in Toronto, but fire crews were kept busy handling more than 400 calls from people trapped in elevators.

"By morning, all will be on," declared Toronto mayor Mel Lastman who said he got his information from hydro officials.

Authorities say twice as many police as usual are now out on Toronto streets.

Without power, the Toronto subway system shut down. TTC manager Rick Ducharme said managers used backup power to get the trains into stations then removed all passengers from the system.

The TTC moves about 1.4 million people a day, most of them in the morning and evening rush hour.

Hundreds of people were still lined up at 10 p.m. along the streets of Toronto waiting for buses. Many buses, full of passengers, passed the throngs.

Hot dog stands all over the city are benefitting with lineups 30-people deep.

Major hospitals throughout the city are on backup power, but none was reporting any serious problems.

Flights at Toronto's Pearson International airport have been grounded and all check-in desks have stopped processing people.

Paul Hickey, who was travelling to Calgary on business, said passengers were being sent home but finding transportation was difficult. 'They were trying to find taxis, buses, anything to get out of there,' Hickey said.

"We have cancelled all our domestic and U.S. transborder Air Canada and Air Canada Jazz to and from Toronto and Ottawa for the remainder of the day," said Air Canada spokeswoman Isabelle Arthur.

In Montreal, flights scheduled to leave from Dorval Airport to affected cities, including LaGuardia airport in New York, have been grounded.

Quebec has power

Quebec is just across the river and power in that province is still on. Many people who work in the nation's capital live in Quebec.

Power was also out as far west as Windsor, one of the main crossing points for truck traffic between the U.S. and Canada. Traffic there was moving slowly over the Ambassador Bridge, but the Windsor-Detroit tunnel was closed.

Michael Hurst, Windsor's mayor, told people to stay at home because the "traffic is very very congested."

Several cities and towns to the north of Southern Ontario were also out of power, including Sudbury and North Bay.

The power failure left telephones operating, but wiped out high speed Internet service in most areas. Meanwhile, banks were scrambling as the outage shut down the automated teller machine system.

Officials responsible for Toronto's water system are pleading with residents to ration their use of water. The city's water system relies on the power system and the city has only a 24-hour reserve of fresh water.