Gatineau power outage affects thousands on Tuesday [Video]

Hydro-Québec says power is being restored in some places after an extensive outage affected thousands of Gatineau residents on Tuesday.

The outage began at 11:15 a.m. after a mobile conveyor belt made contact with hydro lines, the company says. About 56,000 customers, mainly in the Aylmer and Hull sectors, were affected.

The power company says it has started to restore power to affected residents but 25,000 remained without electricity as of 4 p.m.

“We will attempt to restore service to customers still experiencing outages over the next few hours using other lines on our network,” Hydro-Québec said in a post to social media shortly before 2:10 p.m.

The company’s outage map shows power to the Hull sector has been restored. Most of the outages remain in Aylmer.

Gatineau police are on scene in affected areas directing traffic where traffic lights are down.

“When the lights are not working, we remind …