Central and northern B.C. has been hit with massive power outages.
According to the BC Hydro outage map, there are 43 outages in northern B.C. affecting 54,852 customers. The outages stretch from Dawson Creek and Fort St. John in the east to Terrace and Stewart in the west.
The outage was accompanied by what appeared to be a large fireball visible from downtown Prince George. CBC journalist Andrew Kurjata, however, has reported the orange glow was a flare stack at a local mill, which became visible when the lights went out.
The City of Prince George has also confirmed there is no fire.
The outage is not a blanket outage across the North, but rather in pockets affected as little as a handful of customers to thousands. The outage hit shortly before 9 p.m. and at 9:30 p.m. much of Prince George was still without power.
In the central interior, 14 power outages have affected 23,356 customers.
Crews will be heading to multiple outages in the #PrinceGeorge area affecting 20,000 customers. They’ll continue to post updates here: https://t.co/GCUdUyF4o3 pic.twitter.com/WPUWWyKskZ
— BC Hydro (@bchydro) September 12, 2019
It is not known at this time if it related, however, a vehicle incident east of Purden Lake has closed Highway 16.
CLOSED – #BCHwy16 – Vehicle incident 39km East of Purden Lake
— Drive BC (@DriveBC) September 12, 2019
has closed the highway. Assessment in progress, no detour available. Next estimate update time of 9:30 pm.
Info here: https://t.co/wlMQ6wKwrP#PrinceGeorgeBC