Tens of thousands still without electricity
A wood over comes in handy during power cuts.
Image: YLE
Around 75,000 households were still without electricity on Wednesday night. The situation is the worst in south-western Finland and the regions of Satakunta and Savo. Some households have been without electricity for three days already.
About 38,000 clients of power company Fortum were still without electricity on Wednesday evening. The majority of these have been without power for three days, as most of the power cuts were caused by Monday’s storm.
Nearly 12,000 customers of Vattenfall remained without power on Wednesday night, with most black areas in the Pirkanmaa and Häme areas.
Savon Voima had about 7,000 customers without electricity the same night, while around 3,000 households subscribing to Suur-Savon Sähkö were in the black.
The extensive damages wrought by the storms on Monday and Tuesday as well as continuing windy weather have made repair work challenging. However, after a slow start, repairs picked up pace on Wednesday, and power has been restored to over 200,000 households.
Fortum managed to restore power to about 20,000 customers on Wednesday. The power company reports that around 100 foresters have been clearing fallen trees from power lines, while over 350 workers restored electricity supply.
However, Fortum warns that it could take days or even weeks to restore power to some of its customers, as parts of the network need to be built up again.
Malfunction notifications to power companies are expected to increase at the weekend, when people travel to their summer cottages and find power cuts there.
Electricity companies caution against going near any broken power lines.
YLE