ATCO Electric Yukon says two power outages that affected Whitehorse customers on Thursday and Friday morning were unrelated.
About 1,700 ATCO customers in Whitehorse lost power around 6:50 a.m. on Friday, after a raven came into contact with equipment at the Whistlebend substation. Power was restored to all customers by 7:40 a.m.
ATCO spokesperson Stephanie Cunha said the outage bore no connection to Thursday’s outage, which affected 8,000 customers in Whitehorse and as far south as Teslin.
“Yesterday’s outage was caused by a fault on Yukon Energy’s equipment up in the Faro area,” she said. When that happens, the whole power grid is affected.
Yukon Energy spokesperson Janet Patterson confirmed that Thursday’s outage was caused by a tree that fell on the Faro transmission line. Along with Whitehorse residents, about 1,600 Yukon Energy customers in Dawson City and Faro also lost power around 3:45 a.m. on Thursday morning.
Power was restored to all customers by 5:40 a.m.
Patterson and Cunha said both problems have been fully resolved.