INSUBCONTINENT EXCLUSIVE:
It will take several months for Canada to restore critical infrastructure after the powerful storm Fiona left an &unprecedented& trail of
destruction, officials said on Sunday, as crews fanned out in five provinces to restore power and clean up fallen trees and debris.It&s like
a complete war zone,& said Brian Button, mayor of Port aux Basques, one of the hardest hit towns on the southwest tip of Newfoundland with
just over 4,000 residents
More than 20 homes were destroyed and the cost of damages &is in the millions (of dollars) here now,& Button said in an interview.No
fatalities have been confirmed so far, but police in Newfoundland are searching for a 73-year-old woman they suspect was swept out to sea,
Reuters reported.The woman was last seen inside (her) residence just moments before a wave struck the home, tearing away a portion of the
She has not been seen since,& police said in a statement.While the full scale of Fiona&s devastation is not immediately clear, the storm
could prove to be one of Canada&s costliest natural disasters.Canada&s federal government is sending in the armed forces on Sunday to help
clear fallen trees and debris, which will in turn open the way for crews to restore power, Emergency Preparedness Minister Bill Blair told
Reuters.The province of Nova Scotia requested the troops and machinery to clear debris Saturday, &and we said yes, and so they&re being
deployed today,& Blair said
Other provinces are also in discussions about federal aid, Blair said.The Canadian Hurricane Centre estimated that Fiona was the
lowest-pressured storm to make landfall on record in Canada
In 2019, Dorian hit the region around Halifax, Nova Scotia, blowing down a construction crane and knocking out power
Fiona, on the other hand, appears to have caused major damage across at least five provinces.The scale of what we&re dealing with, I think
it&s unprecedented,& Blair said on Sunday.There is going to be… several months& work in restoring some of the critical infrastructure &
buildings and homes, rooftops that have been blown off community centers and schools,& he said.Hundreds of thousands of residents across
Nova Scotia, Prince Edward Island (PEI), Newfoundland, Quebec and New Brunswick remained without power on Sunday
Blair said hundreds of utility crews had already been deployed to restore power.When it&s all said and done… Fiona will turn out to have
caused the most damage of any storm we&ve seen,& Nova Scotia Premier Tim Houston told the CBC.Officials warned on Saturday that in some
cases it would take weeks before essential services are fully restored.The post Canada begins long cleanup after Fiona sweeps homes out to
sea first appeared on Ariana News.
