IceStorm 98 Study

Stewart Fyfe (SF) explained project and wanted to know how outside organizations that came in to area to give assistance functioned. How did Orillia become involved? John Mattinson (JM) explains how Orillia became involved.

(JM): “Our organization – Municipal Electrical Association – had few office staff”. He implied that to a lot of utilities MEA was actually running a co-ordination centre that would match capabilities with needs throughout the province. This is not the case, there is one individual down at the office, John O’Neil.

One of the things that sort of fell down, was that we ended up canvassing to see who could help with the limited resources that we had. We were able to send two trucks and four line-men. Due to the nature of having some rural and remote off road transmission, because Orillia owns several generating stations we also had an all-terrain vehicle with a digger on it which was useful. We ended up with calling around to see who we could help before we got involved with Ontario Hydro. What actually happened was we got in touch with Perth Public Utilities who were desperate in need of help so we went our crews to Perth. We felt they really accomplished something and had really been of help. We received accolades from them.

Then we went on to Ottawa. Hydro had finished in Perth. We worked away there in conjunction with many, many others. They were not as badly hit as the area from Perth southerly. So they dispatched us home and said the next people needing help will be Ontario Hydro in the rural areas and you will hear from Ontario Hydro as to when to send the guys back.

Our idea was to rotate our entire line staff to the area so it was more inconvenient for us to have the lulls. We had people back here for a couple of days and never heard a word from Ontario Hydro. I was personally involved in this and finally found the number for their co-ordination centre in Toronto and said we are able to help and assumed we would have heard before this: The man there said to send them to Kingston, you are supposed to be in Kingston. I said it would be nice if someone told us. I asked if they had accommodation and such for them.

So I had the crew on the road, and I decided to call the Kingston area Hydro Office first to be sure and I got one of the foremen or the superintendent there. Said the Hydro co-ordination centre in Toronto has told us to come to your assistance. He said “well you can but we have men coming out our ears. I was appalled and explained that the provincial co-ordination centre dispatched us. Then I called back to the Co-ordination Centre with that information, he said then go to Perth, they really need you there. Then I called Ontario Hydro at Perth and he said yes we really need you, so the guys ended up working in the Perth-Smiths Falls area.

I was frustrated because aid was not well co-ordinated. There could have been assistance in certain areas sooner. We were twiddling our fingers for a day and a half, and I know of other Utilities who were geared up waiting to go, and for someone to dispatch them.

SF: By Friday morning there were a lot of utilities in Kingston. The storm started in Ottawa and to the east and moved south and west.

JM: Yes. Ottawa was not as badly hit except in the east end. From several sources we heard of another difficulty. That was that Ontario Hydro was not that keen on working with municipal utility line-men. Rumor has it, that one utility, I believe it was Kanata, refused to help Hydro. I used to work for Ontario Hydro years ago. I would put our crew up against Ontario Hydro crew anytime. We had a good relationship with Ontario Hydro because it happened that local Hydro linemen from the area here ended up working with our guys, because we have lines out in the rural area. A sort of unique situation because we have a lot of rural lines so we end up working with them all the time so we had no problems. I know Norm Trottier the manager in Smith Falls he is a good guy.

SF: Because of amalgamation, I gather you had difficulty persuading them (Ontario Hydro) they had customers within the City of Kingston. The general problem was that telephone lines were overloaded and weren’t working well. Cell phones weren’t working. Brockville lost all of power for two days. They were within 15 minutes of having to evacuate an entire hospital.

JM: Just as an aside: Orillia is very lucky because the local hospital has back-up because it has a load displacement co-generation system and supplies all its own power during the day. They shut down at night and use Orillia power because their own generator would cost them more in maintenance costs. Theoretically in an ice storm in Orillia they could supply the hospitals needs.

JM: According to Dr. Young, the head of Emergency Measures Ontario, it became evident that the utilities were treated as the “B” team and was relegated to a secondary role.

SF: Utilities are like fire and police, that have emergencies all the time, and being operational are geared to deal with unusual events to some degree.

JM: Right. You had a chance to talk to some of our crew?

SF: Yes Joe Lee and Dave Morris. Is there a standing arrangement for assistance between utilities similarly to fire departments mutual aid?

JM: There really is not a standard arrangement it has always been the attitude that we are there to help and we will look after that later. We were involved in the Barrie tornado. I myself went down to help. We were not going to invoice them and then it turned out the government had given them assistance, and they told us to give them an invoice so we did. With regard to Ontario Hydro and Perth and Ottawa Hydro, there was no problem.

SF: Do utilities have legal authority under the Utilities act to act in an emergency, the way fire and police do?

JM: No I do not think so. The only legal question is the qualifications to work, which is working in proximity with high voltage. On emergency we would take directions only from the Mayor.

SF: One other area is supplies. We understand that there is a supplier down at Grafton who was doing a good job, and then Hydro took over; the matching of needs and poles, insulators etc, was not as well handled and these is now a surplus hanging over the market to be paid for.

JM: We heard that. And Hydro wanted operational. We even heard that some of the crew working with Hydro were being told to slow down.

SF: It is difficult to understand how this thing all came together, but it did and it worked.

JM: Yes it did.

SF: Our impression is that it took three days for Ontario Hydro to recognize the nature of the emergency. Their main concern had been the high-tension lines were going out , and the regional people were swamped and they could not get help because of communication problems. A big problem was identifying the scale of the problem.

JM: one factor was the crews pride in their trade and what they could do with it. Another was an opportunity to help people.

SF: One problem was operating style. Hydro has one crew responsible for distribution lines and another with house hook-ups. A line could be activated but it could be days before a customer was connected. You do not work that way.

JM: No. They have a different style related to the size of the organization. Hydro has no operational control over municipal utilities. They are the regulatory body on standards for construction and operations.

SF: How do you do your radio communications with the crews?

JM: We have a base station and a back-up and can relay messages from one truck to another.

Addition: Richard Utell (Operation Manager): Could have had a better response. Ontario Hydro is not the most effective co-ordination.

The tape for this interview malfunctioned at this point.

Arrange to put connection for Amateur radio operator on the Orillia commissions Radio Tower.

Somewhere in the discussion but was lost in the tape problem, were references to the differences in operating styles. Municipal utilities often work in confined spaces both in the air and on the ground and with live wires. Ontario Hydro is largely rural lines, where the line is often disconnected before any work is done. Also have a small crew so much stronger sense of working as a team, and of supervisor being right on top of the job or of being readily available. Creates a different labour relations atmosphere.