Hiiumaa ferry connection at risk from winds picking up again Sunday
While the worst of the first autumn storm seems over, there were still over 2,000 households without power Sunday morning. Winds are forecast to pick up again Sunday evening, which might cause ferry disruptions on the Rohuküla-Heltermaa line.
As of 9:45 a.m. on Sunday, power outages were still affecting 2,316 households, according to the Elektrilevi outages map. Power had been restored on the islands, but the highest number of households without electricity remained in Rapla County. Outages peaked Saturday afternoon at slightly over 3,500 households.
"We are working in two shifts with increased manpower, and the crews have accomplished significant work over the past 24 hours. We expect to resolve all medium-voltage outages caused by Friday's storm, as well as the majority of low-voltage issues, by the end of today. However, some low-voltage repairs will still need to be completed tomorrow," said Elektrilevi CEO Mihkel Härm.
Due to strong winds, ferry services on the Hiiumaa route may be affected between 4 p.m. and 8:30 p.m. Sunday, according to a TS Laevad representative.
TS Laevad will provide updates on these scheduled departures on the website praamid.ee at approximately 3:15 p.m., 4:45 p.m., 6:15 p.m., and 7:45 p.m.
As per the current forecast, the 10 p.m. departure from Rohuküla is not expected to be impacted by the wind. Departures on the Saaremaa route will proceed as scheduled.
Storm rages through Estonia Friday and Saturday
Strong winds knocked over trees and tugged at buildings Friday to Saturday. Luckily, no deaths have been reported, while a woman was taken to hospital in Harju County.
Wind speeds were clocked at 39 peters per second (140 kilometers per hour) on the island of Osmussaar, with winds this strong last measured in 2005.
Rita Koppel, the island warden for Osmussaar and its six inhabitants, said that while the storm brought down trees and hurled objects into the air, there was no major damage, as the islanders had been prepared.
The Alarm Center said around 2:30 p.m. on Saturday that it had received around 430 reports of storm damages in the past 24 hours, most of them to do with trees fallen across roads or onto cars.
Winds are forecast to pick up again Sunday evening, with an orange level warning (uncommon meteorological phenomena) issued for the Western Estonian islands, Pärnu and Harju counties.
More information is available on the Environment Agency's website.
For information about crisis preparedness see the "Be Prepared!" website.
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Editor: Marcus Turovski
