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- เผยแพร่เมื่อ 23 ส.ค. 2024
- Reaction To The Worst Natural Disaster in Canadian History (Ice Storm 1998)
This is my reaction to The Worst Natural Disaster in Canadian History (Ice Storm 1998)
In this video I react to the Canada's worst ice storm ever which took place in Montreal/Quebec in 1998.
#canada #history #reaction
Original Video - • The Worst Natural Disa...
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Thanks for reacting to my video! I made it using dozens of news clips and documentaries. I was actually a kid when this happened and because we didn’t have power, I never saw any of this footage haha
I was in university at the time. I was without power for about 9 days so I also missed the television coverage. I had an AM radio so I was getting news that way.
A terrific compilation! I was on the other side of the country at the time, gratefully!
Great doc! I remember all of this vividly , this coverage is important
Well done! I hope you plan to do more. You have a talent.
A fantastic compilation. What a time in our lives.
I have to say, that as a Canadian, I am incredibly greatful to the Americans who helped out. Despite our differences, Americans are family.
For better or worse lol
No they are not family. Ask the average American in most States... they don't even know where Canada is... but, then again that speaks more to their education system... than not knowing where their family is.. LOL...
It was hilarious when the Floridians arrived in shorts and T-shirts because they figured rain =warm
I'm between Montreal and Ottawa. In Ontario. We lived on a farm and had no power for 17 days. We kept our frozen food in a broken down car outside. Milk and fridge stuff in coolers outside... We were lucky to have a wood furnace. My dad and I would halo the local farmers manually milk hundreds of cows until we found a generator we drove around from farm to farm.
We'd keep the tractor with it's spotlights to light the house and cooked on the BBQ or on top of the wood furnace.
My dad and I also volunteered at the shelter.
It was fun to have no school for 2 weeks 😅 but my brother/sister and I were of a few dozen kids in the whole school who had no power.
Montreal had power weeks before other places affected.
Are they though? I would rather live next to the Aussies, the Brits, the Scots or the Irish. Less chance of getting shot.
I was 8 months pregnant during the ice storm. We were without water or power for several weeks. We had access to a shelter at the Montreal General hospital, but it is up on Mount Royal and no cars or buses could make it up the mountain. The streets and side walks were too icy to walk on, so we had to try to walk in the snow but I would sink up to my knees and get stuck. So my husband had to pick me up and march a few steps at a time to get me up to the hospital. It took a few hours to walk a few blocks but we finally made it.
Curious...what did you name your little one?
We had our daughter jan 10 1998 and the hospital was cutting in and out of power during all the time we were there. It was crazy.
My oldest was born in February 1998 and I kept praying for her to go into labour a few weeks early just to get the warmth of the hospital.
At the beginning, my parents went to stay with family. I stayed home to makes sure the pipes didn't explode. Days turn into weeks, a month in... It felt post apocalyptic but we're Canadian, not only that, we're québécois.... We got through this together as a community. It was truly a beautiful thing to see. #jemesouviens
I was so proud to be Canadian and was so happy to see that the people of Quebec come together to help each other.
I am a Montreal citizen and I remember the 1998 Ice Storm like it was yesterday. It was really the worst ice storm I had ever seen. Our whole electrical grid went down. Towers would collapse one after the other because of the weight of the ice. We lost power for a whole week in the middle of winter, but they got it much worse on the south shore where they lost electricity for a whole month. It gave way to something incredible. Instead of fighting each other for resources, people banded together and helped each other by sharing their resources. Lots of people left their city to live with relatives for a month, other lived with their neighbors who had a fire place. I remember going out at night. It was super dark but the sky was lit up with stars. I had never seen so many stars. On just a 10 minutes walk to my friends place, I helped 4 different people pushing their car up their driveway. There were tree branches everywhere and electrical wires on the ground still sparking. We would all sleep in the living room near the fire place to stay warm. I had to wake up at night to stoke the fire. It was a special time I will never forget. BTW, we had another ice storm last april. The worst since 1998. The young ones liked the out-of-the-ordinary event, but the people who went through the ice storm of 1998 were a little more worried.
I was stationed in Moose Jaw Saskatchewan when this happened. Our aircraft tarmac was covered overnight in transport vehicles heading to relieve the victims of this storm. One convoy would leave in the morning and another would arrive that evening heading east. It was the largest domestic operation I had seen in my lifetime. ❤
Bonus respect for not splitting this into 4 parts like others on TH-cam.
I lived through that. We were without power for 7days and 8 hours. We had a fireplace that we were in the habit of using each winter, so we did not need to evacuate. Every family around us did, however. So we ended up as a kind of default block monitor against potential looters. Roofs of shopping malls caved in under the weight of tons of ice. Steel I-beams were twisted like pretzels.
Seeing the news footage is weird, because I recognise all the newscasters, but never saw these reports as we had no television.
I remember one thing in particular that was shown on the national news, it was the audio from a radio call-in show where the host was asking people to describe their experiences during the storm, and this one woman called in and wasn't making any sense. She was babbling and feeling sleepy because she already had hypothermia from spending a night without heat. She couldn't remember her address so the host was starting to panic wondering if this woman was going to die if they didn't get help to her. They kept talking to her off the air and they eventually got her help, but yeah, an ice storm is no joke. It was a bad couple of years in Canada. A year before the ice-storm in Quebec we had the flood of the century in Manitoba.
I remember that too
@@fuzzwork ANd then a year prior to the one in Manitoba, there was the 1996 flooding of Saguenay in Quebec, which was horrible too.
That had to be hell for them and everyone that was listening. So glad they found out where she was.
Since the ice storm of 1998, I have been through a tornado and a derecho here in Ottawa to say nothing of the other smaller weather events and long power outages. Farmers on the outskirts of Ottawa went without power for weeks and ended up losing whole herds of cattle and other animals. We are slowly learning the lessons however and many people are adding things like whole house generators and ensuring that they have emergency supplies, just in case. The ideal situation is to bury the power lines but the cost of that is prohibitive apparently. One thing that I learned from the ice storm particularly was the local radio and TV stations reminding us to check on our elderly and disabled friends and family. A good message and something to always keep in mind.
I lived through it too, have since moved to Calabogie and have accounted for every possible emergency-especially after the tornado ripping through here a few years ago too😫🫣 God bless us all!
Buried power lines require them to be kept in an oil bath to prevent grounding. There is a reason they are hung across poles: air is a very good insulator.
@@sherpajones In Canada everything buried also has to be below the frost line - the depth to which the ground freezes in winter - or it gets completely destroyed by freezing & expanding soil. Which can be 4 ft - 6 ft depending on the area which makes it very expensive both to build and to maintain.
I am from Quebec city, which is 2h and an half from Montreal. January 1998 was devastating to see and live. I'm 38 years of age now and it is still the biggest ice storm we had. The support ppls was giving and receiving from everyone and from everywhere was the perfect timing to see that humanity is still here and proof that we can support each other without asking something in return. Thank you so very much to the ppls that were there to support during this one in a life time even. xx
I turned 18 in Montréal at this time, and for my friends and I, it was like an adventure.
We ate a lot of good food because freezers was no longer working. BBQ was very popular.
I remember this event as it was yesterday.
(I’m a french québécoise, so excuse my english!)
great English dont worry about it
I lived in a town called Hawkesbury its 1 hour between Montreal and Ottawa.... I stayed home the entire time( I was 18 living on my own), I'll never forget the sounds of snapping trees, like gun shots and how literally everything was under inches of ice we had no power for months we kept warm with blankets and a ton of candles
I was living in Alexandria at the time. I remember it vividly. From the sound of trees snapping under the shear weight of ice, the highschool (GDHS) being used as an emergency shelter, and when the military showed up. I remember helping clean up debris for months after the storm.
My partner was a child at the time and in Glen Robertson, they were without power for a really long time too. Lived in an old farmhouse with a wood burning stove and it's the only reason they were able to stay in their house through it. For him though, they got out of school for like a month so it was great.
I have family in Chute à Blondeau who went through this. The devastation to farmers was horrendous, the collapse of barn roofs, death of livestock, and weeks upon weeks without hydro.
I was the same age and lived in Vankleek Hill. My father worked in Hawkesbury and would charge a car battery there each day to bring back so we could have light in the evenings.
@barrywade3774 Barry it's Dwayne we used to play mtg at your house on a pool table covered in cards in high school lol long time no chat
I was there in '98, and remember this storm so well. Despite the challenges of not having power and having to rely on a wood stove to keep us warm and cook food, my biggest memories are of my parents, my younger sister and I in our living room watching our food heating up, sharing stories, and spending quality time together. With both my parents now having passed on, it remains a fond memory, a silver lining in a rough time for many.
I'm so glad you watched and reacted to this one. Since you watched Gander and 9-1-1 and how Canadians helped the USA, I thought you might like to see how the Americans helped us out too. There has been other disasters since then and again, our neighbours south of us, the USA, came to help us out too. Another thing that wasn't mentioned in this video, were the animals and farm animals. Farmers who used modern technology to milk the cows, were forced to manually do it. Some farmers had to get their livestock moved to areas not affected to save their animals. We lived on the very edge of that storm so we were not affected (except for a bit of freezing rain) but friends of ours were over 3 weeks without power.
BTW, a few businesses took advantage of this storm to make a profit from it, charging higher than usual prices to make a fast dollar, but the people affected did not forget that and afterwards, when things went somewhat back to normal, people boycotted those businesses, which eventually had to close or declare bankruptcy.
Thanks for the great reaction.
Glad to hear those scoundrels got their comeuppance. No one in my community did that thank goodness. It was the opposite, even. Pretty much everywhere was a try to pay if you can, otherwise just take what you need but leave plenty for everyone else. It almost felt like each day people thought more-and-more of whatever resources we had no matter where they were as a giant collective pot we had to use and preserve together to survive.
yeah they squeezed out milkshakes
Some businesses pulled that same behavior when Calgary flooded in...2012? Charging inflated prices for water and canned goods. Boycotts and legal action happen after the fact; Only once the emergency is over. I would rob those businesses without a second thought, if I was in Montreal in 1998.
I remember people from the southern part of the state came up to our area and some business inflated prices on things like generators. People have a long memory and to this day won't do business with those business that did that, but on the flip side we are still quick to help those who came to our aide. People forget about those poor cows so many needing to be milked and so many farms with no power.
This happened right after Christmas holidays AND a teacher's strike. I had been home for weeks on end and I think my mom was sick of me. So even though the city was in a state of emergency, she declared I was going to school. She put me in the car and we got to a part of the road that had been turned into a lake with slush and ice and there were power lines down everywhere. Even then, she sat there for a few minutes thinking of any way past it, before she reluctantly turned us around and went back home.
Ha ha ha. I still think of that sometimes. Luv you, mum! Hope I wasn't TOO annoying as a teenager.
Oh my goodness, my mom did the exact same thing!
Mine too lol 😅
lol,
I have friends who lived in the area and experienced the storm. I was trapped in an ice storm returning to Canada along the I 5 highway. Their stories provided me with the wisdom to get off the highway and into a motel as soon as the storm was forecasted. Within hours, the highway was shut down, every hotel and motel was full. The next day when I checked my vehicle, it looked like a giant ice cube. The door handles weren't even visible. 'Mummified' by ice is an apt description.
The positive news reporting and lack of fear mongering is quite different from what we now experience and is a testament to the strength of character and generous spirit of Canadians...as well as the Americans who helped during this devasting event.
“America” sent us this weather and look what we went through and didn’t complain. 2 days of wildfire smoke? A headline that says Blame Canada.
Thank you for taking the time to learn about our country
bhahaha kinda true
Lol..so true..We will pay them damages for wildfire smoke after they pay us for de ages of acid rain damage from the Ohio valley
Not to mention they also blamed Canada for the blackout of 2003 until one of their own techs admitted it was the plant in Ohio that caused it.
@@qwipperty Exactly
As a Montrealer who experienced the ice storm of ‘98 (which wasn’t so bad for my family, thankfully), my heart broke seeing the aftermath of the Calgary flood a few years back. The damage was devastating - damaged homes from all that mud, loss of furniture and possessions… I felt for everyone affected.
I live in Alberta, so quite a distance away, but my heart broke for all the people going through it, and it was a great relief when the power came back.
I went for a bike ride.
I'm in Ottawa...I was sad also for all the orchards, maple farms, etc
Thank you for caring.. :)
No one saw it coming, I was in Montreal in Ahuntsic neighborhood (A region North on the Island) Lost electricity for a week. it was horrifying and so beautiful at the same time. You would go outside and the city was eerily quiet without the normal sound you would expect just the crackling of ice and wood anytime a stiff breeze would pass. I'll never forget it.
One thing I remember about the Ice Storm is that it killed basically ALL the birch trees. They were just too delicate to withstand the weight of the ice. I remember seeing one that had been split right in half, just torn apart. So walking through the woods in the years after, you could date how long ago the storm had been by how old the birch tree saplings were.
Seeing the damage for decades afterward has definitely been nuts.
@@liesdamnlies3372 Yes, and driving through forested areas, along the 416 for example, the crushed forest is still visible 25 yrs later
@@patriciasmith9712 Yeah I was driving with my dad down there a few years ago, I think, and I recall I saw the damage and wondered wtf happened to it and he said "ice storm". And I'm like...oh yeeeeeaaaaaahhhh...shit.
The incredible thing is that the birch in front of my house survived the 2013 ice storm. Nearly all the other trees in the area were severely damaged in some way, most fell. Still, despite ash and oak and dozens of other trees falling destroyed and dead, that birch stood strong. It's amazingly still standing today and it's more than 26 years old (no idea how old it actually is) My family has owned this house that long. It was quite tall and old at that point. I would say it's at very least 40 years old and people from the area say it's much older than that. It's not a thick tree, but it's survived some incredible circumstances.
Younger birch trees survived as they flattened to the ground and sprung back up. The Experimental Farm and Gardens in Ottawa lost trees and animals during the storm. A fire broke out, and the alarm didn't go off in the sheep barn if I remember correctly. That or just general poor response time.
I was devastated. We were without power for 11 days and nights, We couldn't leave our home, we had 3 cats and a bird and the only way to keep any heat was burning stuff in our family room in the basement with the door shut. Most shelters wouldn't take pets. I was close to a toal nervous breakdown. My husband was on the air downtown reporting on it, January 5th was his birthday and his first day back at work after quadruple by pass surgery. I spent all that time mostly alone with the pets, with flashlights and a radio run with batteries.
Hi Lynda! I remember hearing you call in to a talk radio show after the storm but before the cleanup, when we were both without power. Haha!
@@d_s_spence My goodness, haven't heard from you in years. Yes I was fit to be tied. I think that was the one I grilled our Mayor about.
I lived it. I was in Montreal at the time. Was surreal. It broke my heart watching all those trees fall to the ground. On night four, we drove downtown and it was so eerie. We had no idea what part of town we were.
So sorry brother
I lived through this in Ottawa. Driving around afterwards it looked like the tops of all the trees looked like they had all been mowed off by a giant lawnmower. There are still places I drive by today that I can see where all the trees were bent over by the ice.
The more recent atrocious weather also has caused some noticable tree damage. Not as much left from '98 unless you have a keen eye for it.
This storm completely changed how I saw freezing rain. It used to be something magical, it make everything so beautiful. As long as you didn't have to drive for a few hours, it was no problem. But now every time it's in the forecast, I feel anxiety until it's over.
In Manitoba, 1997 we had the Blizzard of the Century. I remember watching people climb out of their second story windows onto the snow drifts so they could start digging out their doors. It was amazing that so much snow fell in one 48 hour period. We went sledding off of hills that were once houses.
I remember doing that up near Barrie Ontario in the seventies!
Yep. Montrealer here and I can still remember walking outside (not on the sidewalks, because they were dangerous, so must of us walked in the streets - there were no cars anyway!) and hearing all the tree branches crack and/or fall. It was a spectacle of parked cars being absolutely crushed by tree branches. I remember a few news stories of people also being killed by falling tree branches. A few of us on our street had electricity but the rest was in the dark. Those of us who were lucky to have were asked to not use too much of it. On a positive note though, it was spectacularly beautiful. I remember lots of people trying to walk outside with their (analog) cameras.
We live in ottawa, but when this happened we were living in Boston because my husband had been temporarily assigned there. Our friends living here told us that there was a constant sound like gunshots coming from the woods behind them, which was trees breaking under the weight of the ice. That storm hit the northern part of the U.S., and for a couple of days the news was full of reports from NewHampshire and Maine, and then someone remembered that there was a whole country north of that area, that had been hit even worse!
I was there too! In south keys 😫 It Was like gunshots and bombs going off
I was in my early 20s when the storm hit. We were lucky enough to be hooked on the powerlines from the neighbouring hospital so we had our power recovered rather quickly. But many of our family members weren’t so lucky and had no power for three weeks because they were in the “triangle of darkness”. I remember clearly having aunts, uncles, cousins and friends coming over to our house to have a warm meal or a hot shower and sometimes staying days at a time just because they had no other place to go. It was a very difficult time, however there was so much compassion and solidarity within communities and that’s really what stayed with me.
I live in central Canada, so I didn't experience this directly but I do remember it dominating the news coverage at the time. If you want to learn about another insane natural disaster, one that we did live through here in Manitoba, look up "The Flood of the Century" from 1997, which devastated southern Manitoba, North Dakota, and Minnesota
I remember this incident very vividly but fortunately my family wasn't affected, there were definitely other people in my hometown that were adversely affected for a very lengthy time. I know it was devastating for many but for me (as a serious amateur photographer) it was a treasure trove of wonderful photographic opportunities, it was actually quite stunning in the bright sunshine!
Remember this well in Ottawa. If you've never been in freezing rain you are lucky, I think it measured at least 2 inches thick, my car tyres were stuck. When the temperature changed it did so in a flash and flooding was a real mess. Lost 1000's of trees. Thankfully in rural areas most people would have a woodstove as back-up.
I lived (and still do) in Quebec (about 1.5 hours away from Montreal) and while I wasn't affected for more than a couple of hours, I know people who were without power for a couple of weeks. We actually had another ice storm this past winter and I was without power for four days. It was very similar to the ice storm '98, but not as bad or widespread.
We were hit by the ice storm too. A couple years ago we had a tornado rip through the city. My friend's house lost almost all their really old trees, which had been ripped up by the roots. You could stand next to the tree's roots and they towered far above you. Lots of people without power again. I think a few people died.
We got the last one too in Eastern Ont.
It was not just Quebec it was from Toronto through to Montreal.
Lived through it. Will never forget it. The subway was down and had to walk to work. Around me was the sound of branches breaking which sounded like crashing crystal. We just had another bad ice storm this year, but the transmission lines didn't go down. The temperatures for an ice storm have to be around 0 to 2 degrees Celsius.
Living on the eastern tip of Montreal we were extremely fortunate losing power for about 2 days. A family member who lived in the triangle went without for several weeks. The thing I recall the most is at night how quiet and dark it got it was very erie. Also getting into a very cold bed is something I don't ever wish to experience again. I appreciate your interest in our country and hope that one day you have a chance to see it first hand. Take care.
The cooperation of everyone, during this event, was indeed amazing. Even more so, you should look into the "Northeast Blackout" of 2003. Effected around 55M people. Folks really came together, to support their communities, and help their neighbors. Much less devastating, than the ice-storm, but much more widespread.
Big difference was that it was summertime. It was actually NICE to have no TV, internet, nothing for a couple of days. Just enjoy the outdoors and actually have conversations, have a campfire, play cards and board games....
Fascinating Horror's done a doc on this event. Very rough. 100 ppl died apparently.
The worst natural disaster in modern Canadian history in terms of deaths, was the western heatwave of 2021. At least 600 people died from that. One town reached 49.6 °C. That was Lytton BC. The heat caused massive wildfires all over British Columbia. The whole village of Lytton actually burned to the ground.
I don't think the western heatwave got this kind of coverage, although I think it deserved it.
People in the interior of BC got very creative about dealing with the extreme heat that year. My son hung construction-grade canvas drop cloths from the eaves of his house to keep the sun off his windows. Shades were drawn and windows closed throughout the day and opened only for a few hours in the dark of the night. Throughout the house fans were set up with rotating ice packs in front of them to cool the interior air. Canadians are survivors!
After going through Hurricanes Juan, Dorian, and Fiona still would agree that BC 2021 heatwave would be the worst
@kayecastleman I did the same thing living in the lower mainland, where the humidity was much higher than the interior. I found out this week that heat dome got extremely close to killing a lot more if the humidity had gone up 3%. Too close, literally, for comfort.
@@ninemoonplanet Yes, the interior has a dry heat, almost desert-like in some places, but that coastal humidity can be stifling. I grew up in Montreal and I remember my clothes sticking to me in the summer heat. The dryness is much more tolerable..
I lived through this. My two kids, my dog and I lived on the 6th floor. No power. No heat. No elevator. No bank machines. Few grocery stores open. It was hard to find batteries, candles and matches. Lots of downed trees. I lived in Kingston, ontario. It was scary!
That was bad for you. No lights in the evening or anything. Kids and dog, holy crap. I had it way too easy in comparison. You tuffed it out. You are an amazing kind of rock.
I can’t watch this video without shedding a lot of tears for all the people affected by this storm,so glad to see all the people helping.much love from Ontario.
Some people in Quebec were without power for 7 weeks.
Yes, and I recall an "on the street interview" fellow complaining that it was like living in a "third world country." People ought to consider, within their means, being prepared for events like this. We're going to see more of them. You don't have to dig a bunker in the back yard, but have water, dry or canned goods, batteries, emergency radio, flashlights etc. If you're shy on cash, don't buy it all at once but build up a little prepper cushion over time. Most of us live completely dependent on massive systems.
Boo hoo, the homesless are without power everyday lol. Try going years with no power. Bet the homeless all froze to death in that ice storm.
In ontario too. I remember it well
33 days in my case. Good thing we had a wood burning stove.
@@civildiscourse2000 sure, but prepping for nearly two months of no power in the winter isn't realistic for most people. For many during this time, even flushing the toilet wasn't an option.
It's no longer the costliest disaster in Canadian history BTW. That title now belongs to the 2016 Fort McMurray Wildfire. It's also possible that the BC floods of 2021 were more costly from an economic standpoint because they destroyed all rail and road connections linking the port of Vancouver to the rest of the country. This documentary is a bit out of date (it's over ten years old.)
And now our country is _literally_ on fire. Good times.
I grew up in Drummondville but I was long gone by 1998. One of my friends family had a duplex in Drummondville, the parents lived in one half and one of their daughters lived in the other. The daughter was cooking supper when the power grid went down from the ice storm. The whole family went to one of the shelters where they stayed for 35 days, that's how long it took to get the power restored as all the crews were busy in Montreal.
The family started heading back home and they heard sirens coming from their neighborhood. When they got to their street they saw the sirens were from the firetrucks hosing down their duplex. When the sister left with her parents she didn't turn off the stove and when the electricity was restored the stove overheated and started the fire.
I lived through this storm when I was 7. We basically "camped out" in sleeping bags in our cold, dark apartment for 2 weeks, eating hot dogs on a camping gas mini stove. It was pretty fun as a kid, I never realized how terrifying it was... My parents made it seems like a grand game for us, I can't imagine how scared they were. We were lucky to have our power restored in just 2 weeks. Some didn't have power for MONTHS. Those pylons aren't quickly replaced!
Mert - You should know that Canadians are pretty hardy people in general. We've experienced every type of winter weather possible, but this was different. I lived in Ottawa during that time and it was horrendous. Just to give you an idea, to drive from Ottawa to Montreal only takes about 1.5 hours so they're very close together. I know in these videos they focus on Montreal but Ottawa got the exact same weather. We didn't have electricity for one week and it averaged around -25C. It was so bad, our neighbours 6 year old had a goldfish and he froze in the water exactly where he was. It was the weirdest thing to see..a goldfish frozen in place in his home.
It's happened before too. Hit Buffalo pretty bad too. It was called the Blizzard of '77. It lasted a few days but it was disastrous. Erno Rossi compiled stories from people who survived it in a book called "White Death". Some were kind of funny and other experiences were horrific. It's honestly worth the read.
I remember my mom and grandfather went to rescue my aunt in Montreal. They told me they got about 20 kilometers and had to give up on the car because it kept almost sliding into the ditch so they had to walk the rest of the way on foot there and back. There were places where they didn't so much walk as skide
I was living and owned a business in the town of St-Lambert. Right across the river from the island of Montréal. I was without power for 2 1/2 weeks and my business was without for 27 days. It was apocalyptic, you have to understand that the majority of homes in Québec use electricity to heat in the winter. If you owned a wood stove your home would be filled with friends and family. A regular ice storm is beautiful to see and a little annoying for drivers. This was a storm like no other and hopefully never again.
I remember this icestorm. I was going for groceries after the storm and the person walking about 6 feet in front of me got hit on the head by a broken branch.
My daughter was out of power for 41 days. She lived in Iberville where it started.
I guess I should mention that Iberville is (St. Jean sur Richelieu) where my daughter lived.
We were not aware that we should not drink the water. No power/no news.
I was 9yrs old when this happened and I lived just north of Granby, QC, which is about an hour drive south of Montreal. I remember literally everything was glazed in an inch of ice, making the whole world a giant ice rink where you were sliding wherever you stepped. The landscape of ice covering the local town, local mountain, covering and destroying our apple orchard and the large frozen farmland has forever stuck to my mind to this day. Our home was the only one with power in our area due to my old man being prepared for anything, and we ended up housing a large portion of our family who happened to be in the area for my grandfather's funeral that winter. I remember playing outside one "clear" day and the ground was so slippery, I couldn't stop myself from sliding onto powerlines. I thought I was gonna die, but they had no power, thank god (I was a kid). The 98 storm was a hell of a thing to witness in person, and it convinced me in the value of a good generator.
Thanks for posting this video, it really brought up alot of memories of that time, I can even remember Dennis Trudea as the CBC news anchor back then on channel 6, always on at 5pm right before the Simpsons came on. Great reactions to the hardships Quebecers had to face at the time., keep up the videos.
I'm from Granby! Hi there!
I’m from Montreal and was there during the Ice Storm and I was volunteering as a security agent in elderly residence mainly to stop them using propane and to have a direct connection with emergency personnel if needed. It was crazy to travel downtown Montreal that was pitch black. I will never forget it.
I lived on the fringes of where it was affecting Ontario, and even then the damage was catastrophic. It was hit and miss between some people in my community, who went days/weeks without power, and those who were unscathed.
Thanks for reacting to this, I'm happy that more people are learning about this disaster. I was a young teenager at the time and I remember being happy to be out of school when the power went out the first day but we never expected it to be what it was and yes it was bad in Montreal but at least the power eventually came back, unlike the triangle of darkness where some people went weeks without power in the more remote locations. My dad created a small heater with candles and aluminum trays, wasn't ideal but it was the best we could manage to at least heat one room where we all hung out for a few days covered in tons of blankets to stay warm while listening to the news on the radio and often calling other family members to know how each were doing. As the years have gone by I think those of us who lived through it are being reminded how quickly ice can do damage, we did get an ice storm for a single day a few months back, it took the power and internet on most of Montreal for about a day and we once again saw branches and broken trees everywhere. Obviously not as bad but enough to make sure we don't forget that it can and most likely will happen again, as the cost of running power lines underground is astronomical even for a city, let alone all the transmission lines coming from all the way north. If it comes to happen again I think the challenge this time will be on communications, a lot more people rely on cell phones that need batteries or the cell networks to function in order to get news and any kind of media updates rather than a good old radio like in 98.
My great uncle lost his entire apple orchard (200 trees in all) in this ice storm, and was without power for many weeks. The house was uninhabitable for more than six months, as all the water pipes burst and the damage had to be repaired.
Oh yeah, I lived through this! We lost power in Montreal, for a good part of it for 2 weeks! So can you imagine it being -20 to -40c and losing power for 2 weeks?
Luckily my house and my block had power, we opened up our homes to others to warm up and keep their food cold.
I was happy to have an entire month off from high school, since it happened during Christmas break. If you can live in Montreal, you can live anywhere, -40c in winters, +46c now for summers. Honestly I was 16yo when this happened, I wasn't a huge news watcher and my parents were freaking out given everyone else in the fam was having a hard time but I didn't think much of it, 16yo kid with a kick ass computer, ya know? But it was a miracle how we didn't lose power all throughout that time, a 15 min drive from the downtown core.
Amazing to watch this again, thanks for this. ^_^
I will never forget that night. I had no power for over 2 weeks. Along with it came thunderstorms. I mainly lived in a hotel, because I had a small child. Gas pumps were empty, stores closed . It felt like the apocalypse
My brother was deployed to Quebec along with our unit but I couldn’t go because my son was only 2 months old at the time and I was on maternity . I knew people that were out of power for weeks .
I live in Moncton, New Brunswick, next door to Quebec, and even though we got some of this as well thankfully it was not as bad for us. We do have a lot of snow most years to contend with, though some years we get off light. In the past 10 years where I live we've had 7 years where we approached or exceeded 10 feet of snow accumulation in a year. The worst was 2015 where it reached 540cm, nearly 18 feet. Most side streets were down to one lane width because there was nowhere to push the snow anymore. So you often had to pull into someone's driveway if you met someone driving the other way. Then there was the storm of 1992. Not the worst year by far but we had 163cm (5 feet) of snow fall over one weekend, which locked up the city for a week. We happened to be moving just as that storm hit and got the last load of appliances out to our new place when there was only a foot and a half of snow on the ground. Not the most fun time of my life.
I lived several hundred kilometers from the epicenter and was still without power for 17 days. Our whole family spent the 2 weeks gathered around our wood fireplace until we got access to a generator from one of my uncles once they got power back first. Powerlines and trees were down across the region. We returned to school after 3 weeks there were still some of my classmates that hadn't got power back and wouldn't for a couple more weeks.
Wearing a hard-hat to protect myself (sorta) from falling branches outside; we had a lot of very old trees around and along the road. Huge, one-foot thick branches would crack under the weight and fall.
An entire tree, probably a century old, falling on a neighbour’s house straight through the roof and into the second floor. (They got lucky, no one was hurt, though scared shitless I’m sure. I think they stayed with a neighbour without so many trees around their house after that.)
A sapling covered in ice three-times as thick as it’s branches. (They were drooping so far branches mid-way up the trunk were touching the ground.)
Grocery stores emptying their stocks because they knew anything refrigerated would spoil, with everyone trying to divide things as fairly as we could, not knowing how long it would be before we had power, water, etc.
Relying on radio for news, and shortwave so we could hear the emergency alerts from the government.
No financial infrastructure to speak of once cash ran-out, so stores started giving things away to people who needed things but had no way to pay. Sometimes it could be as pedestrian as a hammer to fix something important.
Using our wood stove for cooking to conserve precious propane and butane. Neighbours who had nothing like that for heat visiting to get warm, have coffee, etc.
The military eventually getting a generator to our community centre so people could have heated shelter, a shower, etc.
It was absolutely wild.
Edit: And also wondering how the hell the linemen out there were going to manage fixing the electrical grid. Honestly, with how much damage there was, getting things back within one-to-two months was heroic.
It was very interesting to revisit this with a grown-up perspective. I was 16 at the time and my family had power for most of it so I hadn't realised how bad it was. I even have fond memories of the 1992 Ice storm. We had no power so I slept over at a friend's house and we camped in front of his fireplace for 3 days.
I live in eastern Ontario and my home was without power for over a week. We had a woodstove in the basement for warmth and cooking. My office didn't get electricity back for 2 weeks and I was the only person who could make it in. It was so spooky driving to work that first morning. A village I pass through was totally dark except for the odd candle I could see through someone's window. One could not get fuel as all the stations were closed. The military visited every household to check on people. We managed. It certainly was memorable.
I was born and living in Cornwall during the ice storm of 98, one of the worst areas affected. We were without power for 3 weeks but luckily survived by having a generator generously loned to us. I was in my last year of high school and after a week decided to to hitchhike to Peterborough to visit my friends who were attended college at the time.
My favourite part of the whole video is the trucker from Richmond, Virginia, volunteering to bring mattresses and stuff for the people in the shelters. Really and truly it makes me tear up a little. He came all the way from Virginia! Just, bless his heart. I hope he is well.
Classic line, first time in my life I wish I had stayed in Winnipeg!! Canadians would recognize the great irony of that statement since Winnipeg's knickname is Winterpeg.
I put in a natural gas fireplace with a starter that didn't require electricity in my home because of that storm.
Think of how heavy a gallon of water is. The weight of freezing water isn't something to take lightly!!😉
Rain, cold, flooding, it was bonkers. A big push to thank the linemen who were working nonstop in awful conditions.
I live in Montréal and remember this well. Days on end in the dark and cold. Outside was like another world. Like some kind of science fiction movie. Lucky for me at the time I had a gas stove and could still cook. Took things out of the fridge and freezer and put them outside on the balcony to keep them cold. But January is the coldest month in Montreal and I had to keep myself wrapped up in blankets the whole time inside my apartment. I was young and healthy, but I feel for anyone who had health problems or who was elderly.
I live in the Maritimes. We were also affected by the ice storm although not as bad as Montreal. Much of our Provinces are rural so we were able to cope a little better than those who lived in the City. The forests and animals took a very hard hit. It is the worst ice storm I can remember although I wouldn’t consider it to be our worst natural disaster. Hurricanes have been particularly brutal the past few years, starting with Hurricane Juan. Last years Hurricane Fiona was particularly devastating especially for parts of Newfoundland and Nova Scotia. Thank you for showing this video!
It was an El Nino year. It was the first time I heard about El Nino. Now that this is another El Nino this year , it makes me a little nervous for this winter. It was tramatizing.
I was thinking the very same thing.
Oh we had a miniature version of this this year, trust me. Almost a milion lost power a little bit before easter. Lost power for 3 days and my tree on my yard lost a lot of branches haha.
I lived downtown Montreal. I was lucky, only missed power for three days. I had a gas stove so I could cook, heat water to wash etc...All but one station feeding Montreal with electricity went down, could have been so much worse. Going outside in the day was risky. The sun would shine and all the ice on the high rises would come crashing to the ground. Hydro Quebec kept the hospitals and grocery stores open and everyone else in the dark. The worst place was southeast of Montreal, The Dark Triangle, where they missed power for two to three weeks.
I lived right near Guy Metro, no power for 2 weeks, what part of downtown were you in?
Other recent major Canadian disasters:
1987 Edmonton Tornado - 27 dead, 300+ injured
2013 Alberta Floods
2021 Western North America heat wave - 800+ deaths. Considered the deadliest weather related event in Canadian history
1985 Barrie Tornado - 8 dead, 155+ injured
2000 Pine Lake Tornado 12 dead, 100+ injured
Calgary Hailstorms of 1991, 2020, and 2021
2018 Ontario Windstorm
2022 Eastern Canada derecho
2013: Lac Mégantic catastrophe
2015: Goderich Tornado
1987 Edmonton tornado, my family were on vacation in Disneyland! Never expected to turn on the news in California and see Edmonton plastered all over headlines! We were Calgarians but my aunt lived in Edmonton. When we got back and visited several weeks later, she had saved some hailstones from the storm in her freezer. The size of baseballs! I’ll never forget it.
I also was there for the Calgary hailstorms, and Alberta floods and was in Edmonton when Fort MacMurray burned down.
That was a very well made video wherever you found this.
I was only 6 when this happened, I still remember it like it was yesterday. I was living on the south shore of Montreal at the time, just off the Montréal island, which was arguably the hardest hit area during the storm. We were living in a family members basement for a couple weeks. It is quite insane how quiet life is when there is no electricity. You could hear trees snap from multiple blocks away like it was right behind you! Even when power came back on the roads and surroundings were treacherous!
I remember this happening, but I was young and lived outside the disaster zone. I have a lot of sympathy for the people in the region affected because I hate ice storms even when they're not as bad
Oh yes, 98, that was when Jack Frost had a tantrum because his wife left him.
January is always a risky time of year for us here in Quebec and Eastern Ontario. On Jan 24, last week, we had a few hours of freezing rain and everything was covered in ice. And as i was scraping it from my driveway, i remembered what we went though in 98. And how quickly everything just stopped working. It was true about community spirit. i volunteered in a shelter, making warm meals for ppl. We had no power for many days afterward as temperatures began to drop to winter normals.
Long-story short: Montréal gets freezing rain, that is not unusual or uncommon, but that winter, we got way more freezing rain than normal. The ice layers kept piling up and piling up on themselves, adding a lot of weight to tree branches and aerial electric wires, causing them to collapse. Main electrical lines that were feeding Montréal crumbled under the weight and people were out of power for weeks, some of them 3 months. Our home was fine, but we had relatives who lost power and they came live with us for a while.
I'm an Albertan, but I was living in Southern Ontario during the ice storm. I wasn't concerned about my family, even though our oldest children were two and almost one at the time.
I was taught by my parents and at school how to survive extreme weather and I found the weather really warm during the winters in S. Ontario, so if we lost power, we could stay warm. I do remember feeling terrible about the people who got carbon monoxide poisoning. I don't think we lost power where we were.
I think we lost power for only a few hours. SW Ontario.
It wasn’t just in Quebec! Ontario got it bad as well. It was frightening!
I’m from Alberta and remember the news coverage as this unfolded. My family sent money and supplies to the emergency shelters. Another 100 year event in Canada happened is the Alberta floods in 2013. Didn’t cause as much damage as this ice storm, but was still devastating and is the 2nd costliest natural disaster
I was living between Montreal and Toronto at the time, right where the St. Lawrence meets Lake Ontario. We lost power early on. My parents brought us and our cousin to a friends house on the military base. They still had power. A few other families also gathered there as well. I remember watching Air Bud when the power went out there too. All the kids slept in the same room on the floor to keep warm. We lived all together for a few days but we were some of the lucky ones. Power came back within the week.
I had a week off work with full power. I did remarkably well.
I remember it and it was crazy times.
Eastern Ontario was hit pretty bad too! Our rural area was out of electricity for 3 weeks. We were some of the last areas to get it back. We couldn’t stay home, we had to stay with relatives who had wood stoves. Part of the last week without heat and power, we were home and I can tell you I’ve never been so cold at night under a thick pile of blankets 😬
I was living in Trois-Rivieres (1 1/2 hours northeast ) we had almost no ice that week
1 year earlier, we were struck (not as badly) . My parents were without power for 50 hours.
We gathered the food from the freezer and put it outside
We had no power for 15 days thank god for wood stove
Thanks for the video. I live in Ontario and was 10 when the storm hit so I was aware of what was going on but was limited by a child's understanding of the situation. It was really interesting to learn about how Quebec's unique geography was such a major factor.
My dad and my brother (14 at the time) are very experienced campers, including winter camping, and my dad grew up in northern Ontario so is no stranger to harsh winter weather. Ice is different than being buried in snow however. Our house had a lot of discussion about what we would do if something like that hit our area.
ETA, 41:04: I don't know about where you are Mert, but here the media is filled with so much negative news. There is so much going wrong in the world right now so it is so heartening to have a reminder like this that there is so much good out there still! There are people who care about others in need and are happy to help eachother, far more than we realize sometimes. Love is not lost.❤
I grew up in Kingston, Ontario, which is located where Lake Ontario empties into the St.Lawrence River. We used to get freezing rain 2 or 3 times every winter. One time circa 1970, I skated to school (high school).
My parents were still living there in 1998 and I heard that gangs of men with chain saws circulated around town, clearing tree limbs knocked down by the weight of ice. These fellows were volunteers.
I was in Ottawa during the ice storm and my husband was in Montreal, as were his mom and dad and siblings. The road conditions between Ottawa and Montreal were so bad he stayed in Montreal. Ottawa was hit hard as well but nowhere was as badly hit as Montreal. The dairy farmers (of which there are many in the rural areas between Ottawa and Montreal) lost their supplies and in many cases their animals as well. It was horrible. Walking was treacherous at best and in Ottawa and Montreal and the hospitals were overrun with people with broken arms, wrists, legs, hips etc., The only thing I can say about Canadians is that we know to offer help as we may be the one in need at some point. Thank you to everyone who volunteered, who worked long hours, came from the U.S, were deployed from the armed services, police and fire services, Red Cross and the list goes on….
A few years ago, there was a flooding in a city nearby right before it got below zero and the water all froze. People, instead of walking around town, started to put on ice skates instead.
Our family lived outside of Ottawa in a rural area at the time. All the big trees lining the driveway fell over from the weight of the ice. There was no electricity for a month, however my brother in law drove to New York State (which is relatively close to Ottawa) and bought a big gas generator. His drive was treacherous but he made it! There was no heat, electricity, plumbing working in the house but the generator allowed intermittent electricity.
I remember this well. My boyfriend at the time - now husband- was in the armed forces and he was spending the Christmas holiday with me in Toronto. We were watching the news and they were talking about the ice storm and his whole troop was in the back ground as they had called in the army. He said “oh my god- that’s my whole troop! I have to go” and off he went. He lived in a gym on a cot for weeks while they pulled frozen power lines out of the ice. He said it was horrible.
I remember sleeping by the fire place bundled up like crazy and even with the fire roaring nonstop it was so cold. Keep in mind in Montreal people are very used to bad winters, this was a massive disaster.
We didn't have electricity for 2 weeks+ in the freezing winter but I heard stories that some people didn't have power for up to a month maybe a little over a month.
This winter we actually had something similar with people who once again had no power for up to almost 2 weeks. The difference this time was that I was lucky and had power, but I'm told it wasn't as cold as the ice storm and also not as many people without power.
The issue about 1998 was that nobody had power so you couldn't even go stay with a family member or hang out with people for a day, get a warm shower etc. In 98 there was no power almost anywhere. This past winter it was sporadic outages where maybe 25% had power.
Right now the floods in Vermont are awful, we've had those too in the summer recent years due to tons of rain. There were many times where it teetered on the line between complete unmitigated disaster and just fine 🤣
I really do wish Vermont a steady recovery. Natural disasters suck 😢
I remember this storm well. Living in the GTA everything including cars, houses, tree’s & power lines coated in 5mm to 5cm of ice. Northern Ontario, Quebec and Atlantic Canada were hit the worse. My most vivid memory was my boss’s sister, living in Quebec, just outside Montreal was greatly impacted. Power outages forced them to use generator, however they ran out of gas, the local gas stations without power could not run the gas pumps so on day 3 their pipes in the house burst. Their bedroom was flooded. We were able to get a very large truck filled with blankets, mattresses, clothing, ready eat food, water, toiletries baby formula etc. to her sister who took what she needed and shared the rest of the contents with her neighbours. Our community came together in a crisis to “rescue” their fellow Canadians with much needed supplies knowing that in the future those communities will come together once again if ever the needs arise. This instances defines us as proud Canadians will always be there for our fellow Canadians. There is no better feeling. 🇨🇦❤️🇨🇦
Lived in Toronto at the time this happened. I was working night shift (12am to 8AM), and when my shift ended at 8AM, the Public Transport System (TTC) had shutdown, I was unable to get home, I ended up sleeping at work. Many days of power issues, lack of public transport was big deal.
I lived in Ottawa during the storm. I personally was only out of power for a few days, but husband (then boyfriend) lived just south of Ottawa and they did not have power for almost a month! I also did volunteer work for St. John Ambulance and helped at a shelter halfway between Ottawa and Montreal and many people came to eat, but still wanted to stay in their homes - worried and wanting to watch and protect their property. My job was to provide first aid. I remember treating a man with frostbite on his feet. He still chose to go back to his home after receiving treatment and getting some food.
It was an insane event for sure. My mother in law lives near Sherbrooke at the time and they were without power for over 2 weeks. Luckily they had a generator and a wood stove they could cook on. My Gf's family was without power for almost 3 weeks. I'm from Toronto and our worse ice storm was in 2013 just 2 days before Christmas. There were people in the city that didn't have power for an entire week.
Interestingly, ice storms usually happen in the more southern regions of Canada. It requires a particular combination of warm and cold air. My husband and I drove through the start of this storm. We were an hour north of Montreal and drove through to west of Toronto. We had to stop every 20 to 30 minutes to clear the ice off the windshield wipers. What was normally a 7 and a half hour drive took 12 hours. We had two small children with us. This was the first day! Had it been later we would have stayed put.
In 2020 there was an awful ice storm that hit parts of Oregon. It wasnt quite as severe as what happened to Montréal, but it tore down 150 acres of timberland my uncle had hand-planted 30+yrs ago, as well as the century-old oaks that we loved so much on that family farm. It was utterly heartbreaking and has taken years to clean up from...
The video and commentary were amazing
My family and I lived through that and are extremely grateful to those who helped us through this
I was in the triangle of darkness just off island. We were without power for 10 days. One thing that never gets covered is in the early days of recovery, still without electricity, we had brilliant sunshine. With so many lines down no one was driving. Everything is pristine white. and silent.. The bright blue sky was reflected everywhere on sparkling ice and snow. It was spectacularly beautiful.