Energy, Estonia

"It has been difficult to get to the failure points because the roads are full of fallen trees. During the recovery works, there have been cases where a tree is removed from the line at the fault site, but a few moments later, a new tree falls next to it and the line is broken again," Juri Klaassen, head of the control center at Elektrilevi, said.

"The stronger wind in the afternoon has led to additional failures in many places, including the islands, where the storm started in the early morning hours. The first major failures can now also be seen in West-Viru County, and it is feared that failures may also occur in East-Viru County in the late evening, because according to the forecast, the wind will start to rise there," Klaassen said.

As at 6:50 p.m., there were altogether 7,393 households across Estonia without power, 2,693 of which were located on the island of Saaremaa and 2,662 in Harju County.

According to Elektrilevi, the existing medium voltage failures on the mainland will most likely be eliminated on Thursday. Additional failures in the late evening will be restored on Friday. The elimination of the medium voltage failures in Saaremaa and Hiiumaa will be completed by Friday evening and the low-voltage works will be carried out on the weekend.

Teams handling the failures are out from early in the morning until night. Scheduled work on the islands has been canceled on Friday. Elektrilevi and its partners are doing their best to restore the electricity supply as soon as possible, the system operator said.

Elektrilevi also stressed that broken power lines must not be approached, as the ground beneath the wires can be live and give a life-threatening electric shock. "If you notice a tree that has fallen on the line or some other dangerous situation, please call the failure hotline 1343 or the emergency number 112," the system operator said.