Storm leaves 219,000 people without power in Lithuania

A storm that swept across Lithuania on Saturday left 219,000 residents without electricity on Sunday morning, LRT reported. Fire and rescue services received more than 1,800 calls related to the storm by late Saturday evening, and the number continued to rise.

Rasa Juodkienė, a representative of the Energy Distribution Operator, said the storm had caused unprecedented damage to the electricity grid in recent decades.

“In terms of damage to the grid, this is a catastrophic situation,” Juodkienė told LRT radio.

She said the number of faults requiring repairs had reached 3,000, far exceeding the impact of the previous storm.

About 54,000 customers were without electricity in the Utena region, 33,000 in the Panevėžys region, and 30,000 in Vilnius district and surrounding areas. The Alytus region had about 18,000 customers without power, followed by Šiauliai with 14,000 and Klaipėda with 13,000.

Strong, gusting winds prevented Energy Distribution Operator crews from carrying out all the necessary work on Saturday. After the winds eased at about 10 p.m., workers began moving to their assigned locations. More than 600 people were working at affected sites on Sunday, while additional crews were still being recruited.

Juodkienė said restoring electricity to all customers could take up to a week.

Rescue services continue clearing storm damage

Jolita Orentaitė, a representative of the Fire and Rescue Department, said the previous 24 hours had been the busiest period for dealing with storm damage in the past two decades.

Firefighters had responded to more than 1,800 calls between Saturday afternoon and Sunday morning. Although weather conditions had stabilised, the number of calls had been increasing since 7 a.m.

Most calls concerned trees that had fallen onto roads, cars, buildings and electricity infrastructure. Firefighters responded across the country, with the highest number of calls, about 500, recorded in Kaunas County.

A person was killed in Anykščiai district on Saturday afternoon after a tree fell on them during the strong winds. The person had been fishing near their pond when the tree fell.

Prime Minister Mindaugas Sinkevičius is convening a remote interinstitutional meeting on Sunday to discuss the response to the storm damage.

According to preliminary data from the Lithuanian Hydrometeorological Service, the strongest wind gusts on Saturday reached 33 metres per second at Ventė Cape and in Nida near the sea, measured at a height of 24 metres. Gusts reached 32 metres per second at the port of Klaipėda, 28 metres per second in Šilutė, 26 metres per second in Kaunas and Kybartai, and 24 metres per second in Lazdijai and Šventoji.