Residents across northern B.C. were plunged into darkness around 8:55 p.m. on Wednesday night.
At it's peak, approximately 100,000 customers in Prince George, Vanderhoof, Smithers, Fort St. John, Dawson Creek, Chetwynd, Hudsons Hope, Houston, Burns Lake and surrounding areas were without power, according BC Hydro spokesperson Susie Rieder.
"It looks like lightning is the suspected cause of the outage," Rieder said Wednesday night.
The cause of the outage was under still under investigation, she said, but crews were working to restore power to the region one stage at a time.
As of 10 p.m, BC Hydro's website reported more than 44,000 customers were still without power.
A large plume of flame from the Husky refinery's flare stacks was visible throughout much of the city, prompting reports of a fire in the industrial area of Prince George. However, based on reports heard on the fire dispatch radio channel, Prince George Fire Rescue crews were sent back to their fire halls after no fire was found in the area.
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