Tourists already believe life slows to a crawl on the West Coast, but the area will literally have its own time zone next week.
Local clocks are expected to run collectively slow from May 23-26 as BC Hydro upgrades some aging equipment in Port Alberni. While the work is ongoing, the single transmission line that connects the West Coast to power from Port Alberni will be cut off and locals will be relying on Hydro’s Ash River Generating Station near Great Central Lake.
“Ash is providing the energy so it allows us to do work downstream without an outage impact to West Coast customers,” Louwers said.
The last time the Coast relied on Ash, September 2015, local clocks ran several minutes slower than the rest of Vancouver Island and Hydro is advising residents that history will likely repeat itself.
“Clocks may run a little slow, or they may run a little fast, or it may all balance out at the end of the day and you might not notice a difference at all…However, the last time we did island the system, there was about a five to 15-minute variation where they ran slower,” Louwers said.
“We certainly thank customers for their patience as they may need to spend a little bit of time adjusting their clocks on a daily basis while we complete the important work.”
She added all clocks plugged into electrical outlets in West Coast homes will run at the same speed and that the work is expected to be completed by 4 p.m. on May 26.