Toronto Hydro sends nearly 30 workers to Florida to help restore power after Irma

Toronto Hydro is sending nearly 30 workers to Florida on Tuesday to help restore power to the Tampa area followingHurricane Irma.

The workers will join 175 Hydro One employees who headed south on Monday.

Tori Gass, spokesperson for Toronto Hydro, said the crews are leaving from Toronto Hydro's Etobicoke facility.

Toronto Hydro received a call from Florida utilitieson late Monday.

"They've been devastated down there. We've been seeing the pictures and the images coming out of Florida. It's quite severe. It's destruction everywhere. One of the big things is that the power is out tomillions ofcustomers," Gass said.

"This is a bit far for us to be going. I'm not even sure we've been this far before.But that just speaks to the devastation that's down there," she said.

"We'll be doing whatever is necessary to help them do repairs and getthe power back up for those customers who really need it right now."

Gass said the crews will bring their buckettrucks and Toronto Hydro expects most of the work to involve fixing overhead wires.

Close to 4.5 million homes and businesses lost power in the hurricane that made landfall in the U.S. early Sunday, and utility officials say it will take weeks to restore electricity in the state.

Toronto Hydro and Hydro One havereciprocal agreementswith North American utilities to provide helpduring major power outages.

In thesesituations, all costs are covered by the utility receiving the help.