The aftermath of the storms that ravaged Lithuania on Saturday could be the largest in the past two decades – this assessment was given on Sunday morning after a meeting convened by Prime Minister Mindaugas Sinkevičius by the responsible services.
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On Sunday, the Prime Minister said that the country’s leaders receive information about the storm’s aftermath continuously, and the main goal now is to eliminate the effects of the disaster as quickly as possible and assess where further assistance is needed.
“The storm also demanded a sacrifice. I express my sincere condolences to the relatives of the deceased. There are injured people. According to the services, based on the number of uprooted trees and emergency calls, this is the largest scale of incidents in the past two decades,” said the Prime Minister.
The storm disrupted electricity supply, with the greatest damage done in the Kaunas region. According to Sunday morning data, nearly 3,000 faults were recorded across the country, leaving almost 220,000 users without electricity.
“I understand that restoring electricity supply in some areas may take time. I want to thank the firefighters, electricity network workers, road workers, railway workers, and all other services that started working even before the storm ended.
The responsible services must now concentrate all possible resources to remove the storm’s aftermath as quickly as possible,” said M. Sinkevičius.
According to the Prime Minister, the storm did not cause significant damage in his own surroundings. Electricity was out in his garden, but at that time he was already in Vilnius, Turniškės, preparing to travel to Kupiškis, where he was to participate in the Baltic Way commemoration.
“On the way here, one broken tree, broken branches, but nothing significant. Electricity was out very briefly but later it was restored,” said the Prime Minister.
He added that so far he had not received information that the Baltic Way commemoration planned in Kupiškis would be canceled, so he intended to assess the real situation while traveling across the country.
The Prime Minister urges residents to remain cautious, avoid going to dangerous places, follow the recommendations of the services, and report any new dangers caused by the storm to the responsible institutions.
The biggest problem – power outage
Renatas Radvila, head of the Energy Distribution Operator (ESO)
said that the largest scale of electricity supply disruptions was recorded on Saturday evening – at that time about 268,000 users were without electricity. On Sunday, this number decreased to about 220,000.
Currently, the removal of storm damage is not proceeding smoothly everywhere – this is hindered by the strong wind still raging in some areas.
According to R. Radvila, the repair work was complicated by the fact that the storm lasted about 12 hours, and with strong winds, crews could not safely work on power lines.
“We cannot climb towers and work on power lines at wind speeds above 15 meters per second,” explained the ESO head.
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On Sunday, more than 600 people and 260 crews were involved in fixing the electricity network faults, and a larger number of dispatchers were also engaged. In total, according to R. Radvila, more than a thousand employees across the organization were involved in fixing the disruptions.
Currently, the damage caused by the storm to the network is also being assessed and specific faults are being identified to plan the order of work.
“The network is being assessed, so-called defect detection is underway, and we are looking at the damage done to prioritize and organize network restoration,” said R. Radvila.
More than 100 generators had already been delivered to municipalities on Sunday. The ESO head reminded that after the previous major storm, the company purchased 200 generators, which can be delivered to specific locations upon municipalities’ requests.
According to preliminary ESO assessments, this storm was stronger and caused more damage than the disaster that ravaged the country in 2024. On Sunday, the company expected to have preliminary calculations on how long the entire electricity network restoration might take.
Electricity supply, according to R. Radvila, is first restored on the largest lines, and then work is prioritized based on critical infrastructure and how many users can be connected after restoring a specific part of the network.
Emergency Call Center – peak of calls
Saulius Tamulevičius, head of the General Emergency Center (BPC), said that in the past 24 hours, the emergency number 112 received a record number of calls – a total of 24,427 calls. This is almost five times more than on a usual day and about three times more than on previous days with the highest call volumes.
According to S. Tamulevičius, previously very high call volumes were recorded during New Year’s or at the start of Russia’s large-scale war in Ukraine, but Saturday’s storm significantly exceeded these figures.
“At peak times, we received up to 14 calls per second,” said the BPC head.
Taking into account weather forecasts, the center increased the number of working employees by about 30% in advance. The heaviest load was between 4 and 6 p.m.
“We really want to be pleased that our General Emergency Center system withstood that call volume at peak times,” said S. Tamulevičius.
A large part of the reports were related to trees uprooted by the storm. During the day, rescue services received about 1,800 calls for removing fallen trees. Trees fell on cars, buildings, and power lines.
S. Tamulevičius reminded that one person died during the storm, and several others were injured.
Most reports related to the storm’s aftermath were received in the Kaunas region – nearly 500. Next in the number of calls were the Vilnius and Utena regions. On Sunday, services were still continuing the work of eliminating the disaster’s consequences.
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