A massive spring storm that swept into eastern Ontario and Quebec has caused power blackouts and school-bus cancellations Monday in the Ottawa area.

Buses were cancelled for students in several communities outside Ottawa, but the schools remain open for those who can get there, including boards in Stormont-Dundas-Glengarry, Cornwall, Prescott-Russell, and Lanark, Leeds & Grenville.

Hydro crews were working to restore power to about 11,000 homes and businesses in Eastern Ontario and western Quebec.

In the Outaouais, about 1,500 Hydro-Quebec customers were blacked out. In Ottawa, 3,300 Hydro Ottawa customers lost power in the city's Barrhaven area.
 
Trees have fallen on hydro wires in the Walkley Road area — cutting power for 208 customers there — and Hydro Ottawa said Monday morning it didn't know when the power would be back on.

Another 6,500 Hydro One customers south and east of Ottawa were also without power, an area that included Cumberland, Rockland, Hawkesbury and Alexandria, and even some homes in Cornwall, as well as Osgoode, Manotick and Oxford-on-Rideau.

There have been numerous minor accidents reported by police, as city snowplows were a little slow off the mark. A lot of snow-clearing equipment had already been converted for summer use.

The storm moved into Canada after making its way through the eastern United States from New York, which was bombarded by rain Sunday.

At least one person died and hundreds of flights were cancelled along the U.S. eastern seaboard Sunday as a result of the storm.

That's on top of the five deaths blamed on the same storm system as it swept through the Plains Friday and Saturday.