By Joel van der Veen

DAVIDSON — A severe summer storm hit Davidson and area Sunday night, cutting power to thousands of customers, knocking down trees and damaging a number of homes and businesses.

The storm’s stay was brief — rolling through around midnight and clearing before long — but residents were coping with its effects for days afterward.

Public works foreman Doug Torrie said Thursday that he and his staff had been busy since Monday morning, clearing fallen trees and branches, cutting them up and carting them off in the garbage truck.

“We wanted to get the main streets open up first,” he said, explaining that a fallen tree blocking Grant Street near Second Street was their top priority.

The crew of six also had to clean up trees blocking roads at the Davidson campground, and by Thursday they were working at the cemetery.

Despite working continuously, Torrie said he and his staff were having a hard time keeping up with demand and still had plenty of work ahead of them.

“We’re working on it as fast as we can,” he said.

Heather Johnson, a spokesperson for SaskPower, said roughly 2,800 customers in Davidson and area were left without power when the storm struck just after midnight on Monday morning.

A fallen tree branch that severed a power line on Olds Place was to blame for the outage, said Johnson.

It was a busy night for SaskPower employees, dealing with similar situations across multiple regions.

“They got things back as quickly and safely as they could,” said Johnson.

She said power was restored around 2:45 a.m., although some customers reported having experienced continued outages for several hours afterward.

Much of the surrounding area saw similar outages due to the storm. Downed poles caused an extended outage for customers in Watrous and district, including Imperial, Simpson, Liberty, Penzance and Holdfast.

Customers in the Lake Diefenbaker district were also without power early Monday morning, including Loreburn, Elbow and the surrounding rural area.

For the full story and more photos, please see the July 11 edition of The Davidson Leader or call 306-567-2047 to subscribe today.

By Joel van der Veen

DAVIDSON — Two provincial sports titles made for a historic year for Davidson School.

As Sandra Baldwin said during the school’s annual awards ceremony on Wednesday, both the senior boys basketball team and the senior girls volleyball team made history in going all the way and winning provincial gold.

For the school to earn two titles in one year was itself a significant milestone, she added.

Baldwin called the teams up one by one, inviting the players to join hands with Kindergarten students and lead them to the front of the room.

“Kindergarteners,” she said, “you are holding the hands of champions.”

The students’ achievements in academics, athletics and drama were honoured during the ceremony, held in the gym on Wednesday. Tina Stone and Andrew Read served as masters of ceremonies.

Const. Kam Hay from the Craik RCMP detachment was on hand to present the Citizenship Award to Grade 11 student Miranda Farrell.

Senior basketball player Gabe Ebenal paid tribute to coach Kim Rettger, who received the West Central District’s Outstanding Coach award.

For the full story and photos, please see the June 27 edition of The Davidson Leader, or call 306-567-2047 to subscribe today.