Freezing rain and wind leave thousands of Quebecers without electricity.

FILE: Freezing rain (Pixabay photo)

MONTREAL — Almost 68,000 Hydro Quebec customers were without electricity late Tuesday due to a mix of freezing rain and strong winds.

The vast majority of outages, about 58,000, were in communities south and southeast of Montreal. More than 6,000 homes and businesses were blacked out in the city.

Freezing rain has been falling since Monday night in southwestern and central Quebec.

Environment Canada says much of the precipitation has ended, but winds from the west of up to 70 kilometres per hour were whipping up snow and creating hazardous driving conditions.

In the Saguenay-Lac-Saint-Jean area and throughout the Gaspe, heavy snow and blowing snow continued Tuesday night and visibility was down to zero in some areas.

One death was blamed on the poor road conditions on Highway 15 in the Mirabel area north of Montreal. Provincial police say a man died when a van in which he was a passenger collided with a sign structure spanning the highway.