Thousands of people on Vancouver Island are dealing with power outages after high winds battered the region overnight.

BC Hydro said there are almost 4,000 people in the dark Thursday morning, with the vast majority in Nanaimo.

Late Wednesday, as many as 9,000 customers across the South Coast were without power.

BC Hydro said standard crews and extra relief crews were out in full force to try to restore service.

"It's all hands on deck right now," spokesperson Susie Rieder said Wednesday.

In some cases, she said, branches downed power lines and led to the outages. ​

Environment Canada had wind warnings in effect Wednesday for much of the South Coast and Vancouver Island, forecasting potentially damaging winds of up to 90 km/h.

The strongest winds were expected to have subsided by Thursday morning.