A nearly 40-kilometer stretch of Highway 4 on Vancouver Island was closed Tuesday evening due to impacts from a storm forecast to hit the south coast.

DriveBC announced the closure between Coombs and Port Alberni just before 6 p.m.

Port Alberni RCMP, in a social media post, said the closure was due to “hazardous conditions” and that the detachment had already been dispatched to “several” accidents due to the dangerous mix of strong gusts and storms. felled trees.

Before the highway was closed, the Port Alberni Fire Department said they were called to a report of a “tree that had fallen on a tractor-trailer.”

The closure comes as a “bomb cyclone” hits the region, with forecasters predicting winds of up to 120 km/h.

BC Ferries has preemptively canceled all of its Tuesday evening sailings between the mainland and Vancouver Island.