Severe storms cause damage across southern Minnesota. State Fair delays opening – Austin Daily Herald

By Andrew Krueger

Strong thunderstorms rolled across parts of Minnesota — including the Twin Cities — early Tuesday. And tens of thousands of Minnesotans remained without power in the wake of an earlier round of severe weather Monday night.

Monday night’s storms downed trees and power lines, dropped torrential rain and sparked intense lightning as they moved from west-central Minnesota through the Twin Cities and into western Wisconsin during the evening.

The storms prompted officials at the Minnesota State Fair to temporarily close parts of the grounds and cancel Monday night’s Grandstand show. Monday’s Twins game at Target Field was also put in a weather delay.

On Tuesday morning, fair officials said they would delay opening the fairgrounds due to the morning’s storms, and to assess damage and clean up debris. The gates usually open at 7 a.m. each day, but ended up opening at 9 a.m.

As Monday night’s storms exited the Twin Cities metro area, the setting sun created rainbows and a vivid, surreal orange sky.

Xcel Energy, Connexus Energy, East Central Energy and other utilities reported combined power outages affecting more than 100,000 customers in the immediate wake of the storms.

More than 150,000 Minnesota homes and businesses were without power as of 6:30 a.m. Tuesday — a combination of outages remaining from the previous night and new ones sparked by the latest round of strong storms that produced wind gusts in excess of 60 mph.

The Tuesday morning storms also produced torrential rainfall.

Connexus Energy, which was responding to significant power outages in the northern Twin Cities metro, said the multiple rounds of severe weather caused more challenges for its repair crews. It called the damage in its service area “unprecedented.”

“Please be patient. We expect this to take us all day and likely into tomorrow,” the utility said Tuesday morning.

Xcel Energy reminded Minnesotans affected by the severe weather to stay clear of downed power lines.

“Always assume an electric line, even one that is on or near the ground, is energized and therefore dangerous. Never, under any circumstance, touch or move a downed power line. If you come across a downed power line, leave the area and report it immediately,” the utility said.