Severe weather cut power to 1,443 customers in Lexington, Neb., on Saturday as storms moved through central Nebraska and utility crews worked to assess the damage.
The Nebraska Public Power District said the outage was tied to the weather system that also brought winds as high as 70 mph in Dawson County. The strongest wind report was not in Lexington, but the storm’s reach was wide enough to knock out service in the city and keep a tornado watch in place across 12 counties until 11 p.m. CDT.
That watch covered Blaine, Cherry, Custer, Frontier, Grant, Hayes, Hooker, Lincoln, Logan, McPherson, Sheridan and Thomas counties. For people checking for a power outage near them, the Lexington disruption was one more sign of how quickly the storms were spreading across the region.
The immediate question is how long the lights will stay off in Lexington. With severe weather still driving conditions across central Nebraska on Saturday night, the answer depended on how fast utility workers could restore service once the storms eased.
