Thousands without power in wake of severe storms; tornadoes cause damage in west metro
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Severe storms swept across much of central and southern Minnesota from Saturday evening into early Sunday and included at least two tornadoes in Carver County. The storm also knocked out power to thousands of homes and businesses.
The National Weather Service said it had radar confirmation of a tornado touchdown just before 12:30 a.m. near Victoria. Officials reported downed trees blocking State Highway 7 near Rolling Acres Road and Minnewashta Parkway. The highway remained closed in that area overnight.
Before the apparent touchdown in Victoria, a trained weather spotter reported a tornado on the ground near Hydes Lake, northeast of Norwood Young America, at about 12:15 a.m.
Kyle Brindlinger, who lives in Victoria, was celebrating his twin boys’ eighth birthday at home. When he first heard the sirens, he initially shrugged it off as another storm warning. But as the sky grew darker, he realized how serious the threat was.
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“Right as we were going downstairs, we saw the transformers blow, and then we heard the wind hit and the trees start falling,” Brindlinger said. “Luckily, we were all in the basement safe.”
Flashes of lightning illuminated the twister, revealing trees being uprooted and thrown, powerlines snapping and homes sustaining damage.
“I counted about 15 or 16 mature pines that are down. A tree fell on my truck. Another collapsed the backside of our garage,” Brindlinger said. “Our house is going to look different forever.”
Christine Schmidt and her family live nearby. When the tornado passed, authorities notified them of how lucky they were.
“Around 12:30 or 12:45, the Chaska Police Department was knocking on doors, checking on everyone,” she said. “They said, ‘We don’t see any house damage, but there’s a lot of tree damage — and a power line was across our driveway.”
There were no immediate reports of injuries from the storms. The storms weakened and largely exited the Twin Cities metro area by 2 a.m.
Xcel Energy and other utilities, combined, reported more than 50,000 customers without power early Sunday — most of those in the western Twin Cities metro area.
The number had dropped to about 33,000 as of 7 a.m. Sunday.
Earlier in the evening on Saturday, the storms produced numerous reports of tornadoes across eastern South Dakota and into western Minnesota — including reported tornado sightings near Canby, Marietta and Danvers.
Casey Namken was spending the night on a lake near the Minnesota-South Dakota border when he spotted a tornado.
“It was the big one that ended up hitting those houses in Deuel County just across the border,” he said. “I think I tracked it like for 25 minutes. I've never seen a tornado like that. It was moving so slow. It had power, then it decreased, then it come back.”
Namken, who is Yellow Medicine County’s emergency management director, said the area has received at least five inches of rain over the past several days. As of Sunday morning, some county and township roads were closed.
Law enforcement officials and weather spotters reported trees down in St. Michael, Renville, and south of Murdock.
The storms also dropped torrential rain, leading to several flash flood warnings. Street flooding was reported in Buffalo and Rockford, west of the Twin Cities, just after midnight.
The heavy rain may cause rivers across the region — some of them already in flood stage — to rise even further in the coming days.
