Storms cause outages, drop hail in Southeast Missouri

A strong line of thunderstorms that came through the area early Monday morning left most of Jackson without power for about an hour. According to a representative at the city's power plant, about three-quarters of the city's electric customers lost power for 50 minutes while crews repaired a transformer damaged by a lightning strike. The outage occurred shortly before 2 a.m.

Black River Electric Co-op customer service coordinator Keith Myers said there were a few isolated power outages in the Marble Hill, Mo., area, but they were minor. The outages were mainly caused by wind and lighting and were repaired in a matter of minutes, he said. According to the National Weather Service, quarter-size hail fell in Perryville, Mo., around 1:30 a.m.

While there haven't been significant storm-related damages reported to local law enforcement agencies, Tawana Bain with the Scott City Police Department said the station received a call about a downed tree on 5th Street West about 7:30 a.m.

Attempts to reach Ameren Missouri for information about local power outages to its customers were been unsuccessful.

David Blanchard, a forecaster and meteorologist with the National Weather Service in Paducah, Ky., said while there pretty strong wind gusts associated with the storm, there have not been any confirmed tornadoes in the area. He said sustained winds reached up to 25 miles per hour, and gusts as high as 35 miles per hour were reported at the Cape Girardeau Regional Airport.

Much more severe weather was reported in the St. Louis area, according to the Associated Press.

cbartholomew@semissourian.com

243-8600