St. Paul, Minnesota – Jessica Gonko thought it was a tornado that dropped a large tree on her house, crashing into her bedroom window in the South Como neighborhood of St. Paul.
“It’s definitely an interesting way to wake up,” Gonko said. “The trees were blown by the wind and almost bent over.”
Despite the damage, power was restored in their neighborhood shortly after noon on Tuesday.
Twenty minutes down the road on St. Paul’s east side, however, Kong Vang said his power still hasn’t been restored. Vang said Xcel Energy had originally expected his power to be back Tuesday morning.
“Yeah, that’s definitely the frustrating part,” Vang said. “They keep changing the estimated time, so it’s kind of annoying.”
“We feel very sorry for customers who are still without power,” said Trisha Duncan, director of Minnesota Community Relations for Xcel Energy.
The utility is prioritizing power restoration with the greatest impact, Duncan said, with the goal being to restore power to as many customers as possible as quickly as possible.
“We start at the feeder level and then work our way into the neighborhood,” Duncan said.
Duncan said winds exceeding 60 mph caused power lines to fall and trees to be uprooted.
According to the energy supplier, a total of around 250,000 customers were without power during the storms.
“It takes a while,” said Duncan.
Duncan said power should be restored to customers by Thursday evening.
In the meantime, Vang says he is getting by well thanks to a generator from his brother.
“I’m just waiting for them to get the power back on for everyone,” Vang said.
