Rush Hour Storms Knock Out Power to Thousands

A storm system packing high wind gusts and heavy rain knocked out power to thousands of customers in the northern and western Philadelphia suburbs on Tuesday evening. 

A PECO representative told Patch at about 7:10 p.m. on Tuesday that about 45,000 of its customers in Montgomery and Chester counties were without power following the line of storms that passed through the area during the evening rush hour.

The company said it was still assessing the extent of the damage and did not have an estimate for when power would be restored to affected areas.

By 8 p.m., however, the company's online outage map indicated fewer than 20,000 customers without power in those areas.

In the Spring-Ford School District in western Montgomery County, an afternoon power outage to several district schools disrupted the districts computer systems and led officials to cancel Wednesday classes across the district.

PECO reported up to 3,500 customers without power in Upper Providence and Springfield Townships in Montgomery County. The company reported up to 1,500 customers without power in Abington, Cheltenham, Jenkintown, Limerick, Lower Merion, Lower Providence, Royersford, Trappe, Upper Dublin, Upper Merion, and Whitemarsh Township.

Several other municipalities were experiencing scattered outages at 8 p.m., according to the company.