ASHEVILLE - Driving rain, gusty winds and frequent lightning raced through Western North Carolina late on July 28, knocking out power for more than 13,000 customers in the Asheville area, Duke Energy reported.
As of 8:15 p.m., there were 299 outages in Buncombe County, according to Duke’s website. Some of the largest outages are to the northwest and north of Asheville. Duke serves more than 150,000 customers in the county. By 9:15 p.m., the number of outages had grown to 345, but the number of customers without power dropped to around 8,700.
Surrounding counties were largely spared from the storms, which moved through quickly around 6:30 p.m. and prompted tornado sirens. The Asheville City Council meeting, in progress at the time, was interrupted
and attendees directed to the basement of the building, according to independent reporting by Jessica Wakeman, who was on the scene. Downed trees were reported at Bear Creek Apartments in West Asheville.
Dewayne Martin, who lives on the Madison County side of Alexander, captured video from his home of what appears to be a tornado near Mars Hill.
“I was just saying prayers that everybody in that path was going to be OK, and also that it wasn’t going to turn and come our direction,” Martin told the Citizen Times July 28.
Duke said that repair and damage assessment was underway.
This is a developing story.
Cory Vaillancourt is the Helene Recovery/Investigations Reporter for the Asheville Citizen Times. Find him on X at @The_CoryV or on Signal, via email at cvaillancourt@citizentimes.com or at 912-508-5640.
This article originally appeared on Asheville Citizen Times: Thunderstorms cause power outages in WNC
