Xcel now says 50,000 lost power
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About 50,000 customers in Minnesota were without power for at least five minutes after the Monday night thunderstorms and severe weather, according to Xcel Energy spokesman Tom Hoen.
The company originally said 20,000 customers lost power.
That earlier figure released by Xcel Energy of 20,000 referred to the peak of the total number of customers without power at one time --- the most outages that occurred at any given time.
About 4,700 Xcel Energy customers in the Twin Cities were without power Tuesday morning. Xcel Energy spokeswoman Patti Nystuen said about 4,000 of those without power were in the east metro.
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Power outages in Mankato Monday night have been resolved as of Tuesday morning, although there are still poles down that crews are working to replace Tuesday.
"We were able to restore energy during that process," Nystuen said, even though some poles are still down.
"Most of these power outages are wind-related," she said. "When the ground is this saturated, it loosens trees and they may pull out of the ground. So we had limbs coming down. That was our biggest problem, limbs falling on the (power) lines."
Customers around Mankato, the Twin Cities, Red Wing and Winona were affected, according to the company's Twitter account.
Crews worked through the night to repair damage and are continuing work today, Nystuen said. Severe storms hit southwest Minnesota.
Homes and a school in Wisconsin collapsed. In the International Falls area, volunteers are helping fill sandbags and expect to have more than 100,000 filled by today. Rising waters on Rainy Lake rose nearly 10 feet since the beginning of the month, pushing this flood past a record set in 1950.
Showers and thunderstorms are forecast through Friday in some parts of the state.
As of 12:20 p.m., there are about 1,640 customers in the metro area without power, and another 1,100 outside the metro, according to Hoen.
Hoen said if there aren't any major weather changes, everyone in the state should have their power restored by 6 p.m.
"We've got all of our resources dedicated to getting people back up and running again," Hoen said.