Downed trees in the thousands after storm whips Twin Cities

On a pastoral summer Sunday, it hardly seemed possible that a raging storm with straight-line winds in the 70- to 80-mile-per-hour range had blown through the metro area fewer than 48 hours earlier.

Except where trees still lay across streets and, in at least one instance, atop a car in Minneapolis.

A Minneapolis Public Works employee said Sunday that it was still "a mess" in eastern parts of south Minneapolis, and residents reported trees across the road in other scattered areas of the city.

The employee said there were still so many traffic lights out that the department had run out of temporary stop signs.

When the trees on public and private property lost in the storm are tallied, they will likely number in the thousands.

Officials in St. Paul said Sunday that the streets were mostly cleared of trees and debris to at least make them passable. Crews in both cities will work through the week on cleaning up trees and debris, they said.

Cities and suburbs are only responsible for clearing trees that block roads or are on public property. Homeowners are responsible for cleaning up trees and branches that fall in their own yards; limbs, trees and debris need to be hauled away because city and county crews will not pick it up.

As of 11:45 p.m. Sunday, 2,770 customers were still without power, said an Xcel Energy spokesperson, and Xcel crews and partners were working 16-hour shifts trying to restore it, with a goal of having all power restored by midnight.

At the height of the storm, 240,000 customers were without power, Xcel said.

In Carver County, which took a large hit from the storm, an EF1 tornado touched down west-southwest of Watertown and cut a 4-mile path across the county.

Watertown Mayor Steve Washburn said Sunday that roads have been cleared of trees but some in the town of 4,000 were still without power and there was a lot of debris yet to be cleared.

Watertown officials canceled the second day of the town's Rails to Trails festival because of the storm damage, but the planned fireworks display was rescheduled for 10:30 p.m. Sunday.

In Hennepin County, the communications director said the last downed tree was cleared from County Road 112 in Long Lake on Saturday and crews planned to pick up debris on the side of the road on Monday.

Pat Pheifer • 952-746-3284