Winds Cut Power To More Than 200,000 In Puget Sound

Crews had restored power to most customers in the Puget Sound region by Saturday morning, after a windstorm caused more than 200,000 outages in the immediate area Friday night and left one entire county in the dark for several hours. Though National Weather Service meteorologist Mike McFarland called the storm fairly “run of the mill,” the gusts were enough to keep utility crews busy throughout the night. Wind speeds reached 40 mph at Seattle-Tacoma International Airport on Friday night, McFarland said, but surged as high as 54 mph and 51 mph on the Highway 520 and Interstate 90 bridges, respectively. Clallam County, north of the Olympic Mountains, was particularly hard hit, with the county of more than 73,000 people losing power Friday afternoon.