Chicken Little Was Right

The storms that slammed Austin last night cut a sizeable swath of destruction, uprooting trees, flooding major streets (we might as well have been swimming down South Lamar last night) and knocking out power across the city.

The Statesman reports that roughly 17,000 customers remain without electricity as of 10am on Friday, with KXAN quoting Austin Energy saying that repairs may take up into nighttime.

The Austin-Travis County Emergency Conditions Information Page lists several schools closed owing to the power outage, and the following roads remain closed:

Status	Street	City/County	date closed	time closed	date opened	time opened
closed	Lakewood at Bull Creek Park	City	05/04/06	10:30 PM
closed	3100 Adelphi	City	05/04/06	10:30 PM
open	All Crossings on Spicewood Springs Between 360 and Old Lampassas	City	05/04/06	10:40 PM	05/05/06	7:00 AM
closed	4900 Wasson RD	City	05/04/06	11:21 PM
closed	The 2 crossings at 12300 Waters Park RD	City	05/04/06	10:30 PM
closed	2900 Oneill La	City	05/04/06	10:30 PM

Of course, it gets better! The clairvoyant climatologists at the National Weather Service issued a flash flood watch through Saturday morning, with scattered thunderstorms hitting Austin throughout the day -- nothing nearly of the magnitude that we witnessed last night, but nevertheless a damper on evening plans.

*Photo by Matt Wright on flickr

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