The evening of Wednesday, July 31st saw eastern Nebraska and parts of western Iowa pummeled by severe thunderstorms between 5 and 7 PM. Radar indicated the storms moved southwest to northeast from I-80 near Grand Island, NE towards Des Moines, IA along I-80.
These storms brought minor hail, at least two small tornadoes, and extreme wind gusts as high as 90 mph- with the strongest clocking in at 92 mph and being reported in Denton, NE roughly 12 miles east of Lincoln. Effects of the wind resulted in widespread damage to buildings and roofs, vehicles, and many downed trees and powerlines.
Omaha Public Power District (OPPD) reported as many as 218,000 customers without power- with nearly 126,000 coming from Douglas county alone. As of 10 AM Thursday, 140,000 were still affected by outages.
OPPD has said they plan to have all power restored by Friday with over 1000 employees and contractors tasked with the project.
With such a severe situation at hand, Nebraska Public Power District (NPPD) is also stepping in to help.
In a press release Thursday morning, NPPD stated it would be sending a 24 man crew consisting of 21 line technicians and three supervisors to report to the North Omaha Station and begin a mutual effort with OPPD crews in restoring power.
As of Thursday morning, OPPD crews are still assessing damages and necessary repairs. More information will be released as it becomes available.