A large front of severe weather containing high winds, lightning, pelting rain and hail caused havoc in the parish Thursday night, even putting an end to the first night of festivities at the Mandeville Seafood Festival.

Meteorologist Mike Efferson at the National Weather Service station in Slidell estimated the storm had winds that were 60 mph and higher. The winds toppled many trees, especially in Mandeville and Lacombe causing power outages when the trees fell on power lines.

CLECO spokesperson, Robbyn Cooper said that the storm knocked out power to 6,500 homes. Besides trees falling on power lines, Cooper said frequent lightning strikes knocked out some of their transmission equipment, and ruined a lot of transformers on power poles.

Vendors were cleaning away debris, rebuilding their tents and getting ready for business Friday morning at the Greater Mandeville Seafood Festival after Thursday night’s thunderstorm destroyed their tents. (Staff Photo by Debbie Glover)

CLECO crews worked all night to restore power, and by 8 a.m. Friday, there were only 300 homes without power, Cooper said. Most of those that were still without electricity were in Lacombe and Abita Springs.

“We worked through the night, and we made good progress,” Cooper said. “We want to thank our customers for their patience. We know it is hot, but we will have power restored to everybody by Friday afternoon.”

The Washington-St. Tammany Electric Cooperative also had problems keeping power to their customers. Though representatives could not be reached, the WST their Web site had a statement they were restoring power to the hardest hit area in Mandeville, Abita Springs, Lacombe and the Lee Road area near Covington.

“Our system experienced straight-line winds and lightning that has downed trees, power line and poles,” read the statement. The Web site did not have any numbers on how many WST customers were affected by the outage, but the statement said the company hopes to restore power early Friday morning.

Rain was also a big problem, causing some minor street flooding. Efferson said that rainfall across the parish varied depending on where you were located. In Slidell, the NWS collected 0.71 inches of rain, while the rain gauge in Abita Springs registered 2.03 inches of rain. Efferson said there were also reports of pea-sized hail in the northern part of the parish.

The severe weather took a lot of people by surprise, especially those who attended the concert at the first night of the Mandeville Seafood Festival.

Efferson said there is a stalled front over the area, which is causing instability. He said combining the increase in the moisture in the air with the high temperatures during the day is a recipe for severe weather.