Bluewater Power crews were kept busy through the night as one of the most significant severe weather outbreaks of the summer wreaked havoc across southern Ontario Sunday.
Intense lightning threatened utility crews dealing with outages, most notably in northeast Sarnia where about 1,000 customers were affected when a feeder line failed.
Multiple outages were reported in Petrolia as well and Ontario Hydro dealt with sporadic power disruptions in other parts of the county.
An estimated peak wind of 110 km/h at Grand Bend near 8pm was one of the highest gusts recorded, according to Environment Canada.
Parts of midwestern Ontario were hardest hit by Sunday's severe weather that came in afternoon and evening waves.
While much of the damage done was due to straight line winds, Environment Canada says two homes were significantly damaged from a tornado around 9pm at Teviotdale, south of Mount Forest. Several OPP cars were also damaged at the nearby detachment and trees and power lines were brought down on neighbouring concession roads.
The national weather agency sent a survey team to the area Monday and confirmed it was an EF-2 tornado with winds of 180 km/h to 220 km/h. The damage path is about 9 km long by 200 m wide.
Hydro One says the storms knocked out power to nearly 50,000 customers across the province.
Crews were still working to restore service Monday, including in isolated spots around Lambton.