Thunderstorm brings hail, power outages to Dutchess County

A thunderstorm brought large hail and left thousands of Dutchess County residents without power on Thursday afternoon.

A severe thunderstorm warning was in place from 2:30 p.m. until 5 p.m., National

Weather Service meteorologist Samantha Lankowicz said. It is not uncommon to see hail as one of the hazards of thunderstorms. What’s atypical, Lankowicz said, was a tennis ball-sized piece found in Pawling.

A photo posted online by Dutchess County Emergency Management shows the large piece of hail. According to Lankowicz, the last time the area saw hail this size was in May of 2018.

“With these types of storms and with the level two severe risk that the Storm Prediction Center had us in, usually it’s more pea-sized or penny-sized,

” Lankowicz said.

In addition to the hail, the storm caused many power outages in the region.

According to Lankowicz, wind gusts reached 70 miles per hour. Dutchess County Emergency Management said several power lines and trees were felled and that Dover and Amenia were hit the hardest. Among the affected roads were County Route 67/Quaker Hill Road and County Route 68/North Quaker Hill Road, according to

county spokesperson Colleen Pillus.

Repair crews were working with New York State Electric & Gas on Friday, though hundreds of outages remained. According to Times Union data, there were more than 7,000 outages Thursday. As of 2 p.m. on Friday, there were still 802.

“I just got updated that NYSEG has contracted tree crews on site — so once their crews take care of the intertwined tree work amongst their wires, our DPW crews will be able to go and clear the rest,” Pillus said in a statement. “We expect our crews to be working into the night and perhaps into tomorrow.”