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Monsoon Winds Topple Poles and Cut Power Across Phoenix’s West Valley

Forecasters warn a cooler, wetter spell could bring more damaging wind, heavy rain and poor air quality that may prolong outages and hazards.

Overview

  • Strong monsoon storms on Sunday night produced extreme gusts as high as 84 mph and prompted a National Weather Service destructive severe thunderstorm warning.
  • The storms knocked down trees, snapped utility poles and caused flash flooding across the West Valley with APS saying 42 poles fell in the event.
  • Outages jumped into the tens of thousands as the storms passed and fell to a few thousand by Monday morning, with APS reporting 4,549 customers without power (4,464 storm-related) and SRP near 3,000 customers still out.
  • Rainfall varied across the West Valley from about 0.1 inch to nearly 2 inches, with the highest totals measured along the I-10 corridor in Buckeye.
  • Crews are working to restore service through the day while officials warn of continued storm risks that could worsen infrastructure strain after an extended 18-day extreme-heat spell for Phoenix.