The National Weather Service's advisory for a severe thunderstorm warning until 1:45 pm. was right on target for Rockland County. The storm's high winds, lightning and fierce downpours have left 9,000 Orange & Rockland customers in the county without service.



O&R spokesman Mike Donovan said New City, Spring Valley, Suffern and Monsey were hit the hardest with more than 1,000 customers losing power in each community. He said the largest outage of 2,600 customers is in New City in the area of South Mountain Road and Old Route 303. The outage was caused by two broken poles and service is supposed to be restored by 5 p.m. Smaller numbers of customers have affected by power outages on Woodglen Drive and Cricket Court.

Donovan said 2,500 customers on Old Nyack Turnpike in Spring Valley lost power along with 1,500 on Bethune Boulevard in Spring Valley, both caused by downed poles, and 1,000 on Walter Drive in Monsey. He said an earlier outage of more than 2,000 customers in Suffern had been repaired but as of 1:30 p.m. Rockland Community College cancelled classes until 4 p.m. Other scattered outages were reported in Nyack and Valley Cottage with all customers expected to have service restored between 4 and 5 p.m.