T-R PHOTO BY EMILY BARSKE – A fallen tree lays in the road near St. Henry’s Church Saturday afternoon.

Powerful wind and thunderstorms late Saturday afternoon knocked out power for thousands of Marshalltown residents.

In the Marshalltown area, Justin Foss of Alliant Energy said about 7,000 to 8,000 customers lost power Saturday afternoon and evening. He said much of the damage was caused by strong winds, reaching more than 70 miles per hour.

“A lot of outages are simply because of two unique pieces of damage, and that’s on the transmission system,” Foss said.

That system, run by ITC Midwest, was under repair as of 6 p.m. Saturday and are expected to be back up and running within a few hours. The Alliant website, which includes an outages map, shows estimated fix times as 7 p.m. or 8 p.m. for Marshalltown and 8 p.m. for those who lost power in Albion.

Foss said the National Weather Service in Des Moines was helpful Saturday, warning Alliant officials about the impending high winds.

For more information on the outages, visit https://outagemap.alliantenergy.com/external/default.html?utm_source=WS&utm_campaign=outage