Strong storms last night leave thousands without power

EL PASO, Texas (KVIA) -- El Paso was hit by lightning and heavy rain overnight, the storms also caused thousands to lose power late Wednesday. Overnight storms frequently cause power outages, why is it so frequent? Why aren't the power generators durable enough to withstand one night of rain and winds.

Most customers affected were in East El Paso near Las Palmas and Pellicano Drive. Power is now restored but according to the El Paso Electric outage map, at 10:15 pm on Wednesday, 7,076 residents were without power.

El Paso Electric currently ranks 289th for total power outages and 498th for percentage of customers affected among all utilities nationwide. According to PowerOutage.us

Of the 10 counties served by the utility, El Paso County, Texas currently has the most outages.

"Thunderstorms are the number one cause of customer outages on EPE’s electric system. More accurately, it is the lightning and wind bursts that accompany a thunderstorm that usually cause the outages." El Paso Electric said.