Video: Lightning Lights Up Montgomery Skies

Tuesday night's storm brought with it deafening thunder and lightning that illuminated the sky in a strobe effect. It was a frightening yet dazzling display.

Montgomery escaped the worst of the storm, and ComEd reported at 10 a.m. Wednesday that between 50 and 500 people were without power in the Aurora area, which includes Montgomery.

“It was a pretty bad storm that rolled through last night,” ComEd spokesman Tony Hernandez said Wednesday morning.

He said the National Weather Service reported 13,000 lightning strikes, many of which ultimately hit equipment or trees that then fell on power lines, knocking out electricity to customers.

By 9 a.m., Hernandez said 20,300 customers in ComEd's coverage area remained without power.

The National Weather Service reported winds in the area as high as 64 mph, which was a gust recorded two miles outside of Coal City. Although residents there thought they were seeing damage from a microburst, meterologist Ben Deubelbeiss said it was not that kind of a storm.

"It was probably a bow echo," he said. "You can get hurricane-force winds with bow echo."

Areas in Cook County saw recorded wind gusts of as much as 72 mph.

As far as lightning strikes go, Deubelbeiss said the Chicago metro area had about 20,000 cloud-to-ground strikes in a two-hour period.

Check back for more information on the storm's aftermath later today on Patch.