Mother Nature gave the D.C. region a thrashing late Monday, cutting off power to tens of thousands, snarling the evening commute and injuring tourists on the National Mall.
Heavy rains lashed out from darkened skies in the late afternoon. Three adults and seven juveniles were rushed to hospitals for treatment of non-life-threatening injuries after a tent collapsed on the Mall, according to the U.S. Park Police.
Authorities had to slash the tent to pull an 11-year-old girl out from under it, D.C. Fire and Emergency Medical Services spokesman Alan Etter told The Examiner.
Meanwhile, swaths of the city and suburbs were without power after the rains overloaded grid circuits. The hardest-hit areas were Arlington and Alexandria, where at least 70,000 lost electricity, Dominion officials reported.
Another 31,000 lost power in Montgomery County, most of them clustered around the Gaithersburg area, Pepco reported. It had been a bad day all around for Montgomery County public works: Monday began with a massive water main rupture that shut off the faucets of thousands of residents and left thousands subject to boil orders.
In the District, about 9,500 lost power, most of them along Minnesota Avenue in Northeast, Pepco officials said.
Outages elsewhere included:
– More than 13,000 in Prince George’s County;
– 18,000-plus in Fairfax;
– 13,000 in the Springfield area.
The heavy rains forced commuters to crawl home on the region’s roads. Web site Traffic.com reported a downed tree blocking the George Washington Memorial Parkway at Tulane Drive and another at Spout Run Parkway.
Staff Writer Scott McCabe contributed to this story.
