Strong wind gusts brought on by this week’s atmospheric river have left more than 7,000 in the area surrounding Branham without power, including Leigh, Westmont, Prospect and Camden Post-Secondary schools. 

In the area, downed power lines caused mass outages and fallen trees resulted in road closures and major stores such as Target and Home Depot on Hillsdale closed early.

Despite the outages, Principal Lindsay Schubert said in an email to staff that school will remain in session tomorrow, as Branham, Del Mar and Bonyton were the only places that did not experience any outages. 

As winds reached speeds as high as 97 mph in the valleys, fallen trees and other debris forced lunch to be cut short, with students asked to head to their sixth period class early to avoid injury from the gusts.

Campus supervisor John Chun directed students to their sixth period classes.

 “I’m glad that no students were hurt,” he said.

Vice principal Victoria Waite said that the district facilities team cut down trees that were already close to falling down, adding that said that principal Lindsay Schubert will continue to be in communication with the district to handle any necessary procedures to clean up debris and ensure that the campus is safe. She released a statement this afternoon saying that school will still go on as planned tomorrow. 

The National Weather Service’s High Wind Warning will be in effect until 11 p.m. tonight. The alert says to expect widespread power outages, and blocked roadways from downed trees. A moderate Flood Watch alert is also in effect until 11 pm tonight. 

“If we could predict this kind of stuff, then we would be living the life,” Waite said.