MISSOULA — The University of Montana and parts of downtown Missoula went dark Wednesday night after several power lines fell along the Kim Williams Trail on campus.
High winds hit the Missoula Valley around 5:30 p.m. causing the power lines to topple, a transformer to blow, and some trees to catch fire.
Max Scott was at Jacob's Island dog park when the power lines were hit.
"We heard some crackling and looked over across the little creek next to the dog park and just saw one of the lines go down," he told MTN.
He described the incident as a domino effect.
"They just kept getting knocked over and then the transformer just exploded and then the trees kind of caught on fire," he said.
The City of Missoula Fire Department responded to multiple outages due to the weather. The blackout delayed the first-ever University of Montana vs. Salish Kootenai College men's basketball game.
"We were exiting off the Interstate and I noticed the traffic lights were out and that all the businesses were dark," Ruth Swaney, an SKC basketball fan and UM alum, said.
The matchup was set for a 7 p.m. start at Dahlberg Arena. At 7:30, fans were still crowded in the Adams Center lobby waiting to support their teams.
"We got told coming in that hopefully they'd have emergency power on within an hour and hopefully by maybe 8 p.m. we could get in there," Swaney said. "We're gonna stay. We're just excited to see this come about."
The game started nearly two hours later at 8:45 p.m. after power was fully restored to campus. The delay, however, did not dampen the mood.
“It feels like a family reunion. We probably know lots and lots of people that are here, either their family, relatives, friends, so it's really good to see this turnout," Swaney said.
"Like Ruth, there are many of us at SKC who have connections to UM," SKC President Dr. Michael Munson said. "And so whether we were students or we are students or have family there playing on either team, it's a lot of fun because there are so many connections.”
You can read more about the power outages that left Missoula in the dark by clicking here.
