SULLIVAN COUNTY - What would ‘Woodstock Weekend' be without rain and lightning?

Well… for the hundreds of guests staying at the Villa Roma Resort and Conference Center in Callicoon, the weekend would have been a lot brighter if not for a severe thunder, rain and windstorm that sheared off two utility poles and knocked out power to the nearly full resort from shortly after 6 p.m. to 11 p.m. Saturday night.

“We had a bad thunderstorm and high winds,” Villa Roma Resort General Manager Paul Carlucci said Sunday afternoon as electric crews from American Electric snapped the last fuses in place on a utility pole near the laundry building.

According to NYSEG, “an evening of severe thunderstorms, lightning and intense wind gusts across the state…knocked out more than 16,000 customers [statewide].

“The hardest hit areas included Binghamton, Elmira, Geneva, Liberty, Mechanicsville and Oneonta divisions,” NYSEG reported.

According to NYSEG, the Villa Roma had two broken poles due to the storm and NYSEG crews arrived to “make safe” the lines so private contractors could make temporary repairs.

“We de-energize the lines so that they are safe to work on,” NYSEG spokesman Michael Jamision said. “After the repairs were made to their equipment, we re-energized the lines.”

“At the peak, there were 4,785 Sullivan County NYSEG customers without electric on Saturday,” he said.

It was just three weeks ago that a reported twister ripped through Hortonville, doing extensive damage to property, downing dozens of trees and injuring a driver whose car was hit by a falling tree.

On Sunday, most of the day was enjoyed under sunny skies with white clouds hanging in the air until late afternoon. At roughly 5 p.m. concertgoers at Bethel Woods Center for the Arts were asked to leave the lawn and seek shelter in their cars as a fast moving thunderstorm with torrential rain swept through Sullivan County.

The John Fogerty concert started one hour late due to the weather.