Severe storm causes damage in eastern Ontario

A severe thunderstorm knocked out power to thousands of homes across eastern Ontario on Monday and blasted hail across many parts of the region.

At one point Hydro Ottawa reported 8,600 customers had lost power in communitiesincluding Gloucester, Goulbourn, Kanata and Nepean as a result of power lines brought down by the storm. As of 8 p.m. ET that number had been reduced to 2,500 customers.

Hydro Onereported thousands of homesin an area stretching to Alexandria and Cornwall in the east from Barry's Baysouth of Algonquin Park in the west had been affected by outages

The largest of these outages, in an area encompassing Renfrew and Calabogie, saw power cut to about 5,600 homes in the region. Servicehad only beenpartially restored as of 8 p.m. ET.

Unconfirmed tornado near Golden Lake

The federal weather agencyhad issued tornado warnings for several eastern Ontario communities west of Ottawa, including Smiths Falls, Lanark, Sharbot Lake, Barry's Bay, Killaloe, Renfrew, Arnprior, Calabogie and French River.

Ottawa and regions to the east remain under a severe thunderstorm warning into Monday evening.

The weather agency said there have been unconfirmed reports of a tornado touching down near Golden Lake about 140 kilometres west of Ottawa.

Campers at a trailer parknear Lake Dor, close to where the unconfirmed tornado was sighted, say they are shaken up after heavy rains and winds hit at about 2:30 p.m.

Trailer park hit by storm

No injuries have been reported, but trees fell on several trailers at the Lake Dor Tent & Trailer Park, owner Carol Brisebois told CBC News.

"We could see some trees falling down, lots of damage to trailers, awnings, trees and boats lifted from the shoreline. I had one of my fishing boats, my row boat, went flying," Brisebois said.

Emergency Management Ontario recommends taking cover immediately when threatening weather approaches.

Last Tuesday, two tornadoes touched down in eastern Ontario after a similar group of storms rolled through the region.

One hit the area of Athens, near Brockville, and another touched down around Summerstown, east of Cornwall.