Afternoon thunderstorms batter Greater Lynn area

Strong thunderstorms pounded the North Shore on Wednesday, prompting reports of a funnel cloud in Peabody, half-dollar-sized hail in Nahant and the loss of power for thousands of Greater Lynn residents.Skies darkened in Lynn around 1:30 p.m., and by 2 p.m., the storm unleashed rapid-fire lightning strikes and booming thunder over the city. Almost immediately, calls came in for a lightning strike at a house on 6 Ward St. in East Lynn.”We were watching the storm and then ran around like crazy closing windows,” said Ward Street neighbor Cassandra Jackson. “We saw the lightning that hit it and started looking around because we could see the smoke.”View a photo gallery.Fire Chief Dennis Carmody said three engines and two ladder trucks responded to the incident.The scene was largely clear by 3:15 p.m.Carmody said the storm prompted much activity, as residents reported flooding from the heavy rains and hail along with the power outages which triggered many alarms throughout the city.”We went to a lot of different calls because of alarm systems going off,” Carmody said.Watch hail fall on Saugus Town Hall.The storm poured 1.09 inches of rain on the North Shore, which according to National Weather Service meteorologist Lance Franck, “isn’t really that impressive.”More impressive, said Franck, who works out of the weather service’s Taunton office, was the 1? inch hail reported in Nahant. That’s between a half-dollar and a golf ball-sized hail, and was the largest-sized hail reported in the region from the storm, he said.Franck said it was a direct result of funnel cloud activity swirling over Peabody at about 2 p.m.The National Weather Service was working as of 5 p.m. Wednesday to verify video and photo reports of the funnel cloud and whether it touched ground, which would have raised its status to a tornado.The storm passed Greater Lynn in under an hour, but thousands of residents were left to deal with its aftermath of flooded roads and dark homes and businesses.A video on YouTube claiming to be filmed in Woburn shows allegedly shows a tornado heading toward Lynn.About 1,000 National Grid customers in Lynn, 500 National Grid customers in Swampscott and 4,500 customers in Saugus lost power as a result of the storm, according to National Grid spokeswoman Charlotte McCormack.But Salem was hit the hardest, where 7,670 National Grid customers were without power, according McCormack.National Grid Spokesman David Graves said most residents had their power restored as of 8 p.m. Wednesday but that crews were still working to address individualized outages. He estimated everyone would be online by midnight.In Saugus, Town Hall and the library were both without power Wednesday afternoon, as was the Stop & Shop off of Route 1, where the frozen food aisles were blocked off and employees worked to clear out the meat and produce coolers.”We had flooding downstairs,” said Town Manager Scott Crabtree of Town Hall. “The power went out so we lost the pumps.”The thunderstorms hit in a middle of a heat wave and Crabtree said the loss of air conditioning created unbearable conditions in Town Hall.”It’s muggy and hot like you wouldn’t