The storm left behind a trail of damage hot spots, leaving others unscathed.

Corowa, Rutherglen and Wahgunyah were the hardest hit with many residents waking to find tree branches and debris on and around their homes.

North of the border, Essential Energy said 1500 Corowa customers were left without power after the storm hit at 7.30.

Another 574 houses in Albury, Lavington, Jindera lost power but most were back on the grid early yesterday.

South of the border, Ausnet Services said about 500 houses had endured power outages.

Ausnet Services spokesman Jonathon Geddes said most of the blackouts had been caused by trees falling on to power lines and lightning damaging power assets.

“We are throwing all our resources at it to get customers back on line as soon as possible,” Mr Geddes said.

“We have cancelled all planned work in the area to free up resources to get customers with power.

“We are conscious there are storms forecasted again for tonight.”

Corowa Shire Council’s general manager Chris Gillard said Guy, Evelyn, Tower, Banff and King streets had been in the eye of the storm.

Corowa resident Jock Renshaw, who lives in Redlands Road, had the power restored by 11am after the storm took out a large gum tree at the front of his house.

“I was just about to go to bed when I heard the tree crash,” he said,

“There was a big thump and the tree took the power out.

“I’ll just cut it up and clean it up.

“I suppose, I’ll store it down the back and burn it in my wood fire.

Sara Upton, who was driving when the storm hit, found when she arrived at her son’s place that a tree had smashed through his bedroom roof.

“I was driving in the storm and the water was flooding the sides of the road,” she said.

“You couldn’t even see the road because of the hail and the wind — I had to pull over a few times.

“There’s a big hole going right into my son’s bedroom, water is leaking through the cooling system — it went all over their bed, the carpet and the lounge.”

Another resident, Katherine Quick said it was the worst storm she had seen in the 25 years she has lived in the town.