OTHELLO — Power outages ripped across the region Sunday in the wake of a fierce windstorm. The wind knocked down a number of distribution power poles near Othello and knocked out power for Adams County, according to officials with utility company Avista.

Eight poles were knocked down in quick succession near Othello shortly before noon, Avista Operations Manager Ian Eccles said, which caused power for most of the county to go temporarily offline.

The company was able to reroute power through redundancies in the system, bringing power to much of the county within a couple of hours. However, some areas west of Othello were expected to remain offline until Monday morning, said David Vowels, communications manager with Avista.

Though some of Avista’s customers are plugged into smart meters, which remotely inform Avista if power has gone offline or back on, the majority of its customers do not, Vowels said. Customers still experiencing outages are encouraged to inform Avista at 1-800-227-9187, or online at www.myavista.com.