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Storm System Bringing Bay Area Unusual Weather

SAN FRANCISCO (CBS 5 / AP / BCN) -- A storm system over Northern California was bringing heavy rain and some unusual weather to the San Francisco Bay Area this weekend.

Lightning bolts lit up the sky and strong claps of thunder rattled windows across San Francisco on Saturday evening. Lightning was also reported in Sonoma County.

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The National Weather Service said the thunderstorms moving through the region also dropped small hail in some areas.

Forecasters said runoff from the heavy rainfall Saturday evening caused flooding on several roadways around San Francisco and northern portions of San Mateo County.

In addition, a storm-related outage knocked out power to more than 6,000 Pacific Gas & Electric customers in San Francisco on Saturday evening, the utility said.

The cold and rainy weather was expected to continue soaking the Bay Area over the next few days, according to the weather service.

"It's going to be a cold and wet weekend," forecaster Duane Dykema said, noting that rainfall could reach up to 1 inch.

Most of the Bay Area was expected to experience highs in the 50s, though a few regions will have high temperatures in the upper 40s.

Dykema said conditions would get colder as the weekend progressed.

Wind was also blowing through the Bay Area at 15 mph to 20 mph with gusts up to 30 mph, Dykema said.

Snow was likely to fall in areas above 2,500 feet, including Mount Diablo, Mount Tamalpais and Mount Hamilton.

But the snowfall was not likely to impact traffic, Dykema said.

(Copyright 2010 by CBS Broadcasting Inc., The Associated Press and Bay City News. All rights reserved. This material may not be published, broadcast, rewritten or redistributed.)

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