With gusty winds all evening, the atmosphere felt like the area was in for storms. However, most of the thunder and rain didn’t reach Albert Lea until midnight.

The winds picked up at 7:15 p.m. with gusts up to 26 mph. Southeast winds stayed about steady at 15 mph through the evening in between gusts, according to the National Weather Service.

The temperature stayed warm in the late 70s until midnight with dew points in the 70s. Once it began raining, the temperature dropped to the high to mid-60s.

In Albert Lea, rain accumulated to about .39 inches, according to Plant Superintendent Rick Ashling at the Wastewater Treatment Facility.

A thin layer of warm air kept the severe storms at bay, causing them to diminish as they entered the area.

The front didn’t make it into Minnesota until last night, said National Weather Service meteorologist James McQuirter. The cloud cover “kept the lid on the instability,” he said, keeping more severe thunderstorms at bay.

Meteorologists were expecting storms to develop overnight, which was the cause of a tornado watch that was in effect until 5 a.m., he said.

“It just never did materialize,” McQuirter said. “We just didn’t have all the conditions to get the tornadoes going and widespread severe weather.”

The storm didn’t last too long, as the rain ceased around 3 a.m. However, the strong winds and gusts continued through the morning and will last most of the day.

There is a 40 percent chance of rain before 1 p.m. today with the threat of high winds. Southwest winds will be between 28 and 30 mph, with gusts expected as high as 41 mph.

High winds have knocked down trees in parts of southeastern Minnesota, but no major damage is reported after storms moved through the area.

The National Weather Service said a wind gust in Canton was clocked at 63 mph just before 2:30 a.m. Friday.

Trees were reported knocked down in Fillmore and Winona counties.

Areas surrounding Freeborn County did get the expected heavy storms. The line of storms that passed through Minnesota reached as far south as Mexico and as far north as Canada.

A “fairly intense” low pressure system moved from Kansas and up into Minnesota, McQuirter said, which is causing the strong winds through today. At 7:45 a.m., winds at 5,000 miles up in the atmosphere were almost 60 mph, he said.

Over the evening hours, meteorologists were watching the levels of the Cedar River and Turtle Creek because the entire south central part of the state was under a flash flood warning.

The two rivers were not near cresting Thursday evening, but meteorologists stated both could crest Saturday evening though not at flood levels.

Hail pelted the southwestern suburbs of the Twin Cities as severe thunderstorms rumbled over the metro area Thursday afternoon.

Spotters reported 1.25-inch hail in Plymouth. One-inch hail was reported in Chaska, Waconia and Minnetonka.

Flight departures and arrivals at Minneapolis-St. Paul International Airport were temporarily delayed by an hour or more as a heavy cell passed over the airport.

The stormy weather prompted a medical helicopter to make an emergency landing in a field at Theodore Wirth Park in Minneapolis.

The Lifelink helicopter had just dropped off a patient at Children’s Hospital in St. Paul and was heading back to Flying Cloud Airport in Eden Prairie when the crew decided the weather was too much of a threat, Lifelink spokeswoman Kristen Brand said. They put down in the park on the west side of Minneapolis and took off again about a half-hour later after conditions improved. Nobody was injured and there were no patients on board.

Lightning strikes caused fires at three houses in Plymouth, but none sustained serious damage, police said.

About 3,400 homes in St. Cloud lost power because of the storms Thursday evening, Xcel Energy reported, but there were no significant outages in the Twin Cities area.

In southwestern Minnesota, the National Weather Service reported 3 inches of rain in an hour and 4.5 inches through the afternoon in Windom, 65 mph winds and 2.5-inch in Ellsworth. and 1.75-inch hail in Adrian and Wilmont earlier Thursday afternoon. Flash flooding was reported on Kanaranzi Creek near Rushmore, the Rock River near Hardwick and Pipestone Creek at Pipestone.

Forecasters said more severe thunderstorms and additional heavy rains were possible Thursday night, and a tornado watch was out for much of the southern third of the state, including the southern Twin Cities area, into the early hours Friday.

The threat of bad weather led some metro area schools to move graduation ceremonies indoors, and several games in the state high school softball tournament in North Mankato had to be postponed due to rain, while the second day of the Class A boys’ state golf tournament in Becker was canceled.

Thursday’s storms came five days after a round of hailstorms did extensive damage to vehicles, homes and gardens across the Twin Cities, particularly in the western suburbs.