By Ted AYALA

Strong winds swept through Southern California starting Monday, continuing into Tuesday evening, leaving rattled nerves and broken branches strewn about streets.

Though these powerful windstorms tend to be associated with Santa Ana winds, Stuart Seto, weather specialist with the National Weather Service (NWS), said that this system was different.

“These are northwesterly winds,” he said. “Santa Anas hit the region from the northeast.”

Despite the strength of the winds, the damage they caused was minimal.

“We experienced very little damage as a result of the winds,” said Steve Zurn, the city’s director of Public Works. “We had a lot of palm fronds, pine needles, and leaf debris that needs to be cleaned up.”

Among the damages Zurn cited was to a car caused by a falling tree branch. Minor damage was also suffered by a house after a tree fell atop it. Public Works was busy Tuesday conducting tree-trimming and line clearance.

He also reported minor electrical problems caused by the winds.

“We had one electrical outage out of our Glorietta substation that impacted 900 customers,” Zurn said. “The power was restored in approximately 15 to 20 minutes.”

The weather system, which produced gusts clocking up to 60 mph in the North Glendale area, recalled to some local residents the powerful wind storm that struck the region on the night of Nov. 30, 2011 and continued into Dec. 1.

“It [wasn’t] as bad as that storm,” said Melinda Clarke, executive director of the Montrose-Verdugo City Chamber of Commerce. “But this is still kind of scary. The winds aren’t usually this strong here. Most of the time it’s further up in the hills. But [Tuesday] it’s really blowing strong through here. Our windows have been rattling all day.”

  Ted Ayala