SEATTLE - Thousands of homes and businesses lost power Saturday after a storm blew through the Puget Sound region with winds topping 50 mph in some areas. By Sunday morning, electricity had been restored to most areas.

Officials said outages affected about 14,000 customers in Seattle, about 11,000 customers in Snohomish County and thousands more in other Western Washington counties.

The gusty winds toppled trees and sent branches into power lines, creating havoc in many parts of the region. Traffic lights went dark, causing backups and congestion.

The storm also tore some boats loose from their moorings in Puget Sound waters. The Coast Guard's Seattle Command Center received reports of boats going adrift and overturning and boaters being blown into the water by heavy winds throughout the region.

The crew of the Coast Guard cutter Adelie and an HH-60 helicopter crew from the Coast Guard station in Astoria, Ore., went to Carr Inlet near Gig Harbor to assist in the rescue of eight kayakers. The crew of the Adelie rescued two of the kayakers from the water, while the other six were able to make it to shore safely.

Peak winds struck between 2 and 4 p.m. on Saturday afternoon, gusting above 50 mph in parts of King and Snohomish counties.

In Seattle, outages were reported in the Greenwood, Magnolia, Roosevelt, Lake Forest Park, Normandy Park, Burien, SeaTac, and Madrona areas.

Kitsap County customers of Puget Sound Energy were also hard hit with scattered outages. Whatcom, Skagit and parts of King counties were also having outages. Much of downtown Everett also lost power during the storm.

As winds died down, utility crews quickly restored power to most areas.

By 9 p.m. Saturday, the number of Seattle City Light customers without power had been cut to about 2,000 in. The outages were scattered throughout City Light's service territory. Full restoration of service to all customers was not expected until sometime Sunday.

Snohomish County Public Utility District had restored power to all but about 1,000 by late Saturday afternoon, mainly in downtown Everett.

The storm was caused by a strong area of low pressure moving through southern British Columbia. It had some of the remnants of Typhoon Jangmi that struck Taiwan earlier this week.

Peak wind gusts as of late Saturday afternoon:

Alki Beach (Seattle): 55 mph
Everett: 53 mph
Sand Point (Seattle): 51 mph
Magnolia (Seattle): 48 mph
520 Bridge: 46 mph
Bellingham: 40 mph
Seattle (Boeing Field): 39 mph
Bremerton: 39 mph
Seattle (Sea-Tac Airport): 38 mph
Shelton: 36 mph
Tacoma: 36 mph