(KRON) -- A bolt of lightning struck a beloved redwood tree next to a Santa Rosa preschool Tuesday while thunderstorms rolled through the region. Lightning ripped through the large tree's trunk before it toppled over on Woodside West School, located at 2577 on Guerneville Road. The school's roof su stained damages. Students had not arrived for school yet, no one was injured, and classes were cancelled for the day. Diana Dumbadse, owner of Woodside West School, said she was first alerted by a teacher at 5 a.m. about the lightning strike. The redwood tree was estimated to be 100 years old. (Photo by Dave Cannon) The Santa Rosa Fire Department said a series of lightning strikes flashed on the north side of the city overnight. Chief Fire Marshal Paul Lowenthal said, "That resulted in everything, from ... a tree that damaged a school and caused a closure to a number of power outages." As of Tuesday afternoon, more than 1,000 PGE customers remained without power. North Bay residents said they heard loud thunder before sunrise. The National Weather Service explains, "Thunder is created when lightning passes through the air. If the thunder sounds more like a rumble, the lightning was at least several miles away. The loud boom that you sometimes hear is created by the main lightning channel as it reaches the ground." Brunt of storms ‘dumping’ snow on Sierra Nevada mountains (Photo by Dave Cannon) Lowenthal said it was fortunate that Mother Nature unleashed cloud-to-ground lightning strikes before most residents woke up and left home for the day. He cautioned, "When you hear the thunder roar, head indoors. In this particular case, we were lucky a lot of the strikes took place in the early morning hours." Crews hauled away pieces of the redwood tree to prepare for students returning Wednesday. Dumbadse said, "We've survived the 2017 fires in Sonoma County. We were open for the entire (COVID) pandemic, so we're used to pivoting." ...read more read less