BEND — A thunderstorm on Thursday afternoon, June 2, brought a heavy downpour in Bend, causing flooding on downtown streets, rainwater pouring through storefronts and the closure of flooded underpasses.

Mike Buettner, the city of Bend’s utility director, said crews were clearing flooded areas, and the parts of Franklin and Greenwood avenues that go under overpasses were closed Thursday. Buettner said the two areas would likely remain closed until Friday morning at the latest.

“We will work into the evening hours until they are clear so we can open those no later than Friday morning,” Buettner added. “We are built for this. This is what we do. This is a response we’ve made numerous times before.”

The basement construction project at the historic Liberty Theater building downtown was also flooded because of the storm, and the plumbing backed up sewers in Bend-La Pine school district buildings.

Bend-La Pine Schools spokesperson Julianne Repman said the storm produced enough rain to back up sewage in the district’s education center downtown. She said schools in both the east and west parts of Bend also reported “minor” amounts of water entering the buildings. It was mopped up by custodians. She said around 3:20 p.m. that the district’s maintenance crews were out responding to the storm.

At the Deschutes County Circuit Court, proceedings in the courtrooms on the second floor of the building were delayed because the rain fell hard enough to make it difficult to hear. Maintenance workers were also removing water from the public entrance to the Deschutes County District Attorney’s Office because of a visible amount of water leaking into the building.

A little over a half inch of rain fell in the Bend area within a period of about an hour during the height of the storm, said Mary Wister, a meteorologist with the National Weather Service office in Pendleton. Redmond Airport also recorded heavy rain, and flash flood watches were in effect in areas to the northeast of Bend, she added.

Wister said the storm that passed through the Bend area was consistent with the heaviest spring thunderstorms typically occurring in the area in April and May. It is not uncommon for the region to experience such storms in June as well, she said.

Dave Abbas, the streets and operations director for the city of Bend, said the city was responding to a number of flooded areas across town. He said the city’s storm water crew was deployed along with all five of its vacuum trucks, which are used to suck up water.

“That was a heck of a storm,” Abbas said. “A lot of water in 20 minutes or so.”

Abbas added he is aware of yards and ponds breaching, flood drains getting clogged and piping reaching its threshold, but he was not aware of any structural damage as a result of this storm.