LEWISTON — We needed the rain. We just didn’t need so much of it.

Beginning at about 6:30 p.m., right on cue, thunderstorms rolled across the area, bringing crazy wind and driving rain. It lasted only an hour but by the time it was over, a full 3 inches of rain had fallen in some areas.

There was plenty of notice that the storm was coming, but the warning did not diminish the amount of trouble it caused.

Basements were flooded, roads washed out and some neighborhoods became temporary lakes. In some spots, manhole covers popped right out of the street as they became overburdened by water gushing below. At least one sidewalk collapsed after being undermined. Cars stalled as drivers tried to cross massive puddles.

In Lewiston, several areas were underwater as rain kept falling and drains could not handle anymore. A sinkhole appeared on Bartlett Street in front of the Italian Bakery. The roadway was washed out at Sabattus and Jean streets.

At Holland and Oak, it looked like a pond where there had been streets and grass. A section of Holland was underwater and only a few brave souls drove through it.

“In my 15 years in Lewiston-Auburn,” said Faith Vandeymark, “I’ve never seen it that bad.”

A pair of teenagers ran through the water, Vandeymark said, and found themselves up to their knees.

To add insult to all of the chaos, the Public Works Department on Adams Avenue — where they keep barricades and other items for situations such as floods — saw its parking lot and the street out front fill with water.

“It forced a manhole cover right out of the ground,” said Harold Lilly, who walked down to Public Works after hearing about the flooding on a police scanner. “They couldn’t even get up to their pumps. There was almost 3 feet of water in that area.”

The roadway on outer Main Street flooded, as did a section of Sabattus Street where one firefighter described the roadway as “like a river flowing over it.”

Bathrooms at St. Mary’s Regional Medical Center were said to be flooding as were dozens of homes across the area.

In Auburn, it was the same variety of chaos. A woman leaving work said Main Street was completely under water that flowed like a stream. The intersection at South Main and Broad streets was washed out.

Firefighters, police and Public Works crews were sent all over the place as reports of flooding continued to roll in long after the rain had stopped.

Power was out at homes and businesses all over the state. Those in Lewiston and Auburn appeared to be spared that misfortune but in nearby towns such as Minot, Poland, Mechanic Falls and Turner, people lost power as lines came down in gusting winds. A Central Maine Power spokesman said that by 9 p.m., more than 23,000 customers were without electricity. Crews were expected to be out all night making repairs.

By and large, the people of the Twin Cities were fortunate. A storm warning earlier in the day called for possible tornadoes and hail the size of quarters.

A funnel cloud was reported in the Portland area, though it had not been confirmed. Funnel or no funnel, it was causing problems in that city and towns to the west of it, where the wind was particularly wild.

“An outlet in the kitchen tripped. I heard whistling but didn’t see a funnel,” said Mary K. Burpee Sargent of Parsonsfield. “My dog keeps trying to hide in the fridge.”

In Oxford, flooding forced the closure of a section of East Oxford Road.

According to Tom Hawley, a meteorologist at the National Weather Service in Gray, tornadoes were reported in Gorham, Limerick and across the border in New Hampshire. Whether they were genuine twisters remains to be seen.

“We’re going to send somebody out to those locations to check things out,” Hawley said.

It was believed 2 inches or more of rain fell in Lewiston and Auburn before the storm ended. When it was over, shortly before 8 p.m., the rain stopped, the clouds parted and blue was visible in some parts of the sky. The forecast for Thursday: more sunshine with almost no chance of rain.