A historic downpour flooded parts of the Far South Side and south and southwest suburbs Monday afternoon, leaving streets awash in up to 4 feet of water, shutting down parts of the Dan Ryan and Stevenson Expressways and Interstate Highway 57 and flooding hundreds of basements.
The 9.1-mile Calumet leg of the Deep Tunnel flood control project, which holds 1.85 million gallons, filled with rainwater for the first time.
South Side sewers quickly reached capacity. The Des Plaines River was so swollen at Lockport that the Chicago Sanitary and Ship Canal, an extension of the South Branch of the Chicago River, had trouble draining into it, said Barbara Rumsey, a spokeswoman for the Metropolitan Water Reclamation District.
At least one person was struck by lightning but was not seriously injured.
“An astounding 3 to 3 1/2 inches of rain fell within two hours, causing basement flooding throughout the city, especially on the South Side,” said Mayor Richard Daley.
“This is the highest rainfall . . . in two hours that we’ve ever had in this area,” added Tom Fuller, president of the Metropolitan Water Reclamation District. “This exceeds anything ever recorded before. So it’s an act of God.”
The intersection of 95th Street and Stony Island Avenue was under 4 feet of water for several hours.
The heaviest rain was measured at Burr Ridge in the southwest suburbs, which got 4.63 inches. In adjacent Darien, the water was 2 to 3 feet deep at the door of City Hall.
On Chicago’s Far South Side, 3.55 inches of rain was measured at 95th Street and Baltimore Avenue, and 3.5 inches on East 130th Street, according to the water reclamation district.
Sixteen viaducts flooded on the South Side, Daley said.
The North Side and northern and northwest suburbs were spared serious flooding. Less than an inch of rain fell at O’Hare International Airport during the afternoon storm.
Nevertheless, 250 inbound and outbound flights were canceled, and the Red Cross and Salvation Army were looking after several hundred travelers who expected to be stranded overnight.
Only a handful of flights were canceled at Midway Airport, officials said.
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The Dan Ryan Expressway was closed north and south of 87th Street for four hours, between 3 and 7 p.m. Motorists had to get off the Dan Ryan and drive through South Side neighborhoods. Southbound I-57 was also closed in two places from 3 to 7 p.m.
As a result, Chicago police officers in four South Side districts were kept overtime and the police summer mobile task force for the lakefront was directed to the South Side to help with the diverted traffic and assist stranded drivers.
The hardest hit area in Chicago was from 79th Street south to the city limits and from Cicero Avenue to the lake. Raw sewage was reported coming up through storm drains into the basements of some homes, said Ald. William Beavers (7th).
The mayor and the city Health Department warned people to stay out of flooded basements until the water recedes and to disinfect the basements afterward.
In many parts of Chicago and in the older, close-in suburbs, storm sewers are also sanitary sewers, so when floodwaters back up into basements they can carry raw sewage, Rumsey said.
Sewers can handle only a half-inch of rain per hour, she said, so when the rainfall is heavier, it collects in the streets and basements.
Frank Dalton, general superintendent of the Water Reclamation District, said the Cal-Sag Channel would normally dump excess floodwater into Lake Michigan, but the lake’s water level was higher than the channel’s, so the locks had to be kept closed.
“The amount of water that fell here is 45 billion gallons,” Dalton said. “The (Deep) Tunnel itself can only handle 1.5 billion gallons.” He was referring to the total capacity of the mainstream Deep Tunnel, which runs from Wilmette to Hodgkins, combined with the much smaller Calumet tunnel leg. “In order to handle the rest of the problem, we need to build those reservoirs we’ve been talking about for the last 20 years. We need the political support,” Dalton said.
Two reservoirs have been designed on paper for Thornton and McCook that together could hold 45 billion gallons of floodwater, Rumsey said, but financing has not been approved. They would cost $400 million.
Pupils at Higgins Elementary School, 11710 S. Morgan St., saw some of the flooding inside their building.
“The sewers also are flooding and backing up into the school,” principal Leona Paytes said at 2:30 p.m. “The sump pump is working, but it couldn’t carry out the water fast enough. We had water shooting up through the (drinking) fountains on the second floor, and the sinks in our 1st grade class were flooding over.”
Carolyn Champion, 35, of the 9100 block of South Harper Avenue, said everybody she knew from 89th to 93rd on Harper had been flooded.
“Everyone’s basement is flooded, and their furniture is just floating around. I have water up to my waist (about 4 feet). The smell is gross,” Champion said.
Champion said she feared damage to her furnace and appliances. “I’m afraid there’s going to be a lot of electrical damage.”
“This is a disaster,” Champion said. “I know money-wise this is going to be very costly.”
Daley said he might seek federal disaster relief funds for the South Side.
At the viaduct at 95th Street and Stony Island, a schoolbus with 15 children, two CTA buses, and at least 25 cars got stuck in the water.
Cars trying to avoid the flood waters took to driving on the narrow sidewalks.
Bernard Meeks, 37, of the 8400 block of South Crandon Avenue, who works for a company that is hired by the city to mow grass, used a small tractor he operates to help pull stalled cars from beneath the vidauct.
Between noon and 4 p.m., he had pulled out about 25 cars, Meeks said.
In Blue Island, the weight of the rainwater apparently caused the collapse of a domed roof above a 50,000-square-foot warehouse at Parco Foods Inc., 139th and Chatham Streets.
After the collapse, officials at the cookie company couldn’t even get into the warehouse to assess the damage. “We can’t get back there because of the flooding,” said Robert Devereaux, a company executive.
In Calumet Park’s police station, itself hemmed in by water, phone calls came as fast as the rain.
Calumet Park dispatcher Joan Kurzeja talked to one resident, repeating what became a harried emergency worker’s refrain: “Listen. Some have got it up over their dryers. Some people got it waist-deep in their basements. We had a dog stranded on a roof. There’s nothing we can do. It’s an act of God.”
In a scene like ones played out countless times Monday, Edith Johnson was sailing down Plainfield Road in Darien when she suddenly realized that she was no longer on a street, but in a pond.
After her motor stalled, she waited several minutes for yellow-slickered city workers to push her scuttled Honda into dry dock outside a hot dog stand.
“The basement was flooded, then this,” she said, her hair damp. “It is not a great day.”
How high was this tide? Even the Chicago Skyway was flooded.
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Lightning slightly injured one man in West Chicago and sparked at least two small fires, one that caused $10,000 damage to an Aurora apartment and another that damaged a Carol Stream home.
In the West Chicago incident, a worker grasping a metal rod was knocked to the ground and slightly injured by a lightning “splash”-an indirect jolt that can occur within several hundred feet of a lightning strike.
“He saw a bright light and the next thing he knew he was on the ground,” said Dr. Joseph Giordano, an emergency room physician who treated the man, identified as David Bentley, 32, of Ohio.
Although he was listed in good condition, Bentley was “dazed and slow to respond,” Giordano said.
More thunderstorms are forecast for Tuesday morning and Tuesday afternoon, according to the Central Weather Service.