After a stretch of days in the Chicago area with temperatures topping 90 degrees, Thursday storms were supposed to bring a reprieve from the dry heat. But heavy rain and wind gusts caused widespread damage to trees and power lines in some suburbs Thursday night.
Around 52,000 Commonwealth Edison customers were affected by the storms, according to a ComEd social media post early Friday. By 10 a.m. Friday, more than 8,000 customers were still experiencing outages, according to the ComEd outage map.
Rafal Ogorek, a meteorologist with the National Weather Service’s Chicago-area office, said his office received reports of wind damage in Elgin and South Elgin. Ogorek said another swath of damage was reported along a line from Palatine to Libertyville.
Ogorek said there were no thunderstorms forecast for Friday, though there’s a “very small chance we could see a severe thunderstorm or two” Saturday in the southwest part of the Chicago area.
Winds in the Elgin and Libertyville areas on Thursday were about 50 mph, enough to knock down the average tree, Ogorek said. It is also the threshold for issuing a severe thunderstorm warning, he said.
Photos taken by Tribune staff in Elgin showed numerous trees downed throughout the city, especially in the Spring Douglas Historic District. Storms most greatly affected neighborhoods surrounding the downtown area, according to an Elgin news release.
Elgin city crews started responding to calls for service around 7 p.m. Thursday, the news release said. Elgin emergency services received more than 300 calls, mostly for storm issues, and Elgin 311 received more than 100 calls for forestry services, according to the news release.
The Elgin release didn’t specify how many trees were felled or damaged in the storm.
Michael Pakosta, Libertyville deputy fire chief, said high winds came through town a little after 8 p.m. Thursday.
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High winds “knocked down some tree branches, knocked down some trees onto power lines and various other communication lines, trees down in people’s yards and on the sidewalk, that was the extent of the damage,” Pakosta said. “Couple other roads were blocked, but we had our public works crew working throughout the evening and into this morning to make sure people could get to where they needed to go.”
Pakosta said the department received about 20 calls related to the storm between 8 p.m. and 9:30 p.m. About 120 Libertyville residents were still without power as of Friday morning, according to Pakosta.
Libertyville will have neighboring communities assist with storm damage pickup due to the volume of the damage, according to a Libertyville news release.
According to Ogorek, a weather phenomenon called a microburst caused the storms in Elgin and Libertyville on Thursday night. When thunderstorms form, air rises into the thunderstorm cloud, Ogorek explained. A strong enough updraft can suspend precipitation in the cloud, he said.
“Eventually over time, the amount of precipitation in that cloud builds up until that updraft can no longer hold it,” Ogorek said. “At that point, you can get basically a burst of precipitation falling to the ground. When it hits the ground, it spreads out and can produce gusty winds that can down trees if it’s strong enough.”
People should take shelter indoors if they see lightning or hear thunder, Ogorek advised.
“Make sure you’re not outside, where you can be susceptible to dangerous lightning and even hail,” he said. “Definitely don’t want to be standing underneath a tree during a thunderstorm because of the possibility of strong winds knocking it down or lightning striking it. When thunder roars, head indoors.”
Check the Tribune’s weather page for forecast updates.