After torrential rains flooded viaducts, stopped automobiles, and sent water gushing into basements, the National Weather Service issued a flash flood warning for parts of northeastern Illinois, including Chicago's northern metro region, on Sunday.
On social media, Chicago residents shared photographs and videos of automobiles half submerged beneath underpasses and plumes of water shooting out from pavements.
Flash floods hit Chicago metro area
(Photo : Scott Olson/Getty Images)
The Chicago Bears showed no signs of postponing a scheduled football game against the San Francisco 49ers at noon local time (1700 GMT), instead releasing videos of the squad warming up in the pouring rain on a soaked field, as per Reuters.
Even after the hardest rain had stopped by 11 a.m. The NWS cautioned that highways in Connecticut would stay inundated until the water receded.
On Twitter, the city asked citizens not to drive through standing water on roadways, viaducts, and low-lying places.
The IPCC, or Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change, forecasts more catastrophic flooding in the Midwest.
According to Chicago's water management office, extreme rainfall events that are "very local, highly severe, and difficult to anticipate" have grown in recent years.
Such showers may dump 2 inches (5 cm) of rain per hour on a neighborhood, flooding municipal sewers, overflowing mains, and driving water into houses' basements via private drains.
As a result, the city has begun to place water blocks on catch basins, which prevent sewers from flooding but potentially exacerbate street flooding.
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Consistent rains submerge roads and flood basements
Torrential rains blasted over Chicago on Sunday, flooding basements and alleys, shutting grocery shops and restaurants, and leaving automobiles stranded beneath viaducts on roadways inaccessible due to high water, as per The New York Times.
The harsh weather caught the city off guard, particularly the North Side of Chicago.
According to Kevin Doom, a National Weather Service meteorologist, close to five inches of rain had fallen by late afternoon.
Cars were stuck in rain at certain junctions when motorists drove across unexpectedly flooded roadways.
Homeowners whose basements had not seen water in years were dismayed to learn that rainfall had surged up via drains, producing an ankle-deep flood with a foul sewage odor in some cases.
Flooding forced the closure of grocery shops, and other companies were unable to operate at all.
Mayor Lori Lightfoot asked Chicagoans not to operate dishwashers or washing machines to avoid more flooding.
She also advised people to avoid swimming in Lake Michigan due to large waves and hazardous circumstances.
Chicago is prone to flash floods when its wastewater system overflows, but this storm put the city under exceptional strain, according to officials and citizens.
What happened today was an extremely severe downpour, really suddenly, that looked to have overloaded portions of the sewage system, according to Andre Vasquez, an alderman representing a ward on the North Side.
Rain fell throughout the afternoon and evening and was not forecast to stop until Monday.
Hopleaf, a pub, and restaurant in the Andersonville area of Chicago's North Side were forced to close for lunch on Sunday when the basement flooded with the first rush of rain.
"It's been a long day," Mr. Roper said.
Employees raced into the restaurant early in the morning, but instead of preparing for lunch, they grabbed mops and buckets to clean up.
This type of flooding, he added, has forced the restaurant to close about a half dozen times in 30 years.
He noted that the city's infrastructure needs to be updated to adapt to greater rainstorms, even though it had avoided the harsh weather witnessed in most of the nation.
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