Thunderstorms Cause Mass Power Outages in Chicago

After heavy and dangerous thunderstorms hit the Chicagoland area late Tuesday afternoon and evening, many Chicago and suburban residents and Commonwealth Edison customers still haven't had their power restored Wednesday morning or afternoon.

As of this morning, around 200 Chicago residents still had no power in their homes. Commonwealth Edison spoke about the issue and said that more and more customers are slowly getting their power back with crews working to get poles back up and wires reconnected. Early Wednesday morning around 450 customers were in the dark, so the number of those without power had decreased by over half.

ComEd also said that at one point during Tuesday evening, there were as many as 15,000 customers and Chicago residents that were out of power in their homes. Around 39,200 people in the area had their power restored since the storms hit the city around 5 p.m. A lot of people only had their power flinch out and go back on.

"My mother's power went out within a few minutes of the storm hitting. I was really worried because the rain tends to make the air much more humid and without air conditioning, it can be dangerous, especially for the elderly. As soon as her power knocked out, I brought her over to my house, which is all I could really do. ComEd finally restored her power early this morning, but it's ridiculous that people are still without power today," said Schaumburg resident Amber Tegan.

Some neighborhoods were hit harder than others. Chicago's north side saw heavy rains but power stayed on for the most part for residents. The western suburbs were hit the worst and still had a large number of power outages in the area.

"It looked like a hurricane had hit," said western suburb resident Tammie Flynn. "Poles were cracked and wires were down. You could tell the there were lots people without power. You could see that ComEd crews hit the streets as soon as the storm cleared to cleanup areas that had been hit hard."

Luckily, after the storms hit, the temperature in the area cooled down. For Wednesday, weather.com reported that temperatures will stay comfortable in the 70s. On top of nice temperatures, the city and surrounding area will not been seeing anymore rain today or tonight. However small showers and maybe thunderstorms are possible tomorrow. The chance of rain is 30% and the highest predicted temperatures will be in mid-70s.