Scattered rainstorms swept through the northern half of the Chicago area Wednesday night, bringing welcome but widely varying amounts of rain and also causing power failures, some localized flooding and wind gusts of up to 50 miles an hour in Naperville.
Meanwhile, weather forecasters predicted for Thursday a break from the heat by at least 15 degrees. The mercury soared to another record high of 97 degrees at 4 p.m. Wednesday at O`Hare International Airport.
Two systems of rainstorms hit in the evening, one in the northern and northwest suburbs and northern and northwest parts of the city, and the other swept through Du Page County.
The Metropolitan Sanitary District reported that 1.82 inches of rain fell in Wilmette and 1.66 inches in Glenview.
But in west suburban Stickney, only 0.03 of an inch fell, and at Pershing Road and Racine Avenue there was only 0.01 of an inch, according to the district.
The National Weather Service reported 1.05 inches fell in Arlington Heights and 0.78 inches at Lincoln and Damen Avenues in Chicago. The rain at Lincoln and Damen was the first to hit that neighborhood since April 16, according to an observer reporting to the National Weather Service.
An intense downpour dropped 1.07 inches of rain in only 15 minutes in west suburban Naperville, and the same storm packed wind gusts of up to 50 m.p.h., the weather service said.
In Wheaton, where 1.2 inches of rain fell Monday, an additional 0.75 of an inch fell Wednesday night. Downers Grove reported 1.30 inches.
Just a brief drizzle was reported by police on the Far South Side Wednesday night. In the southern suburbs, where unofficially 2 inches of rain fell in Glenwood Monday night, no rain was reported Wednesday.
Power failures were reported Wednesday night in Naperville, Lake Zurich, Wilmette, Highland Park and Glenview. Northbrook reported a house fire caused by a lightning strike.
The official high Wednesday of 97 as measured at O`Hare broke a record for June 22 set in 1941. The previous record high for the date was 94.
Steve Toci, forecaster for the Central Weather Service, predicted that Thursday`s high would reach only about 82 degrees in the western suburbs. This might seem like sweater weather when compared with the last three days in which the highs reached 104, 101 and 97.
Also on Thursday, a brisk, northeast wind expected to blow off the lake at 10 to 20 m.p.h. should keep the high at the lakefront from rising beyond the upper 60s, Toci said.
Thursday night`s temperatures should be in the low to middle 50s in outlying areas, Toci said. For comparison, the low temperature just before sunrise Wednesday was 80 degrees.
Adding to this summer`s store of strange weather, the water in Lake Michigan rose and fell dramatically along Chicago`s shoreline Wednesday afternoon, exposing 40 to 100 yards of new beach for brief periods in a phenomenon called a seiche.
Those who saw it called it just plain weird.
”People were looking around and calling their friends over to look,”
said William Sullivan, lifeguard captain at the North Avenue Beach.
When the water dropped, Sullivan said, ”a lot of little kids walked out further than they normally would. We told our guard in the tower to move the people in so when the water came back, the children wouldn`t be in there.”
A National Weather Service spokesman said that starting at about noon, water levels in the southern portion of the lake repeatedly dropped 2 to 3 feet for three or four minutes, then returned to normal. Bob Collins of the weather service said the water receded about 100 yards; Sullivan said about 40 yards.
Seiches occur when storms and high winds, accompanied by a rise in air pressure, cause the level of the lake to drop in some places while rising in a huge wave in others. Thursday`s seiche occurred while a line of intense storms passed across the lake north of Chicago.
