Sunday’s heavy rain poured upward of 8 inches in Berwyn, Cicero and Garfield Park, according to preliminary reports from weather officials, sending residents in search of supplies to clean up flooded homes.
The National Weather Service said that daily rainfall totals ranged from 3 to 7 inches in the immediate Chicago area after “extended rounds of heavy/torrential rainfall.”
The preliminary data came from radar estimates, personal weather stations and rain gauges. Official information will be released over the next few days, weather officials said.
A flood warning remained in effect until 1 a.m. Monday.
The worst of the flooding occurred on the west and southwest sides of Chicago and in the near west and southwest suburbs, weather officials said.
Portions of I-290 and I-55 were flooded, some CTA services were halted and homes flooded across Chicago. The majority of 311 calls for flooding on Saturday afternoon were from Austin.
In Berwyn, residents made their way to the JC Licht Ace hardware store during the downpour in search of sump pumps, submersible pumps and other gear to stem flooding.
“If it pumped, we sold it yesterday,” said Jeremy Melnick, vice president of hardware for JC Licht, which owns close to a dozen Ace hardware stores in the Chicago area.
Melnick said the company transferred inventory from other area stores to the Berwyn location to stay ahead of demand there. “We got low, but we didn’t run out,” he said. Residents elsewhere generally didn’t start coming in for supplies until after the rain had calmed, and they were largely looking for cleaning supplies, Melnick said.
Jay Fuentes, a manager at Clark Devon Hardware in West Town, said the hardware store started receiving calls about flooding supplies yesterday afternoon. People were looking for sump pumps, fans and in a couple cases utility knives to cut up basement carpet, he said. The demand didn’t compare to what he’d seen in the aftermath of a torrential downpour last spring, he said.
“I didn’t get a lot of panicked calls,” Fuentes said.
People dealing with flooding should dry things out as quickly as possible to prevent mold and disinfect the area afterward, he said.
“If you’ve got flooding you probably want to mop with a Lysol or a bleach solution when you’re done,” Fuentes said.
The severe weather over the weekend delayed the scheduled 4:05 p.m. start of the NASCAR Cup Series Grant Park 220, where puddles on the racetrack made for slippery conditions.
In Evanston, all swimming areas were closed Monday because of elevated and unsafe E. coli levels in Wilmette. The excessive flooding in Wilmette resulted in the water locks being opened leading to the increased E. coli levels.
O’Hare International Airport broke the record for daily rainfall on Sunday, recording 3.35 inches of rain. The previous record was 2.06 inches in July 1982.
Hot and humid conditions are forecast for Monday and Tuesday. Weather officials said the next two days would stay mostly dry, with a chance of isolated showers Tuesday afternoon.
Current conditions at O’Hare International Airport are sunny and 68 degrees.
vla@chicagotribune.com
