Early morning storms tangle traffic, kill power

Heavy storms, standing water and power outages played havoc with Monday morning's commute, officials said.

Jeff Burdick, spokesman from ComEd, said 1,800 customers were without power at 7 a.m. Monday morning due to heavy winds and lightning strikes from a powerful storm that blew through late Sunday and early Monday morning.

He said 1,300 of the 1,800 of the power outages were in the northern suburbs, and an additional 300 in the city of Chicago.

"Lightning strikes and high winds are the cause of most of the outages this morning," he said. "But, wind wise, it was one of the more milder storms."

Officials said, while there remain some isolated outages throughout the area, most of the 1,600 customers that were powerless due to the storms Monday morning have been repaired.

Traffic wise, though, most major expressways showed delays, with portions of the Kennedy, Reagan and the Eisenhower moving at a crawl due to standing water and heavy pockets of rain.

But, officials from the Illinois State Police said traffic moved along as well as could have possibly been expected

Police reported accidents on Lake Street and Lambert Avenue in Elgin and Route 53 and Biesterfield near Schaumburg that also added to longer traffic times. Pyott Road in Crystal Lake was also shut down while ComEd officials repaired a transformer.

Meteorologists from the National Weather Service are predicting more rain and scattered thunderstorms throughout Monday.

Amy Seeley, meteorologist from the National Weather Service, said O'Hare had about an inch of rain overnight, and Aurora recorded about 1.72 inches in the same time span.

"We could worry about some flooding later today if rain keeps falling in the same areas," Seeley said. "Kane County saw over an inch Sunday, so any more on top of it could cause some problems along the rivers."

She added expected temps are expected to be in the high 70s or low 80s.