More storms on the way

A flash flood warning is in effect for Cook, DuPage and Kane Counties until Friday night as overnight thunderstorms are expected to drop another inch or two of rain on already flooded areas.

After storms pummeled much of the Chicago area late Wednesday night and Thursday morning with up to 5 inches of rain falling in some areas; creeks, steams and ditches are expected to continue rising.

Storms making their way through Iowa are expected to reach the Chicago area after midnight Thursday and produce torrential rainfall of one to two inches along with hail, lightning and gusting winds, according to the National Weather Service.

A flash flood watch is also in effect for McHenry and Lake Counties.

Meteorologists are warning drivers not to attempt to cross water covered bridges or flowing streams, as most flood related deaths occur in vehicles.

The back to back storms forced airlines to cancel more than 425 flights out of Chicago airports Thursday and delayed many flights for up to two hours, according to the Chicago Department of Aviation.

The overnight storm wrecked havoc on power lines with ComEd reporting 59,000 customers without power as of 6 a.m. Thursday. Of those, 10,800 were reported in Chicago, 7,700 were in the northern suburbs and 9,400 in the western suburbs.

The outages started about 8 p.m. last night when storms began to roll through ComEd’s service area, officials said.

As of Thursday afternoon; 3.15 inches of rainfall was reported in Bartlett, 1.75 inches was reported in Roselle, 2.89 inches in Aurora, 2.58 in Oak Brook and 2.76 in St. Charles, according to weather service reports.

The forecast through the weekend does not look promising, as more severe storms are predicted for Friday afternoon with temperatures in the low 70s.