Memorial Day weekend kicks off with rain, wind, cold and no sunshine
CHICAGO - It is Memorial Day weekend, but do not expect Mother Nature to make it easy.
"I’m sick of it already because I wanna be cute and get dressed, instead I’m getting rained on," Laeunice Andrade from the North Side said.
Alex Zamudio is an Uber driver in the city.
"It’s actually pretty good for me (the rain), I drive Uber, I make more money," he said.
Rainfall throughout the day created bumper to bumper traffic and messy road conditions in many parts of the city. There was also a massive tree which uprooted in Humboldt Park.
"I think it’s crazy. I was on way home, looked outside, I’ve never seen nothing like this happen before," Patrick Curry said.
Heavy winds also caused a tree to topple onto at least two cars driving along Lake Shore Drive near North Avenue Beach. The damage was significant.
A veteran Chicago firefighter saw the tree as it was coming down.
"I hit as much brake as I could, as fast as I could, but still ran into the tree. It could have been worse," he said.
But it was not all bad, even though swimming at many Chicago beaches was prohibited Friday due to 11-foot waves. FOX 32 still found a few folks along the lakefront, exercising and anxiously awaiting a return to normalcy.