Flooding in Chicago

I called home this weekend, telling my parents that I had flashbacks to being along the Mississippi. We had over 7 inches of rain in a 24 hour period, and more rain that fell over the next 12. It was storms from Ike that made their way up here.

My neighborhood is called Albany Park, and we have the north branch of teh Chicago River that runs through it. It flooded and shut down several streets, many homes, and a good deal of our campus. School was closed yesterday, but we're back in business today.

Two dorms had to be evacuated and sleep in the rec center over the weekend. Thankfully, they were able to return to their dorms to sleep last night. There is water damage in many of our buildings, and a couple of computer labs were destroyed.

I was on my way to babysit Rosie on Saturday when the water began pouring over the street down the way and they began sandbagging it. The water is still covering Foster Ave by Jewel, and traffic yesterday during rush hour was terrible. Traffic was backed up on Foster past Swedish Covenant due to Foster being closed between Pulaski and Elston, and Kedzie was backed up to Peterson with cars trying to get onto Foster Ave.

There are still sandbags on campus surrounding the river. The students seem to be okay, for the most part. I haven't heard that anyone lost any of their posessions, and they seem to be in good spirits now that they can get into their rooms.