The New Nation - Internet Edition

AP, Chicago

Summerlike storms pounded the Midwest on Saturday with hail, high winds and even funnel clouds, helping to thaw the ice after days of a deep freeze and threatening floods.

Residents braced for an aftermath forecast expected to include overflowing rivers and flooded basements. Flooding was also being fueled by unseasonably high temperatures that climbed into the 60s in Illinois.

In Kane County, several dozen Boy Scouts spent Saturday morning filling 2,400 sandbags for residents to pick up as needed outside the Campton Township Highway Department. Scouts shoveled sand into the bags and stacked them in neat piles.

"They're learning community service," said troop leader Jeff Koehl, who said authorities sent out an e-mail asking for Scouts to volunteer.

"They're just concerned with the way we're going to get this quick melt that all the tributaries are going to fill up."

In the Chicago suburb of Riverside, authorities encouraged residents along the Des Plaines River to evacuate, saying the river was expected to rise to nearly 10 feet by Sunday morning.

Nature dealt Illinois a mixed bag of weather on Saturday, with flood warnings and advisories in the north and tornado watches in the central and southern parts of the state.