Searing heat and storms mar holiday with 3 children dead in Wisconsin and utility outages widespread

LAKE GENEVA, Wis. (AP) — Three children who died when a boat capsized in Geneva Lake during a Wisconsin storm were wearing life vests, authorities said as the nation assessed damage from storms and a heat wave that marred the July Fourth holiday, leaving hundreds of thousands of utility customers without power.

The tragedy in Wisconsin’s Walworth County in a part of Southern Wisconsin that has long served as a favorite vacation getaway for residents of the Chicago area came with a storm that downed trees, ruptured power lines and made transportation treacherous and complicated across multiple states.

It was a trio of calamities that repeated itself each time storms doused a region. After a similarly vicious storm struck the New York area late Friday, hundreds of thousands of utility customers were left without power, trains to New Jersey were canceled and thousands of trees were damaged or uprooted.

Combined with the Midwest storms, nearly 1 million residents were left powerless. By noon Saturday, about 750,000 utility customers were powerless in Wisconsin, Michigan, Illinois, Pennsylvania, Ohio, New York and New Jersey.

But the Wisconsin deaths stood out for how quickly the extreme weather could turn a holiday weekend pleasure outing into a nightmare.

As the Wisconsin Department of Natural Resources and the Geneva Lake Law Enforcement Agency investigated the Geneva Lake tragedy, the city’s police department issued a statement blaming it on a “sudden and severe storm” that rapidly produced hazards for boats.

It said a privately owned recreational motorboat carrying 10 occupants, including four children, tried to race to safety before it was overwhelmed by severe wind and waves. As it took on water, it eventually capsized and sank, the release said.

Six adults and a child were rescued from the water, but three children recovered from the lake after an intensive search were unresponsive to exhaustive lifesaving measures administered as soon as they were found, police said.

Officials confirmed that all four children on board were wearing life jackets, police added.

After the storm, Lake Geneva Mayor Todd Krause declared an emergency and said one person suffered minor injuries after being struck by a falling tree while downed power lines and trees blocked some streets.

The storms that rolled through the Midwest and Northeast on Friday led multiple cities to cancel holiday festivals and reschedule fireworks displays. Mayor Frank Velez in Belleville, New Jersey, rescheduled them for next year, telling residents: “While we’re disappointed we couldn’t celebrate together tonight, your safety will always come first.”

By noon on July Fourth, temperatures across parts of the Northeast were already soaring back toward triple digits, resuming conditions likely to be relieved by the storms predicted to follow, leaving temperatures much lower for the start of a new week.