Storms leave scattered damage to conclude holiday weekend

Strong winds, driving rains, and in some cases golf ball-sized hail pelted parts of southern Wisconsin on Monday afternoon.

Lightning and thunder made for nature's own fireworks and a punctuation mark on the end of a hot holiday weekend.

By evening, the rumbles in the sky had been replaced by the roar of chainsaws as dozens of homeowners in New Glarus worked to clear downed trees.

"If we were here probably 20 minutes earlier, my car, the motorcycle, probably everything would have gotten hit," Carmen McDonald said as she
and her neighbors got to work cutting and clearing limbs.

A lightning strike in Edgerton is the preliminary cause of an apartment fire at the Edgewood Glen Senior Living Community. Firefighers reported more than 30 families were displaced by the fire, but no one was hurt.

The Red Cross was on the scene helping residents but no further
information was available.

In Brooklyn, a large and apparently old tree was no longer a match for the wind. It fell across power lines shutting down Sandy Hook road and Highway 92 for more than an hour. Electric customers in the area reported hours of darkness.

In Oregon, Highway 14 was partially blocked by a downed tree for about 30
minutes.

Storms spent the early part of the afternoon lingering in western

Wisconsin before moving through swiftly around dinnertime. As they
approached the isthmus, organizers of the annual Brat Fest made the call to shut the event down an hour early.

"We saw a storm coming in, it hit Verona, 40 mph winds, hail and we knew it was about 15 minutes away and just for safety's sake we made the announcement to close down," said organizer Tim Metcalfe.

Stifling heat and on-and-off rain left the festival short of its sales goal. In 2010, celebrity cashiers and volunteers sold nearly 210,000 brats. This weekend the total a mere 151,216.

"For Brat Fest to break the record we have to have a perfect weekend and that's what we did in 2010, we had perfect weather," said Metcalfe.

There was 1 inch hail reported in Middleton and Stoughton. There were powerlines down on the north side of Edgerton. Trees were reported down east of Oergon.

In Green County, Highway 92 in the Town of Brooklyn was closed because of downed lines.

In Montello, there were reports of 1.75 inch hail and 72 mph wind gusts.

In Wisconsin Dells, there were reports of many trees and branches down -- with some landing on cars. There are four cars totaled, WISC-TV reported. About 1 inch hail

Stay tuned to WISC-TV and Channel 3000 for continuing coverage.