Severe storms roll through parts of US as heat wave continues – ABC News – Breaking News, Latest News and Videos

Severe storms roll through parts of US as heat wave continues  ABC News – Breaking News, Latest News and Videos

As America begins to celebrate its 250th birthday on Saturday, there are nearly 800,000 outages being reported across multiple states. Events on the National Mall in D.C. were delayed by a few hours on Saturday. The widespread extreme heat fueled another round of severe weather, impacting a large swath of the country as July Fourth celebrations took place. More than 75 million were in the threat zone for severe storms in the coming hours, stretching across parts of the Plains into the Northeast, with the primary hazard being damaging wind gusts. The greatest threat on Saturday spanned across parts of the mid-Atlantic, including Washington, D.C., and Baltimore and into parts of Kansas and Oklahoma, under a level 3 of 5 risk, with numerous severe thunderstorms packing potentially destructive wind gusts possible in these areas.

In Washington, D.C., severe weather, including lightning, led authorities to evacuate the National Mall ahead of President Donald Trump's Fourth of July speech. Attendees were told to shelter in nearby government buildings, and the celebration was delayed by a few hours before going on as scheduled. Severe Thunderstorm Watches stretched from Missouri to upstate New York this afternoon, including major cities like Chicago, D.C., Philadelphia and New York City. In New York City, the Macy's Fourth of July fireworks started a little earlier than scheduled to