First Day of Summerfest brings rain, heavy downpour

Summerfest started on Wednesday, June 28th, 2017. There are more than 800 acts planned to be performing on twelve different stages over the eleven days of this year’s Summerfest according to Milwaukee Journal Sentinel’s Piet Levy. This is due to the fact that this year’s Summerfest marks the 50th edition of the Milwaukee music festival since its opening in 1968.

Alex Young says, “Upwards of 850,000 people are expected to descend on Henry Maier Festival Park.” In 2016, Summerfest drew more than 800,000 visitors in total as claimed by sportswriter Jimmy Carlton from On Milwaukee.

The weather was nice for visitors until 9:52 a.m. when it began to rain according to Weather Underground. At 4:08 p.m., people at Summerfest began to look for shelter as thunderstorms began, but the weather did not stop people from seeing their favorite bands, such as the Red Hot Chile Peppers, Tesla, Flume, or the Marcus King Band.

“We went last night when it was raining really bad. The weather was the worst, but it was still very fun though because my friend Brady got to see a band that he really likes,” stated Arrowhead student Rachel Kriehn. “I’ve never been there before. It’s my first year there so I’m pretty excited. I went with my friend Brady to see Lauv. We discovered the band together and it was cool to see them live.”

Some activities were postponed, such as the Big Bang Fireworks Show as stated by News Channel 12 Milwaukee. Summerfest is scheduled to continue until July 9th, 2017.