At least six tornadoes touched down in northern Illinois Wednesday night as powerful storms swept across the upper Midwest, damaging rural communities and forcing thousands of soccer fans to seek shelter during the Copa America semifinal in Chicago.
The National Weather Service said an EF-2 tornado with estimated top wind speeds of 115-125 mph cut a path more than 11 miles long and about four football fields wide through the city of Pontiac, injuring four people Wednesday night. Survey crews also identified three EF-1 tornadoes, with maximum winds up to 110 mph, that struck Cissna Park, Ottawa and West Brooklyn. No injuries resulted from those storms.
Survey crews were investigating damage along three separate supercell paths, the weather service said.
“We are fortunate things are not worse and are thankful there were no fatalities,” Illinois Gov. Bruce Rauner said in a Thursday morning statement.
The storm system produced dime-sized hail in some areas, and its high winds snapped trees, blew roofs off buildings and downed power lines. The weather service reported winds from 80 mph to 100 mph in some parts of northern Indiana.
The northwestern Indiana town of Brookston, among those buffeted by the high winds, declared a state of emergency Thursday after the entire town lost power. WLFI-TV reported that two state highways in the town were blocked by storm debris, and authorities were warning people to avoid the area.
“The wind was so ferocious you couldn’t have stood out in it at all,” Brookston resident Steve Hall told WLFI. “This tulip (poplar) tree behind me was a healthy young tree and (the wind) just twisted it and laid it over like a pretzel.”
A 100 mph wind gust was recorded in the nearby town of Battle Ground, the weather service said.
Nearly 50 families sought refuge at an emergency shelter established at a Brookston church, Red Cross volunteers said.
In northern and central Indiana, nearly 17,000. homes and businesses were without power as of noon.