Advertisement

We need your help now

Support from readers like you keeps The Journal open.

You are visiting us because we have something you value. Independent, unbiased news that tells the truth. Advertising revenue goes some way to support our mission, but this year it has not been enough.

If you've seen value in our reporting, please contribute what you can, so we can continue to produce accurate and meaningful journalism. For everyone who needs it.

A tree was pulled out of the ground by the roots, collapsing onto a house after a tornado left a path of devastation through the north end of Pekin. AP Photo/Journal Star, Fred Zwicky

Six killed as tornadoes tear across America's midwest

Trees were uprooted, cars flipped and houses flattened.

DOZENS OF TORNADOES and intense thunderstorms swept across the Midwest on Sunday, leaving at least six people dead and unleashing powerful winds that flattened entire neighbourhoods, flipped over cars and uprooted trees.

Illinois took the brunt of the fury as the string of unusually powerful late-season tornadoes tore across the state, injuring dozens and even prompting officials at Chicago’s Soldier Field to evacuate the stands and delay the Bears game.

“The whole neighbourhood’s gone. The wall of my fireplace is all that is left of my house,” said Michael Perdun, speaking by cellphone from the hard-hit central Illinois town of Washington, where he said his neighbourhood was wiped out in a matter of seconds.

“I stepped outside and I heard it coming. My daughter was already in the basement, so I ran downstairs and grabbed her, crouched in the laundry room and all of a sudden I could see daylight up the stairway and my house was gone.”

image

Ray Baughman embraces family shortly after his home was destroyed by a tornado that left a path of devastation through the north end of Pekin. (AP Photo/Journal Star, Fred Zwicky)

An elderly man and his sister were killed when a tornado hit their home in the rural southern Illinois community of New Minden, said coroner Mark Styninger. A third person died in Washington, while three others perished in Massac County in the far southern part of the state, said Patti Thompson of the Illinois Emergency Management Agency. She did not provide details.

With communications difficult and many roads impassable, it remained unclear how many people might be hurt or whether the death toll would continue to climb. The Illinois National Guard said it had dispatched 10 firefighters and three vehicles to Washington to assist with immediate search and recovery operations.

Whole blocks of houses were erased from the landscape in Washington, a rural community of 16,000, and Illinois State Police Trooper Dustin Pierce said the tornado cut a path from one end of town to the other, knocking down power lines, rupturing gas lines and ripping off roofs.

image

A mattress is wrapped around a stripped tree in Washington. (AP Photo/The Pantagraph, Steve Smedley)

An auto parts store with several people inside was reduced to a pile of bricks, metal and rebar; a battered car, its windshield impaled by a piece of lumber, was flung alongside it. Despite the devastation, all the employees managed to crawl out of the rubble unhurt, Pierce said.

“I went over there immediately after the tornado, walking through the neighborhoods, and I couldn’t even tell what street I was on,” Washington Alderman Tyler Gee told WLS-TV.

“Just completely flattened — some of the neighborhoods here in town, hundreds of homes.”

image

Pat Whitaker, 82, sits under a blanket in her nightgown outside her home waiting for help to come in Gifford. (AP Photo/The News-Gazette, Robin Scholz)

Among those who lost everything was Curt Zehr, who described the speed with which the tornado turned his farmhouse outside Washington into a mass of rubble scattered over hundreds of yards. His truck was sent flying and landed on an uprooted tree.

“They heard the siren … and saw (the tornado) right there and got into the basement,” he said of his wife and adult son who were home at the time. Then, seconds later, when they looked out from their hiding place the house was gone and “the sun was out and right on top of them.”

image

A man stands near a pickup that belonged to farmer Curt Zehr after a tornado blew through Zehr’s farm. (AP Photo/David Mercer)

At OSF Saint Francis Medical Center in Peoria, spokeswoman Amy Paul said 37 patients had been treated, eight with injuries ranging from broken bones to head injuries. Another hospital, Methodist Medical Center in Peoria, treated more than a dozen, but officials there said none of them were seriously injured.

Steve Brewer, Methodist Medical Center’s chief operating officer, said doctors and other medical professionals were setting up a temporary emergency care centre to treat the injured before transporting them to hospitals, while others were dispatched to search through the rubble for survivors.

By nightfall, Trooper Pierce said there were reports of looting in Washington.

About 90 minutes after the tornado destroyed homes in Washington, the storm darkened downtown Chicago. As the rain and high winds slammed into the area, officials at Soldier Field evacuated the stands and ordered the Bears and Baltimore Ravens off the field. Fans were allowed back to their seats shortly after 2pm, and the game resumed after about a two-hour delay.

image

Fans are advised to leave the stadium as severe weather passes over Soldier Field during the first half of an NFL football game between the Chicago Bears and the Baltimore Ravens. (AP Photo/Charles Rex Arbogast)

Earlier, the Office of Emergency Management and Communications had issued a warning to fans, urging them “to take extra precautions and … appropriate measures to ensure their personal safety”.

Just how many tornadoes hit was unclear. Although about 80 reports of tornadoes had come in as of Sunday night, Bill Bunting of the National Weather Service’s Storm Prediction Center in Norman, Oklahoma, said the actual number will likely be in the 30 to 40 range.

He said that’s because the same tornado often gets reported multiple times.

When the weather service was issuing its warning that severe weather was bearing down on the Midwest, officials said the last such warning issued so late in the season in November came in 2005, and the result was an outbreak of 49 tornadoes.

image

A young boy takes a break from helping comb the rubble of Curt Zehr’s home just outside Washington. (AP Photo/David Mercer)

Sunday’s storms followed warnings by the weather service that they were simply moving too fast for people to wait until they saw the weather to get ready.

“This is a very dangerous situation,” said Russell Schneider, director of the Storm Prediction Center. Some 53 million people in 10 states were “at significant risk for thunderstorms and tornadoes,” he said.

The White House issued a statement saying President Barack Obama had been briefed about the damage and was in touch with federal, state and local officials.

Such severe weather this late in the season also carries the risk of surprise.

“People can fall into complacency because they don’t see severe weather and tornadoes, but we do stress that they should keep a vigilant eye on the weather and have a means to hear a tornado warning because things can change very quickly,” said Matt Friedlein, a weather service meteorologist.

The storm also slammed through parts of Wisconsin, Indiana, Michigan, Ohio and Kentucky as it made its way east into the mid-Atlantic states on Sunday night. Tornadoes, large hail and damaging winds tore through several communities, leaving thousands without power as emergency crews tried to clear roads.

Friedlein said that such strong storms are rare this late in the year because there usually isn’t enough heat from the sun to sustain the thunderstorms. But he said temperatures Sunday were expected to reach into the 60s and 70s, which he said is warm enough to help produce severe weather when it is coupled with winds, which are typically stronger this time of year than in the summer.

“You don’t need temperatures in the 80s and 90s to produce severe weather (because) the strong winds compensate for the lack of heating,” he said. “That sets the stage for what we call wind shear, which may produce tornadoes.”

Severe storm and tornadoes threaten Midwestern US states

Ireland pledges additional €1.6 million to Philippines relief efforts

Meet the man attempting to become the first Irish person to row 2,100 miles across the Pacific Ocean

Readers like you are keeping these stories free for everyone...
A mix of advertising and supporting contributions helps keep paywalls away from valuable information like this article. Over 5,000 readers like you have already stepped up and support us with a monthly payment or a once-off donation.

Close
20 Comments
    Install the app to use these features.
    Mute susanna smyth
    Favourite susanna smyth
    Report
    Nov 18th 2013, 8:03 AM

    Maybe if storms of this magnitude effect the US might reconsider signing the Kyoto agreement

    30
    Install the app to use these features.
    Mute Liam
    Favourite Liam
    Report
    Nov 18th 2013, 8:34 AM

    Narrow-minded tea party people will see to it that does not happen.

    22
    Install the app to use these features.
    Mute Ricky Spanish
    Favourite Ricky Spanish
    Report
    Nov 18th 2013, 10:15 AM

    Owning a v8 will not cause a tornado.

    13
    See 4 more replies ▾
    Install the app to use these features.
    Mute Ricky Spanish
    Favourite Ricky Spanish
    Report
    Nov 18th 2013, 10:16 AM

    No Liam…. The Kyoto thing was rejected by both sides of the aisle.

    9
    Install the app to use these features.
    Mute Aunty Simmonite
    Favourite Aunty Simmonite
    Report
    Nov 18th 2013, 10:29 AM

    Japan, third largest economy in the world, and the land of Kyoto itself, has dumped their ambitious plan to reduce emissions by 25% by 2020. Now they warn that their emissions may rise instead.

    The Japanese are acting sensibly as claims made by climate alarmists grow evermore preposterous .An example of this are claims made about ‘extreme weather events’ such as the recent typhoon which hit the Philippines, Haiyan is between 21st and 35th strongest cyclone in that region since the 1950s and these turn up ,as the data shows, every 2-3 years.

    8
    Install the app to use these features.
    Mute Declan Noonan
    Favourite Declan Noonan
    Report
    Nov 18th 2013, 12:00 PM

    Susanna, I answered this question for you yesterday! Please do some research.

    1
    Install the app to use these features.
    Mute Boo!-Fight the Board
    Favourite Boo!-Fight the Board
    Report
    Nov 18th 2013, 1:10 PM

    The tea party will say its Gods judgement on gays, Obamacare and the liberalisation of America.

    6
    Install the app to use these features.
    Mute Popcorn
    Favourite Popcorn
    Report
    Nov 18th 2013, 9:05 AM

    Life – Bad things happen to good people.

    25
    Install the app to use these features.
    Mute Gerard Creedon
    Favourite Gerard Creedon
    Report
    Nov 18th 2013, 8:01 AM

    Why is life such a bitch.

    19
    Install the app to use these features.
    Mute DarthTempus
    Favourite DarthTempus
    Report
    Nov 18th 2013, 10:16 AM

    My sympathies to those who lost so much but I’ve always wondered why people risk living in such a place, the cobstant fear of a tornado destroying everuthing you hold dear

    10
    Install the app to use these features.
    Mute Ricky Spanish
    Favourite Ricky Spanish
    Report
    Nov 18th 2013, 10:25 AM

    Why do people live in Japan?
    Why do people live in the Phillipines?

    Risks will always exist.
    You just do your best to mitigate.

    17
    Install the app to use these features.
    Mute DarthTempus
    Favourite DarthTempus
    Report
    Nov 18th 2013, 1:44 PM

    Fair point I guess I just feel lucky we live where we do and don’t need to face these risks

    2
    See 1 more reply ▾
    Install the app to use these features.
    Mute Oisín Tarrant
    Favourite Oisín Tarrant
    Report
    Nov 18th 2013, 10:27 PM

    I lived 40 mins from Peoria IL for years. No one there worries about tornadoes on a daily bases. Its not something you’d avoid the place for. Have a look at the Tri-State Tornado, it doesnt matter where you live in the mid-west, your in the path of them everywhere.

    1
    Install the app to use these features.
    Mute Rugby DadaiO
    Favourite Rugby DadaiO
    Report
    Nov 18th 2013, 2:29 PM

    Always sad to see loss of life and destruction of property but tornados are a fact of life for those who live in a vast region from Oklahoma to Minnesota. The 100+ tornados per year have been going on since before the combustion engine and have nothing to do with the myth of global warming. Most of the tornado activity tears up some farmer’s field rarely hitting population centers. It is the news coverage that makes it seem like the world is coming to an end.

    4
    Install the app to use these features.
    Mute Aunty Simmonite
    Favourite Aunty Simmonite
    Report
    Nov 18th 2013, 5:56 PM

    These late ones even have their own title ‘November Witch’

    1
    Install the app to use these features.
    Mute Miss Filed
    Favourite Miss Filed
    Report
    Nov 18th 2013, 11:54 AM

    Hmmm, so temperatures higher than usual for the time of year, leading to a prolonged tornado season… I know what I think…

    2
    Install the app to use these features.
    Mute Ricky Spanish
    Favourite Ricky Spanish
    Report
    Nov 18th 2013, 12:02 PM

    What do you think?

    4
    Install the app to use these features.
    Mute Brian Hicks
    Favourite Brian Hicks
    Report
    Nov 18th 2013, 2:11 PM

    Cow farts?

    1
    See 1 more reply ▾
    Install the app to use these features.
    Mute Aunty Simmonite
    Favourite Aunty Simmonite
    Report
    Nov 18th 2013, 5:32 PM

    Even the scaremongering IPCC has this to say.
    “Current datasets indicate no significant observed trends in global tropical cyclone frequency over the past century … No robust trends in annual numbers of tropical storms, hurricanes and major hurricanes counts have been identified over the past 100 years in the North Atlantic basin… In summary, confidence in large scale changes in the intensity of extreme extratropical cyclones since 1900 is low.”

    1
    Install the app to use these features.
    Mute John Sherrit
    Favourite John Sherrit
    Report
    Nov 18th 2013, 12:28 PM

    This is the longest journal story ever!!!!!

    Well done!

    Must have been serious if they had to delay an NFL game

    1
Submit a report
Please help us understand how this comment violates our community guidelines.
Thank you for the feedback
Your feedback has been sent to our team for review.
JournalTv
News in 60 seconds