Overview
- A long derecho moved through the region on Wednesday and a second round of severe thunderstorms spawned multiple confirmed tornadoes on Thursday that struck towns in Illinois and northwest Indiana.
- The storms caused concentrated catastrophic damage in communities such as Streator, Merrillville and Hebron with homes, schools and power poles torn apart.
- At least one storm-related death was confirmed in Des Moines when a tree fell on a man and aggregated outage counts climbed into the hundreds of thousands with PowerOutage.us and utilities reporting more than 650,000 customers affected across several states.
- Air travel was heavily disrupted as tornado warnings forced evacuations at Chicago area towers and led to thousands of flight delays and cancellations while local officials opened shelters and reunification centers for displaced residents.
- National Weather Service crews have begun multi-day damage surveys to establish tornado counts and intensities, utilities are staging restorations that prioritize hospitals and major lines, and the Storm Prediction Center says the short-term risk of additional damaging windstorms and isolated tornadoes remains elevated.