Residents were left to clean up the damage left by tornadoes and record-breaking hail in Kankakee County.
The supercell spawned at least four tornadoes in Pontiac and south of Kankakee in Illinois and Lake Village an Wheatfield in Indiana.In Indiana,Bishop McNamara Catholic School in Kankakee was badly damaged.
SEE ALSO | Chicago's Anti-Cruelty Downtown Adoption Center at 510 N. LaSalle Dr. welcomed six dogs to help the Kankakee County Animal Control create space in their shelter.Chicago's Anti-Cruelty Downtown Adoption Center at 510 N. LaSalle Dr. welcomed six dogs to help the Kankakee County Animal Control create space in their shelter."I honestly didn't think we were going to come back out. It was the scariest thing ever. The glass was bursting. You could hear everything rumbling above us, Abigail Gerth said. "We got a phone call saying that there was a tornado that had touched down, so we should go to the basement and seconds later it hit," Gerth said."I was just trying to find my son, just trying to get over," Erin Boerschig said. "All I could think of was just get over him, so the glass didn't hit him, but it was so loud." Boerschig said she went to put her car in her friend's garage to protect it from the hail. A move she says may have saved her and her son's lives. "I can't believe that we walked away. I mean, four adults, three kids, and four dogs. And I don't think any of us even have a scratch on us. I don't know.," Boerschig said. The cleanup begins but the people who live in the area say its better to deal with a big mess than mourn a life."As soon as I got down in the crawlspace, we heard like bombs going off," Kent said. "It sounded like bombs. You heard like the hail, gumball sized hail, even bigger than that, and then you just heard all the cracking and crashing." Kim Green's father owns a home and is one of the hardest hit on Norman Avenue. A good portion of the roof is gone. "We could see the swirling in the sky," Green said. "We were, 'Like this is going to turn into something.' After that the hail started."Reports of large-scale hail stones came pouring in from the western suburbs. The National Weather Service said the largest hailstone produced was six inches in diameter, which fell in Kankakee. The NWS said the hailstone may be a state record for Illinois."We had hail almost baseball size," Don Jones said. "We have roofers coming out to look at the roof. I would tell you almost every house in this two-block area probably have roof damage."Unsurprisingly, a steady stream of restoration companies were already doing the rounds early Wednesday afternoon. "We're helping the homeowners identify if they have any qualifying damage from the storm; educating homeowners on their insurance policies," Bradley Parks with Pro Restoration said.A Toyota Camry was dropped off at the Darien's Collision Center with the entire rear windshield smashed to bits.It's part of the stated reason, companies like State Farm dramatically increased rates for Illinois homeowners late last year.The company sharing numbers show that in 2024 Illinois customers reported $638 million dollars in hail damage, ranking second only after Texas. Some scientific studies say that as climate change accelerates, large-scale hailstones will become more frequent."We have about 400 ComEd crews currently working throughout the service territory, actively looking to see how we can deploy more resources and where the heaviest hit areas were," Jeremy Smith with ComEd said.Tuesday night, Kankakee County filed an emergency declaration with the state to get help. The American Red Cross has set up a shelter at Kankakee Community College for those impacted by the storms. Governor JB Pritzker posted on social media, "I've been briefed on the storm and tornado damage in the Kankakee area. My administration including IEMA are in contact with local officials to offer our full support. Keeping in our thoughts all Illinoisans impacted by the severe weather - we'll be here to help them recover."
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