Tornados are a hazard we are taught to prepare for in Illinois. All throughout my K-12 education we would do frequent tornado drills in school, and every family I knew had a spot they would go to in their home if a tornado was imminent. As much as we prepared, though, we didn’t often see many. This is why the tornado that struck the western suburbs of Chicago on June 20, 2021, was so surprising.
Footage taken after the tornado. Many of the roofs of the homes on this street were damaged, including the house that I live in now.
The storm began on a Sunday night and continued into Monday morning. In all, there were four tornadoes as well as dangerous high-speed winds. The strongest tornado was categorized as an EF3, which is considered severe on the Enhanced Fujita scale. The EF3 damaged 900 structures and injured 11 people. Luckily, there were no reported deaths, which the National Weather Service correlates to the preparedness of people and their willingness to listen to the tornado warnings.
Even though no one died, there was still significant damage to these towns. At the time I lived in a town that neighbored those who were hit, but we still had a good amount of debris and power outages caused by the storm. Many who did live in the areas hit had to rebuild their homes and businesses, which took a long amount of time. This past summer my family and I moved into a house located in a suburb where the EF3 tornado hit. The house is newly renovated, and we realized that’s because it was damaged by the tornado, forcing the previous owners to rebuild.
A few days after the storm there was a community effort to help clean up the damaged areas. I volunteered with a club that I was a part of in high school to help. That morning we went around a neighborhood picking up branches and other debris that had fallen.
References
“EF-3 Tornado Touches down in DuPage County, with Damage Reported in Woodridge, Naperville.” ABC7 Chicago, 22 June 2021, abc7chicago.com/chicago-weather-forecast-radar-tornado-warning/10815597/.
Pathieu, Diane, and John Garcia. “Repairs Still Underway 1 Year after EF-3 Tornado Hit Woodridge, Naperville, Darien.” ABC7 Chicago, 20 June 2022, abc7chicago.com/naperville-tornado-2021-woodridge-damage-repair/11981038/.
US Department of Commerce, NOAA. “June 20-21, 2021: Late Night Tornadoes and Wind Damage, Including an EF-3 Tornado from Naperville to Willow Springs.” National Weather Service, NOAA’s National Weather Service, 14 July 2022, www.weather.gov/lot/2021jun2021.
Emery, what an insightful post! The pictures you included not only effectively encapsulate the damage that the tornado left behind but also illustrate a sense of community that connects to your last paragraph. As someone who has never experienced a tornado, reading about the number of structures damaged and people injured really puts into perspective how dangerous an EF3 tornado can be. It must've been surreal discovering that the home you recently moved into was impacted by a powerful hurricane only a few years prior!
ReplyDeleteReally cool that the club volunteered to clean up the debris and branches. Also cool that no one died from the tornado considering EF3 sounds kind of severe in how much damage they do. It's interesting how different school districts prepare for geohazards that are most likely to occur in their area.
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