EF-2 Tornado Confirmed in Hickory Hills: National Weather Service

HICKORY HILLS, IL—After another day of damage surveys on Sunday, the National Weather Service-Chicago has confirmed an additional six tornadoes from the June 11 storm in NWS-Chicago’s service area, bringing the count to 17 tornadoes in its forecast area.

The National Weather Service-Chicago office in Romeoville monitors weather conditions in 23 Illinois counties, the Chicago metropolitan area and Northwest Indiana. Survey teams were in the Hickory Hills-Bridgeview area over the weekend assessing storm damage. The June 11 storm caused widespread power outages and extensive damage to trees, buildings and structures.

The forecast office confirmed an EF-2 tornado rampaged from Hickory Hills to Chicago Midway Airport.

An EF-2 tornado is a strong tornado on the Enhanced Fujita Scale, with wind speeds of 111–135 mph, capable of causing significant damage to structures and trees.

At 8:17 p.m. Thursday, NWS issued a tornado warning for the area, about the same time tornado sirens started going off. Severe thunderstorms producing straight-line winds were located along a line extending from La Grange to Palos Hills to Orland Park. Radar indicated rotation.

The tornado-warned storm ripped the roof off a Bridgeview apartment building near 79th Street and Oketo Avenue and knocked down a billboard in Roberts Park. Winds also tore off the roofs of apartment buildings in Roberts Park.

“We Are Angry”

Many area residents have been without power since the first round of straight-line winds gusted through on Wednesday, with warnings that the worst was yet to come on Thursday.

Power didn’t come back on for Chicago Ridge residents until Saturday evening.

“We are angry. ComEd needs to improve their infrastructure and definitely get better at planning for disasters and storms,” Chicago Ridge Tr. Ed Kowalski said. “Where do our increases go? We have utility poles that should have been replaced 10 years ago, with trees growing over power lines.”

Kowalski estimated that it cost the average Chicago Ridge family up to $400 on gas for generators and eating out due to the power outages, more if people rented a hotel room, on top of their $340 electric bills.

“We didn’t see a [ComEd] truck in our town for two days,” Kowalski said, whose power didn’t come back on until Saturday. “We had seniors out of power for four days. People struggling to keep up with high grocery prices are throwing out food. Our trash collection day is Monday, and the garbage cans in Chicago Ridge are overflowing.”

Praising the ComEd crews who are “in the field working their butts off,” Kowalski said, that as a company, “ComEd has a human responsibility.”

“They’re derelict in that duty,” Kowalski said. “They’re going to say it was an act of God, but it was also an act of ComEd’s crumbling infrastructure.”

More Tornados Confirmed

Several tornadoes, including multiple strong to intense tornadoes, occurred across parts of northern and central Illinois and northwest Indiana during the late afternoon and evening of Thursday, June 11th, NWS said in a statement.

Other Chicago suburbs where tornadoes have been confirmed include an EF-0 that blew through Naperville to Lisle and an EF-1 in Barlett.

Oak Lawn was hit by 100 mph straight-line winds during Thursday evening’s storm. It’s not yet known if the village sustained a tornado, as storm damage surveys continue.