Severe thunderstorms tore through the U.S. Midwest on Tuesday, leaving at least two people dead and nearly 800,000 customers without power, officials said.
A 4-year-old child died after a tree fell on his home in Geneva Township in Indiana, Jennings County Sheriff's Office Chief Deputy Cody Low said.
Widespread Damage and Outages
The storm system knocked out power to nearly half a million customers across Illinois and Indiana, with Lake and Porter counties in Indiana and Will County, Illinois, sustaining some of the heaviest impacts. Outage tracking site poweroutage.us reported that total customer outages in Illinois, Indiana, Ohio, and Kentucky had reached nearly 500,000 as of midnight Wednesday. Personal weather stations across the region logged numerous gusts of 80 mph or greater during the height of the storm.Residents Describe Chaos
Social media posts from the Chicago area showed scenes of flooded streets, downed trees entangled in power lines, and homes with torn-open roofs.In the suburb of Homewood, resident Javid Jenkins, 54, described riding out the storm underground. "No power. It was very scary. We were down in the basement," Jenkins said, adding, "We're built for snow. We're built for cold. We're not built for this."
Jenkins said he spent part of the day searching for gasoline to run a generator and keep his refrigerated food from spoiling.
In Tinley Park, Kerry Hourigan surveyed what was left of the house she has lived in for 25 years.
Ohio Also Hit Hard
The storm system's reach extended into Ohio, where power outages swept through the state capital region and left more than 228,000 customers in the dark as of midnight Wednesday.Ohio Gov. Mike DeWine said Tuesday afternoon at a severe-weather briefing in Ohio that a Roseville resident died during a medical emergency after flooded roadways prevented first responders from reaching the scene in time. DeWine warned that flood dangers in the state were far from over, saying, "This is not something that will end tonight,” at the Ohio Emergency Operations Centers in Columbus.
The governor also announced a proclamation declaring a state of emergency in Perry and Muskingum counties over the severe weather.
Forecasters Had Sounded the Alarm
According to the National Weather Service's Chicago office, forecasters had flagged destructive wind gusts potentially exceeding 80 mph and the possibility of brief tornadoes as the primary threats, along with an elevated risk of flash flooding.The disruptions rippled into community life as well. The Lake County Fair canceled its fifth day of scheduled events, disappointing attendees who had planned to watch a professional wrestling show. In LaPorte County, Indiana, Commissioner Joe Haney reported a "tremendous amount of tree damage."
Columbus, Ohio, officials sent government employees home early ahead of a second wave of storms, and a library in nearby Westerville closed after rainwater flooded its atrium.