Powerful derecho leaves 2 dead, heavy crop damage in Midwest
IOWA
CITY, Iowa (AP) — Hundreds of thousands across the Midwest remained
without electricity on Tuesday after a powerful storm packing 100 mph
winds battered the region a day earlier, causing widespread damage to
millions of acres of crops and killing at least two people.
The storm known as a derecho
tore from eastern Nebraska across Iowa and parts of Wisconsin and
Illinois, blowing over trees, flipping vehicles and causing widespread
damage to property and crops. The storm left downed trees and power
lines that blocked roadways in Chicago and its suburbs. After leaving
Chicago, the most potent part of the storm system moved over north
central Indiana.
In Iowa, Gov. Kim Reynolds said early estimates
indicate 10 million acres (4 million hectares) have been damaged in the
nation’s top corn producing state and many grain bins were destroyed.
That would be nearly a third of the roughly 31 million acres (12.5
million hectares) of land farmed in the state. The most significant
damage is to the corn crop, which is in the advanced stages of
development nearly a month away from the beginning of harvest.
“This
morning I had a farmer reach out to me to say this was the worst wind
damage to crops and farm buildings that he has ever seen across the
state in such a wide area,” Reynolds said.
Satellite imagery shows extensive crop damage through about one-third of the center of the state from east to west.
“It’s
incredibly devastating to see what’s happening to crops, and to
structures all across the storm path,” Iowa Agriculture Secretary Mike
Naig said.
Naig said tens of millions of bushels worth of
commercial grain storage and millions of bushels of on-farm grain
storage has been damaged or destroyed.
Roger Zylstra, who has
farmed in central Iowa near Kellogg since 1980, said that four of his
hog barns lost their roofs, two of his machine sheds suffered
significant damage and many of his corn acres were destroyed.
Zylstra, 69, said crop insurance will help, but that the financial hit will be devastating for many farmers.
“The
question remains for all of us is, what happens in the next five or six
weeks? How much can we salvage out of these fields?” Zylstra said. “I
know that some people won’t survive this. But there’s a fair number of
people that will figure out how to hang in there, and we’ll keep doing
what we do.”
The high winds continued to damage crops as the storm
swept into northwestern Illinois but the wind had weakened somewhat by
that point. Information about the severity of the damage was still being
gathered Tuesday, said Andrea Casali, a spokeswoman for the Illinois
Farm Bureau.
In Fort Wayne, Indiana, Isabel E. Atencio died at a hospital after firefighters pulled her from debris inside her mobile home after high winds rolled it onto its side Monday night, officials said. Firefighters found the 73-year-old woman under debris inside her toppled trailer and discovered that she was clutching a 5-year-old boy believed to be her grandson, said Adam O’Connor, deputy chief of the Fort Wayne Fire Department. The boy had minor injuries.
“It’s awful. I was thinking about that all last night,” O’Çonnor said.
A
derecho is not quite a hurricane. It has no eye, and its winds come
across in a line. But the damage it is likely to do spread over such a
large area is more like an inland hurricane than a quick more powerful
tornado, according to Patrick Marsh, science support chief at the
National Weather Service’s Storm Prediction Center in Norman, Oklahoma.
The
storm began as separate thunderstorms in South Dakota before
strengthening over Iowa. It held together for 770 miles (1,200
kilometers) over 14 hours before losing strength as it entered Western
Ohio, Iowa State Climatologist Justin Glisan said. By the time the
system reached Des Moines, wind gusts were clocked at more than 100 mph
(161 kph) Glisan said.
The National Weather Service said the storm
also spawned a tornado in northern Illinois near the Wisconsin state
line that damaged buildings and trees in both states.
Iowa
officials reported roofs torn off homes and buildings, vehicles blown
off roads and hit by trees, and people hurt by flying debris. One death
and dozens of injuries were reported in the state.
A 63-year-old
bicyclist died after he was struck by one of several large trees that
fell Monday on a bike trail outside of Cedar Rapids near Ely, the Linn
County sheriff’s office said. Thomas Rowland of Solon, Iowa, suffered
extensive injuries and died at the scene, the office said.
The
Iowa Veterans Home also has extensive building damage and access was
limited due to downed power lines. A nursing home in Madrid, Iowa, had a
portion of the roof torn off, and six COVID-19 patients were evacuated
while one staff member was taken to a hospital after a window blew out.
The Iowa governor said 20 patients at a Newton nursing home were
evacuated to a nearby church.
Meanwhile, three of the state’s
drive-through coronavirus testing sites, in Cedar Rapids, Davenport and
Marshalltown, sustained damage and were temporarily closed Tuesday,
Reynolds said. She added that the closures would temporarily impact
availability of testing but the state hoped to reopen them quickly. She
said no testing samples appeared to have been damaged.
Utility
officials in Iowa said it will likely take several days to restore power
to everyone. Nearly 340,000 Iowa customers of MidAmerican Energy and
Alliant Energy remained without power Tuesday afternoon. Another 33,000
in the Illinois Quad Cities region also lacked power.
Power and
Internet outages were widespread in Iowa’s three largest metropolitan
areas, of Des Moines, Cedar Rapids and Davenport. The power outages were
so extensive that at one point Monday, 97% of households in Linn
County, which includes Cedar Rapids, were in the dark, Reynolds said.
Mediacom spokesman Thomas Larsen said Tuesday that roughly 340,000 customers are without Internet service in Iowa, Illinois and Indiana. He said the Cedar Rapids-Iowa City corridor of eastern Iowa was particularly hard hit due to its fiber ring being cut in multiple locations. Some customers will get their service back when their power is restored, while others will need additional repairs.
Associated Press writer Rick Callahan in Indianapolis contributed to this report. David Pitt contributed reporting from Des Moines, Iowa. Funk reported from Omaha, Nebraska.