By 8 a.m. Tuesday, workers from some 200 electric companies stretching across the Midwest were ready to fan out across the tiny town of Jerome, Ill., and the surrounding Springfield area to continue the heavy task of fixing an electrical system effectively laid to waste during the powerful storms and tornadoes that tore through parts of the Midwest through the weekend. At least 10 people were confirmed dead from the storms that hopscotched across Kansas, Missouri, Illinois and other Midwest states.
The clouds had mostly cleared above Springfield, allowing the sun to shine bright on this capital city and nearly mask the devastation of powerful storms that spawned hail, fierce thunderstorms and twisters that ravaged large areas south and west of Springfield, where homes were leveled, a hotel roof popped off and electrical poles and trees busted like twigs.
On the outskirts of Jerome, a small town of 1,800 tucked just southwest of Springfield and perhaps the hardest hit in the area, signs were scrawled on the windows of the Shop 'n Save telling residents the store was open. But while the grocery store was spared, the damage wreaked by the weekend storms that hit most directly here late Sunday was clear. An Oldsmobile Cutlass, its windows shattered, was somehow lifted and plopped back down on the rack of shopping carts outside the store.
"It's just unbelievable," said Jerome police officer Butch Tuxhorn, who estimated that 80% of the town's homes suffered some damage. Driving the streets around Springfield, traffic was jammed as police shut down major streets here to make way for the tow and electrical trucks, the diggers and the emergency equipment that scattered across the city to begin shoving aside nature's litter. Some of the capitol building's windows were blown out and other government buildings suffered some damage.
But most of the wreckage appeared to be in the surrounding neighborhoods and business districts. On one block, part of a house had crashed down on a truck. On another, the trees on either side had collapsed into the middle, creating an impassible stretch. Power cables dangled and stretched across streets like clotheslines. A local bar owned by the brother of Springfield's mayor was turned into a convertible, its roof swept away, but beer signs still hung on walls that remained standing—a telling sign of nature's seeming illogic.
Similar signs were seen throughout Jerome, which enforced a curfew from dusk to dawn starting Monday night, as police prevented people without valid identification from entering the ruined town. "I'm a little hard of hearing and I was in the basement — me and my dog — so I didn't hear a thing," said Yvonne McCauley, 77, who was out during the curfew walking her dog, Molly. "But when I came out, my neighborhood, it was terrible to see. My neighbor's car was squashed, and another neighbor had a tree that crashed on his house. Me, I just feel lucky. Very lucky."
Indeed, just down the street, pumps at gas stations were toppled. Strip malls were no more. The Paul Bunyan head from the statue outside the Lauterbach auto shop was missing. Buses, mobile homes, pontoon boats, delivery trucks — all tipped on their side, thrown like toys. "We're taking our trucks, everything we got, to do what we can to pick up trees, whatever," said Steve Ferrier, a Springfield water department employee. "I'm 34, and I've just never seen anything like this. It has just devastated the city."
Most of the government buildings and much of the city's historic districts were spared and no deaths were reported here, thought some two dozen people were injured, and it was no less tragic for the families who stood on the wrecked streets staring at homes and memories that vanished in a violent spasm of storms and tornadoes that first touched down about 7:20 p.m. Sunday roughly 60 miles southwest of Springfield and hit the capital an hour later.
Across the Midwest stores were selling out quickly of such essentials as water and basic foods, but also of generators, heating oil and chainsaws. A sales rep at a small farm shop at the edge of town said some 20 generators and 35 chain saws were sold Monday as the cleanup began. Hotels and motels were at capacity, as were Red Cross shelters as families sought refuge amid reports that power could be out to some 10,000 for as long as three days.
Area radio and television stations carried both pleas for help from those left homeless or without power and pitches from contractors looking to make a sale or simply lend a hand. "There's reports of people gouging on prices, of people sticking it to people at their lowest moment on just about everything they need," one man said as he stood in line at an area store stocking up on enough beer to carry him through a couple of days. "It's just sick. These people are down."
It could have been much worse, according to the National Weather Service. "It was a highly unusual storm for this time of year and, and while it may not seem like it, we were actually extremely lucky," said senior meteorologist Ed Shimon. "Had the atmosphere been just a little more unstable, with this mix of cold and hot air, that instability could have spun up a storm like we saw in May of 1999 in Oklahoma City, when that city was just devastated. These were some of the strongest rotations I've ever seen."