EF2 twister hits St. Elmo

Fayette County emergency management officials were hoping to hear anytime now that the county has been declared a disaster area after a tornado ripped through the St. Elmo area on Sunday.
And while that tornado caused extensive damage, it did not cause any fatalities or, apparently, serious injuries.

In a 10-minute period, a twister that the National Weather Service estimated to be 200 yards wide caused severe damage to close to 20 homes, uprooted large diameter trees and knocked down power lines in that area.
The NWS said that the twister touched down 4.6 miles southwest of St. Elmo and headed northeast, finally dissipating 6.9 miles northeast of town, according to Kendra Craig, Fayette County’s Emergency Management Agency coordinator.
Craig said that the NWS has classified the tornado as an EF2, which means that it had winds of up to 120 mph.
At 12:08 p.m. on Sunday, the Fayette County Sheriff’s Office notified Craig that severe weather was headed this way.
At the same time, the sheriff’s office was notifying other emergency responders, including the fire department in St. Elmo, which activated the town’s tornado sirens. “We set the sirens off a second time at 12:15,” said SEFD Chief Doug Engeljohn.
About 30 minutes after the first notification, Craig received a second call from the sheriff’s office. “I was told that there was significant damage in St. Elmo,” said Craig.
Craig and the deputy EMA coordinator, Kiley Depew, then headed to St. Elmo.
Once there, the pair mainly assisted city, county and state law enforcement authorities with traffic control, which was needed due to the number of live power lines laying across roads.
Craig and Depew were out for about eight hours on Sunday, then they started out again at about 10 a.m. on Monday, picking up Engeljohn – who is also the road commissioner for Avena Township – and beginning to assess the damage.
“It really helped having Doug with us, because he knows all of the area and had a good idea of who had damage,” Craig said.
While the county EMA, she said, has been required to initially document damage to residences, “we also wrote down (damage to) vehicles and other buildings.”
She estimated that 17 homes “were a total loss.”
Until they finished assessing damage west of town, Craig believed that most of the tornado damage was only in that area.
“I had no idea there was so much damage over by Lake Nellie and the golf course (St. Elmo Country Club),” she said.
“There was a three-car garage thrown about three-quarters of a mile,” Craig said.
Craig submitted photos to the NWS on Monday and Tuesday, and has passed along photos and reports to the regional office of the Illinois Emergency Management Agency.
That information will be given to Gov. Pat Quinn, and he will determine whether there is enough damage to warrant the county being declared a disaster area. Such a designation would pave the way for federal assistance to those sustaining damage.
As of mid-morning Wednesday, 13 Illinois counties hit by tornadoes had been declared disaster areas by the governor.
This is the first significant incident for Craig, who has been the EMA coordinator for about 15 months. That means that she is learning what all needs to be done in such a situation.
One thing she has learned that property owners who have sustained damage should keep track of how much debris they have and how much it will cost to remove it, as well as all expenditures related to debris cleanup.
 

The twister demolished an outbuilding at the residence of Ina Abendroth.

A large tree uprooted in the front yard of the residence of Tim Logan and Rachael Miller.

The home of Ina Abendroth, which is located west of St. Elmo and north of Cumberland Trail Growers, was ripped apart by Sunday’s tornado, which has been registered as an EF2 (winds up to 120 mph) by the National Weather Service.

Sunday’s tornado threw this block from an outbuilding at the residence of Tim Logan and Rachael Miller into the side of their residence west of St. Elmo.

Sunday’s tornado destroyed this camper at the home of Rusty and Patti Booher, but left an outbuilding right next to it untouched.

Sunday’s tornado broke off a large tree at this home west of St. Elmo, laying it across the back door right after Tim Logan and Rachael Miller rushed through that door to the basement.

The twister toppled an oil well drill, estimated to weigh between 30,000 and 40,000 pounds.

Chad Mayfield, who lives east of Brownstown, captured this image of a funnel cloud on Sunday afternoon.

EMA Coordinator Kendra Craig, Deputy Coordinator Kiley Depew and Doug Engeljohn assess the damage at the property of Rusty and Patti Booher. Engeljohn is the St. Elmo fire chief and road commissioner for Avena Township.