Joliet museum documentary on Plainfield tornado presented at Skilling weather seminar

JOLIET – A documentary produced by the Joliet Area Historical Museum will be presented Saturday during meteorologist Tom Skilling’s 36th Annual Tornado and Severe Weather Seminar.

Skilling, chief meteorologist for WGN-TV, will present an abridged version of the 40-minute documentary titled “8 Minutes in August – The EF-5 Plainfield Tornado” while speaking at the half-day seminar at Fermi National Accelerator Laboratory in Batavia.

A news release on the event calls the documentary "the best program he [Skilling] has seen on the infamous Aug. 28, 1990, tornado."

That’s high praise indeed, said museum Executive Director Greg Peerbolte, who will speak at the seminar about the documentary.

“I was pretty amazed to hear that,” Peerbolte said. “It’s giving the documentary, appearing at an event like that, a high level of credibility.”

There will be 11 speakers at the seminar, including Louis Uccellini, director of the National Weather Service. Information about the seminar, which runs from noon to 4:30 p.m., is available at WGNtv.com/fermilab.

The documentary does feature Skilling along with interviews with: WJOL-AM Director Scott Slocum, who did on-the-scene reporting at the time of the tornado; Thomas Thanas, who was Joliet’s city attorney at the time and was at the scene of tornado damage; and Sue Hasenyager, head of the Plainfield Historical Society.

Peerbolte said Skilling’s showing of a video segment will be the debut presentation of the documentary, although it actually has been out on YouTube. The museum also plans to make hard copies of the video available in its store.

The documentary was created in conjunction with the museum's exhibit "Eight Minutes in August: The 1990 Tornado," which ran summer and fall of last year.

“The documentary is supposed to be the exhibit in film form,” Peerbolte said. “It was the first time we ever did one. It was a new medium for us.”

The exhibit was unique, Peerbolte said, in the emotions it evoked among museum visitors.

“Emotionally, I would say it was one of our most effective exhibits,” he said. “I can’t remember another exhibit where we saw people on more than one occasion leave in tears.”