2 tornadoes confirmed in Ogle County during Monday’s storms

OREGON – The storm systems that swept across northern Illinois Monday evening spawned at least two tornadoes in the Sauk Valley.

One tornado went through Byron, and a second touched down north of Davis Junction, National Weather Service meteorologist Brett Borchardt said. Both were EF-0, with winds that peaked around 80 mph, he said.

“The majority of damage along both paths was to trees and crops,” Borchardt said. “The one that went through Byron also damaged some roofing materials.”

The Byron tornado started at 7:44 p.m., lasted seven minutes and traveled 5.02 miles, according to the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration’s Damage Assessment Toolkit. It landed at North Conger Road and traveled east, directly through the city’s center, to just past North Hales Corner Road, the toolkit shows.

The Davis Junction tornado touched down at 7:58 p.m., lasted two minutes and traveled 1.71 miles, the NOAA reported. It stayed north of, and almost parallel to, state Route 72, according to the toolkit.

Six tornado warnings were issued Monday night for Ogle County, as of Thursday afternoon, those two were the only tornadoes confirmed across Ogle, Lee, Whiteside and Carroll counties, Borchardt said. National Weather Service field surveying efforts are done for the area, but they are still reviewing some high resolution satellite data, he said.

“Based on our radar, there’s some rotation in Ogle and Lee counties that we want to look at the satellite data for,” Borchardt said. “It’s possible there were some areas hit that we couldn’t access for in-person surveys.”

Monday was a test of coordination between county, city and village law enforcement, the county highway department, city street departments and township supervisors, Ogle County Sheriff Brian VanVickle said.

“Whenever your resources are stretched that thin, you have to coordinate,” he said. “Everyone was working together to make sure people were safe.”

The Ogle County Sheriff’s Office received 97 calls for service Monday evening, starting around 7:20 p.m. and going through midnight, VanVickle said. After that, there were a handful of calls about power lines that had come down or were sparking, but the volume was much less, he said.

Monday also marked the first use of Ogle County’s Integrated Public Alert and Warning System, or IPAWS, which was purchased in late spring, VanVickle said.

IPAWS is a federal system that pushes notifications to all cellphones within a county, he said. Whenever a new tornado warning popped up, they pushed another alert through to all cellphones in Ogle County, VanVickle said.

“This will actually, at some point down the road, replace the outdoor storm sirens,” he said. “The thing to remember is, the sirens were made for outdoor warnings. They were made for the kids out at the parks. It wasn’t designed to wake people up out of sleep.”

It’s a technological improvement, VanVickle said.

Cleanup is going well and focuses mostly on removing debris from county highways and municipal roads, VanVickle said. He said he expects it to be complete this week.

Rock River levels

The Rock River remained in flood stage in Byron and Sterling as of Thursday afternoon, Borchardt said. Both were expected to drop below flood stage by Thursday evening, but will remain bankfull – at the top of its banks – for a while, he said.

“The river sort of has a natural spacing to hold some water,” Borchardt said. “Bankfull is typically when parks or designated flood areas are full of water. It’s designed to flood and absorb the water. Flood stage is when it’s actually impacting infrastructure, such as roads and homes or businesses.”

In Dixon, the Rock River is bankfull, but not in flood stage, he said. It’s expected to remain bankfull through next week.

Rainfall

There were four or five different storm systems that hit Ogle, Lee, Whiteside and Carroll counties over the weekend and early this week, Borchardt said. During that time, the total rainfall averaged 1 to 2 inches in Carroll County and southern Lee County, while the rest of the Sauk Valley saw about 3 to 4 inches, he said.

Rain isn’t forecasted to return until early next week, but it isn’t shaping up to be anywhere near as intense as last weekend’s storms, Borchardt said.

“With severe weather occurring across the area, it’s a good idea to be ready for the next round,” he warned. “Whenever you hear warnings, heed them. We still have more of the severe weather season to get through.”