Stormy Weather

As of 1am, Ameren had about 30,000 without power....

Springfield daughter texted us at 8 am. Their power was back on. The Animal Shelter not far from them completely destroyed, but animals are safe. Sangamon Ave near their house blocked off due to power poles and lines down. Airport hangars damaged. Only a few tree limbs in their yard. Thinking the tornado flew over their house on the way to Sherman.@Mahkno, feel free to chime in with any damage in your Springfield area.

My pines trees got thrashed... some limbs down.
The airport suffered some damage.
The animal control shelter suffered damage... they will have to relocate some animals.

River is going up:water.noaa.gov/gauge s/piai2

I guess there was a charity float on the Mackinaw River this weekend and it's cancelled. It went from "a little low, but nobody would get stuck" to "oh, hell no". At the DNR canoe/Kayak ramp near Mackinaw, you have to go down to the river. Now the river is over the ramp and into the small parking area there.

Sounds like Streator took a direct hit.

Well that was fun... sirens went off but no NWS warnings.... Could hear the roaring winds above in the upper clouds, very loud.After the last three days of rain, the lightning bugs have come forth in great numbers and so have the tree frogs. We went from bone dry to 5 or so total inches of rain and the frogs are singing away... even during the rain.

Streator on Fox Weather

How's everyone else doing in our Central Illinois area? While out Storm Tracking, we saw this funnel cloud dropping out. We were eat of Ipava along US highway 136. But because of trees, we don't know if it became a tornado if it landed.WMBD's transmitter in EP got hit, as did WYZZ's transmitter in Congerville. Molly and I got back about 7, power was out at the station too. Back up generator was going, so enough power for newsroom lights, some hallway lights. No Internet, couldn't edit anything because of power restrictions. I came home, MH power on top of hill was out including my house. Wife was at Mom's in Pekin, she had power, although some Pekin downtown and stoplights were out. I ate my cold sandwich lunch that I'd carried around all day, still cold from ice packs.
Two big trees by MH Dollar General got pulled out by roots, so got video of that with cellphone. But tried sending what I shot using Wetransfer to station in case they could use it (apparently not if off-air) But with no Wi-Fi, took forever for just 4 files. Went to bed around 9:45 pm, wife came home to get some things to stay overnight. And then our power came back on at 10:30. Up again at 3:45 am, WMBD and WYZZ still off the air. Still going in to grab gear for Live Weather shots with Nathan in Tremont for Turkey Festival....but it might be at a site showing damage instead.

Power here went out at 6:15 and just came back on at 4:30. Note to self...add change generator oil to weekend project list.

@kraziebill : We have ours on an annual maintenance plan, but your comment is making me curious as to runtime hours between changing it. 22kW NG Generac w/ the twin Vanguard (aka Briggs) and 200amp ATS.

Just got to station. Power still out. Generator went out,.so on emergency power. Just a couple lights on in newsroom. Patrick and Renae about to do a Facebook Live telling viewers what's going on. With no computers, producers couldn't put together shows or scripts. So Nathan and I won't be heading out yet, and it will be somewhere on Storm Damage.

@DennisinPeoria : Generator went out? Isn't that the duty of the station broadcast engineer?

My coworker shed got flattened by the Washburn tornado and had shingles ripped off their roof. Most of their neighbor stuff is completely gone. I've had no power in my part of the East bluff since 6:15 last night. Ameren's website says that they have no idea what caused it and no estimated time to have power restored. Large battery pack I use for camping says my refrigerator has eight more hours worth of power until I have to switch to the smaller camping battery. If I start to worry about stuff in the freezer I'll just pack it up and take it to work.

@mypeez :
Not sure. But even the generator at full power is not enough to power up studio lights, control room, computers, equipment for transmission to transmitter... which is also still out. Apparently a substation that powers WMBD, CWTC, and perhaps Connect restaurant got hit, and Ameren's been working on it all night.Instead of sitting around in the dark, I went and shot storm damage in Morton. Then was supposed to look for Peoria damage, but told I could go home and wait to see if we'll be doing Weather Live shots tonight. Saw this in Morton at a Casey's