EF0 Tornado — Vermilion, Illinois

2025-05-20 · near Bismarck, Vermilion, Illinois

1.7 mi

Path length

30 yds

Path width

Event narrative

A tornado touched down southeast of the intersection of East 2800 North Road and North 2050 East Road about 3 miles east of Bismarck at 5:39 PM CDT. The tornado tracked northeastward, causing some tree damage along East 2800 North Road and damaging the roof of an outbuilding before dissipating northeast of IL-119 just shy of the Indiana border at 5:41 PM CDT.

Wider weather episode

A warm front lifted slowly northward through central Illinois during the afternoon of May 20th. A few showers developed in the vicinity of the boundary...with one of the cells producing a brief EF-0 tornado near Oakland in northeastern Coles County. Meanwhile further west, scattered supercell thunderstorms formed in the warm sector ahead of a cold front crossing the Mississippi River. Some of the storms dropped hail as large as tennis balls (2.5 in diameter) across portions of Morgan County as they initially developed. As the storms continued further eastward, several weak tornadoes were observed: one near Latham in southeastern Logan County and four additional tornadoes further east across eastern Champaign County into Vermilion County. The strongest tornado was rated EF-1 as it snapped two power poles and damaged numerous trees near Armstrong and Potomac in Vermilion County. Further southeast, a downburst with estimated 90 mph winds created widespread wind damage on the south side of Westville in Vermilion County.

View location on OpenStreetMap → (40.2684, -87.5532)

Source: NOAA Storm Events Database, event_id 1251562. Narrative written by the NWS forecast office that issued the report.