Thunderstorm Wind in Christian County, Illinois

An NWS employee estimated wind gusts of 60mph.

A strong storm system interacted with a highly unstable and sheared environment to produce a significant severe weather outbreak across central Illinois during the late afternoon and evening of June 11th. Scattered supercell thunderstorms initially developed west of the I-55 corridor along a pre-frontal trough during the afternoon. One of these storms produced an EF-3 tornado that impacted portions of Woodford and Marshall counties and dropped tennis ball-sized hail (2.50 diameter). Additional cells rapidly developed further west across southeastern Iowa into northern Missouri ahead of an advancing cold front. These storms congealed into a line and pushed eastward into central Illinois during the evening. Widespread damaging wind gusts of 60-70mph occurred with the line along and north of the I-72 corridor. After storm surveys were completed, it was discovered an additional 8 tornadoes were embedded within the line...creating pockets of enhanced damage.