#Tornado Track in Northern #Illinois

After a powerful EF-4 tornado barreled through the farming community of Fairdale, Illinois, on April 9, 2015, homes were transformed into chaotic piles of wood, trees were left coated with tufts of insulation, and cars were strewn about like a child’s toys.
 
As seen from space, the aftermath of a tornado has a very different look. The Operational Land Imager (OLI) on Landsat 8 acquired this image of northern Illinois on April 10, 2015. Evidence of the Fairdale tornado appears as a line of damaged vegetation and disturbed soil scrawled across the agricultural landscape. With a top spatial resolution of 15 meters (49 feet) per pixel, individual houses are difficult to distinguish in Landsat 8 imagery. Whole towns appear as small patches of gray. To make it easier to distinguish the tornado track from surrounding farm fields, this false-color Landsat image combines shortwave infrared, near infrared, and green light (OLI bands 7-5-3). Living vegetation appears appear green and farm fields are shades of brown.

The satellite view makes clear how unlucky the 150 people living in the community of Fairdale were to be squarely in the tornado’s path. The track fades away just a few kilometers northeast of Fairdale, suggesting the community was close to escaping such severe damage. Rochelle, in contrast, was far enough south of the tornado to avoid its wrath. According to news reports, two people were killed in Fairdale, 20 people were injured, and 70 homes were destroyed.

Records of historical tornado tracks show that EF-4 and EF-5 tornados are uncommon in northern Illinois, but they do occasionally occur in the area The map above, based on data maintained by the NOAA/National Weather Service’s Storm Prediction Center, shows the location of all the major tornados that have affected northern Illinois between 1950 and 2014. EF-5 tornados are shown in white, EF-4 are pink, and EF-3 and below are shades of purple. (Note: The 2015 April 9 event was not included in the NOAA database and was digitized using the Landsat scene.)

• References

• Delhotal, M. (2015, April 10) Northern Illinois Tornado Track. Accessed April 13, 2015.
• National Weather Service, M. (2015, April 10) April 9, 2015 Tornado Event: EF-4 Tornado Confirmed. Accessed April 13, 2015.
• Washington Post (2015, April 10) Deadly Illinois tornado destroyed everything in its path (Photos). Accessed April 13, 2015.

NASA Earth Observatory images by Joshua Stevens, using Landsat data from the U.S. Geological Survey and tornado track data from the NOAA National Weather Service Storm Prediction Center. Caption by Adam Voiland.

Instrument(s): 

Landsat 8 - OLI