{"id":649168,"date":"2026-03-12T00:45:19","date_gmt":"2026-03-12T00:45:19","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/649168\/"},"modified":"2026-03-12T00:45:19","modified_gmt":"2026-03-12T00:45:19","slug":"2-killed-as-tornadoes-smash-into-northwestern-indiana-and-kankakee-illinois","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/649168\/","title":{"rendered":"2 killed as tornadoes smash into northwestern Indiana and Kankakee, Illinois"},"content":{"rendered":"

KANKAKEE, Ill. (AP) \u2014 Major storms whipped up tornadoes<\/a> that killed at least two people in northwest Indiana and leveled buildings in Kankakee, Illinois, authorities said Wednesday, as another round of rain, hail and strong winds made its way through the region.<\/p>\n

Several intense supercell thunderstorms moved across northern Illinois and northwestern Indiana the previous day, including one responsible for at least four tornadoes<\/a>, according to the National Weather Service office in Chicago.<\/p>\n

The Newton County Coroner\u2019s office said Edward L. Kozlowski, 89, and his wife Arlene Kozlowski, 84, were killed when a tornado struck their home in Lake Village, in northwestern Indiana. The couple appeared to have been killed by blunt force trauma, the coroner\u2019s office said, and an autopsy was scheduled for Friday.<\/p>\n

\u201cThey were wonderful, just really wonderful human beings,\u201d son-in-law Steve Rehfeldt told CBS News in Chicago. \u201cYou know, tough old guy and sweet old lady.\u201d <\/p>\n

They left behind four children, seven grandchildren and great-grandchildren.<\/p>\n

The storms shattered windows, tore off roofs and smashed vehicles in Kankakee, Illinois. Wood planks and other debris littered yards, streets and parking lots. A landscape and garden center was seriously damaged, some parts completely destroyed.<\/p>\n

Storms also dropped 1 to 2 inches (2.5 to 5 centimeters) of rain and left piles of hail in the Grand Rapids area in western Michigan, said Alex Manion, a weather service meteorologist in Detroit. Streets flooded, swamping cars with water above their doors in some places.<\/p>\n

The weather service said crews were determining the strength and number of tornadoes, and parts of Illinois, Indiana, Kentucky and Ohio remained under a tornado watch Wednesday.<\/p>\n

<\/p>\n

\n AP AUDIO: Tornadoes kill 2 in northwestern Indiana and raze buildings in Kankakee, Illinois\n <\/p>\n

Two people have died as tornadoes rip through the Midwest. AP correspondent Mike Hempen reports.<\/p>\n

Suspected tornadoes<\/a> last week killed four people in southwestern Michigan and two in eastern Oklahoma.<\/p>\n

A tornado leaves a small Indiana community in tatters<\/p>\n

In Lake Village, where the Kozlowskis died, crews rescued some people who were trapped in damaged homes. At least 70 utility poles were knocked down and many roads were rendered unpassable, Newton County officials said.<\/p>\n

\u201cPlease do not come here. Do not try to help right now,\u201d Sheriff Shannon Cothran said in a video shot in front of a destroyed home.<\/p>\n

Laurie Postma, a spokesperson for the Lake Township Volunteer Fire Department, said the storm injured less than 10 people in Lake Village. Cothran said no other significant injuries had been reported but search and rescue operations were continuing.<\/p>\n

Lake Village is about 60 miles (95 kilometers) southeast of Chicago and 25 miles (40 kilometers) east of Kankakee.<\/p>\n

Resident says not all warning sirens sounded<\/p>\n

David Ferris of Lake Village said he, his wife, and their dogs \u201crode it out in our downstairs bathtub.\u201d They were unscathed, except for losing power. Ferris, who is a paramedic, helped rescue and treat injured people.<\/p>\n

\u201cWe had another house where a guy crawled out,\u201d Ferris said. \u201cHe was having some trouble breathing because he was covered in house insulation.\u201d <\/p>\n

Ferris said a Family Dollar store and a gas station were destroyed, and multiple large trees were uprooted. <\/p>\n

Jennifer Telford, 49, said she hid in her basement in Lake Village while she followed news reports of the storm. She did not hear the tornado, which struck to the south, but heard the hail pelting her roof.<\/p>\n

\u201cThe siren in town didn\u2019t go off,\u201d she said. \u201cThe sirens outside town did.\u201d<\/p>\n

The power was back on in the morning at the truck stop where she works, but elsewhere, \u201ceverything is closed due to the downed trees and power lines.\u201d<\/p>\n

About 4,300 customers in Lake Village and surrounding communities were without power late Wednesday morning, down from more than 11,000 at the peak of the storm, the Northern Indiana Public Service Co. reported.<\/p>\n

Giant hailstones pelted an Illinois community<\/p>\n

There are more tornadoes in the US than anywhere else on Earth. How do they form? This is in part because of the geography of the US. (AP video\/Laura Bargfeld; Production\/Shelby Lum; Animation\/Eva Malek)<\/p>\n

In Kankakee, the storms produced exceptionally large hail, ranging from 3 to 5 inches (7.6 to 12.7 centimeters) in diameter. One 6-inch (15.2-centimeter) hailstone may have set a new state record, the weather service said.<\/p>\n

A tornado touched down near the fairgrounds before traveling northeast into the small suburb of Aroma Park, where it caused extensive damage, the Kankakee County Sheriff\u2019s Office said.<\/p>\n

Nine people in the county had minor injuries, officials said at a news conference. Kevin Birk, a meteorologist in the NWS Chicago office, confirmed at least one tornado touched down in the area.<\/p>\n

Newlywed Cassidy Sinwelski, 23, said she and her husband were aware of the tornado watch in their Kankakee neighborhood and were expecting a run-of-the-mill storm until her husband spotted dark clouds barreling toward them.<\/p>\n

\u201cWe went into the bathroom, got a piece of plywood and within minutes, I closed my eyes, the lights flickered, and we just \u2014 there was nothing,\u201d Sinwelski said.<\/p>\n

Then she heard loud rumbles and the sound of shattering glass.<\/p>\n

\u201cI just kept crying out for God, because I didn\u2019t know what else to do,\u201d she said.<\/p>\n

The storm shattered a longtime garden center\u2019s spring plans<\/p>\n

Tholens\u2019 Garden Center on the south side of Kankakee was hit hard by the tornado, owner Nancy Tholen said.<\/p>\n

\u201cWe have multiple buildings, and lots of them are destroyed,\u201d Tholen said. \u201cThis is our 50th year in business, and this was not how we planned to kick off our spring.\u201d<\/p>\n

Workers had just left for the day when the tornado hit Tuesday afternoon, she said. Thankfully, no one was hurt.<\/p>\n

\u201cYou know, we make our living in the next 12 weeks,\u201d Tholen said. \u201cWe\u2019ll figure something out to open, but it\u2019s just … it\u2019s crazy. But again, everybody\u2019s safe, so we\u2019re thankful for that.\u201d<\/p>\n

In Aroma Park, just southeast of Kankakee, restaurateur and village trustee Kathleen Slavin watched the destruction of the tornado and \u201cbaseball-sized hail\u201d from the village hall, where she attended a village board meeting. <\/p>\n

\u201cIt took down trees that are probably over a hundred years old, huge trees came down. It took out main power lines,\u201d Slavin said.<\/p>\n

Her friend, 69-year-old Ruth Denoyer, swept up glass after the tornado blew out her windows.<\/p>\n

\u201cIt took our whole garage down, our pool, we have broken windows in the house, glass everywhere.\u201d Denoyer said. \u201cBut we still have a roof, unlike some people out here.\u201d <\/p>\n

___<\/p>\n

McCormack reported from Concord, New Hampshire. Associated Press journalists Hallie Golden in Seattle; Sarah Brumfield in Cockeysville, Maryland; Hannah Schoenbaum in Salt Lake City; Margery Beck in Omaha, Nebraska; John O\u2019Connor in Springfield, Illinois; and AP video journalist Laura Bargfeld in Lake Village, Indiana, contributed.<\/p>\n

___<\/p>\n

This story has been updated to correct that Bargfeld reported from Lake Village, Indiana, not Kankakee, Illinois.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"KANKAKEE, Ill. (AP) \u2014 Major storms whipped up tornadoes that killed at least two people in northwest Indiana…\n","protected":false},"author":3,"featured_media":649169,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":"","_share_on_mastodon":"0"},"categories":[4,3],"tags":[275781,275779,275786,10109,10106,275784,168,275787,57,1819,1818,6323,2862,275783,77533,275782,275789,50,275788,275780,275785,3883,3878,61,67,132,68,313],"class_list":["post-649168","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-united-states","category-us","tag-alex-manion","tag-arlene-kozlowski","tag-cassidy-sinwelski","tag-climate","tag-climate-and-environment","tag-david-ferris","tag-domestic-news","tag-edward-l-kozlowski","tag-general-news","tag-il-state-wire","tag-illinois","tag-in-state-wire","tag-indiana","tag-jennifer-telford","tag-kankakee","tag-kathleen-slavin","tag-kevin-birk","tag-news","tag-ruth-denoyer","tag-shannon-cothran","tag-steve-rehfeldt","tag-storms","tag-tornadoes","tag-u-s-news","tag-united-states","tag-unitedstates","tag-us","tag-weather"],"share_on_mastodon":{"url":"https:\/\/pubeurope.com\/@us\/116213444103634075","error":""},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/649168","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/3"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=649168"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/649168\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/649169"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=649168"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=649168"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=649168"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}