According to NBC and WGN Governor Rauner activated the Illinois Emergency Response Teams and those personnel are on their way to Rochelle to help rescue the people who are trapped under what used to be their neighborhoods.

According to NBC 5 Chicago Rochelle has massive damage with no casualties so far.

Here is videos of the tornado as it went through Rochelle all of the major news networks NBC, CBS, WGN here in Chicago are showing these videos on repeat


https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Rt9O8tsXPXU

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=kiiBEpabzc8

Here is some more information on the storm that hit Rochelle along with a live stream of NBC 5 Chicago News

http://www.nbcchicago.com/news/local/To ... 26671.html

The city of Rochelle itself was largely untouched, aside from (maybe) some minor straight line wind damage. BNSF and UP are running freight trains this morning without problems, as seen on the railfan webcams in town. The tornado that has garnered much of the attention was about 5-10 miles north of town, closer to the CP main line. The "Rochelle restaurant" the media is continuing to bring up was at the intersection of Hwys 251 and 64, about five miles north of town.

That's excellent while it is not good that the town got hit by such a massive tornado at least it went around the city and mostly went through farmland. The problem with what was going on last night was that I was switching through all of the news and all they said was that the town of Rochelle was hit and they did not tell us how bad. so thanks for letting me know that most of the city was not hit.

While Rochelle was mostly spared extensive damage, the little village of Fairdale, IL, was basically obliterated. This 3 block by 4 block community of approximately 150 souls was largely destroyed. Fairdale is located on the former Milwaukee Road Chicago - Omaha mainline east of the more well-known railfan haunt of Davis Junction. The advance warning of the "wedge" tornado resulted in keeping most of the inhabitants safe but, sadly, one 67 year old resident died in her home from injuries sustained in this massive storm.