Tornadoes · United States · Illinois · 2026

Unrated tornado, Monroe County, Illinois, July 11, 2026

This Unrated tornado ran 0.6 miles across Monroe County on July 11, 2026, touching down at 4:44 PM CDT. It killed nobody.

Preliminary. This is NWS LSX's damage survey, filed in the Damage Assessment Toolkit as Moredock Lake Tornado. The rating, the path and the casualties are the survey's and can change while it is revised. The Storm Prediction Center compiles the official record of 2026 from these surveys and publishes it in the spring of 2027; this page moves to that tornado's permanent address when it does.

The rating scale

Tracks are drawn in the color of the rating. The Enhanced Fujita scale rates the damage rather than measuring the wind: the speeds are what that damage is taken to imply.

  1. EF065 to 85 mph

    Light damage. Surface peeled off some roofs, gutters and siding damaged, branches broken, shallow-rooted trees pushed over.

  2. EF186 to 110 mph

    Moderate damage. Roofs badly stripped, mobile homes overturned or badly damaged, exterior doors lost, windows broken.

  3. EF2111 to 135 mph

    Considerable damage. Roofs torn off well-built houses, frame homes shifted on their foundations, mobile homes destroyed, large trees snapped or uprooted, cars lifted off the ground.

  4. EF3136 to 165 mph

    Severe damage. Whole stories of well-built houses destroyed, large buildings badly damaged, trains overturned, trees debarked, heavy cars lifted and thrown.

  5. EF4166 to 200 mph

    Devastating damage. Well-built houses leveled, structures with weak foundations moved some distance, cars thrown and large missiles generated.

  6. EF5over 200 mph

    Incredible damage. Strong frame houses swept off their foundations, car-sized missiles thrown more than 100 meters, steel-reinforced concrete badly damaged, high-rise buildings deformed.

  7. Unratedthis tornado

    The survey recorded a tornado but could not put a number on it, most often because it crossed open country and damaged nothing a rating can be read from.

The survey

Rating, as surveyed
Unrated, preliminary
Date
July 11, 2026
Touchdown
4:44 PM CDT (21:44 UTC)
Lifted
4:45 PM CDT (21:45 UTC)
On the ground
1 minutes
Path length
0.6 miles (0.9 km)
Path width
0 yards (0 m)
Deaths
0
Injuries
0
County
Monroe County
Touchdown point
38.328, -90.305
Lift-off point
38.323, -90.312
Surveyed by
NWS LSX
The office's name for it
Moredock Lake Tornado
Survey last edited
July 28, 2026
Record number
None yet. SPC numbers 2026 in the spring of 2027.

What the survey found

Video footage reveals that a waterspout, possibly landspout, tornado briefly touched down at Moredock Lake, but caused no damage. The track is very approximate.

Written by NWS LSX in the NWS Damage Assessment Toolkit. A survey is revised as better evidence arrives.

The warnings

No tornado warning for this county appears in the archive as in force at the moment the tornado touched down.

Every warning and watch covering the touchdown point that day, from the Iowa Environmental Mesonet's archive of National Weather Service products. Lead time is measured from the issue of the warning in force to the touchdown time in the database, both of which were recorded to the minute by different people.

The forecast that day

The Storm Prediction Center had this point in a Marginal Risk. The outlook in force was issued at 19:55 UTC.

SPC's Day 1 convective outlook as it stood when the tornado began, read at the touchdown point. The same archive is on the radar archive.

The air that afternoon

The radiosonde launches on either side of the tornado, from the nearest station that was launching then, drawn and analyzed the way Storm Lab does: the same diagram, the same parcel and shear definitions SPC's mesoanalysis uses.

Lincoln, IL (KILX), 12:00Z

9.7 hours before the tornado, 251 km from the path. July 11, 2026.

Skew-T log-pSkew-T log-p diagram, Lincoln, IL at 12:00Z on 2026-07-11Temperature and dew point through the depth of the atmosphere, with the mixed-layer parcel lifted from the surface. Mixed-layer CAPE 560 joules per kilogram, CIN -50, lifted condensation level 588 meters above ground. Wind barbs in knots down the right edge.LCLLFCEL10008507005003002001001 km2 km3 km6 km9 km12 km15 km-30°-20°-10°0°10°20°30°40°
Temperature in red, dew point in green, the mixed-layer parcel dashed. The warm shading is its CAPE, the cool shading the inhibition it has to break through.
HodographHodograph, Lincoln, IL at 12:00Z on 2026-07-11The wind through the lowest 10 kilometers as a curve, rings every 10 meters per second labeled in knots. Zero to 1 km storm-relative helicity 9 square meters per square second, 0 to 6 km bulk shear 20 knots.19395878Sfc1 km3 km6 km9 kmRMLM
The wind turning with height, colored by layer: ground to 1 km, 1 to 3 km, 3 to 6 km, 6 to 10 km. RM and LM are the right and left moving storms Bunkers' method gives; the shaded area is the 0 to 1 km storm-relative helicity.
Mixed-layer CAPE
560 J/kg
Mixed-layer CIN
-50 J/kg
Surface CAPE
615 J/kg
Mixed-layer LCL
588 m above ground
0-6 km bulk shear
20 kt
0-1 km bulk shear
5 kt
0-1 km storm-relative helicity
9 m²/s²
0-3 km storm-relative helicity
50 m²/s²
Significant tornado parameter
0.0
Supercell composite
0.0
0-3 km lapse rate
5.2 K/km

Open this sounding in Storm Lab

Lincoln, IL (KILX), 00:00Z

2.3 hours after it, 251 km from the path. July 12, 2026.

Skew-T log-pSkew-T log-p diagram, Lincoln, IL at 00:00Z on 2026-07-12Temperature and dew point through the depth of the atmosphere, with the mixed-layer parcel lifted from the surface. Mixed-layer CAPE 647 joules per kilogram, CIN -10, lifted condensation level 1051 meters above ground. Wind barbs in knots down the right edge.LCLLFCEL10008507005003002001001 km2 km3 km6 km9 km12 km15 km-30°-20°-10°0°10°20°30°40°
Temperature in red, dew point in green, the mixed-layer parcel dashed. The warm shading is its CAPE, the cool shading the inhibition it has to break through.
HodographHodograph, Lincoln, IL at 00:00Z on 2026-07-12The wind through the lowest 10 kilometers as a curve, rings every 10 meters per second labeled in knots. Zero to 1 km storm-relative helicity 27 square meters per square second, 0 to 6 km bulk shear 22 knots.1939Sfc1 km3 km6 km9 kmRMLM
The wind turning with height, colored by layer: ground to 1 km, 1 to 3 km, 3 to 6 km, 6 to 10 km. RM and LM are the right and left moving storms Bunkers' method gives; the shaded area is the 0 to 1 km storm-relative helicity.
Mixed-layer CAPE
647 J/kg
Mixed-layer CIN
-10 J/kg
Surface CAPE
1961 J/kg
Mixed-layer LCL
1051 m above ground
0-6 km bulk shear
22 kt
0-1 km bulk shear
13 kt
0-1 km storm-relative helicity
27 m²/s²
0-3 km storm-relative helicity
15 m²/s²
Significant tornado parameter
0.0
Supercell composite
0.5
0-3 km lapse rate
6.3 K/km

Open this sounding in Storm Lab

The radar

The St Louis radar (KLSX), 53 km away, was scanning. The volume nearest the touchdown began at 21:41 UTC.

Open the radar archive at this moment, over the track

Reflectivity and velocity, decoded from the Level II archive in the browser. Volumes take a few seconds to open the first time.

What was reported nearby

Local storm reports within 60 km of the path, in the three hours either side.

Time (UTC)ReportWhereCountyRemark
21:45 UTCTORNADO2 N ValmeyerMonroe, ILVideo footage reveals that a waterspout, possibly landspout, tornado briefly touched down at Moredock Lake, but caused no damage.

From the Iowa Environmental Mesonet's archive of National Weather Service local storm reports.

This ground now

The live radar over the trackEvery 2026 tornado in IllinoisEvery tornado in Illinois since 1950Warnings in force in Illinois nowThe forecast where you are

What this means

Ratings are the survey's, read off the damage rather than measured; the rating scale is above. A survey can be revised, so the rating, the path and the casualties can all still change.

Sources

NWS Damage Assessment Toolkit, the record the survey teams file from the damage, and NOAA Storm Prediction Center storm reports. Neither is the official database for 2026, which SPC publishes in the spring of 2027.