© AP
A person surveys the damage from the roof of College Church in Wheaton, Illinois, after a severe storm toppled the church steeple on the campus of Wheaton College on Monday
The derecho, a widespread weather system with a long line of storms packing high winds, descended upon the Central U.S. on Monday with wind speeds comparable to a major hurricane as it spent several hours tearing through parts of Iowa, Nebraska and Wisconsin.
The storm likely caused more widespread damage than a normal tornado, said Patrick Marsh, science support chief at the National Weather Service´s Storm Prediction Center in Norman, Oklahoma.
It´s not quite a hurricane. It has no eye and its winds come across in a line. But the damage it is likely to spread over such a large area is more like an inland hurricane than a quick more powerful tornado, Marsh said.
He compared it to a devastating Super Derecho of 2009, which was one of the strongest on record and traveled more than 1,000 miles in 24 hours, causing $500 million in damage, widespread power outages and several deaths.
Comment: Update: CNN reports on August 10: .