That's bigger than many hurricanes.
Our comment at the time was:"Iowa's corn yields could be cut in half where hurricane-force winds flattened fields"
The tornado warnings and knocked-over trees in Chicago got the headlines but it looks as if the real damage was done in Iowa.
From Reinsurance News, October 13:
Iowa’s August derecho could drive $5bn insured loss: Holborn
Analysts at US domiciled reinsurance broker Holborn Corporation have estimated that a major derecho event that impacted the state of Iowa in August could drive $5 billion of insured property losses.
A derecho is a widespread, long-lived, straight-line wind storm that is associated with a fast-moving group of severe thunderstorms, and which can potentially be as powerful as hurricane or tornado force winds.
On August 10th, a derecho with maximum measured gusts of 126mph tracked across Iowa after initially developing in northern Nebraska and southeast South Dakota.
Affected areas experienced sustained high winds for 30 to 45 minutes, with damage reported to numerous outbuildings, barns, grain bins, homes, mobile homes, apartment buildings, trees, and power poles across Iowa.
Three fatalies were reported and more than 8,000 homes are thought to have been destroyed or heavily damaged, as well as significant damage to crops and forestry.
In early September, Property Claims Service (PCS) estimated the insured losses of $2.9 billion for both the derecho and other severe storm activity in the region beginning on August 8th.
But Holborn, which currently represents approximately 25% of the property insurance market in the state of Iowa, says losses will be substantially higher than this figure....
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And that's not counting the higher food prices, both direct/immediate and coming down the pike through the supply chain.
