on what had happened beyond mention of a wind event
in Chicago. Cedar Rapids hadn’t been blown off the map
exactly, but it, along with hundreds of other communities,
had blown off the grid.
All of the Cedar Rapids metropolitan area, some
132,000 people, lost power in the storm. (Across the
state, 680,000 customers did.) With cell towers toppled,
some lost communications too. For a 51-hour period, St.
Luke’s Hospital, one of two medical centers in downtown
Cedar Rapids, was a complete island—losing Internet,
electronic medical records, the landline, and service from
all three of Cedar Rapids’ cell carriers. At the same time,
Eastern Iowans who had been injured in the storm or
debris-cleaning efforts were pouring into the emergency
room. The hospital saw twice its normal volume in the 24
hours after the derecho. “It was probably the scariest time
I’ve had as a hospital administrator,” the hospital’s CEO,
Michelle Niermann of UnityPoint Cedar Rapids, tells me.
Assessing the scope of the damage was especially chal-
lenging in Cedar Rapids, which—beyond the loss of power
and communications—was initially almost untraversable
because of all the debris and fallen trees. (As a “Tree City
USA,” Cedar Rapids a lost an estimated 65% of its canopy
in the storm.)
It’s hard not to think of the derecho as a blatant spec-
tacle of climate change, particularly when the city it hit
hardest, Cedar Rapids, is not long recovered from the
freak 500-year flood that destroyed much of its downtown
and a good chunk of its affordable housing in 2008.Kimberly Elder (left), the emergency
management coordinator for Marshall
County, is a one-woman disaster relief
department. Restaurateur Alfonso
Medina’s slogan, “No love, no tacos,”
went viral in October.masses was among my worst COVID fears at the time.
Then, in the middle of the afternoon on Aug. 10, my
mom sent a group text that began, “We are safe [prayer
hands emoji] ...” There was a series of photos that were
barely recognizable as their backyard. “Tornado!?” My
sister texted. My brother, who lives a block away from
my parents, wrote “land hurricane.” They didn’t have the
power or cell reception to communicate much beyond
that, and for the next 48 hours it was as if Cedar Rapids
had been blown off the face of the earth.
There were a few video clips of the intense storm circu-
lating on social media, but it was hard to find much newsMARCH 9, 2020 JULY SEPT. NOV. JAN. 20210
50
100
150 CASES PER 100,000
RATE OF DAILY NEW CASES OF COVID-19
SOURCE: CENTERS FOR DISEASE CONTROL AND PREVENTION, 7-DAY AVERAGEIOWAU.S.HIGHEST:
NOV. 15, 2020
146.5PHOTOGRAPHS BY DANNY WILCOX FRAZIER—VII/REDUX PICTURES