KANKAKEE, Ill. — Bob Wehrle sat in his driveway Wednesday morning and looked at the lot where his house once stood. His belongings and debris were scattered across his lawn, and his trailer was frozen in the air, pierced by a tree. It’s difficult to make out where the house ended and began.

Wehrle, 60, said he and his wife moved into their Kankakee home about 30 years ago. The same tri-level home that Tuesday’s tornadoes demolished while he was inside.

“Where do you start cleaning up? Where do you start making calls? What’s the process?” Wehrle told the Chicago Tribune. “You got insurance. What do you do now? And how do I get my trailer out of a tree?”

At least two people are dead and homes leveled after tornadoes and “gumball”-size hail tore through Kankakee County and northwest Indiana Tuesday evening, according to local authorities and weather officials.

Several intense supercell thunderstorms were responsible for at least four tornadoes that hit Livingston and Kankakee counties in Illinois, as well as Newton, Jasper and Starke counties in northwest Indiana, according to Chicago’s National Weather Service. Survey crews will work to determine the strength and total number of tornadoes.

“When (tornadoes) happen outside of the core season, they have the propensity to be on the stronger side,” said meteorologist Kevin Donofrio. “We have less of them but they’re stronger.”

Donofrio said the core tornado season is April through June in northeast Illinois and northwest Indiana, but that it’s a “pretty dynamic time of year.”

One supercell appeared to produce a long-track tornado that started west of Kankakee, moved through that town and nearby Aroma Park, and then eastward into Indiana, striking areas in and around Wheatfield. The other storm of interest which produced hail moved through the western suburbs of Chicago, Donofrio said.

“The unique thing when you have just two individual storms is they’re taking all the energy,” he said. “All that juice and moisture is going into those two storms — that’s another thing that can make these two individual cells become stronger.”

The strength of the storm is something Wehrle experienced firsthand. He received a tornado alert on his phone around 5:30 p.m., and looked out his window to see a “huge” twister throwing debris across the field behind his house. He sought shelter in his basement before his kitchen fell on top of him, leaving him pinned under a mini fridge.

“After everything was done, I was there for a while trying to unbury myself,” Wehrle said.

An hour later, he heard his best friend, who lives a mile away, shouting his name. Wehrle said he then texted his brother and nephew, who also came to help. While sticking a broom through the rubble to mark his location, Wehrle waited as the three men dug him out.

The paramedics checked on him and took him away from the gas leaks in his neighbors’ houses, which were also destroyed and damaged. Wehrle said he sent them to check on his next-door neighbor and were relieved to find them alright.

“It’s kind of a small community out here, and everybody helps watch your backs,” Wehrle said. “It’s always been like that.”

Wehrle said he is holding up fine emotionally and is thankful for the help he received. But he knows there’s a long road to recovery ahead of him.

Most of Wehrle’s immediate neighbors’ homes were either flattened or severely damaged as well. The drive along South Sandbar Road, where Wehrle lives, is lined by fallen and broken trees. In some places, cars have to turn around while crews work to clear the road.

Illinois Gov. JB Pritzker said in a statement that he’d been briefed on the storm and tornado damage and that he’s in contact with local officials to “offer our full support.”

“Keeping in our thoughts all Illinoisans impacted by the severe weather — we’ll be here to help them recover,” he said.

In Indiana, two fatalities were recorded. An elderly couple were found dead in Lake Village after a tornado struck and destroyed their home, according to the Newton County Coroner’s Office. The office said their names aren’t being released until their family is notified.

The small town, about an hour and a half drive from Chicago, “took a direct hit” from the tornado, Rob Churchill, the chief of the Lake Township Volunteer Fire Department, said late Tuesday night. He said multiple homes were destroyed by the storm, which hit around 7 p.m.

“A large tornado hit our community and it hit us hard,” said Lori Postma, the fire department’s spokesperson. She added that first responders were stationed throughout the community to serve as storm spotters before the weather hit, “and many of us saw it. We did locate some very injured people.”

“We will be working feverishly to bring our little town back to where it once was,” Postma said. “We are a very strong community and we will be just fine.”

By early Wednesday morning, Newton County Sheriff Shannon Cothran said at a press conference that “no other significant injuries” have been reported, but that the fire department is continuing search and rescue operations.

“Don’t come to see the devastation or how many trees are down,” he urged. “Let us have the room to work and stay off the roads in the immediate Lake Village area.”

Jessica Cantarelli, a spokesperson for Northern Indiana Public Service Company, said the storms impacted about 12,000 of the utility’s customers, including 2,500 customers in Lake Village and the surrounding area.

“The severe weather resulted in extensive damage to our electrical system around Newton County,” she said, adding about 70 power poles were down, along with hundreds of wires.

“We are expediting the restoration efforts in the community today and our hearts do go out to all those affected by last night’s storms,” she said.

The storms also produced “exceptionally large” hail that ranged in size from three to five inches in diameter, the weather service said. A potentially record-setting hailstone of six inches was reported in Kankakee. The previous record was a hailstone measuring 4.75 inches in diameter that fell in Minooka in 2015.

Ashlyn Villarreal was driving home from work selling cars in Kankakee Tuesday night when she saw a flash of lightning and the large hail. Suddenly, the hail became softball-sized and the glass on her Mustang’s windshield cracked, cutting her hands.

“I could just feel the glass shatter all around me,” recalled Villarreal, 31, who said the hail came “out of nowhere.”

She took cover at a gas station near her home in West Kankakee with several other people, who, like her, were stunned by the severe weather.

On Wednesday, Donofrio said there’s a minimal chance of severe weather continuing. In fact, he said, the Chicago area may see some snowflakes Wednesday afternoon. However, a period of strong to potentially damaging non-thunderstorm winds is expected Thursday night through Friday.

There’s a risk of gusts exceeding 55 miles per hour, with the strongest gusts expected north of interstate 80, the weather service warned.

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