IL

Storm restoration across Cook County

Cook County sits in the heart of the Midwest severe-weather corridor, where supercell thunderstorms, fast-moving derechos, and straight-line winds exceeding 80 mph are recurring summer hazards; the July 2024 derecho produced a record 32 tornadoes in a single day across the NWS Chicago forecast area, and the 2026 season logged 128 severe thunderstorm and tornado warnings through April alone. Hail events are frequent and often exceed 2 inches in diameter, directly driving the county's high rate of roof and siding claims; wind and hail together account for roughly 42 percent of all Illinois homeowners insurance losses. Cook County's aging combined sewer system is engineered for 2 inches of rain per 24-hour period, so the intensifying convective rain rates routinely overwhelm it, causing basement sewer backups that flooded an estimated 70,000 homes in 2023 alone - damage that standard homeowners policies typically do not cover. Winter brings ice-dam formation from repeated freeze-thaw cycles that can lift shingles and saturate roof decking, adding a second seasonal driver of storm-restoration demand across the county's roughly 1.3 million housing units.