Tornado Warning Issued for North Central Stephenson County, IL
This alert is no longer in effect.
NOAA issued it on May 26, 2026, 2 months ago. Warnings of this kind stay in effect for hours to a few days, so this page is a historical record of what was issued, not a current warning. For conditions where you are right now, check weather.gov (US), weather.gc.ca (Canada), the Met Office (UK), or the Bureau of Meteorology (Australia).
Areazine synthesizes this NWS weather alert directly from NOAA's official public data feed. See our methodology for full source attribution and refresh cadence.
A Tornado Warning is in effect for north central Stephenson County in northwestern Illinois until 11:15 AM CDT on May 17, 2026.
Read this weather record in 30 seconds
- Record type
- Tornado Warning
- Affected area
- Northwestern Illinois
- Issued
- May 26, 2026
- Issuing authority
- NWS Quad Cities IA IL
Tornado warnings are short-window notices for the named area. The issuing office is the authority on whether the warning remains active or has been replaced.
Record status: historical. It was issued 2 months ago; use the issuing agency's live warning service for current conditions in Northwestern Illinois.
Alert Details
Tornado Warning issued by NWS Quad Cities IA IL. Effective from 2026-05-17T10:49:00-05:00 until 2026-05-17T11:15:00-05:00. Severity Extreme, urgency Immediate, certainty Observed.
Affected Areas
North central Stephenson County in northwestern Illinois, including the location of Rock Grove.
What You Should Do
TAKE COVER NOW! Move to a basement or an interior room on the lowest floor of a sturdy building. Avoid windows. If you are outdoors, in a mobile home, or in a vehicle, move to the closest substantial shelter and protect yourself from flying debris.
Expected Conditions
At 10:47 AM CDT, a severe thunderstorm capable of producing a tornado was located near Rock Grove, moving northeast at 50 mph. Radar indicated rotation. Max hail size up to 0.75 inches. Hazard: Tornado. Impacts include dangerous flying debris, damage to mobile homes, roofs, windows, vehicles, and likely tree damage.
Timeline
Alert effective 2026-05-17T10:49:00-05:00, expires and ends 2026-05-17T11:15:00-05:00.
Original source: NOAA Official Notice ↗
Related Weather Alerts
All Weather Alerts →Nationwide notices with similar length or severity timing 8
Two Areazine-derived peer sets for this NWS weather alert: nearest notices by body length and by same severity near the same agency date. Peers come from other categories so they are not the same-feed Related list above.
Similar body length
Nearest notices by article body length (1,025 characters here).
Similar severity timing
Same severity (high) notices issued closest in time to May 26, 2026.
Frequently Asked Questions
Common questions about this NWS weather alert.