OREGON — The April 4 hail storm that hit portions of Ogle County left a trail of damage on roofs, autos, and trees in Oregon.

“We noticed heavier damage, as far as hail, to homes in the north end of town, up by the Fairgrounds subdivision,” said Darin DeHaan, city administrator.

The large hail — measuring close to 2 inches in diameter in some instances — hit the area at around 12:15 p.m. and lasted for approximately 4 minutes, stripping bark from tree branches, denting cars, and overflowing gutter systems on homes.

The hail created rivers along some streets as catch basins clogged leaving piles of hail along the curb and at some intersections.

“The street department had just taken the snow plows off the trucks so when I called them to clear the streets they had to come out with an end loader,” DeHaan said.

The hail didn’t discriminate, damaging police cars and public buildings in its wake.

“It was a crazy storm. My guys pushed through and got the streets cleared.”

—  Bill Covell, Oregon director of pubic works

“We had two squad cars with hail damage and my work vehicle was also damaged,” DeHaan said. “We have damage on two of the roofs on our well buildings and some other outbuildings.”

Bill Covell, the city’s director of public works, praised his crews for their quick response to the storm.

“It was a crazy storm,” he told the Oregon City Council on Tuesday. “My guys pushed through and got the streets cleared.”

Ogle County Sheriff Brian VanVickle said his department had around 23 squad cars damaged by hail.

“We had water in four different buildings, but there was no damage,” VanVickle said.

Ogle County Highway Engineer Jeremy A. Ciesiel said county plows did not have to be used to clear roads.

“The hail was intense; however, we did not utilize any plows to clean off the roads. Most of our county highways melted off rather quickly” Ciesiel said. “The road and bridge infrastructure held up rather well. There was flooding across the county due to a combination of the intense rain and a lot of debris and corn stalks clogging drainage culverts. We did what we could in those locations to open up the structures to allow for the water to drain. All of our county highways were open by the end of the work day. Unfortunately, we do have some erosion near the structures that needs to be addressed.”

Ciesiel said due to advance weather reports all of the county highway vehicles and equipment were moved inside to prevent damages.

“We are still assessing our buildings to determine if any roof repairs are needed,” Ciesiel said.

The storm also brought a “flood” of contractors to town with some going door-to-door offering free hail damage estimates.

Solicitors are supposed to register at city hall before approaching residents, DeHaan said.

“We only had four contractors who actually went through the solicitation permit processing,” said DeHaan on Tuesday. “And we’ve had reports of others going to people’s doors even though they have a ‘no solicitation’ sign on their door.”

DeHaan said the city does not recommend contractors even those who go through the permitting process. Instead, DeHaan encourages residents to fully research any contractor.

“This is just a permitting process and bond issue with the city,” DeHaan said. “We don’t guarantee anyone’s work. We are telling residents to ask for references and see if anyone else has used a particular contractor to see what they say about their work.

“People need to make sure they will be getting what they need,” he said. “The biggest thing is to be careful.”