O’FALLON, Mo. — People began showing up with dented cars and smashed windshields at Jeff’s Body Shop shortly after hail the size of baseballs started to fall. And business has been nonstop ever since, owner Jefferey Herndon said Friday.
The shop spent the day scheduling appointments and assessing damage — including to the city’s police vehicles.
“Windows are out, mirrors were knocked off, every kind of panel,” Herndon said. “Everything in O’Fallon is damaged.”
Severe storms swept through the region on Thursday, spawning damaging winds, multiple tornadoes and hail the size of golf balls, if not bigger, from St. Charles to Edwardsville. The hail alone caused millions of dollars of damage, businesses and officials said. It ruined roofs and siding. It damaged the copper dome atop O’Fallon City Hall. And it devastated car lots, breaking windshields, taillights and mirrors.
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In O’Fallon, hardly a car outside was spared.
By Friday, roofers were walking neighborhoods here and residents were flooding auto body shops. The influx left some shop workers worried that they won’t have enough auto glass, hoods and panels for all the repairs. Some said they’re still waiting on supplies to fix damage from a hail storm in September.
All 50 vehicles at used car dealer MotorCars LTD were damaged, and about half were totaled, said salesman Joe Wood. Each has a $2,500 deductible — and the building will need a new roof and new siding.
“It’s a bunch of money for this little poor car lot,” Wood said. “It was devastating.”
At Clement Ford, rows and rows of vehicles had dimpled hoods and cracked windshields.
The hail there fell for 15 minutes; employees could hear the cars being hit, glass breaking, from inside the dealership.
One worker called it “catastrophic,” another “mind-boggling.”
“I’ve never seen anything like it,” said salesman Rick Valenti.
Raj Clement, who has owned the dealership since 2021, estimated 300 new cars and 100 used cars each had about $25,000 in damages, totaling $10 million. He expects insurance will help cover the damage.
By midday, Clement was checking with his staff to make sure someone was adding a “hail sale” banner to the website.
He said Ford promised a delivery of new vehicles within 10 days.
Across the street, Glenn Travers was hoping Travers RV would soon be operational again, too.
He said the hailstorm was the worst of his 28-year career in auto sales.
His dealership had nearly $10 million in inventory of late-model used cars and new RVs; he expects insurance adjusters to total roughly 30% of them.
“I would say the damages are going to be north of $2 million,” Travers said.
In the meantime, he’ll bring in vehicles from his other dealerships. He has also placed an order for 100 new RVs, which should arrive in the next two weeks.
“We’re heading into our busy season right now with RVs. I had unbelievable inventory, and now it is all damaged,” Travers said. “But we’re just trying to get through this.”
He’ll discount the RVs with “superficial dings” by $15,000 to $20,000, he said.
“We’re hoping that there will be somebody out there who will be willing to look past those dings and buy one,” he said.
Down the road at Mudd Auto Body, office manager Julie Johnson had taken over 60 calls before 9 a.m.
The body shop now also has to fix the 15 cars being stored outside. Some were totaled, she said.
“One lady’s car was just fixed. She was in an accident so she had to get body work done,” Johnson said. “She didn’t pick it up in time and now it has to stay for hail damage.”
Johnson told walk-in customers seeking estimates that the business was only setting appointments.
The earliest she could book was for Tuesday.
Johnson told one customer looking to get an estimate on his Chevy truck that she’s worried suppliers are going to run out of parts like hoods and glass, some of which were already on back order.
“Hoods were a hot commodity. I don’t know what glass suppliers are going to do,” Johnson said. “People need that right away. It’ll be overwhelming.”
By early afternoon Friday, CD Strong Construction owner Dave Ferguson had sent his employees door-to-door on Blackberry Lane, to offer residents free roofing inspections and estimates.
“It’s a footrace between businesses,” Ferguson said. “There’s going to be a lot of roofers here.”
But he’d rather have more competition than no business, he said.
“It beats not answering the phone,” he said.