4 tornadoes hit St. Louis area Thursday. Wedding party in Eureka ran for cover after roof blew off. (2024)

EUREKA — Wedding planners here are hoping to host a wedding Saturday after a tornado blew the roof off their venue while the bride and groom were holding a rehearsal dinner.

No one was hurt in the incident about 5:30 p.m. Thursday at Brookdale Farms. The venue was repairing the roof Friday morning hoping to have it in place in time to keep the wedding date.

"We’re just feeling very very blessed that no one was hurt," said Marnie Schneider, office manager. "Everything else can be replaced."

The farm venue was damaged in one of four tornadoes to hit the St. Louis area Thursday night during storms that also brought lightening andheavy rain. Some areas also temporarily lost power during the storm, and National Weather Service teams said they had counted four tornados by noon Friday while out assessing damages.

There were no reports of any injuries.

The strongest tornado started near Eureka and reached wind gusts of up to 110 miles per hour along an eight-mile path to High Ridge, downing power lines and causing damages to buildings near Twin Rivers Road.

About 25 people had gathered Thursday night in Brookdale's main wedding venue, Silo Point, when storms blew off about one-fifth of the roof, Schneider said. Two Brookdale wedding coordinators helped usher everyone into safer areas in bathrooms and back rooms in the venue.

"Everyone walked way without a scratch," Schneider.

The venue immediately called contractors and Eureka city inspectors that night, so that by Friday morning they could repair the roof and get it reapproved for occupancy, Schneider said.

"Our goal is to be able to give the bride her wedding tomorrow," she said.

One of Brookdale's other buildings, a storage facility, was seriously damaged in the storms, which took off the roof there and caused the building to partially collapse.

Three weak tornadoes also touched down in the Metro East, damaging roofs and trees across a swath of Madison County, the National Weather Service said. A tornado with up to 95-mile-per-hour winds in Dorsey caused damage there along a three-mile path. Two weaker tornados, with wind gusts up to 80 miles per hour, also caused damage in Marine and Pontoon Beach.

In the City of Madison, the World Wide Technology Raceway canceled drag races for the weekend after high winds flipped bleachers onto the drag strip.

The winds the west grandstands and made the track inoperable until workers clear it, the raceway owners said in a statement Friday. The weekend activities, including Midnight Madness on Friday and VP Streetcars on Saturday, will not be rescheduled.

The Gateway Kartplex, a kart racing track, will remain open.