A county coroner says two people were killed when a tornado hit their home in rural southern Illinois.

Washington County coroner, Mark Styninger, said the elderly man and his sister died Sunday afternoon in their farmhouse in the town of New Minden, about 50 miles southeast of St. Louis.

The storm that struck New Minden was part of a series of intense thunderstorms and tornadoes that swept across the Midwest on Sunday, causing extensive damage in several central Illinois communities.