Debris lies scattered around the destroyed upper-level apartment of David Frantz and Pamela Elliott at the Westdale Court apartments in Cedar Rapids, Iowa, on Aug. 16. (KC McGinnis for The Washington Post) No single thunderstorm event in modern times — not even a tornado — has wrought as much economic devastation as the derecho that slammed the nation’s Corn Belt on Aug. 10, based on analyses from the public and private sectors. The storm complex, blamed for four deaths, hit Cedar Rapids, Iowa, particularly hard, cutting power to almost the entire city of 133,000 people, and damaging most of its businesses and homes. In an October update to its database of billion-dollar weather disasters, the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration estimated damages from the August derecho, which raced from Iowa to Indiana, at $7.5 billion. This includes agricultural impacts that are still being analyzed, so the total may be […]