2 killed in Alabama tornado as tree crushes mobile home
Two people died in central Alabama early Wednesday as devastating tornadoes ripped through the U.S. South, officials said.
The deaths occurred when a tree struck a mobile home near Montgomery, where a tornado was reported by the National Weather Service shortly after 3 a.m. local time.
“They were in their home that was struck by a tree due to the tornado,” said Christina Thornton, the director of Montgomery County’s emergency management agency.
That tornado, which also left others in the area injured, was one of more than two dozen reported in Alabama, Mississippi and Louisiana during a storm surge that began Tuesday, according to the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration’s storm prediction center.
Meteorologists warned Tuesday that 40 million people lived within the path of the severe storm system. Officials issued more than 73 tornado warnings in the region lasting from Tuesday afternoon to Wednesday morning.
Homes throughout the South were destroyed, while more than 50,000 Mississippians and Alabamans remained without power Wednesday morning.
A fire station and a grocery store in Mississippi suffered significant damage, while 15 families left their apartments overnight after the complex in Eutaw, Ala., lost much of its roof.
“We’ve got power lines, trees just all over the road,” Eutaw Police Chief Tommy Johnson told the local news outlet WBRC-TV. “In the morning when we get a little daylight, we’re going to do a door-by-door search to make sure no one is trapped inside or anything like that.”
With News Wire Services
