MAGEE, MS (AP) – A tornado destroyed dozens of homes and businesses in a small Mississippi community early Thursday, injuring several people and flattening a church although there were no immediate reports of fatalities.
A heavy mantle of fog hampered rescuers as they tried to determine the extent of the damage and reach any survivors after the tornado rampaged through a residential area on a day when powerful thunderstorms rumbled across the Southeast.
Downed power lines and scraps of metal and downed tree limbs littered roads and highways leading from the Mississippi town of Magee, prompting state transportation officials to warn motorists to stay off the routes as rescue crews sought to reach any victims.
“We’d like to have some helicopters in the air pointing us in the right direction, but we can’t do that until this fog lifts,” state Public Safety Commissioner Steve Simpson said.
Other reports of downed trees, power lines and damaged homes came in across the Deep South, caused by a band of heavy thunderstorms and high winds. In Louisiana, storms knocked out electricity to about 40,000 customers.
The exact number of injuries in Mississippi isn’t yet known, but two people had been flown by helicopter to the University of Mississippi Medical Center in Jackson, said Katherine Gunby, spokeswoman for the Mississippi Emergency Management Agency. Their conditions were not yet available.
At least 60 homes suffered varying degrees of damage. Gunby said the nearby Corinth Baptist Church was destroyed: “Only the doors to its sanctuary were left standing.”
Officials were concerned that the storms’ timing could mean there are more injuries.
“Tornadoes are such powerful, fast storms and when they hit at this time of year at night when people are sleeping, people might not have been able to get to interior rooms, safe places or shelters fast enough,” Gunby added. “So we are going to be watching out for that and I suspect we will be taking more people to hospitals today.”
Members of the 100-year-old Corinth Baptist Church stepped around the rubble of the red brick building perched on a hilltop overlooking the pine forests of south-central Mississippi, consoling one another. Others walked through a nearby cemetery littered with broken tree limbs and headstones knocked to the ground. Pieces of artificial flowers from the gravesites were strewn all about.
A tearful Maegan Errington, 23, said Thursday was her birthday and she was to be married in the church on Saturday. Church member Charlene Loyd, 58, hugged her and patted her on the back.
“Our church is still here, because our church is the people, but the building is gone,” Loyd said.
Magee Mayor Jimmy Clyde told NBC’s “Today” show that the town about 40 miles southeast of Jackson was in “dire straits.”
“We have no power,” he said. “Most of the roads into and out of our city are blocked. It damaged our water supply. We don’t know the extent of the damage as of yet, because we’re waiting for daylight.”
Another reported tornado touched down in Mississippi’s Lauderdale County on Wednesday night, heavily damaging nine homes and a business, but no injuries were reported, MEMA officials said.
High winds blew down trees overnight in central Alabama, damaging at least three homes in two counties, but no injuries were reported.
In Louisiana, meanwhile, power companies worked to restore electricity to thousands of customers after a line of severe thunderstorms raked the state early Thursday. The storms also unleashed heavy rain in Louisiana on their march across the South.
Copyright © 2009 The Associated Press. All rights reserved.
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