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US President Joe Biden early Sunday issued an emergency declaration for Mississippi, making federal funding available for Carroll, Humphreys, Monroe and Sharkey counties, the hardest hit areas the night of the deadly tornado that tore through the Mississippi Delta, one of the poorest areas in the US
At least 25 people were killed and dozens more injured in Mississippi when a massive storm tore through several towns in an hours-long path. One man died after his trailer home flipped over several times in Alabama.
Search and recovery crews on Sunday continued the harrowing task of digging through the rubble of flattened and damaged homes, commercial buildings and municipal offices after hundreds of people were displaced.
Federal Emergency Management Agency Administrator Deanne Criswell is scheduled to visit the state on Sunday to assess the damage.
Another tornado is possible Sunday
FEMA coordinating officer John Boyle has been appointed to oversee federal recovery operations. After Biden’s declaration, federal funds can be used for recovery efforts including temporary housing, home repairs, loans covering uninsured property losses and other individual and business programs, the White House said in a statement.
The twister flattened entire blocks, obliterated houses, tore the steeple from the church and toppled the municipal water tower. Even as the recovery began, the US National Weather Service warned of the risk of more severe weather on Sunday – including high winds, large hail and possible tornadoes – in eastern Louisiana, south-central Mississippi and south-central Alabama.
Based on preliminary data, the tornado received a preliminary rating of EF-4, the National Weather Service office in Jackson said late Saturday in a tweet. An EF-4 tornado has maximum sustained winds between 265 km/h and 320 km/h, according to the service. Jackson’s office cautioned that it is still gathering information about the tornado.
Friday night’s tornado tore through the town of Rolling Fork of about 2,000 people, reducing homes to rubble, flipping cars over banks and toppling the town’s water tower. Other parts of the Deep South were digging out of the damage caused by other suspected twisters. One person was killed in Morgan County, Ala., the sheriff’s department said in a tweet.
“How anyone survived is beyond me,” said Rodney Porter, who lives 20 miles south of Rolling Fork. When the storm hit on Friday night, he rushed there to help in any way he could. The porter arrived to find “total destruction” and said he smelled natural gas and heard people screaming for help in the dark.
“Houses are gone, houses are piled on top of houses with vehicles on top of them,” he said.
‘Crying at night, crying this morning’
Annette Body drove to Silver City from nearby Belozi to survey the damage. He said he felt “blessed” that his own home was not destroyed, but that everyone else he knew lost everything.
“I cried last night, I cried this morning,” he said, looking at the flat houses. “They say you have to cover up, but it happened so fast, a lot of people didn’t get a chance to cover up.”
Storm survivors walked around Saturday, many in disarray and shock, as they cut through thick debris and fallen trees with chainsaws, searching for survivors. Power lines are strung under a decades-old oak tree, its roots torn from the ground.
Mississippi Governor Tate Reeves declared a state of emergency and pledged to help rebuild as he saw the damage to areas heavily planted with cotton, corn and soybeans and catfish farms. He spoke with Biden, who also held a phone call with the state’s congressional delegation.
More than half a dozen shelters opened in Mississippi to house displaced people.
Preliminary information based on estimates from storm reports and radar data showed the tornado was on the ground for more than an hour and traveled at least 175 miles, said Lance Perrilloux, a meteorologist with the National Weather Service in Jackson, Miss.
“It’s very, very rare,” he said, citing the long path to atmospheric instability.
Perrilloux said preliminary findings indicate the tornado started its damage southwest of Rolling Fork before continuing northeast toward the rural communities of Midnight and Silver City and continuing toward Tchula, Black Hawk and Winona.
The supercell that produced the deadly twister also appeared to produce tornadoes causing damage in northwest and north-central Alabama, said Brian Squitieri, a severe storm forecaster with the Storm Prediction Center weather service in Norman, Okla.
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