No fewer than 23 people have been confirmed dead as violent storms and at least one tornado ripped through the US state of Mississippi, tearing off roofs and flattening neighborhoods, officials and residents revealed on Sunday.
The southern state’s emergency management agency disclosed that about four people were missing and dozens were injured, while tens of thousands of people who live in the city of Mississippi, Alabama, and Tennessee were without power.
‘At least 23 Mississippians were killed by last night’s violent tornados. We know that many more are injured. Search and rescue teams are still active,’ Governor Tate Reeves said on Twitter.
‘The loss will be felt in these towns forever. Please pray for God’s hand to be over all who lost family and friends’ he added.
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Confirming the death toll at 23, the emergency management agency cautioned: “Unfortunately, these numbers are expected to change.”
Search and rescue operations were underway in Sharkey and Humphreys counties, about 70 miles (110 kilometers) north of the state capital Jackson, the agency said on Twitter.
‘My city is gone,’ Rolling Fork Mayor Eldridge Walker, whose town is located in Sharkey county, told reporters.
He told CBS affiliate WJTV that when he was able to leave his home, “what we found is devastation all around us.’
Woodrow Johnson, a local official in Humphreys County, told CNN his wife woke him up and they heard what sounded like a train.
‘It was a very scary thing,’ Johnson said, adding his neighbor’s house, a trailer, was ‘completely gone.’
The National Weather Service warned residents that as clean-up operations continue, “dangers remain even after the storms move on.”
TV footage showed homes levelled and debris strewn across roads as emergency services attempted to get to those who needed help.