4 killed in a storm system that spawned tornadoes across the southern U.S.
Officials assessed damage Sunday after a powerful storm system moved through and spawned in the southern U.S. over the weekend tornadoes and killing at least four people.
There were at least 45 reports of tornado damage in Texas, Louisiana, Mississippi, Alabama and Georgia, said Brian Hurley, a meteorologist with the National Weather Service’s Weather Prediction Center. Crews will conduct damage surveys to confirm tornadoes.
The storms during peak holiday travel caused treacherous road conditions and delays or cancellations at some of the busiest U.S. airports. There were more than 600 flight delays at Hartsfield-Jackson Atlanta International Airport on Sunday afternoon, according to flight tracker FlightAware.
“It’s not unheard of, but it is quite unusual for a severe weather outbreak of this magnitude to occur this late in the year,” said Frank Pereira, meteorologist at the Weather Prediction Center.
In the Houston area, National Weather Service storm survey crews confirmed that at least five tornadoes struck north and south of the city on Saturday.
At least one person died. The 48-year-old woman was found about 100 feet from her home in the Liverpool area south of Houston, said Madison Polston of the Brazoria County Sheriff’s Office. She said the exact cause of death was not immediately known.
Four other people in Brazoria County had injuries that were not considered critical, Polston said, adding that at least 40 homes and buildings were significantly damaged.
In Montgomery County, north of Houston, about 30 homes were destroyed and about 50 others suffered major damage, county official Jason Smith said.
In North Carolina, a 70-year-old man was killed Sunday in Statesville, just north of Charlotte, when a tree landed on the pickup truck he was driving. Highway Patrol Trooper DJ Maffucci said “it was just a freak accident” and he believed Matthew Teeple, of Cleveland, North Carolina, died instantly.
“It’s very sad, it’s just terrible timing,” Maffucci said, adding that the storms were responsible for a number of downed trees and “quite a few wrecks.”
Two people have died in storms in Mississippi, officials said. An 18-year-old died Saturday evening after a tree fell on her home in Natchez in Adams County, Emergency Management spokesman Neifa Hardy said. Two other people in the home were injured.
Another person died in Lowndes County and at least eight others were injured across the state, officials said.
The National Weather Service said two tornadoes struck around Bude and the city of Brandon, ripping the roofs off several buildings.
Storm damage was also reported in the northern Alabama city of Athens, northwest of Huntsville.
Holly Hollman, a city spokeswoman, said most of the damage from the early Sunday morning storms occurred downtown. She said it hurled large HVAC units from the roofs of a building and tore the roof off a bookstore. A large, stripped-down military helicopter was thrown from a pole where it was on display, they added.
“I stepped out on the porch and heard the roar,” she said of the storm. “I think we are very lucky that we were hit late at night. If it had happened during busy hours, I think we might have had some injuries and possibly fatalities.”
More than 40,000 people were still without power in Mississippi as of Sunday afternoon, according to electric utility tracking website PowerOutage.us. Texas, Alabama, North Carolina and Georgia each had about 10,000 customers without power, the report said.
The storms closed some roads in western North Carolina, a region largely devastated by Hurricane Helene this fall. That included a portion of US 441, also known as the Great Smoky Mountains Expressway, which was closed north of Bryson City due to high winds.
In Bumpus Cove, Tennessee, Justin Fromkin, president of Raising Hope Disaster Relief, worked Sunday to salvage what he could from the organization’s supply tent — filled with clothing and food — after about 6 inches (152 millimeters) of rain fell.
In recent months, he has provided relief to areas of western North Carolina and eastern Tennessee still reeling from Helene. The ground in some parts of the mountains is still unstable due to Helene, Fromkin said, and Sunday’s rainstorm is exacerbating the problem.
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Associated Press reporters Corey Williams and Julie Walker contributed to this report.