More than 20 dead as tornadoes rip through U.S. Midwest and South

The storm, which could spark dozens of tornadoes, has killed at least 21 people in small towns and large cities in the southern and Midwestern United States.

The storm tore through a road in the Arkansas state capital, knocked out the roof of a crowded concert venue in Illinois and caused widespread damage across the region.

Tornadoes have been confirmed or suspected in at least eight states, destroying homes and businesses, knocking out trees and decimating communities across swaths of the country.

Alabama and Mississippi also reported other deaths from the storm Friday night into Saturday, as well as a death near Little Rock, Arkansas, where the mayor said more than 2,000 buildings were in the path of a tornado superior.

The Wayne community of about 8,000 people, 50 miles west of Memphis, Tennessee, was stunned Saturday when they woke up to find their high school’s roof ripped and windows blown out.

“Most of the damage has been in houses and residential areas,” Mr Lechner said, adding that while it appeared everyone had been counted, crews were going door-to-door to make sure.

In Belvidere, Illinois, some of the 260 people who attended a heavy metal concert at the Apollo Theater pulled a 50-year-old man from the rubble after part of the roof collapsed; already dead. Another 40 people were injured, two of them life-threatening, officials said.

The venue’s Facebook page says the bands scheduled to perform are Morbid Angel, Crypta, Skull Remains and Undo.

Three people were killed and eight others were injured after a tornado struck near New Hebron in Crawford County, Illinois, County Council President Bill Burke said.

That’s not far from where the three people were killed in Sullivan County, Indiana, about 95 miles southwest of Indianapolis.

Sullivan Mayor Clint Lamb said at a news conference that an area of ​​about 4,000 people south of the county “is now largely unrecognizable,” with several people pulled from the rubble overnight.

He said as many as 12 people were reported injured and search and rescue teams scoured the affected area.

In the Little Rock area, at least one person was killed and more than 20 people were injured, some seriously, authorities said. Little Rock Mayor Frank Scott said 2,100 homes and businesses were in the path of the tornado, but had not yet assessed how many were damaged.

The National Weather Service said the tornado is a high-end EF3 tornado with winds of up to 165 mph and a path of up to 25 miles.

A suspected tornado killed a woman in northern Alabama’s Madison County, County Officer Mac McCutcheon said. In Ponto Toque County in northern Mississippi, officials confirmed one death and four injuries.

The storm came just hours after U.S. President Joe Biden visited the Mississippi community of Rolling Fork, where a tornado devastated parts of the town last week.

Bill Bunting, chief of forecast operations at the Storm Prediction Center, said it could take several days to determine the exact number of tornadoes. There were also hundreds of reports of large hail and damaging winds, he said.