145 Injured as Downed Trees, Power Lines Hamper Rescues : Mississippi Twisters Kill Seven, Ravage 20-Mile Area

LAUREL, Miss. — Powerful tornadoes swept across south-central Mississippi on Saturday, killing seven people and injuring 145 others. Fallen trees and power lines made rescue efforts difficult.

“We’ve got injuries along a 15- to 20-mile track,” said Carl Carlos, Jones County Civil Defense director.

Officials called units of the National Guard to help clear roadways and prevent looting Saturday night in damaged areas.

One or more tornadoes, spawned by a storm system that had dumped heavy rain and caused flooding in other parts of the state, hit at mid-morning and killed two people in Glade, a farming community of about 300 people five miles southeast of Laurel.

School, Church Destroyed

The tornado knocked out Glade’s power, burst gas mains and sparked small fires, witnesses said. Trees and electric and telephone lines littered roads; shattered homes and businesses lined Mississippi 15. A school and church also were destroyed, officials said.

“The area was hit so bad that they apparently couldn’t get to all the victims,” said JoAnn Dunagin, nursing director at South Mississippi State Hospital in Laurel.

Another person was killed on the outskirts of Laurel, and four other fatalities were reported elsewhere in the county, Jones County Deputy Larry Harper said.

Two other unincorporated areas, Dixie and Powers, also were hit as one or more twisters cut a path 20 miles long by two miles wide through the county, Carlos said.

At least 50 houses were destroyed in Jones County, which was declared a disaster area by Gov. Bill Allain.

In all, the storm damaged or destroyed more than 500 houses and mobile homes, said Dusty Perkins, spokesman for the state Emergency Management Agency.

Eight Counties Warned

The National Weather Service reported that trees and power lines were downed from Rankin County, in central Mississippi near Jackson, to the Alabama border. Tornado warnings were issued in eight counties.

Forty people were taken to Jones County Community Hospital, and 12 others were taken to South Mississippi State Hospital. Most suffered cuts and bruises from flying debris and some drove themselves to the hospitals, officials said.

Janet West said that she watched through the door of her family’s storm cellar while the wind whipped rain “to the consistency of smoke.”

“We looked outside and it just didn’t look right,” West said. “It was almost green.”

“I’ve got a trailer house behind me and I swear it looked like it had exploded,” her husband, Howard, said. “Our neighbors’ houses are tore all to pieces.”

Severe thunderstorms rumbled across central and southern parts of Mississippi. Wind driven by thunderstorms gusted to 61 m.p.h. at Mobile, Ala.

Heavy thunderstorms over southern Louisiana dampened street celebrations and parades during the final weekend of the Mardi Gras festival.

More than two inches of rain had fallen since Friday across sections of Arkansas and Mississippi into western Tennessee. Charlotte, N.C., has received 2.39 inches since the storm began, with nearly four inches in two days across northern and central Georgia.

Flood watches were posted over western Virginia, central North Carolina, South Carolina, most of Georgia and Alabama, Kentucky, Tennessee and Ohio.

Elsewhere in the nation Saturday, a powerful storm system centered over Oklahoma spread snow across the northern Plains.

The storm system was expected to move northeastward and could spread heavy snow from the central Plains to the upper Mississippi Valley and upper Great Lakes today, weather officials said.