4 Dead When Exhaust Gas Fills Detroit Home

After a storm knocked out their electricity and flooded their basement, three children and their grandmother died in a house that filled with carbon monoxide from a portable generator.

The bodies of Maude Priester, 55, Darrell Hughes, 11, Tiera Hall, 6, and Jordan Burns, 6, were found by a relative Friday, increasing the death toll to 16 from storms that tore through southeastern Michigan on Wednesday.

Neighbors said Priester’s husband, Benjamin, had the generator running outside to power lights and the refrigerator but brought it in the house to pump water out of the basement.

“It’s believed the generator being used to supply the home with electricity filled the home with carbon monoxide gas,” said Police Officer Allene Ray.

Damage from the violent storms--which spawned heavy rains and several tornadoes--continued to be tallied Friday. Michigan State Police said almost 700 homes and businesses had been damaged or destroyed.

There were 104 reports of injuries.

Utility crews were scrambling to restore power to 120,000 customers, Detroit Edison Co. spokeswoman Lorie Kessler said.

Rep. John Conyers Jr. (D-Mich.) toured the hardest-hit areas Friday, including the Detroit enclaves of Highland Park and Hamtramck.

“This is the worst storm to hit metropolitan Detroit in my lifetime,” he said, calling on churches to ask their congregations Sunday to volunteer to help clean up and repair devastated areas.