The Guardian / Michael Ellison in New York
At least 12
people were killed and hundreds were left homeless last night
after tornadoes that whipped up winds of 200mph tore through the
southern United States, the worst cutting through a trailer park
and a middle-class neighbourhood.
"You didn't know if you were going to live or not,"
said Myrtle Bowden, who took shelter in the bathroom of her home
in Tuscaloosa, Alabama, with her husband James. "It was roaring
and the wind just blew."
Mobile homes
were torn to pieces - one was blown from its foundations and into
a tree - more than 50 people were injured and about 43,000 homes
across the state were without electricity as temperatures fell
below zero.
"This
was a monster," said Don Hartley, public information officer
for the Tuscaloosa county emergency management agency, as rescue
teams continued to pick through the debris for survivors. "This
was big."
Sixty-one-year-old
Joe Haynes, who lost the roof of his home to the storm, said he
saw a small pick-up truck lifted into the air and its occupants
thrown out. "I saw it coming all the way," he said.
He and 12 others sought refuge from the half-mile wide tornado
in his basement.
Several people
were still missing, including an 18-month-old baby and a 16-year-old
girl. "We are still trying to find out how many are unaccounted
for," said Ted Sexton, sheriff of Tuscaloosa.
"There
were people out there Christmas shopping and all. We just don't
know where they are. This was the worst tornado I've ever seen.
It will probably be the worst in our history."
Charles Foster
said he braved the storm with his wife and their two children.
"We were praying when the house literally exploded. After
that hit I stood up because I thought it was over and it hit again.
Everything is just gone.
"Usually,
you can see them coming and get out of the way. You couldn't escape
this one. It was so huge and big...you couldn't see anything but
that."
Further south,
another tornado overturned cars, destroyed five homes and severely
damaged another 20 while a textile plant and a peanut mill were
also hit.
A third twister
ripped through northern Alabama, injuring 12 people and damaging
more than 20 buildings in rural Etowah and Limestone counties.
The storms
extended a period of fierce weather across much of the US, with
hundreds of airline flights grounded, schools closed and power
lines down, from Texas to the Great Lakes and from the north-west
to New England.
Even before
the devastating tornadoes struck, more than a dozen people had
died, nine of them in Arkansas, where about 100,000 homes and
businesses were without power.
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