Deadly tornadoes and storms tear through South, Midwest

Violent storms and tornadoes tore through cities from Oklahoma to Indiana during what could be a record-setting period of deadly weather and flooding, destroying homes and sending debris nearly 5 miles into the air in one location.

Dozens of tornado and severe thunderstorm warnings were issued Wednesday and early Thursday from Texas to West Virginia as storms hit those and other states. Forecasters attributed the violent weather to daytime heating combining with an unstable atmosphere, strong wind shear and abundant moisture streaming into the nation’s midsection from the Gulf.

Sgt. Clark Parrott of the Missouri Highway Patrol said at least one person was killed in southeast Missouri, KFVS-TV reported, while part of a warehouse collapsed in a suburb of Indianapolis, temporarily trapping at least one person inside. In northeast Arkansas a rare tornado emergency was issued as debris flew thousands of feet in the air.

The Tennessee Department of Health confirmed two weather-related fatalities, one in McNairy County and the other in Obion County, the Tennessee Emergency Management Agency announced early Thursday.

A man was killed in a home damaged by the storm near Moscow, Tennessee, about 50 miles from Memphis, according to Ray Garcia, chief deputy of the Fayette County Sheriff’s Office. Garcia also reported downed trees and power lines in the county, and officials are preparing for more rain and strong storms Thursday.

The coming days were also forecast to bring the risk of potentially deadly flash flooding to the South and Midwest as severe thunderstorms blowing eastward become supercharged. The potent storm system will bring “significant, life-threatening flash flooding” each day through Saturday, the National Weather Service said.

With more than a foot of rain possible over the next four days, the prolonged deluge “is an event that happens once in a generation to once in a lifetime,” the weather service said. “Historic rainfall totals and impacts are possible.”

More than 90 million people were at some risk of severe weather in a huge part of the nation stretching from Texas to Minnesota and Maine, according to the Oklahoma-based Storm Prediction Center.

A tornado emergency — the weather service’s highest alert — was briefly declared around Blytheville, Arkansas, on Wednesday evening, with debris lofted at least 25,000 feet.

Four people were injured in Kentucky when a church was hit by debris from a suspected tornado, according to Ballard County Emergency Management. One person was in critical condition, while the others have non-life-threatening injuries.

Two workers were injured at a Sur La Table distribution center in Brownsburg, Indiana, that was significantly damaged in the storm Wednesday, a company spokesperson said in a statement.

Emergency crews worked for several hours to free a trapped worker at the distribution center, where the roof and a wall collapsed.

Five semitrucks were blown over on Interstate 65 near Lowell, Indiana, state police reported.

Power was knocked out to more than a half million customers in Indiana, Ohio, Kentucky, Arkansas, Tennessee, West Virginia, Mississippi, Missouri and Texas as of Thursday morning, according to PowerOutage.us, which tracks outages nationwide.

Additional rounds of heavy rain were expected in parts of Texas, the lower Mississippi Valley and the Ohio Valley from midweek through Saturday. Forecasters warned that they could track over the same areas repeatedly, producing dangerous flash floods capable of sweeping cars away.

Rain totaling up to 15 inches (38 centimeters) was forecast over the next seven days in northeastern Arkansas, the southeast corner of Missouri, western Kentucky and southern parts of Illinois and Indiana, the weather service warned, with some areas in Kentucky and Indiana at an especially high risk for flooding.