Meteorologists were shocked by an unusually strong tornado that struck Mississippi and left a devastation in its wake, killing at least 25 people there and one person in Alabama. The National Weather Service estimates the storm lasted more than an hour, and search and rescue operations went on until Sunday.
According to CBS News, US President Joe Biden declared an emergency in Mississippi on Sunday, making federal funding available to Carroll, Humphreys, Monroe, and Sharkey counties, which were the hardest hit on Friday night. According to a White House statement, the government assistance would support local, state, and tribal efforts to recover in the devastated areas.
According to the website PowerOutage.us, the storm had left some 26,000 people in Mississippi, Alabama, and Tennessee without power as of Saturday night.
The hardest-hit community was Rolling Fork, a western Mississippi community of about 1,900 people. According to Reuters, the degree of the damage and devastation was such that homes were reduced to rubble, tree trunks snapped like twigs, and cars were thrown away like toys. The water tower for the community was on the ground, bent.
It is heartbreaking to see Rolling Fork in such ruin.
We are thankful of our federal partners’ presence on the ground to observe the tornado’s effects.
The character and generosity of Mississippians is on full display with the countless volunteers and donations being offered. pic.twitter.com/rK4SmD8AVT — Governor Tate Reeves (@tatereeves) March 26, 2023
At least 12 of those deaths occurred in Rolling Fork, its mayor, Eldridge Walker, told CNN earlier in the day. “My city is gone, but we are resilient,” Walker said on CNN. “We are going to come back strong.”
Storm chaser Michael Searcy spent hours assisting in the evacuation of those who were trapped after he saw the tornado move towards Rolling Fork.
“As soon as we would go from one vehicle to the next vehicle or from building to building, we could hear screams and we could hear cries for help,” he told Reuters.
Michael Searcy thought back to the horrific scene in which members of one family managed to flee by hiding in a toilet while the rest of the house crumbled around them.
Monster of a Tornado
“I still can’t get over what I saw,” Stephanie Cox, a storm chaser based in Oklahoma who witnessed the tornado as it rolled into Mississippi, told the BBC.
Cox told the BBC that she originally was not able to estimate how massive or violent the storm will be. She claimed that after hearing a loud roar, a bolt of lightning struck, illuminating what she called a “monster” of a tornado.
“I’ve never seen one that violent or heard one just make that roaring sound,” she said.
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