JEFFERSON CITY, Mo. (AP) — The Latest on severe weather moving across the central United States (all times local):
12:45 p.m.
Jefferson City residents had at least 30 minutes advance warning before the tornado hit.
Weather forecasters had been tracking the storm from Eldon. The tornado warning sirens first sounded in Jefferson City at 11:10 p.m. Wednesday. Police Lt. David Williams says they were sounded again at 11:40 p.m. after the first report of property damage in Cole County. The first calls about property damage in the city came about 6 or 7 minutes after that.
11:15 a.m.
More than 80 people are staying in shelters in central Missouri after tornadoes ripped through the region.
Tornadoes caused significant damage overnight in Missouri’s capital city of Jefferson City and in Eldon, a town of about 4,900 residents around 30 miles (48 kilometers) southwest. The National Weather Service said it was the same storm that hit Jefferson City, though it’s not clear whether it was the same tornado.
The American Red Cross opened one shelter in Jefferson City and two in Eldon. Spokeswoman Sharon Watson says 50 people were at the Jefferson City shelter as of late morning.
Thirty-two people were staying at a shelter at an Eldon elementary school. Watson didn’t yet have details about how many people were staying at the third shelter, at the Eldon Community Center.
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10:40 a.m.
The National Weather Service says it’s possible that a tornado that left three people dead and one injured in southwest Missouri had a 50-mile path.
Weather Service Meteorologist Cory Rothstein in Springfield, Missouri, said a tornado touched down Wednesday night near Treece, a southeast Kansas ghost town on the Oklahoma border, and then moved northeast.
Officials said a tornado damaged homes in Carl Junction, Missouri, near Joplin and moved through Oronogo and Golden City. Authorities said three people were found dead and one injured outside Golden City.
Rothstein said a single tornado could have been on the ground for 80 minutes.
But he said the Weather Service won’t know for sure whether there was one or multiple tornadoes until two teams finish surveying the storm’s path Thursday.
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9:40 a.m.
A local emergency management official says a few people sustained injuries from a tornado in a town southwest of the Missouri capital of Jefferson City.
Miller County Emergency Management Director Mike Rayhart said Thursday that several of the injuries in Eldon were serious enough to send people to the hospital but he did not have more specifics.
Eldon has about 4,900 residents and is about 30 miles (48 kilometers) southwest of Jefferson City. The National Weather Service said it was the same storm that hit Jefferson City, though it’s not clear whether it was the same tornado.
Rayhart said the tornado skipped through Eldon, damaged the business district and “tore up several neighborhoods.”
Rayhart said two shelters in Eldon are housing between 60 and 70 people.
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8:45 a.m.
Jefferson City hospitals report treating 19 people after a tornado hit the city overnight.
Jessica Royston, a spokeswoman for SSM St. Mary’s Hospital, said seven people with minor injuries were treated there.
About 12 people suffering minor to moderate injuries such as cuts and bruises were treated at Capital Regional Medical Center.
Spokeswoman Lindsay Huhman says only one person was admitted.
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8:25 a.m.
The Missouri State Highway Patrol says an elderly couple and another woman were killed when a powerful storm destroyed their homes in southwest Missouri.
Patrol spokesman Sgt. John Lueckenhoff said the bodies of 86-year-old Kenneth Harris and his 83-year-old wife, Opal, were found about 200 yards from their home outside Golden City Wednesday night.
And 56-year-old Betty Berg died and her husband, Mark, was seriously injured when their mobile home was destroyed just west of Golden City.
The storm also ripped a roof off a fertilizer plant in the area, prompting a precautionary evacuation of 1-mile radius because of a possible chemical leak.
Lueckenhoff said Golden City itself had power lines and trees down but no serious injuries. The town is about 43 miles (69.2 kilometers) northeast of Joplin.
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7:10 a.m.
Damage from a tornado that struck Jefferson City overnight was concentrated in a 3-mile square area in the southern part of the city.
Jefferson City Police Lt David Williams said there are no reports of missing people in the city, but authorities will be making door-to-door checks Thursday.
Williams said no deaths were reported in Jefferson City from the storm that hit the state’s capital shortly before midnight on Wednesday. About 20 people have been rescued.
The storm damaged the roof of a state labor department building but the Capitol and governor’s mansion were not damaged.
Missouri Gov. Mike Parson surveyed the hardest hit areas in Jefferson City on Thursday and called the damage “devastating.”
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JEFFERSON CITY, Mo. (AP) — A tornado caused heavy damage in Missouri’s capital city as severe weather swept across the state overnight, causing at least three deaths and injuring nearly two dozen people as homes and businesses were ripped apart.
@MSHPTrooperF is in Jefferson City assisting @JeffCityPolice and Cole County Sheriff Dept. after tonight’s tornado. If you are NOT affected, please avoid the area. You will see several power lines down in these pictures. Treat them as though they are live. #MoWx pic.twitter.com/JHyNNfDX8F
— MSHP Troop F (@MSHPTrooperF) May 23, 2019
The National Weather Service confirmed that the large and destructive tornado moved over Jefferson City shortly before midnight on Wednesday.
“Across the state, Missouri’s first responders once again responded quickly and with strong coordination as much of the state dealt with extremely dangerous conditions that left people injured, trapped in homes, and tragically led to the death of three people,” Governor Mike Parson said.
Missouri Public Safety said the three were killed in the Golden City area of Barton County, near Missouri’s southwest corner, as the severe weather moved in from Oklahoma, where rescuers struggled to pull people from high water. The tornado hit during a week that has seen several days of tornadoes and torrential rains in parts of the Southern Plains and Midwest.
No deaths were reported in the capital, but Jefferson City Police Lt. David Williams said about 20 people were rescued by emergency personnel.
The weather service reported that a “confirmed large and destructive tornado” was observed over Jefferson City at 11:43 p.m. Wednesday, moving northeast at 40 mph (64 kph). The capital city has a population of about 40,000 and is located about 130 miles (209 kilometers) west of St. Louis.
“It’s a chaotic situation right now,” Williams said.
Williams spoke from the Cole County Sheriff’s office, where debris including insulation, roofing shingles and metal pieces lay on the ground outside the front doors. Authorities were discouraging people from beginning clean-up efforts until power is safely restored. Area hospitals set up command centers in case the need arises.
Missouri Public Safety tweeted that there was a possibility of more tornadoes and flash flooding.
Austin Thomson, 25, was in the laundry room of his complex of two-story apartment buildings to do his wash and noticed the wind started picking up. He saw sheets of rain coming down and a flagpole bend and then slam to the ground. The windows broke and he dove behind the washers and dryers.
After it calmed down, he walked outside to check the damage, and retrieved a stuffed animal for his daughter from his damaged apartment.
“There’s basically one building that’s basically one story now,” he said.
The National Weather Service said it had received 22 reports of tornadoes by late Wednesday, although some of those could be duplicate reporting of the same twister.
One tornado skirted just a few miles north of Joplin, Missouri, on the eighth anniversary of a catastrophic tornado that killed 161 people in the city. The tornado caused some damage in the town of Carl Junction, about 4 miles (6.44 kilometers) north of the Joplin airport, where several injuries were reported.
Storms and torrential rains have ravaged the Midwest, from Texas through Oklahoma, Kansas, Nebraska, Iowa, Missouri and Illinois.
Two barges broke loose and floated swiftly down the swollen Arkansas River in eastern Oklahoma on Wednesday, spreading alarm downstream as they threatened to hit a dam.
Authorities urged residents of several small towns in Oklahoma and Kansas to leave their homes as rivers and streams rose.
The Arkansas River town of Webbers Falls, Oklahoma, was one such town. Town officials ordered a mandatory evacuation Wednesday afternoon because of the river’s rising level.
But Wednesday evening, a posting on the town’s official Facebook page sounded the alarm about the runaway barges for its 600 residents: “Evacuate Webbers Falls immediately. The barges are loose and has the potential to hit the lock and dam 16. If the dam breaks, it will be catastrophic!! Leave now!!”
There was no word by midnight Wednesday where the barges were on the river, but local television stations showing live video of the river and the lock and dam said they had not yet arrived.
The Arkansas River was approaching historic highs, while the already high Missouri and Mississippi Rivers were again rising after a multi-day stretch of storms that produced dozens of tornadoes. Forecasters predicted parts of Oklahoma, Missouri and Kansas could see more severe weather on Thursday.
Deaths from this week’s storms include a 74-year-old woman found early Wednesday morning in Iowa. Officials there say she was killed by a possible tornado that damaged a farmstead in Adair County. Missouri authorities said heavy rain was a contributing factor in the deaths of two people in a traffic accident Tuesday near Springfield.
A fourth weather-related death may have occurred in Oklahoma, where the Highway Patrol said a woman apparently drowned after driving around a barricade Tuesday near Perkins, about 45 miles (72 kilometers) northeast of Oklahoma City. The unidentified woman’s body was sent to the state medical examiner’s office to confirm the cause of death. Oklahoma Department of Emergency Management spokeswoman Keli Cain said she isn’t yet listed as what would be the state’s first storm-related death.