Oklahoma, USA:
An exceptional number of powerful tornadoes have devastated parts of Oklahoma and the nearby Great Plains states, with one small town reportedly hit by two separate tornadoes within hours, authorities said Sunday.
After 78 tornadoes were reported Friday, mostly in Nebraska and Iowa, a separate weather system brought 35 tornado reports from north Texas to Missouri on Saturday, the National Weather Service said.
At least two people, including a 4-month-old child, were killed in the Oklahoma city of Holdenville, according to multiple reports in state and local media, although crews were still searching through mountains of rubble on Sunday.
The storms dropped as much as 7 inches of rain in some places within hours, and meteorologists warned Sunday of a continued threat of extreme weather, including flash flooding, hail and more tornadoes.
Videos and images posted to social media showed dozens of buildings razed in the small town of Sulfur, in south-central Oklahoma, with vehicles destroyed or toppled and trees stripped of branches and leaves.
Mail trucks in Sulfur sat precariously on top of almost unrecognizable wreckage of buildings, a video showed. Rescue crews went from house to house and vehicle to vehicle looking for victims or survivors.
“DO NOT COME TO SULFUR UNLESS YOU ARE A FIRST RESPONDER!!!” the Murray County Sheriff's Office said in a Facebook post.
A tornado that hit Ardmore, Oklahoma, threw debris as high as 20,000 feet, the Washington Post reported. Then two other tornadoes came close to the city over the next two hours.
Oklahoma Governor Kevin Stitt declared a 30-day state of emergency to speed aid to 12 of the hardest-hit counties.
More than 50,000 homes in Texas and more than 30,000 in Oklahoma were without power late Sunday morning, the website poweroutage.us reported.
The region is known for the frequency and strength of the tornadoes that rip through the area each spring. But single major outbreaks on consecutive days are extremely rare, meteorologists said.
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