Crews and search dogs hunted Sunday for survivors or bodies in piles of debris after tornadoes and storms rumbled through the U.S. states of Missouri and Oklahoma a day earlier and killed at least 22 people in three states.
Seven people died in Picher, Oklahoma, once a bustling mining center of 20,000 that dwindled to about 800 people as families fled lead pollution here, and officials held out hope that they wouldn't find any more bodies.
Residents said the tornado created a surreal scene as it tore through town Saturday afternoon, injuring 150 people, overturning cars, damaging dozens of homes and throwing mattresses and twisted metal high into the canopy of trees.
The same storm system then moved into southwest Missouri, where tornadoes killed at least 14 others. The storms moved eastward; on Sunday, storms in Georgia killed at least one person.
In Seneca, Mo., about 20 miles southeast of Picher near the Oklahoma state line, crews on Sunday combed farm fields looking for bodies and survivors. Ten of the dead were killed when a twister struck near Seneca.
The National Weather Service sent out a tornado warning at 5:26 p.m., 13 minutes before the tornado hit Picher, said David Jankowski, a National Weather Service meteorologist in Tulsa. Tornado sirens warned residents to take shelter.
The twister was the deadliest in Oklahoma since a May 3, 1999 twister that killed 44 people in the Oklahoma City area.
The National Weather Service estimated that at least eight tornadoes had been spawned in Oklahoma along six storm tracks. Three teams were dispatched to assess damage, meteorologist Steve Amburn said.
Source: Xinhua/Agencies
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