About 100 people may have been killed after a tornado swept through Kentucky.
The state is still assessing the death toll after bad weather conditions caused buildings to collapse overnight.
The National Weather Service’s Hurricane Center has identified more than 20 different tornadoes across the southeastern states of the United States.
Kentucky Governor Andy Beshear said at a news conference that the powerful storms were ‘the most severe tornado event in the history of Kentucky’ and more than 56,000 people were without power.
The governor said the devastation was concentrated in the western part of the state, with Graves County bearing the brunt and more than a dozen counties affected.
He added that the city of Mayfield was ‘devastated’ after being hit ‘as hard as any town … has ever been beaten’.
The roof collapse at a candle factory in the city was described as ‘a mass casualty event’ and said the consequences were ‘catastrophic’.
The governor added: ‘There were about 110 people in there at the time the tornado hit.
‘We believe we will lose at least dozens of such individuals. It’s been hard, really hard, and we’re praying for every single one of those families. ‘
He warned Kentuckians to wait for news of the dead from some counties, with the number expected to exceed 50 and rise to between 70 and 100.
A state of emergency has been declared and National Guard forces and water supplies are being urgently distributed in the area.
The weather system hit land for 200 miles and could include four separate tornadoes, an ‘extremely rare’ event that could become the largest ever recorded in the state.
Official figures are yet to be confirmed but some tragic stories have come from neighboring states.
The Washington Post quoted Dean Flener, a spokesman for the state’s Emergency Management Agency, in Tennessee, inclement weather left at least three people dead.
At least one person was killed and five injured when a tornado collapsed the roof of a nursing home in Monette, northern Arkansas, according to reports.
In Illinois, authorities said many people were trapped after a roof partially collapsed at an Amazon.com Inc warehouse near St. Louis late Friday, after tornadoes and powerful storms blew through the area.
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https://metro.co.uk/2021/12/11/kentucky-up-to-100-feared-dead-after-tornadoes-topple-buildings-in-us-state-15754492/?ITO=metro-trending Tornadoes in the US: Up to 100 people die after tornado in Kentucky
