Severe storms have left at least 14 people dead across Missouri and Arkansas as forecasters warned that intense, long-lasting storms at a level typically experienced only once or twice in a lifetime could sweep across a vast section of the South on Saturday.
The Missouri State Highway Patrol reported 11 fatalities in the state, with six in Wayne County, three in Ozark County, one in Butler County and one in Jefferson County.
In Arkansas, three people were killed in Independence County, and 29 others were injured across the state, according to the Arkansas Division of Emergency Management. The state experienced extensive storm damage, the agency said.
The National Weather Service on Saturday issued the highest risk alert for tornadoes in some parts of the South.
The most dangerous threat of tornadoes would most likely be across Louisiana and Mississippi from late morning into early afternoon on Saturday. From the afternoon into the evening, the storms are expected to sweep across Alabama and maybe into Tennessee before crossing into Georgia and northern Florida overnight.
According to the Storm Prediction Center, Saturday is likely to be the third time in history that the center has issued a high-risk warning on the second day of a storm.
Central Mississippi and Alabama face the highest risk level, five, in the center’s rating system. The Gulf Coast states and Georgia face a high risk level of four on Saturday.
Storms at this highest level of alert can often produce intense long-track tornadoes, meaning they stay on the ground for a very long time. A slow storm will typically only affect one or two communities, but a faster-moving storm such as this one can cross multiple states, leaving a long trail of damage.
The National Weather Service issued a tornado watch for eastern Louisiana, including Baton Rouge, and nearly all of Mississippi through Saturday evening. The service said these areas faced a “particularly dangerous situation,” a designation used during a high risk of violent tornadoes.
Only seven percent of tornado watches receive this extra warning, and areas under these alerts are three times as likely to experience damaging tornadoes, according to a NOAA study analyzing tornado watches from 1996 to 2005.
The Federal Emergency Management Agency warned of excessive rainfall and flash flooding in the Southeast “with numerous significant tornadoes expected on Saturday afternoon and evening.”
The Storm Prediction Center received 23 reports of tornadoes since Friday across Arkansas, Illinois, Mississippi and Missouri, according to FEMA, as well as nearly a dozen reports of hurricane-force winds.
In Missouri, tornado damage was reported in Bridgeton, Morse Mill, Perryville and Poplar Bluff, according to FEMA. And in Arkansas, tornado damage was reported in Black Rock, Campbell, Cave City and Smithville, FEMA said.
Robbie Myers, the director of Butler County Emergency Management in Missouri, said that at least one person had died overnight after getting trapped in a house that sustained severe damage on a country road near Poplar Bluff, Mo.
More than 500 homes, a church and grocery store in town had also been damaged, he said. A mobile-home park, he said, had been “totally destroyed.”
“It was a very devastating scene where the mobile-home park was,” said Mr. Myers, who added that several people had been taken to the hospital with injuries.
Storms caused widespread damage in the state, including in the city of Rolla, state emergency officials said late Friday night.
Around noon Eastern time, power outages had spread to more than 123,000 customers in Missouri, more than 39,000 in Illinois, 32,000 in Indiana, 16,000 in Arkansas and 14,000 in Tennessee, according to PowerOutage.us, a tracking website.
Big Whiskey’s American Restaurant & Bar in Poplar Bluff, Mo., opened Saturday morning as usual. Unlike some stores in town, it had power and running water.
“We made some box lunches and taking them to the police station, the coliseum, to help people in need of assistance,” said Terry Pierce, a manager at Big Whiskey’s. “We’re giving out free meals to linemen.”
Mr. Pierce, who lives in nearby Williamsville, Mo., said that he huddled with his wife and children in his basement during the worst of the storm. He said he heard a tornado touch down near Mill Spring, Mo. “It sounded like a train was coming through here,” he said.
These storms are all connected to the intense system wreaking havoc across the central United States, which over the past day has brought tornadoes across the Midwest and dust storms and wildfires to the Plains.
The storms on Saturday are forecast to move extremely fast and may catch people off guard.
They have the potential to form numerous significant tornadoes, some of which could be potentially violent, damaging hurricane-force (greater than 74 miles per hour) winds and golf-ball- or even baseball-size hail.
Tornadoes typically occur across the South from the middle of March until late April, when the risk shifts to the Plains.
The threat of severe weather is expected to continue into the weekend, as the front pushes eastward. The storm is expected to move offshore on Monday.
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