An Oklahoma City woman drowned in a storm cellar after 51 tornadoes and fierce storms tore across parts of the Midwest on Wednesday and pounded Oklahoma, officials said.
The 42-year-old woman was trapped in an underground shelter in her yard as torrential rain filled it up with water, Sgt. Gary Knight told the New York Daily News.
“It was like a river running over the shelter and she couldn’t get out,” he said, noting it was an old cellar not built to modern standards.
Her boyfriend found the unidentified woman’s body in the storms’ only reported fatality, Knight said.
At least 20 people were injured, five of them critically so, according to local reports.
The storms also hit Nebraska, Kansas and north Texas, but Oklahoma took the brunt of the destruction, forcing Gov. Mary Fallin to declare a state of emergency in 12 counties Thursday morning.
“It’s been a very long night and a long day yesterday,” Fallin said, according to The Oklahoman. “Our thoughts are with those injured and those who lost property.”
Oklahoma City issued its first ever flash-flood emergency warning after storms dumped about 7 inches of rain, the third highest daily total of all time, officials said.
The scene is still “somewhat chaotic,” Knight told the Daily News. “We’re still trying to get people out of places and make sure we haven’t missed any injured people.”
As people sifted through the rubble of dozens of destroyed buildings Thursday, forecasters asked Tornady Alley to brace for possible storms later in the week.
“People just really need to stay weather-aware, have a plan and understand that severe storms are possible across portions of the southern Plains almost daily through Saturday,” National Weather Service meteorologist Jonathan Kurtz said.
A trailer park was almost completely destroyed by Wednesday’s storms, and 12 residents were injured and transported to local hospitals, the state’s Emergency Medical Services Authority spokeswoman Laura O’Leary said. Five of them were critically injured, KFOR reported.
Two other people were injured in a weather-related car accident in Moore, and flying debris caused one person to sustain an arm injury, The Oklahoman reported. Another man was hurt entering a storm shelter.
The twisters flipped vehicles and left power lines strewn across roadways, according to meteorologist Michael Scotten with the National Weather Service.
Fire department crews were dispatched to rescue people and ambulances stranded in high water “all over” Oklahoma City, O’Leary said.
Most roads were reopened Thursday after troopers checked on all those stranded, Lt. John Vincent said.
More than 10,000 homes and businesses were without power, according to the Oklahoma Corporation Commission.
“I think we got lucky,” Oklahoma City police spokeswoman Dee Patty said. “We’ve seen a lot worse come through these same areas.”
Flash flood warnings were in effect in two counties in north-Central Texas, where there were reports of tornadoes without damage or injuries, meteorologist Forrest Mitchell with the National Weather Service said..
At least nine tornadoes swept through Kansas in the sparsely populated north-central part of the state, destroying some homes and a barn. In Nebraska, 10 to 15 homes were damaged near the Kansas border.
A wildlife park near Oklahoma City that houses leopards, lions, alligators, tigers and other exotic animals was hit by the storm, prompting fears that tigers had been loosed upon the city.
The animals were all accounted for by late Wedneday, but not before the term “Tigernado” began trending on social media and sparked a storm of memes.
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With News Wire Services
