By Chris Joyner, USA TODAY
JACKSON, Miss. — Emergency workers are searching for the missing amid damage caused by severe weather Saturday afternoon in Mississippi, state Emergency Management Agency spokesman Greg Flynn said Saturday.
In hard-hit Yazoo City, Mayor McArthur Straughter said the Yazoo County coroner confirmed two deaths to him.
Flynn said a damaging storm spawned tornadoes that cut a line through central Mississippi.. Damage has been reported in Issaquena, Warren, Yazoo, and Holmes counties and as the system moves northeast through the state, he said.
"It is still evolving because it hasn't left the state yet," he said. "This sucker is leaving a path of destruction".
The American Red Cross and the Mississippi State Department of Health are responding to the area, and Gov.Haley Barbour is in the process of declaring a state of emergency.
Flynn said damage reports still are being collected, but there appears to be substantial damage in the area of Eagle Lake, north of Vicksburg, and in Yazoo City, where The Weather Channel aired video of demolished structures.
"There were reports that it was three quarters of a mile wide," he said.
Police officials in Warren County reported that communication lines were down as a result of the storm, including cellular phone towers.
Flynn said the tornado jumped the Mississippi River into Mississippi around 11:30 a.m. central time.
"It caused a bunch of damage in Louisiana," he said. "Then it strengthened when it got into Issaquena".
A band of heavy weather that passed through east central Mississippi earlier in the day caused damage in that part of the state. Flynn said there are reports of trees and power lines down in Lauderdale County.
That band of heavy storms passed through between 8-9 a.m. followed by the second, more damaging round.
Contributing: The Associated Press
USA Today
