Dozens die as US tornadoes open gates of hell
Marysville disappeared off the map. When a swarm of killer tornadoes raked across the American heartlands, this small, southern Indiana town of 1900 people took a direct hit.
Clapboard homes crumbled, downed electricity poles and uprooted trees blocked roads and battered vehicles were tossed into the ruins.
''Marysville is completely gone,'' said Chuck Adams, the county sheriff.
Among those hurt was a two-year-old girl found alone in a field after her parents and two siblings were killed by a tornado in New Pekin, Indiana.
The storms were not as destructive as the extraordinary outbreak of April 27, 2011, when more than 300 people were killed by 199 tornadoes in the Deep South, with Alabama the hardest hit. But what lies ahead is difficult to predict.
Mobile phone signals were hard to find, the internet was out and electricity indefinitely interrupted. In many cases, word-of-mouth conversations replaced text messages, Facebook status updates and phone calls. “It’s horrible. It’s things you take for granted that aren’t there anymore,” said Jack Cleveland, 50, a Census Bureau worker from Henryville, Indiana.
While it could be days before power and phone services are fully restored to the damaged areas, crews were making progress. In Indiana, about 2,800 homes were without power, down from 8,000 in the hours after the storms. But in some hard-hit areas, like Henryville, a substation and transmission lines need to be rebuilt, which could take up to a week.
Nearly 19,000 customers were without power in Kentucky, according to the state’s Public Service Commission, and a few thousand more from municipal utilities.
Mobile phone companies were trying to help residents by setting up mobile charging and e-mail stations so they could communicate while power and phone services were still difficult to find. They also brought in portable towers to boost signals and service was improving yesterday.
At such times everyone knows that ''We are no match for Mother Nature at her worst.''
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