A day after a series of powerful storms in Arkansas killed 10 people in flooding and a tornado, residents in several central US states on Tuesday braced themselves for a second straight night of violent weather as forecasters again predicted that twisters would hammer the region.
The National Weather Service issued a high risk warning for severe weather in a stretch extending from northeast Memphis to just northeast of Dallas, covering a large swath of Arkansas.
It last issued such a warning on April 16, when dozens of tornadoes hit North Carolina and killed 21 people.
Forty-five tornado warnings had been issued in Arkansas by 8pm on Tuesday. A number of trees fell on homes and at least one vehicle, but no new injuries were reported.
A possible tornado touched down in the east Texas town of Edom on Tuesday evening, injuring at least one resident when her mobile home was destroyed, Edom fire chief Eddie Wood said.
In Missouri, floodwaters threatened earthen levees protecting thousands of homes, rising so fast in some places that panicked residents didn’t have time to pile up sandbags. Six people have died in floods.
The greatest flooding threat loomed in the southeastern Missouri community of Poplar Bluff, a town of 17,000 residents 209km south of St Louis. About 15cm of rain fell on Monday alone, bringing the four-day total to 38cm.
In another area near the confluence of the swollen Mississippi and Ohio rivers, authorities debated a desperate plan to use explosives to blow a 3.2km-wide hole through a levee to ease the pressure on others.
The latest round of storms began as communities in much of the region struggled with flooding and damage from earlier twisters. In Arkansas, a tornado smashed Vilonia, just north of Little Rock, on Monday night, ripping the roof off a grocery store, flattening homes and tossing vehicles into the air.
An early warning may have saved Lisa Watson’s life in that case. She packed up her three children and was speeding away from the Black Oak Ranch subdivision in Vilonia when she looked to her left and saw the twister approach.
Two of her neighbors died in their mobile homes and a visiting couple who took shelter in a metal shipping container where the husband stored tools died when the container was blown at least 45m into a creek.
Republican US lawmakers on Friday criticized US President Joe Biden’s administration after sanctioned Chinese telecoms equipment giant Huawei unveiled a laptop this week powered by an Intel artificial intelligence (AI) chip. The US placed Huawei on a trade restriction list in 2019 for contravening Iran sanctions, part of a broader effort to hobble Beijing’s technological advances. Placement on the list means the company’s suppliers have to seek a special, difficult-to-obtain license before shipping to it. One such license, issued by then-US president Donald Trump’s administration, has allowed Intel to ship central processors to Huawei for use in laptops since 2020. China hardliners
Conjoined twins Lori and George Schappell, who pursued separate careers, interests and relationships during lives that defied medical expectations, died this month in Pennsylvania, funeral home officials said. They were 62. The twins, listed by Guinness World Records as the oldest living conjoined twins, died on April 7 at the Hospital of the University of Pennsylvania, obituaries posted by Leibensperger Funeral Homes of Hamburg said. The cause of death was not detailed. “When we were born, the doctors didn’t think we’d make 30, but we proved them wrong,” Lori said in an interview when they turned 50, the Philadelphia Inquirer reported. The
RAMPAGE: A Palestinian man was left dead after dozens of Israeli settlers searching for a missing 14-year-old boy stormed a village in the Israeli-occupied West Bank US President Joe Biden on Friday said he expected Iran to attack Israel “sooner, rather than later” and warned Tehran not to proceed. Asked by reporters about his message to Iran, Biden simply said: “Don’t,” underscoring Washington’s commitment to defend Israel. “We are devoted to the defense of Israel. We will support Israel. We will help defend Israel and Iran will not succeed,” he said. Biden said he would not divulge secure information, but said his expectation was that an attack could come “sooner, rather than later.” Israel braced on Friday for an attack by Iran or its proxies as warnings grew of
IN PURSUIT: Israel’s defense minister said the revenge attacks by Israeli settlers would make it difficult for security forces to find those responsible for the 14-year-old’s death Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu on Saturday condemned the “heinous murder” of an Israeli teenager in the occupied West Bank as attacks on Palestinian villages intensified following news of his death. After Benjamin Achimeir, 14, was reported missing near Ramallah on Friday, hundreds of Jewish settlers backed by Israeli forces raided nearby Palestinian villages, torching vehicles and homes, leaving at least one villager dead and dozens wounded. The attacks escalated in several villages on Saturday after Achimeir’s body was found near the Malachi Hashalom outpost. Agence France-Presse correspondents saw smoke rising from burned houses and fields. Mayor Amin Abu Alyah, of the