A monster storm system on Friday tore through the US South and Midwest, spawning deadly tornadoes that shredded homes and shopping centers in Arkansas, collapsed a theater roof during a heavy metal concert in Illinois and made a deadly sweep across the border into rural Indiana.
The dead included four in the small town of Wynne, Arkansas, Cross County Coroner Eli Long told KAIT-TV.
The storm caused three deaths in Sullivan County, Indiana, county Emergency Management Agency Director Jim Pirtle said in an e-mail early yesterday.
Photo: AFP
It damaged homes and some residents were missing in Sullivan.
At least one person was killed and more than two dozen were hurt, some critically, in the Little Rock area, authorities said.
“This was actually an incredibly devastating tornado,” witness Lara Farrar said.
She said she drove to West Little Rock and got out of her car at a blocked intersection.
“I was basically in total shock because the neighborhood had been basically completely wiped out and destroyed,” Farrar said. “Some of the buildings had the roof completely blown off.”
Officials in Pulaski County confirmed a death in North Little Rock.
The town of Wynne in northeastern Arkansas was also devastated, and officials reported two dead there, along with destroyed homes and people trapped in the debris.
Authorities said a theater roof collapsed during a tornado in Belvidere, Illinois, killing one person and injuring 28, five of them severely.
The Belvidere Police Department said the collapse occurred as a heavy storm rolled through the area and that calls began coming from the theater at 7:48pm, and the initial assessment was that a tornado had caused the damage.
The collapse occurred at the Apollo Theatre during a heavy metal concert while 260 people were in the venue, Belvidere Fire Department Chief Shawn Schadle said.
He said first responders also rescued someone from an elevator and had to grapple with downed power lines outside the theater.
Belvidere Police Chief Shane Woody described the scene after the collapse as “chaos, absolute chaos.”
Gabrielle Lewellyn had just entered the theater when a portion of the ceiling collapsed.
“I was there within a minute before it came down,” she told WTVO-TV. “The winds, when I was walking up to the building, it went like from zero to a thousand within five seconds.”
There were more confirmed twisters in Iowa and wind-whipped grass fires blazed in Oklahoma, as the storm system threatened a broad swath of the country home to about 85 million people.
Additional reporting by AFP
People can preregister to receive their NT$10,000 (US$325) cash distributed from the central government on Nov. 5 after President William Lai (賴清德) yesterday signed the Special Budget for Strengthening Economic, Social and National Security Resilience, the Executive Yuan told a news conference last night. The special budget, passed by the Legislative Yuan on Friday last week with a cash handout budget of NT$236 billion, was officially submitted to the Executive Yuan and the Presidential Office yesterday afternoon. People can register through the official Web site at https://10000.gov.tw to have the funds deposited into their bank accounts, withdraw the funds at automated teller
PEACE AND STABILITY: Maintaining the cross-strait ‘status quo’ has long been the government’s position, the Ministry of Foreign Affairs said Taiwan is committed to maintaining the cross-strait “status quo” and seeks no escalation of tensions, the Ministry of Foreign Affairs (MOFA) said yesterday, rebutting a Time magazine opinion piece that described President William Lai (賴清德) as a “reckless leader.” The article, titled “The US Must Beware of Taiwan’s Reckless Leader,” was written by Lyle Goldstein, director of the Asia Program at the Washington-based Defense Priorities think tank. Goldstein wrote that Taiwan is “the world’s most dangerous flashpoint” amid ongoing conflicts in the Middle East and Russia’s invasion of Ukraine. He said that the situation in the Taiwan Strait has become less stable
CONCESSION: A Shin Kong official said that the firm was ‘willing to contribute’ to the nation, as the move would enable Nvidia Crop to build its headquarters in Taiwan Shin Kong Life Insurance Co (新光人壽) yesterday said it would relinquish land-use rights, or known as surface rights, for two plots in Taipei’s Beitou District (北投), paving the way for Nvidia Corp to expand its office footprint in Taiwan. The insurer said it made the decision “in the interest of the nation’s greater good” and would not seek compensation from taxpayers for potential future losses, calling the move a gesture to resolve a months-long impasse among the insurer, the Taipei City Government and the US chip giant. “The decision was made on the condition that the Taipei City Government reimburses the related
FRESH LOOK: A committee would gather expert and public input on the themes and visual motifs that would appear on the notes, the central bank governor said The central bank has launched a comprehensive redesign of New Taiwan dollar banknotes to enhance anti-counterfeiting measures, improve accessibility and align the bills with global sustainability standards, Governor Yang Chin-long (楊金龍) told a meeting of the legislature’s Finance Committee yesterday. The overhaul would affect all five denominations — NT$100, NT$200, NT$500, NT$1,000 and NT$2,000 notes — but not coins, Yang said. It would be the first major update to the banknotes in 24 years, as the current series, introduced in 2001, has remained in circulation amid rapid advances in printing technology and security standards. “Updating the notes is essential to safeguard the integrity
RSS