Winds of more than 160 kilometers per hour passed through this state, leaving severe damage in their wake.
The state of Mississippi, in the southern United States, is preparing for new storms this Sunday, after several tornadoes devastated the region between Friday and Saturday and left at least 26 dead, a situation that led President Joe Biden to order the deployment of federal aid. area.
Winds of more than 160 kilometers per hour crossed this state in the southern United States leaving “devastating damage” in its wake, said the superintendent, Tate Reeves.
One of the preliminary hurricanes is classified as a category 4 (5 on the Fujita scale), according to the Mississippi State Emergency Service (Msema).
In Rolling Fork, a town of about 2,000 touched by that tornado Friday, the streets were a “war zone,” said John Brown, commander of the Alabama and Mississippi Cross.
Entire rows of houses have been torn from their foundations, the streets are littered with cement, and several cars appear on the roofs of the houses, as well as dragging trees, and entwined in metal trunks.
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On Saturday, aid began to be organized in this city. The American Red Cross has built a shop in the National Guard, where food, medicine and shelters arrive. Some traveled ten kilometers to help the victims.
Jon Gebhardt, a professor of military science at the University of Mississippi in Oxford, said he arrived in town late Friday, about a three-hour drive from Rolling Fork, to help mediate relief efforts. “I cried a lot” because of the “pain and anguish” of the residents, he said.
On Saturday night, electricians drove in vans across the city to try to restore power as quickly as possible. “We’re going to do everything we can to provide housing solutions and other means so that people can return to the city as soon as possible,” the officials said at a press conference in Rolling Fork.
The governor was accompanied by the Secretary of National Security, Alejandro Mayorkas, who said he saw the situation as “disturbing” and also mentioned climate change. “We are seeing extreme weather events increasing both in severity and frequency,” he noted.
And he added: “We will build our cities so that we are ready as soon as possible and we can respond to normality as soon as possible.”
President Joe Biden this Sunday ordered the deployment of federal aid, which was used to build temporary housing, repair others and provide soft loans to cover the damage to individual properties.
Biden evoked images of “misery” on Saturday and stated that the federal government will “do everything possible” for those affected “as long as necessary.”
According to Msema, new severe weather conditions are expected for this Sunday night. “Dangers of severe storms have been confirmed” in some regions of the country, he said, adding that “destructive winds and tornadoes are possible.”
