Rain-swollen rivers flooded regions throughout the Midwest on Monday even as residents assessed damage from pounding weekend storms, including tornadoes that ravaged parts of Nebraska.
More tornadoes touched down late Monday in Oklahoma, Nebraska, Missouri and Kansas. Four were reported in or near Chillicothe, Mo., and a hospital said it was treating a number of injured.
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Stormy Weather
While flooding plagued many Midwest states, several more tornadoes were reported Monday in Nebraska’s Nuckolls and Thayer counties, including one that cut a three-mile path and destroyed farm machinery. Saturday storms in Nebraska killed a 73-year-old Hallam woman, injured 37 others, destroyed 158 homes and damaged at least 57 others in Lancaster, Saline, Gage and Cass counties. |
State police in tornado-flattened Hallam, Neb., began allowing residents and repair workers back into town – only to order them out again before tornadoes were reported Monday night.
“It’s just about a total loss,” said Millie Schuster, whose possessions were reduced to an heirloom clock, the family Bible and a closet full of clothes.
Piles of corn covered the streets of Hallam, a village of 276 where earlier Monday the sounds of chain saws, electric generators and heavy equipment filled the air.
“I don’t think there’s a habitable structure – maybe one house,” said Chief Deputy Sheriff Bill Jarrett of Lancaster County.
Nebraska Gov. Mike Johanns has requested a presidential disaster declaration for 10 Nebraska counties.
In the northern Illinois community of Gurnee, residents Monday battled the rising waters of the Des Plaines River in what threatened to become the town’s worst flood in two decades.
The floodwaters forced schools to close for more than 2,000 youngsters, and homes and businesses filled with water.
Flooding also was a problem in Indiana, where storms beginning Friday produced a string of 19 tornadoes, hail, high winds and heavy rains. As much as 9 inches fell over the weekend near Ames.
Indiana Gov. Tom Vilsack asked for a federal disaster declaration covering 17 counties.
Several thousand Ohioans remained without power Monday after weekend thunderstorms, and more storms caused new outages. Several schools in central Ohio were closed because they lacked electricity.
More than 20 counties in southeastern and east-central sections of Lower Michigan were under flood warnings Monday. The storms that began Friday knocked out power to at least 510,000 Michigan homes and businesses, as many as 69,000 of which remained without power Monday evening.
In Rochester, N.Y., lightning ignited a natural gas line, shooting flames 20 feet into the air, and thousands of homes had no electricity after thunderstorms laid a trail of damage across upstate New York.
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