A day after parts of the Midwest and the South were bombarded with severe thunderstorms, hail and tornadoes, another round of storms — and life-threatening flash flooding — has been forecast for the region.
At least seven people were killed — four in Michigan, two in Indiana and one in Oklahoma — after a severe winter storm brought heavy rain, strong winds and tornadoes to St. Landry Parish, Louisiana, and Maury County, Tennessee, on Monday. The deaths in Indiana include an 84-year-old man who died after a buggy flipped over in heavy winds, according to the Elkhart County Sheriff’s Office.
Residents in the Salina, Kansas, area were warned to shelter in place Tuesday night after spotters located a tornado on the ground southwest of the city, the National Weather Service said.
The weather service office in Topeka, about 100 miles east of Salina, warned that a string thunderstorms were possible overnight.
“Storms will move east with time, eventually exiting into Missouri around sunrise,” it said on X. “The main severe threat will transition to damaging wind gusts.”
In Kay County, Oklahoma, hail the size of hen eggs — about 2 inches in diameter — was reported, the weather service said.
The severe weather Wednesday will include flash flooding, strong tornadoes and hail 2 inches in diameter, putting 71 million people at risk from central Michigan to northern Texas, including Little Rock, Arkansas; Memphis and Nashville, Tennessee; Shreveport, Louisiana; St. Louis; Chicago; Indianapolis; and Louisville, Kentucky. The highest severe threat Wednesday will be to the mid-Mississippi Valley region.
This multi-day flash flood event is likely to last through Sunday. Around 26 million people are already under flood watches stretching from the Ark-La-Tex (where Arkansas, Louisiana and Texas join together) to central Ohio
