ENTERPRISE, Ala., 3 March 2007 — A violent storm system ripped apart an Alabama high school as students hunkered inside and later tore through Georgia, hitting a hospital and raising the death toll to at least 20 across the Midwest and Southeast.
Eight students died when a tornado struck Enterprise High School, Mayor Kenneth Boswell said yesterday. The teenage victims were all in a wing of the school that took a direct hit as the tornado blew out the walls and roof.
“It was in a split second that we sat down and started to cover ourselves before the storm hit,” said 17-year-old Kira Simpson, who lost four friends to the storm. “Glass was breaking. It was loud.”
“It’s like a bad dream. I have to keep reminding myself that it actually happened,” she said.
As the massive storm system swept into Georgia, another tornado apparently touched down near the Sumter Regional Hospital in Americus, 117 miles south of Atlanta, blowing out the windows, tossing cars into trees and killing at least two people, said Buzz Weiss of the Georgia Emergency Management Agency.
Doctors, nurses and volunteers had worked into the night to evacuate dozens of patients.
“It was controlled chaos,” said Dr. Tim Powell, an anesthesiologist.
Six more people were killed in the town of Newton, Georgia, including a child, and several homes were destroyed, Fire Chief Andy Belinc said early yesterday. “We’re still tying to assess everything,” Belinc said. Georgia’s governor declared a state of emergency.
The burst of tornadoes was part of a larger line of thunderstorms and snowstorms that stretched from Minnesota to the Gulf Coast. Authorities blamed tornadoes for the deaths of a 7-year-old girl in Missouri, 10 people in Alabama and nine in Georgia, and twisters also damaged homes in Kansas.
Early yesterday, the storm was drenching the Carolinas. A tornado warning was posted through late morning for the North Carolina coast. In South Carolina, the Coast Guard prepared to search for six people on a small boat who sent a distress call during the storm saying they were taking on water off the coast. The strong wind made it difficult to get a helicopter up yesterday to search, Petty Officer 1st Class Donnie Brzuska.
In all, the National Weather Service received 31 reports of tornadoes Thursday from Missouri, Illinois, Alabama, Georgia and Florida, plus a report yesterday of a waterspout near Cartaret, N.C.
The normal peak tornado season is April and May, but weather service meteorologist Dennis Feltgen said tornadoes can occur at any time.
At Enterprise High School, officials had been watching the storm Thursday as it swept through southern Missouri and headed into Alabama. The students were preparing to leave for the day when the sirens started up and the lights went out.
Teacher Grannison Wagstaff was with them. “I said ‘Here it comes. Hit the deck,” he told CBS’s “The Early Show” yesterday. “I turned around and I could actually see the tornado coming toward me.”
