Clean up efforts have started in several US states which endured destructive storms that killed more than 40 people over the weekend.
The massive storm system in question swept across at least eight states in the south and midwest over the weekend, with multiple tornadoes, wildfires and dust storms hunkering down on the region, destroying thousands of businesses and homes.
The governors of Arkansas, Georgia and Oklahoma each declared a state of emergency over the weekend in the wake of the storm. Red flag warnings still remain for states in the midwest and south, including Texas and Oklahoma, meaning those states are still at risk of high, dry winds that could lead to wildfires.
There were 96 tornadoes reported in the region on Friday and Saturday, according to the National Weather Center’s Storm Prediction Center.
The death toll from the storm continued to go up on Sunday after two children were killed in Transylvania county, North Carolina, after a tree fell through their family’s trailer.
Missouri has the highest death toll, with 12 dead from tornadoes and wildfires that hit the state. At the storm’s peak, more than 140,000 homes and businesses lost power. As of Monday morning, more than 20,000 customers in the state were still without power.
In a statement on Sunday Mike Kehoe, Missouri’s governor, said that “the scale of devastation across our state is staggering”.
Hurricane-force winds in Texas and Oklahoma led to wildfires that spread in multiple communities across the two states. In Oklahoma, at least 130 wildfires had been reported in the state by Friday, with the dry, powerful gusts setting large swaths of land aflame. A ranch outside of Oklahoma City owned by governor Kevin Stitt was burned in one of the wildfires.
In a video taken for social media, Stitt showed the remains of his ranch, saying that he is “rebuilding with all of Oklahoma”.
“You never think it’s going to happen to your place, and these wildfires just come out of nowhere and can really take over,” Stitt said.
In Kansas, at least eight people died after a 70-vehicle pileup on an interstate highway during a dust storm Friday afternoon that led to near-zero visibility on the roads.
On the Louisiana-Mississippi border, two powerful tornadoes formed concurrently and took the same path, ultimately leaving three dead in Tylertown, Mississippi, a town of under 2,000 people.
William Shultz of Tylertown told NBC News that he was “holding my wife to my chest and just watching everything disappear and watching everything get ripped out away from me”, he said. “I’m just thankful to be alive.”
In a post on Truth Social Sunday, Donald Trump said that the National Guard has been deployed to Arkansas, where tornados have left three dead. The president also said: “my administration is ready to assist state and local officials as they help their communities to try and recover from the damage”.
Trump’s statement notably lacked any mention of help from the Federal Emergency management Agency (Fema), which helps with disaster reliefs after severe weather events. The president and Elon Musk, the head of the so-called “department of government efficiency” (Doge) and the architect behind the mass government layoffs, have come under criticism for laying off workers in agencies like Fema.
Advocacy groups have pointed out that it appears hundreds of Fema employees have been terminated over the last few weeks. In January, after being sworn into office, Trump floated the idea of scrapping Fema completely, calling it “very bureaucratic” and “very slow”.
