Several tornadoes hit the Southeast Sunday afternoon, killing at least 22\u00a0people in one Alabama county on the USA’s deadliest day for tornadoes in almost 6 years.<\/p>\n
The death\u00a0count\u00a0could rise, Lee County Sheriff Jay Jones told local station WSFA\u00a0as people are still reported missing. Emergency management officials said crews are searching through debris in the county, about 60 miles\u00a0east of Montgomery, where at least one tornado\u00a0destroyed multiple homes.<\/p>\n
The tornado wrecked an area several miles long and a fourth-of-a-mile wide, Jones told WRBL-TV.\u00a0Numerous injuries were reported in the community of Beauregard, emergency management spokesperson\u00a0Rita Smith said, where two deaths were confirmed. Details about the deaths were not immediately available.\u00a0<\/p>\n
More than 40 patients went to East Alabama Medical Center, the hospital said<\/a>.\u00a0Debris also closed part of Highway 431, according to the Alabama Department of Transportation. After issuing a state of emergency for severe weather on Feb. 23,\u00a0Governor Kay Ivey extended<\/a>\u00a0it statewide Sunday night.\u00a0<\/p>\n Sunday was also the USA’s\u00a0deadliest March day for tornadoes since March 2, 2012, when 40 died.<\/p>\n As of late Sunday, there were 26 reports of tornadoes in the South, according to preliminary data from the Storm Prediction Center.\u00a0<\/p>\n Damaging tornadoes also hit Georgia on Sunday afternoon, AccuWeather\u00a0said. Powerful winds or a tornado destroyed several mobile homes in rural\u00a0Talbotton 80 miles from Atlanta, said\u00a0Ann Erenheim,\u00a0director of the Talbot County Emergency Management Agency.<\/p>\n Six to eight people sustained minor\u00a0injuries,\u00a0Ereheim said, but there were no known fatalities. \u00a0<\/p>\n Several people were trapped in their homes in Cairo following another tornado, local reports said. Near Macon, severe weather snapped power poles and destroyed a barn a\u00a0Peach County Emergency Management Agency spokesperson said.\u00a0<\/p>\n In the\u00a0Florida panhandle, the National Weather Service said another tornado toppled trees and stopped traffic on part of Interstate 10. Weather service meteorologist Don Harrigan said tornadoes also touched the ground in Alabama’s Geneva and Henry Counties.\u00a0<\/p>\n The tornado that hit Lee County, Alabama, was the USA’s deadliest single tornado since April 27, 2014 when a tornado struck Vilonia, Arkansas.\u00a0<\/p>\n It was also Alabama’s deadliest tornado day since the infamous April 27, 2011 outbreak.<\/p>\n