Terrified Texans woke to the sound of tornado sirens last night as the latest in a series of brutal storms battered the Lone Star State, leaving a trail of destruction and damage.
The storms are the latest in a series to have tortured several states in recent weeks, with 24 people now dead as a result.
In Texas, ‘extreme’ hail rained down in some cities while others were under a constant barrage of rain – threatening to disrupt the primary runoff election which decides which Democrats and Republicans will run for various seats in November.
Many Texans took to social media to share their fears, likening it to the ‘end of the world’ while cowering under tables and saying prayers.
The death toll of 22 also included seven deaths in Cooke County, Texas, from a tornado on Saturday that tore through a mobile home park, officials said, and eight deaths across Arkansas.
Astonishing footage also showed an American Airlines Boeing-737 being rotated by severe gusts of wind at Dallas Fort Worth Airport. Luckily no-one was injured.
Meanwhile, HGTV stars Jenny and Dave Marrs described hiding in a ‘small closet’ from the barrage with their five kids and four pets as their holiday getaway in Arkansas turned into a nightmare.
The Fixer to Fabulous hosts were vacationing at a cabin in Rogers, which was the epicenter for one of the tornadoes, and Jenny revealed they felt grateful to have survived.
‘A tornado went through our town last night. A tree is on our neighbor’s house and our power is out,’ she wrote on Instagram.
‘We are barricaded in by trees in the road. But we are safe. The Memorial Weekend getaway we planned as a family didn’t quite turn out the way we had hoped but, again, we are safe. Nothing else matters.’
The TV star described sitting in a ‘tiny closet’ with seven people, two dogs, a bearded dragon and a lamb as they ‘prayed aloud while the storm passed through’, while their five-year-old son Luke vomited twice out of fear.
After weathering the storm through the night, they woke to find a tree had fallen on their truck and power lines had been struck down all around them.
‘We are all a little shaken up this morning and sections of our beloved area are destroyed,’ Jenny wrote.
Texans also described the storm as ‘crazy’ on social media, with one person saying they ‘witnessed water going horizontal with a jet engine noise’.
Another resident admitted they were ‘crouched’ under furniture in their kitchen while the storm raged around their home.
Two people died in Mayes County, Oklahoma, which is east of Tulsa, authorities said. The injured included guests at an outdoor wedding.
The tiny Kentucky town of Charleston took a direct hit on Sunday night from a tornado that the governor said appeared to be on the ground for 40 miles.
‘It’s a big mess,’ said Rob Linton, who lives in Charleston and is the fire chief of nearby Dawson Springs, hit by a tornado in 2021.
‘Trees down everywhere. Houses moved. Power lines are down. No utilities whatsoever – no water, no power.’
More than 744,000 households suffered power cuts in Texas on Tuesday, according to Poweroutage.us, including 600,000 in Dallas Fort-Worth, as power lines were blown down and some were hit by trees.
More than 100 polling stations in Dallas were without power as of midday Tuesday, and officials are advising anyone whose local station is out to try the next nearest station.
In Kentucky, 81,000 have lost connection, 41,000 in Arkansas, 22,000 in West Virginia and 21,000 in Missouri. Twelve states also reported at least 10,000 outages earlier in the day.
In Dallas, county officials have issued a disaster declaration over the power outage situation. Dallas County Judge Clay Jenkins posted on X Tuesday that he anticipates a ‘multi day power outage for a significant number of Oncor customers.
Further east, some rural areas of Hopkins County hit by the 2021 tornado around the community of Barnsley were damaged again on Sunday night, said county emergency management director Nick Bailey.
‘There were a lot of people that were just getting their lives put back together and then this,’ Bailey said. ‘Almost the same spot, the same houses and everything.’
Texans on social media shared videos of their hometowns being hit by constant lightning strikes as tornado sirens rang out.
Videos of violent flashes punctuating surreal purple skies flooded social media as people said they had ‘never seen anything like this’.
Meanwhile, motorists in Dallas captured torrents of floodwater turning roads into rivers as rain lashed at their vehicles.
Further north in Carrollton, residents shared videos of torrential rain being blown in all directions across their balcony as gale-force winds whipped it into terrifying motion.
Others shared videos of what looked like fire raining down as tornadoes whipped lampposts and tore electricity lines down.
The eye-watering damage caused by a tornado in Valley View, Texas
Homes were obliterated in Valley View, Texas, by the storm which ripped through the Lone Star State over Memorial Day weekend
President Joe Biden sent condolences to the families of people who died.
He said the Federal Emergency Management Agency is on the ground conducting damage assessments and he has contacted governors to see what federal support they might need..
It has been a grim month of tornadoes and severe weather in the nation’s midsection.
April had the second highest number of tornadoes on record in the country.
Harold Brooks, a senior scientist at the National Severe Storms Laboratory in Norman, said a persistent pattern of warm, moist air is to blame for the string of tornadoes over the past two months.
That warm moist air is at the northern edge of a heat dome bringing temperatures typically seen at the height of summer to late May.