BY BRUCE SCHREINER, JULIO CORTEZ AND KEN MILLER, ASSOCIATED PRESS

The storms spawned a tornado that overturned heavy recreational vehicles and shut down an interstate near Dallas.

A series of powerful storms swept over the central and southern U.S. over the Memorial Day holiday weekend, killing at least 21 people and leaving a wide trail of destroyed homes, businesses and power outages.

In North Texas, seven people died in Cooke County from a Saturday tornado that tore through a mobile home park, officials said. Two people also died in Mayes County, Oklahoma, east of Tulsa, authorities said. More deaths were reported in Arkansas and Kentucky.

More than 600,000 customers across the eastern U.S. were without power Monday morning, including more than 170,000 in Kentucky. Twelve states reported at least 10,000 outages, according to PowerOutage.us.

The area on highest alert for severe weather Monday is a broad swath of the eastern U.S., from Alabama to New York.

The destructive storms began Saturday night and included a tornado that overturned heavy recreational vehicles and shut down an interstate near Dallas. Officials said multiple people were transported to hospitals by ambulance and helicopter in the Texas county of Denton but did not immediately know the full extent of injuries.

Forecasters had issued tornado and severe thunderstorm warnings for parts of Texas and Oklahoma, as some heat records were broken during the day in South Texas and residents received triple-digit temperature warnings over the long holiday weekend.

In Arkansas, damaged buildings, uprooted trees and downed power lines were reported across the northwest edge of the state. Tens of thousands of homes and businesses reported power outages. Benton County Judge Barry Moehring confirmed one death.

The destruction continued a grim month of deadly severe weather in the U.S.

Tornadoes in Iowa this week left at least five people dead and dozens injured. The deadly twisters have spawned during a historically bad season in the country for tornadoes, at a time when climate change is heightening the severity of storms around the world. April had the second-highest number of tornadoes on record in the country.

Late Saturday, a tornado crossed into northern Denton County in Texas and overturned tractor-trailer trucks, stopping traffic on Interstate 35, Denton County Community Relations Director Dawn Cobb said in a statement.

The tornado was confirmed near Valley View, moving east at 40 mph, prompting the National Weather Service to issue a tornado warning for northern Denton County, Cobb said.

The storm damaged homes, overturned motorhomes and knocked down power lines and trees throughout the area including points in Sanger, Pilot Point, Ray Roberts Lake and Isle du Bois State Park, Cobb said.

People who suffered injuries in the storm were transported to area hospitals by ground and air ambulances, but the number of injuries in the county was not immediately known, Cobb said, while a shelter was opened in Sanger.

The fire department in the city of Denton, about 37 miles north of Fort Worth, posted on X that emergency personnel were responding to a marina “for multiple victims, some reported trapped.”

The Claremore, Oklahoma, police announced on social media that the city about 28 miles east of Tulsa was “shut down” as a result of storm damage including downed power lines and trees and inaccessible roads.

Earlier Saturday night, the National Weather Service’s office in Norman, Oklahoma, said via the social platform X that the warning was for northern Noble and far southern Kay counties, an area located to the north of Oklahoma City. “If you are in the path of this storm, take cover now!” it said.

This article originally appeared in The Texas Tribune at https://www.texastribune.org/2024/05/27/texas-panhandle-wildfires-preparedness/.

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