By Le Figaro with AFP
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A violent tornado hit Little Rock, the big city in the state of Arkansas, in the southern United States on Friday March 31, causing significant damage according to the authorities.
“Extensive damage has occurred in central Arkansas”said Governor Sarah Huckabee Sanders on Twitter, who declared a state of emergency in her state. “I pray for those who were and remain in the path of this storm”, she added. Little Rock Mayor Frank Scott announced in a tweet that he asked the governor for help from the National Guard after a “devastating tornado.”
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No human toll was immediately communicated by the authorities. The UAMS university hospital told AFP that it had placed itself on first level alert, expecting to receive many victims. Rescue services “have difficulty reaching people due to falling trees”said a spokeswoman for the hospital reached by telephone.
A “major weather event”
Videos of local journalists shared on social networks show a vast swirling black mass tearing the sky of this agglomeration of 200,000 inhabitants. Some 70,000 people are without electricity in Arkansas, according to the specialized site PowerOutage.us. The American weather services (NWS) had warned a few hours earlier of the imminence of a “major weather event” In the region.
Tornadoes, a meteorological phenomenon as impressive as they are difficult to predict, are common in the United States, especially in the center and south of the country. A week ago, a tornado swept through Mississippi, killing 25 people and causing extensive property damage. President Joe Biden visited the site on Friday. As of December 2021, around 80 people had lost their lives after tornadoes hit Kentucky.
