Two weak tornadoes touched down in Pike and Walthall counties during a burst of severe weather on Monday afternoon, a National Weather Service meteorologist in Slidell, La., confirmed this morning.
Meteorologist Freddie Zeigler said an EF-1 tornado touched down at 1:55 p.m. around Emerald State Line Road south of Highway 48 in Pike County and stayed on the ground for nine miles.
Zeigler said the twister went toward Love Creek Road, just north of Highway 48.
“Large trees were uprooted, some trees were snapped and several houses and mobiles homes were damaged,” he said.
The National Weather Service sent crews to assess the damage on Tuesday.
Zeigler said another weak EF-1 was also confirmed in Walthall County, five miles west of Tylertown and north of Highway 48.
“Some large trees were uprooted and snapped and power lines were damaged by trees,” Zeigler said.
This twister, which stayed on the ground for a mile with maximum winds of 95 miles per hour, occurred at 2 p.m.
Zeigler said it’s possible that the tornado that touched down in Pike County lifted up, picked up speed and regenerated in Walthall County.
“It’s probably the same storm, but not the same tornado,” he said, “There could have more damage but we didn’t have reports from Pike or Wathall civil defense directors.”
Both tornadoes were about 100 yards wide, Zeigler said.
He said it’s also possible other tornadoes touched down in Pike and Amite counties, but nothing has been confirmed so far.
Zeigler said the weather service is still gathering information about storms around the Terry’s Creek community and Gillsburg. The National Weather Service also received a report from Amite County Civil Defense Director Grant McCurley of a possible tornado on Thompson Road, where a 1:29 p.m. storm damaged several houses.
Zeigler said the next couple of days should be dry until Friday when there is a forecast of possible rain and other precipitation into Friday night.
In Tylertown, a storm spotter reported several trees down, roof damage to a home, a mobile home turned on its side and a blown-over fireworks stand, as well as damage to a building along Highway 48.
In Kentwood, La., some 100 to 200 trees were down, along with several powerlines. The roof of the Kentwood Hardware Store also suffered damage. Several are still without power from Monday’s storm.
Lucy Shell, the member services director with Magnolia Electric Power said around 10 a.m. today that the electric cooperative was still working to connect 122 customers, and that should be done by 5 this afternoon.
She said there were a lot of broken powerlines and trees down on powerlines. Magnolia Electric also reported that lines in Amite and Lincoln counties that had been energized lost power again.
“Irene Road in Amite County just went back out this morning. This is affecting around 50 members and also being worked on by crews. The 45 members that are experiencing outages are mostly in small pockets and are ones with broken poles attached to their outages, according to our Manager of Engineering and Operations,” the post states.
MEP had crews working well into the night to restore power to its customers. Entergy reports on its website that there are 15 outages reported and 554 people still affected in Walthall County.
