Rescuers are scouring wreckage in Mississippi for survivors of deadly tornadoes that tore through the southern US state, killing at least 10 people and destroying dozens of homes.
The National Guard fanned out across affected areas, using Humvees to reach hard-hit Yazoo County, nestled in hills that rise sharply out of the Mississippi Delta. Others surveyed the damage from Blackhawk helicopters.
Officials said three children aged three months, nine and 14 were among the dead in Choctaw County.
The toll could well mount as rescuers clear the debris from Saturday's storms, which tore roofs off buildings, reduced homes to splinters, overturned vehicles, downed power lines and toppled trees onto the roads.
Mississippi Governor Haley Barbour teared up as he described the damage in his hometown of Yazoo City.
"It reminds me of (Hurricane) Katrina," he said, describing the tornado as "enormous."
"By God's grace, it did not go into the central part of the city or the most populated areas," Barbour told reporters, although cautioning that some were still trapped inside their homes.
"There are a number of businesses that have been destroyed, others that have been severely damaged, there are churches that have been obliterated," Barbour said. "There are many, many homes that are damaged, some that are destroyed."
The Mississippi Emergency Management Agency has already counted nearly 200 homes damaged by the storm, and Barbour said at least 21 locals who sustained injuries had been ferried to nearby hospitals in helicopters or ambulances.
Survivors told dramatic stories of narrow escapes from tornadoes that were up to a mile (1.6 kilometers) wide and packed winds of nearly 165 miles per hour, according to meteorologists.
Sandra Grayson, who was sitting on her front porch just outside Yazoo City when she saw a tornado come tearing over a nearby hill, ran and hid inside her bathroom.
"I could hear all around me the trees twisting and swaying," she told The Clarion-Ledger newspaper. "I asked God to hug us because it was like you could just tell you were looking in the eyes of death."
The federal government and the American Red Cross dispatched rescue teams to the disaster zone.
Tarps, meals and water were being distributed as officials called for volunteers to help coordinate efforts in Yazoo City to remove fallen trees, splintered homes and other debris.
Electricity company Entergy said the tornado "caused widespread damage to Entergy facilities," leaving hundreds without power.
The storms began early Saturday in neighboring Louisiana, later cutting west to east across Mississippi, leaving a trail of death and destruction in their wake.
The severe weather also dumped hail the size of tennis balls in Mississippi's southern Lowndes County, according to the National Weather Service.
The storms stretched through a broad area from Missouri to the Florida Panhandle, causing more than two dozen twisters to develop in Louisiana, Arkansas and Alabama.
Counting the cost of the disaster would be a big challenge, Mississippi Emergency Management Agency spokesman Jeff Rent said.
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