LITTLE ROCK, Ark. Another wave of severe storms struck a large swath of the United States and Canada, leading to flash flooding and water rescues on Wednesday in the Ozark Mountains, launching a destructive tornado that brought down a B-52 bomber from its base in upstate New York and stranding motorists in high waters around Toronto.
The relentless series of storms has caused deaths or damage from the Plains to New England this week. Hundreds of thousands of people lost power and air conditioning during days of sweltering heat.
Nearly 28 inches of rain fell overnight Wednesday in parts of the Ozarks, Arkansas and Missouri, the National Weather Service said.
At least 80 people had to evacuate a nursing home in Yellville, Arkansas, and were taken to a community center, said Lacey Kanipe, a spokeswoman for state emergency management. A section of a bridge was destroyed and a historic courthouse was flooded.
About 40 residents had to flee their homes in the town of Flippin, Kanipe said, and there was also a quick water rescue involving a recreational vehicle in neighboring Baxter County. There were no immediate reports of injuries from the floods.
Bill Scruggs and his crew at Wild Bill’s Outfitter, based south of Yellville, fought to save their canoes and kayaks from a sandbar on the Buffalo National River as waters rose quickly before dawn Wednesday.
“Right now, that gravel bar is 8 feet underwater and still rising,” Scruggs said.
Nearly five inches of rain fell overnight in the tourist hub of Branson, Missouri. Taney County Sheriff Brad Daniels said several campgrounds were evacuated and people had to be rescued from a flooded mobile home park in nearby Hollister.
Cities in upstate New York declared a state of emergency after a storm swept through Tuesday with high winds and spectacular lightning. A confirmed tornado in the city of Rome knocked over vehicles and left streets clogged with the remains of trees, power poles and electrical transformers.
The winds were strong enough to knock a tourist attraction, a B-52 bomber, off its pedestal at Griffiss Business and Technology Park. Steeples collapsed and roofs were destroyed at First Presbyterian Church and St. Mary’s Church, both built in the 1800s. St. Mary’s is not an active church and is privately owned.
“They are beautiful old churches. This breaks my heart,” Rome resident Barb Mulvey said on Facebook.
A Rome landmark, a mural of a figure on horseback from the Revolutionary War, was destroyed, along with the building where it was painted. All that was left was the image of a horse’s hoof.
Governor Kathy Hochul said it was “miraculous” that no one died in Rome, a city of 31,000 people. She visited the small city center on Wednesday and said 22 buildings were damaged or destroyed. She described trees “collapsed like toothpicks,” houses without roofs and mobile homes toppled over with people inside.
She marveled at the narrow escapes, including two children in a medical waiting room who emerged unharmed even though the building was partially “destroyed.”
Debris from the storm struck and killed an 82-year-old man who was outdoors about 30 miles away in Canastota, village administrator Jeremy Ryan said.
Trees fell on homes and cars Tuesday in Keene, New Hampshire, forcing some residents to evacuate. Around Toronto, flooding temporarily closed several major roads and left motorists stranded, The Canadian Press reported.
About 200,000 homes and businesses were without power Wednesday in northeastern U.S. states, according to PowerOutage.us. The East Coast, from Maine to the Carolinas, was warned about weather that could reach more than 100 degrees (37.8 Celsius) in some places.
A storm helped control a burned burning on a military bombing range in New Jersey as it rained half an inch, the state wildland fire service said.
This week’s bad weather hit the Chicago area especially hard. The weather service said it has confirmed 17 tornadoes that struck northern Illinois and northwestern Indiana, including 11 during a single period of extraordinary storms Monday night.
Utilities continued to restore power in the Midwest, where more than 100,000 homes and businesses in Illinois and Indiana still did not have electricity, according to PowerOutage.us.
In the US, the storms caused at least five deaths, including the one in New York. Flooding killed an 88-year-old couple in their car near Elsah, Illinois, on Tuesday, and a 76-year-old passenger in a pickup truck in Rockford, Illinois, on Sunday. A fallen tree killed a 44-year-old woman in Cedar Lake, Indiana, on Monday.
___
White reported from Detroit. Associated Press writers Karen Matthews in New York City, Anthony Izaguirre in Albany, New York, and Nick Perry in Boston contributed to this report.
This story originally appeared on ABCNews.go.com read the full story
