Four people were killed, roofs were ripped from homes and churches and trees were torn from the earth early on Saturday when a tornado hitting in the dark of night ripped through a region in southern Mississippi, officials said.

Four people died after the twister blew through the city of Hattiesburg and its surrounding area, said Forrest County coroner Butch Benedict. The twister was part of a wall of stormy weather traveling across the region, bringing with it rain and unstable conditions.

Authorities did not immediately release the names of the four people who died. But at least one family had already received the terrible news. Monica McCarty said her father died in the same trailer park where she and her boyfriend live and her son was apparently crushed to death while in bed at her mother’s house, where he lived.

 

Standing amid the carnage the tornado had wrought, McCarty wept as her boyfriend, Tackeem Molley, comforted her.

“They couldn’t get him out of the house. They said he was laying in the bed,” McCarty said of her son.

Molley said he and McCarty were in a trailer when the storm hit. Molley, whose bare foot was bandaged, said he climbed out through a hole in what had either been the trailer’s roof or wall.

“I had a little hole I could squeeze out of,” he said.

In the surrounding neighborhood, power company trucks were running up and down the streets. A city backhoe was plowing debris from the road. Dozens of homes were damaged.

Sheet metal was strewn everywhere. Trees turned into spindly sticks were lying across power lines and the roar of chain saws could be heard. At least three churches had sustained damage.Mayor Johnny DuPree has signed an emergency declaration for the city, which reported “significant injuries” and structural damage.

The search for the dead and injured continued as the sun rose. More than 40 firefighters from across Mississippi gathered outside Hattiesburg police headquarters to search. Equipped with dogs and all-terrain vehicles, they were planning a grid search from police headquarters to nearby William Carey University in one of the most heavily damaged areas.

On Bernice Avenue south of downtown Hattiesburg, Edna Smith was surveying what was left of the tan brick house she has lived in since 2005.

Her parrots had been spared but the tornado ripped off most of her roof, dumping it in the backyard and alley behind her house. Her neighbor’s porch roof blew into her carport, slamming her car into a brick wall.

“It woke me up and half the roof was gone,” said Smith, who moved to Hattiesburg after Hurricane Katrina displaced her from her suburban New Orleans home in 2005. Rain cascaded on to the roofless house, turning wallboard into mud and soaking upholstered furniture.

“I don’t know what I’m going to do now. I’m going to try to get some help,” she said.

Hours after the tornado, authorities were still concerned about downed power lines and possible gas leaks and were encouraging people to stay home, said Hattiesburg police lieutenant Allen Murray.

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