The Latest: Police release names of tornado vicitms
(AP) – The Latest on a destructive storm that killed four, injured dozens and left a path of destruction from Southside Virginia to the Northern Neck:
4:45 p.m.:
The National Weather Service reports that a tornado that ripped through Essex County packed winds of up to 140 mph.
A survey team from the weather service on Thursday rated the twister an EF3. Its path from Virginia’s Middle Peninsula through the Northern Neck totaled 28 miles, with an average width of 200 yards.
Meteorologists said the tornado’s peak intensity occurred in Essex County, one of the hardest-hit localities in Virginia. Dozens of homes were destroyed or seriously damaged, while two dozen people were injured, a few seriously.
The weather service has already confirmed tornadoes in Waverly and Appomattox, the two other storm-ravaged locations in the state.
Four people were killed Wednesday when a series of twisters hit the state.
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3:10 p.m.
Virginia State Police have released the names of the three people who were killed when a tornado demolished a mobile home in Waverly.
Police said in a news release Thursday that the victims were 50-year-old Larry D. Turner, 26-year-old Devine J. Springfield and 2-year-old Ivan T. Lewis. Police said the toddler’s 30-year-old mother also was in the trailer and is in the hospital.
Authorities did not disclose other relationships. A neighbor, Timothy Williams, said the woman was Turner’s girlfriend and Springfield’s brother.
Gov. Terry McAuliffe met privately with several relatives of the victims. He said the family lost everything and does not have money to bury the child.
A deputy sheriff held reporters at bay as the family members left the meeting. The deputy said they did not want to talk to the press.
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2:45 p.m.:
Gov. Terry McAuliffe is amid a tour of the hardest hit areas from a series of twisters that left a path of destruction and death in Virginia.
Thursday, he met with several relatives of the three people killed in Waverly. The victims include two men and a boy, 2. They haven’t been identified.
McAuliffe met with family members, who he said lost everything in the tornado. They don’t have money to bury the child.
Earlier Thursday in Appomattox County, the governor said he saw “a tremendous amount of devastation.”
In Appomattox County, one person died and seven were hospitalized.
The governor said he expected the storm damage to top the $11 million threshold for a federal disaster declaration. That frees up low-interest loans for rebuilding.
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1:15 p.m.:
Officials have identified the victim of a tornado in Appomattox County as a 78-year-old man.
Sheriff Barry Letterman told a news conference Thursday that Edward Keith Harris was found outside his home in Evergreen late Wednesday.
Seven other people were hospitalized after the tornado damaged dozens of structures in its path.
Three people died in Waverly in a separate tornado Wednesday. The Sussex County Sheriff’s Office has not released their identities.
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12:45 p.m.
The National Weather Service has confirmed that two more tornados touched down in Virginia during a burst of severe weather that raked various locations around the state.
Meteorologist Mike Rusnak said a survey crew assessed the damage in Essex County and confirmed Thursday that a twister had touched down a day earlier. The tornado left a massive path of destruction, damaging dozens of homes and injuring at least two dozen people, two critically.
Meteorologist Jake Ruckman says crews confirmed that a tornado touched down in Appomattox, leaving an 8- to 10-mile path of debris, injuring seven people and killing one man.
A tornado had already been confirmed in Waverly, where three were killed on Wednesday. Rusnak says that tornado was rated an EF1, with wind speeds of 100 to 110 mph. He says its path was 9 miles long and 300 yards wide.
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12:15 p.m.:
National Guard troops and state emergency response officials are in Essex County after a tornado left dozens of homes destroyed and seriously damaged and injured 20 to 25 people.
Stanley Langford, the chairman of the Board of Supervisors, said Thursday that he has lived in the Northern Neck farming community all of his 51 years and never has seen so much devastation. But he added, “we will survive.”
He said some residents had to be rescued from their battered homes late Thursday. There are no reports Thursday of missing residents.
Gov. Terry McAuliffe was due in Tappahannock later Thursday, one in a series of stops he was making around the state to size up the destruction.
Langford said he had nothing but praise for the state’s response to the storm.
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12 p.m.:
The National Weather Service is assessing more than a half-dozen suspected tornadoes in Virginia after a severe series of storms left four dead, dozens injured and scattered areas of destruction.
The lone confirmed tornado Wednesday was the twister that ripped through Waverly, a small farming town in southeastern Virginia where three were killed.
Weather service crews are fanning out Thursday to the Richmond area, Southside Virginia, Appomattox County and the Northern Neck to seek signs of tornadoes.
Meteorologist Mike Rusnak says they’re looking for trees snapped like twigs, the track of a storm and what type of damage buildings sustained.
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11 a.m.:
One day after Virginia was battered by at least one tornado, Gov. Terry McAuliffe is heading out to three of the hardest-hit regions of the state to assess the destruction.
McAuliffe’s first stop Thursday is Appomattox, where one of the state’s four storm deaths was recorded. A funnel cloud left an 8- to 10-mile path of debris, injuring seven people.
McAuliffe’s next stop is Waverly, where three people were killed as a tornado carved a 5-mile path of destruction.
The governor’s final stop is Tappahannock. At least 15 structures were destroyed and 25 injured when the storm passed through Essex County and the town of Tappahannock.
McAuliffe declared a state of emergency within hours after the destruction in Waverly.
