Severe weather threatened more than 45 million Americans on Easter Sunday, as a treacherous string of thunderstorms continued to strike parts of the southern and midwestern United States, causing flooding and at times tornado risks across a substantial block of the country from East Texas to southeastern Iowa and Illinois. In Oklahoma, people braced for more rain after a deluge turned deadly earlier in the weekend.
Two people, including a child, died Saturday night because of flooding in Moore, Oklahoma, which is a suburb outside Oklahoma City, police said. The adult woman and 12-year-old boy were inside a vehicle that was among about a dozen stuck in high water, while heavy rainfall inundated the area and, in some places, flowed up and over the curbs, according to the Moore Police Department.
One of the vehicles left the flooded road and was swept under a bridge. Police said all of its occupants were rescued except for the woman and boy, who were later found dead.
“This was a historical weather event that impacted roads and resulted in dozens of high-water incidents across the city,” said Moore Police in a statement. “The Moore Police Department would like to extend a thank you to our neighboring agencies who assisted in rescue efforts. Our thoughts and prayers go out to the family and friends of the victims.”
Moore Police had launched a search for the people washed away in floodwaters, sending dive teams, ground crews and drones to probe a creek running under the bridge after their truck slid beneath it, CBS News affiliate KWTV reported. With the vehicle pinned under the bridge and two occupants missing, dramatic video shared by the station showed an emergency responder suspended by a harness over the creek’s rushing current, seemingly trying to access the truck and those inside from above.
Multiple water rescues took place around Moore on Saturday, according to KWTV, which also shared video of someone wading through waist-deep water beside a submerged car in the area.
Storms were forecast to continue sweeping through sections of southern Oklahoma into Sunday, where the National Weather Service in Norman warned of flash flooding that would likely ramp up again in the early morning hours.
Elsewhere, severe weather was expected to strike parts of East Texas through the Ozarks and mid-Mississippi Valley in the afternoon and evening, threatening portions of Arkansas and Missouri with potentially destructive winds and large hail while raising the risk of tornadoes, which could be serious, according to the Storm Prediction Center.
Tornado watches were in effect Sunday for parts of those two states in addition to pockets of eastern Oklahoma and various places in southwestern, central and northern Texas. In the latter state’s Montague County, which is about 80 miles northwest of Dallas-Fort Worth, a strong storm drenched neighborhoods and in multiple instances required boat crews to rescue people from floodwaters, CBS News Texas reported. As of Saturday night, there were no reports of injuries or damage to homes or businesses in that area, according to the station.
Forecasters have predicted the worst of the weekend’s storms would abate by Monday.
