Tornado, floods bring death and damage to three states

CHATAIGNIER, La. -- A tornado flung a mobile home several hundred yards early Tuesday, killing two people and seriously injuring five others, authorities said. A man suffered a fatal heart attack as he was rescued from another mobile home flattened by high winds.

The tornado was spawned by a storm system that produced heavy rain and high wind from Texas, across Louisiana and into Mississippi.

Flooding killed one and forced dozens from their homes in the Houston area. High wind also caused scattered damage in southern Mississippi and tornadoes were reported in the area.

Firefighters found the mobile home in southern Louisiana in a pile of rubble near Chataignier, about 30 miles northwest of Lafayette, around 4 a.m., said fire Chief Ronnie Smith.

"It had been picked up out of a field and traveled 300 or 400 yards and slammed on the pavement," Smith said. "We found the father first in the wreckage, and he informed us there were a total of seven people in the mobile home."

Susan Robichaux, 33, and an unidentified 16-year-old girl were dead at the scene. All five survivors were taken to hospitals with severe injuries, Smith said.

Several other houses were demolished, but no other injuries were reported, Smith said.

Farther west, high winds severely damaged several homes in a Beauregard Parish mobile home park. Reid Simmons, 69, died of an apparent heart attack, said Robert McCullough, chief deputy with the sheriff's office. He was stricken after neighbors helped Simmons and his wife out of their home, which had been flattened by the wind, McCullough said.

A tornado also was blamed for serious damage at Northwest High School near Chataignier. Several walls were knocked down and classes were canceled for the rest of the week.

"The roof was completely knocked off, all the windows blown out, the walls are buckling and we have debris scattered for a mile or so from the school," said Frank Guidroz, St. Landry Parish's assistant emergency preparedness director.

As much as 7 to 9 inches of rain fell during the night in the Houston area, causing flooding that forced more than 120 people to flee their homes, said Jim White, emergency management coordinator for Harris County.

"They've had rain the last week more or less, so it didn't take much to get flooding," said Brian Kyle of the National Weather Service.

Homes and streets were flooded in the Beaumont, Texas, area after about 8 inches of rain fell in four hours. A woman's body was found in a car submerged in a flooded underpass near downtown Beaumont, police said.

Strong wind ripped through Picayune, Miss., early Tuesday, damaging homes, knocking out power and toppling trees. Picayune City Manager J.P. Burns said power was knocked out to thousands of residents in his town of about 12,000.

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