9 Dead After Storms in Oklahoma, Arkansas

Destructive storms that tore across the country's midsection left at least nine people dead after smashing uprooted trees into homes in Arkansas and ripping apart the only school in the tiny Oklahoma town of Tushka, officials said today. The fatalities in Tushka were two sisters in their 70s, and another two dozen people were injured. Witnesses there reported seeing two tornadoes that merged to form a single twister.

In Arkansas:

• In Garland County, a 24-year-old man and his 18-month-old daughter were killed when lightning struck a tree, which then fell on their mobile home.
• In Little Rock, a tree fell on a home, killing an 8-year-old boy and his mother who had climbed into bed with him during the storm.
• In Bald Knob, a 6-year-old boy was killed when a huge tree crushed his home at about 2:30am.
• In Scott in Pulaski County, a man was killed when a tree fell on his recreational vehicle.
• In St. Francis County, a 64-year-old woman was killed when winds overturned her mobile home.

(More tornado stories.)