Residents in the US clean up following storms

Jim Skillington in Disaster News Network: Tornadoes and severe wind damage clean-up was the order of the day in several eastern U.S. communities this weekend while in the northeast residents braced for yet more rain Sunday in areas that had been under flash flood warnings earlier in the weekend.

More than 51,000 customers including a major Baltimore area hospital lost power for several hours Friday night after high winds and a tornado downed trees and damaged homes northwest of the city. A tornado was also reported in Frederick County, in western Maryland.

A much more severe storm hit the Memphis area Thursday, damaging more than 100 homes in Olive Branch and Cordova. According to the National Weather Service, the Olive Branch twister was an EF-2 (third strongest on the six-phase intensity scale) and was approximately a quarter-mile wide and stretched nearly six miles. At least six other tornadoes were reported in the Mid-South on Thursday.

Tornadoes were also reported this week in Wantage Township, NJ and in the Pocono Mountains in PA. In New Jersey, the tornado destroyed a barn and in Pennsylvania the roofs were torn off several homes….

A 1973 tornado in Union City, Oklahoma