Midwestern US cleans up from tornadoes, more storms forecast

Andrew Stern in Reuters: Residents of storm-tossed midwestern towns searched for photographs and mementos from their ruined homes on Thursday as the death toll from a line of tornado-producing storms rose to 13, while more storms bore down on the region. Adding to the toll, a 53-year-old man who was trapped in his collapsed home in Harveyville, Kansas, was removed from life support at a hospital and died, state officials said on Thursday.

Another nine people in Kansas suffered storm-related injuries that required hospital care, state emergency management spokeswoman Sharon Watson said. The worst loss of life from the line of "super-cell" storms, which marched across the Midwest and produced 35 tornado reports from late Tuesday through Wednesday, was in Harrisburg, where six people died.

A powerful tornado tore a path across the city's southern edge, where a residential neighborhood and a shopping district were flattened and virtually unrecognizable.

Power company crews were out on Thursday restoring electricity, and several residents sifted through rubble for something to salvage. Occasionally, a chain-saw roared to life, breaking the quiet.....

The National Weather Service took this January 23, 2012 photo of a home mostly destroyed by an EF3 tornado in Center Point, Alabama