27 April 2014 Night 16 killed

Rescuers scoured rubble and expected to find more bodies Monday after the most destructive tornado outbreak of the year killed at least 18 people in three states and hammered the suburbs of Little Rock, Ark.

As day broke over a grim scene of splintered trees and shattered homes there, forecasters warned that tens of millions of people from Iowa to the Gulf Coast to the Carolinas were still in the path of a days-long storm system.

Faulkner County, Ark., particularly the suburbs of Mayflower and Vilonia, was the hardest hit Sunday. As many as 10 people died there, including two children, and authorities said that at least 150 homes had been destroyed. Rescuers still hoped to find people alive.

In all, 16 people were killed in Arkansas, Gov. Mike Beebe said. One woman was killed when debris took out the door of the fortified safe room where she was taking shelter.

“What I’m seeing is something that I cannot describe in words,” Faulkner County Sheriff Andy Shock said. “It is utter and sheer devastation.”

Vilonia, a town of about 4,000 people, was hit by a twister three years agothis week that killed four people and leveled homes and businesses. Homes rebuilt after the 2011 tornado were among those demolished on Sunday night.