Tornadoes, storms kill five in US

WASHINGTON - A massive system of thunderstorms and tornadoes claimed at least five lives in the south and central US Friday, local media reports said.

Three people were killed by a tornado in northwest Arkansas, while another two deaths in bordering southwest Missouri were also reported.

Weather forecasters warned that a system of damaging thunderstorms, including a few tornadoes, were threatening the entire lower Mississippi Valley through New Year’s Eve, from central Illinois to northern Louisiana, AccuWeather reported.

In Arkansas, a tornado killed an elderly man and woman in their home in Cincinnati, Arkansas, and a man who was milking cows in a nearby barn, the Arkansas Democrat Gazette reported online.

The storms also caused a number of injuries and felled trees, prompting police to close several highways in the area.

In Missouri, high winds and possible tornadoes killed two people near the town of Rolla, the News-Leader of Springfield, Missouri, reported.

“We do have substantial damage,” Steve Lindenberg, a meteorologist at the National Weather Service, was quoted as saying.