Authorities say 3 bodies found in submerged car

Alabama Gov. Robert Bentley will tour areas in his state damaged by floods a day after declaring a state of emergency in all counties affected by excessive rain.

“There does appear to be some significant damage”, National Weather Service meteorologist Jody Aaron reported, adding that details were pretty sketchy. It’s part of the same cell that warranted an earlier tornado warning in Tuscaloosa County, southwest of the Jefferson.

Birmingham Police Lieutenant Sean Edwards said at least three people had been taken to hospital with minor injuries, but no reports of fatalities had been made.

Holmes said reports of tornado activity in Bibb County, also southwest of Birmingham, have not been confirmed.

Ruthie Green, resident of a working class neighborhood in downtown Brimingham, said she ran to a closet when a tornado warning came up on her iPad.

The American Red Cross of North Mississippi’s disaster program manager, Nicholas Garbacz (GAR-bach), says members of the Marine Corps helped turn the Eddie Smith Multi-Purpose Center in Holly Springs into a substitute Santa’s Workshop.

Dozens of children and their families showed up Friday morning to pick up a toy or other items they might need to recover from the storm, Garbacz said.

Tony Goodwin ducked into a storm shelter with seven others as a storm pounded Tennessee and other states in the southeastern U.S. He emerged to find his house in Linden had been knocked off its foundation and hurled down a hill by high winds.

The National Weather Service says flash flooding is “possible today from the Southern Plains, the middle Mississippi Valley and into the Lower Great Lakes region – remaining over the Southern Plains and middle Mississippi Valley for Sunday”.

Six people were killed in Tennessee, including three who were found in a auto submerged in a creek, according to the Columbia Police Department.

National Weather Service meteorologist Jim Stefkovich tells our colleagues at Alabama Public Radio that, “we have a number of storm systems coming through, in fact we expect more rain going into Sunday night and into Monday, so that’s only going to make things worse”.

The National Weather Service warned residents to avoid driving in areas where flooding was expected.

Tornadoes are possible in parts of Alabama north of the I-20 corridor, with other damaging winds of up to 60 miles per hour possible.

A flood warning was also in effect for the Coosa River, swollen by up to 8 inches of rain over the past week, and threatening the city of Gadsden.

The NWS is warning drivers to stay off roads in areas where flooding is expected. The Tennessee Emergency Management Agency said the victims were a 19-year-old female and two 22-year-old males.

James Brown of the Coffee County Emergency Management Agency says volunteers distributed sandbags in Elba, where the Pea River was projected to crest Saturday at 43 feet, about a foot below the levees that protect the area.

Unseasonably warm temperatures across the southeastern USA this week spawned severe weather blamed for deaths in Mississippi, Alabama and Arkansas.

Some survivors of deadly storms across the Southeast lost their homes and belongings, but say they’re thankful to see another Christmas.

Perkins’ neighbors weren’t as fortunate. Two people in one home were killed.

Barbara Perkins was told Thursday by an insurance agent that her storm-damaged home in Falkner, Mississippi, was a complete loss.

Despite being newly homeless, Perkins said the tragedy helped her “stop and realize what Christmas is all about”.