The state of Alabama has been injected with a massive storm system, that has produced dozens of tornadoes and the damage has been devastating. In particular, the city of Tuscaloosa has been hit by a storm of catastrophic and epic proportions.
Tuscaloosa’s mayor, Walter Maddox, appeared on The Weather Channel shortly after the storm plowed through his city, and said that the “devastation is ‘catastrophic’ and parts of city ‘have been obliterated’.” Maddox added “please pray for us.”
On his Twitter feed, Aaron Suttles, Senior Recruiting Analyst for the Alabama Rivals site, TideSports.com, wrote that “I don’t mean to overstate, but it looks like bombs went off. Nothing left standing. Complete rubble. Cars upside down and caved in.”
Cecil Hurt of the Tuscaloosa News wrote on his Twitter feed simply: “Scale of destruction in Tuscaloosa is very bad.”
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Various reports from Twitter indicate there is massive damage to 15th Street and McFarland Boulevard. Sports writer Aaron Suttles reports via Twitter that the CVS at 15th Street and MacFarland has been destroyed, among many other businesses and apartment buildings.
Other reports state complete devastation along 15h Street heading to MacFarland.
Alabama Power reported at 8 p.m. there are 375,000 Alabama residents without power. As of 6 p.m. in the city of Tuscaloosa, 50,295 customers are without power. In the western division of Alabama Power as of 8 p.m., there are 146,000 customers without power. This comes from spokesman Freddy Padilla.
Damage has also been reported to DCH Medical Center and the University Mall. Staff writer Wayne Grayson is reporting via Twitter that the Central High School football field was hit. The roof of the press box was ripped up along with bleachers.
There is an excellent recap and perspective (with more videos) about how advances in "social video" allowed such new experience in coverage. Here, http://www.reelseo.com/tornado-outbreak-shows-speed-power-social-video/
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