Tornado Kills Seven in Alabama

Tornadoes ripped through the US state of Alabama yesterday and killed at least seven people, including five at a high school where students became trapped after a roof collapsed.

Last night rescue crews dug through piles of rubble at Enterprise high school looking for other victims.

The state emergency management said the death toll could very well increase as search efforts continued.

In the hours following storm, reports about the death toll varied. At one point, state officials said as many as 18 people were dead. A spokeswoman for the state emergency management said that miscommunication at the scene was to blame.

Martha Rodriquez, a 15-year-old student, said she had left the school about five minutes before the storm hit. When she returned, a hall at the school had collapsed.

"The stadium was destroyed and there were cars tipped over in the parking lot and trees were ripped out. There were trees and wood everywhere. It was just horrible," she told the Associated Press.

Another student who was in the school when the tornado hit described the storm to CNN. "The tornado came through and the roof came down on us," he said. "A lot of the exterior bricks came in and hit people around us."

In Miller's Ferry, 66 miles west of Montgomery, Alabama, a person was reported killed when a tornado struck a mobile home park, leaving homes overturned and trees uprooted.

The burst of tornadoes was part of a larger line of thunderstorms and snowstorms that stretched from Minnesota to the Gulf coast. Authorities have also blamed a tornado for the death of a seven-year-old girl in Missouri. Tornadoes were also reported in Kansas.