BEAUREGARD, Alabama — Pope Francis sent condolences Wednesday to tornado victims in Alabama, where searchers have been scouring a dismal landscape of shattered homes, splintered pines and broken lives.
President Donald Trump said he will visit Alabama on Friday to see the damage.
Twenty-three people were killed and dozens more were injured when the powerful tornado ripped through Lee County. The youngest of those killed was 6, the oldest 89.
The search for victims, pets and belongings in and around the devastated rural community of Beauregard was being conducted amid the din of beeping heavy machinery and whining chain saws on Tuesday. But Lee County Sheriff Jay Jones said the list of the missing had shrunk from dozens to just seven or eight.
“We’ve got piles of rubble that we are searching just to make sure,” said Opelika Fire Chief Byron Prather Jr. “We don’t think we’ll find nobody there, but we don’t want to leave any stone unturned.”
At the Vatican, Pope Francis said he was praying for the dead and injured of the Alabama tornado, saying he is spiritually close to all those who are suffering and grieving.
Francis sent a telegram of condolences Wednesday to the bishop of Mobile, Alabama, the Most Rev. Thomas Rodi, saying he was saddened to learn of the “tragic loss of life and injuries” caused by the twister.
Francis prayed for peace and strength for the survivors, and that God “may grant eternal rest to the dead, especially the children, and healing and consolation to the injured and those who grieve.”
The tornado was an EF4 with winds estimated at 170 mph and carved a path of destruction up to nine-tenths of a mile wide in Alabama, scraping up the earth in a phenomenon known as “ground rowing,” the National Weather Service said. It traveled a remarkable 70 miles or so through Alabama and Georgia, where it caused more damage.
It was the deadliest tornado to hit the U.S. since May 2013, when an EF5 twister killed 24 people in Moore, Oklahoma.
Associated Press writers Kate Brumback and Jeff Martin in Atlanta and Russ Bynum in Savannah, Georgia, contributed to this report.
