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Photo by Luke Horton A man walks down a Brookhaven street in the rain Thursday afternoon as a storm moved across Lincoln County. Visit www.dailyleader.com for more photos.

Cade Lane

City crews work to clear a storm drain on West Congress Street

West Congress Street

Evelyn Street

Photo by Luke Horton A car drives through the flooded Brookhaven intersection of Fisher and West Congress streets in the rain Thursday afternoon as a storm moved across Lincoln County.

West Congress Street and Schwem Avenue

West Congress Street

West Congress Street and Schwem Avenue

A Brookhaven man died from injuries he received removing a tree that fell on a house during Thursday’s storm.

Freddie Mobley, 63, was helping cut a tree that had fallen onto a house in the 1300 block of Old Hwy. 51 during strong storms that roared across the South Thursday, said Lincoln County Coroner Clay McMorris.

Mobley made a few cuts into the tree then backed away. The trunk then rolled before Mobley could move, said Deputy Coroner Ricky Alford. The accident occurred shortly after 7:30 p.m.

Mobley was pronounced dead in the King’s Daughters Medical Center ER at 9:41 p.m.

Strong storms roared across the South, killing two Mississippi drivers while leaving more than 100,000 people without power across Alabama, Mississippi, Louisiana and Texas.

National Weather Service forecasters said they believe multiple tornadoes hit southwest and central Mississippi, although they won’t be sure until damage is surveyed. Heavy winds also were reported in Louisiana earlier in the day and in central Alabama as the system quickly pushed eastward.

Lincoln County Emergency Management Director Clifford Galey reported damage from strong winds throughout the city and county and “a little bit” of flooding in the city and county in the areas that normally flood in heavy rains.

A barn was damaged at Pleasant Hill Drive and Elm Lane from what could have been a tornado, he said. He expects NWS to survey the area next week.

The Brookhaven Building was opened as a weather shelter from noon to 4 p.m. Thursday in anticipation of the storm. Galey said one person checked in.

Two other men were killed in weather-related accidents. One man died when his car hit a tree on a highway south of Philadelphia. Another was killed while driving in the storm. He fatally crashed near the rural town of Gillsburg in southwest Mississippi, Amite County Coroner Campbell Sharp said.

Damage was heavy in the Mississippi hamlet of Learned, about 20 miles southwest of Jackson. Large oaks were uprooted from saturated ground, landing on at least a dozen houses.

Two cars two cars were flipped in a Walmart parking lot in Clinton.

To the northeast, Scott County Emergency Management Director Mike Marlow said reports indicated a number of homes were damaged near Morton and the roof blew off a gas station near Lena. In Philadelphia, a wall collapsed at a medical clinic and the storm knocked down traffic signals and canopies and pushed trees onto houses, the Neshoba Democrat reported.

Damage from the storm system was reported in at least 24 of Mississippi’s 82 counties.

The same system produced tornadoes and hail earlier in North Texas, the Texas Panhandle, Oklahoma and southeastern Kansas.

The Associated Press contributed to this story.

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