A half-mile-wide tornado with winds reaching 120 mph ripped through Newton County late Monday evening, destroying a post office in Parthenon and damaging several homes and buildings in the area, and a smaller tornado was reported in Madison County.
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The Newton County twister, rated an EF2, also tore off a portion of the Parthenon First Baptist Church and damaged several other buildings in the small community about 25 miles southwest of Harrison. Officials said one person suffered minor injuries but refused medical treatment.
Winds also destroyed two airplane hangars at a private airstrip along Arkansas 74 between Jasper and Vendor, about 25 miles south of Harrison.
"It's toast," Justin Reddell said of the mangled remains of his 1954 Cessna 170-B, parts of which were lodged in a barbed-wire fence by the airstrip. "The other wing was down there in the road."
The National Weather Service in North Little Rock confirmed the Newton County twister Tuesday afternoon after a survey team visited the swath of destruction it left behind. A second tornado, an EF1 twister that struck near the Crosses community in Madison County about 20 miles southeast of Fayetteville, was confirmed Tuesday evening by the National Weather Service in Tulsa.
Twelve tornadoes have been confirmed in Arkansas this year.
National Weather Service teams also inspected sites in Benton, Faulkner, Fulton and Lawrence counties. Much of northern Arkansas experienced severe weather Monday night and early Tuesday morning after a cold front from the west clashed with warm, moist air in Arkansas.
Volunteers and postal employees sifted through debris Tuesday morning in Parthenon, picking up letters and files that were strewn in a nearby field. Wood, concrete and metal fragments were piled on a lot and hauled away by crews.
"The U.S. post office is completely destroyed," said Dennis Cavenaugh, warning coordinator for the National Weather Service in North Little Rock. "It's the most sobering thing we've seen. It wiped it off the foundation."
[360-DEGREE PHOTOS: Explore tornado damage in Parthenon]
The building "kind of did a flip," according to one postal employee from a neighboring town who was in Parthenon on Tuesday.
Arkansas' storms formed on the southern edge of a long series of systems that stretched from central Oklahoma north to the Great Lakes, creating a line of destruction through the Midwest overnight Monday.
The Storm Prediction Center in Norman, Okla., said at least 19 tornadoes were reported in Illinois, Iowa, Missouri and Kansas in addition to the two in Arkansas. A tornado that struck Zimmerman, Minn., about 50 miles northwest of Minneapolis, was the earliest twister recorded in the state's history.
More than 450 homes and businesses were damaged in Oak Grove, Mo., after a tornado with winds reaching 152 mph roared through the Kansas City, Mo., suburb. The Associated Press reported 12 people were injured in the storm. Twisters also formed in Lee's Summit, Mack's Creek and Wentzville, Mo.
Tornado warnings were issued for Newton, Madison and Faulkner counties Monday evening, said meteorologist Charles Dalton with the National Weather Service in North Little Rock. Teams also were surveying damage just across the Arkansas border in eastern Oklahoma, according to meteorologist Amy Jankowski with the National Weather Service in Tulsa.
"This is typical of an early spring-type system," she said. "We've had a mild winter and some warm temperatures now. The weather can't decide what it should do."
Jankowski said trees were toppled in Eureka Springs and Crosses as winds reached 95 mph. Quarter-sized hail also fell in rural Madison County.
Two homes were damaged in Searcy County, said Whitney Green, a spokesman with the Arkansas Department of Emergency Management.
About 20 homes were damaged in Pea Ridge, said Robert McGowan, the Benton County Office of Emergency Management coordinator. The storms blew through the area at about 11:30 p.m.
"From everything I saw, it's probably straight-line winds," McGowan said.
Pea Ridge Mayor Jackie Crabtree said the roof of a tax service was blown off in the downtown area, and an overhanging roof at a home was flipped.
"I heard it come through," Crabtree said of the winds.
In Lawrence County, Williams Baptist College saw storm damage for the second time this month.
Tuesday morning's winds downed several trees near the college, which is in an area recently annexed by Walnut Ridge. Winds topping 60 mph also toppled the college's baseball scoreboard, said Chris Jones, the Lawrence County Office of Emergency Management coordinator.
"It blew the scoreboard away," Jones said.
One home near the college had minor damage when a tree fell on it, Jones said. A March 1 storm also felled trees in the area.
West of Walnut Ridge, utility poles were knocked down north of Smithville and winds damaged several barns north of Black Rock, Jones said.
The National Weather Service also reported that trees fell onto two homes in Mountain View and that Arkansas 87 was blocked with fallen trees north of Mountain View.
Information for this article was contributed by Bill Bowden of the Arkansas Democrat-Gazette and by Emma Pettit of Arkansas Online.
State Desk on 03/08/2017
