China News Agency, San Francisco, May 21. US media reported on the 21st local time that a tornado hit Gaylord, a small town in northern Michigan, on the 20th, killing at least two people and injuring 44 others.
ABC quoted Michigan State Police Officer Derek Carroll as saying on the 21st that a tornado landed at Gaylord's "Nottingham Forest" mobile home park at about 15:48 on the 20th and then passed through Gaylord Commercial District, causing "extensive damage" to commercial and residential buildings in its path.
Images from the scene showed buildings razed, some trees toppled and cars overturned.
On the day of the disaster, Michigan Governor Gretchen Whitmer signed a state of emergency declaration for Gaylord's Otsego County.
The Associated Press quoted Otsego County Fire Officer Chris Martin as saying on the 21st that the tornado's damage to the "Nottingham Forest" mobile home park may reach 95%, and crews are using heavy equipment to conduct a secondary search of the area.
Carroll said on the 21st that the two victims died in the mobile home park.
The New York Times reported that the cleanup began on the 21st, and more than 40 people were receiving treatment, with one still missing.
Gaylord is about 230 miles northwest of Detroit and has a population of about 4,300.
The National Weather Service said on the 21st that the tornado had a top speed of 150 miles per hour.
John Boris of the Gaylord office of the National Weather Service said it took about three minutes for the tornado to pass through the local community, CBS reported.
More than 14,000 customers in Michigan lost power on the 21st, according to data from the U.S. electricity tracking website PowerOutage.US.
Utility company Consumers Energy said on the same day that 4,715 Gaylord customers were affected by the outage.
Michigan has significantly fewer tornadoes than many Midwestern states.
The state averages about 15 tornadoes a year, most of them south of Gaylord, Boris said.
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