Search crews scour debris after Florida storms kill 19

LADY LAKE, Fla. – Disaster crews with dogs went from one pile of debris to another in a search for bodies Friday after powerful storms, including at least one tornado, smashed hundreds of homes across central Florida and killed 19 people or more.

It was the second-deadliest combination of thunderstorms and tornadoes in Florida history, cutting a 40-mile swath of destruction across four counties just before daybreak, terrorizing residents of one of the nation’s biggest retirement communities, and leaving trees and fields littered with clothes, furniture and splintered lumber.

Residents helped pull the dead from the ruins.

“It was scary, really scary,” said Patrick Smith, who lives in the Paisley area, where at least 13 deaths were reported. He said he saw a weather alert on television, grabbed his wife and “went straight to the floor.” After the storm passed, he pulled the bodies of a man and his 9- or 10-year-old son from a neighboring house.

Florida’s emergency management chief, Craig Fugate, said it could take several days to determine the exact number of dead.

Gov. Charlie Crist asked President Bush to declare a major disaster for Florida as a result of the storms.

The worst damage was reported where the twister touched down in northern Lake County and eastern Volusia County. In typical tornado fashion, the storm hopscotched across the landscape, demolishing some homes and leaving others virtually untouched.

“Our priority today is search and rescue,” said Crist, who toured the damaged area in his first natural disaster since taking office last month.

Lake County spokesman Christopher Patton said there were 19 confirmed deaths, all in Lake County, about 50 miles northwest of Orlando.

Officials in Lake and Volusia counties ordered dusk-to-dawn curfews in heavily damaged areas to prevent looting and injuries to residents trying to sift through wreckage in the dark.

Authorities said hundreds of houses, mobile homes and other buildings were damaged or destroyed. Volusia County reported a preliminary estimate of $80 million in damage involving 500 properties.

The storm left yards strewn with chairs, beds and clothes, knocked tractor-trailers onto their sides as if they were toys, and tore away roofs. Debris hung from trees, and some homes were thrown off their foundations.

Bernadette Fields, 67, said two of her neighbors in mobile homes were blown through a bedroom wall into Lake Mack. Their bodies were found by their own dog, she said.

Dozens of rescue workers – many hardened by experience with Florida’s multiple hurricanes – went from house to house, spray-painting big red X’s to mark the husks of buildings that they had checked. Often they found people who awoke to the storm’s roar and watched their homes disintegrate around them.

Lee Shaver, 54, said he and his wife, Irene, and their dog had “about 10 seconds” to take shelter in a closet before their roof was torn off.

“Every muscle and bone in my body shook,” Shaver said outside his damaged home in The Villages, one of the nation’s largest retirement communities.

The state’s deadliest tornado event on record happened in February 1998, when five twisters hit near Orlando over two days, killing 42 people and damaging or destroying about 2,600 homes and businesses.