Deadly storms rip through small Kentucky town

(17 May 2025)
RESTRICTION SUMMARY:

ASSOCIATED PRESS
London, Kentucky
1. Storm-damaged trees and house
2. Collapsed house
3. Overturned lawnmower on grass
4. SOUNDBITE (English) Kayla Patterson, Local resident:
“Um , it was within minutes of us actually getting downstairs in our basement. You could literally hear just things ripping in the distance. You could hear glass shattering everywhere, just roaring like a freight train. It was terrible to be honest, and the noise, the sounds, it's like it all replays kind of in your head, and we gathered our kids and bunkered down in a tub as far underneath our house kind of as we could get in our basement."
5. Person searching through debris
6. SOUNDBITE (English) Kayla Patterson, Local resident:
"Recovery and just try to you know, recover from loss and mostly just honestly just giving the lord thanks that my family's alive. My babies are fine. My husband's OK. The majority of our close friends that we know of made it to safety."
7. Fallen tree on a vehicle
8. Uprooted tree on a lawn
9. Man on the phone assessing storm damage
10. Fallen mailbox amid debris
11. SOUNDBITE (English) Shane Eldridge, Local resident:
“We took shelter in the laundry room and the lights went out and then we heard like a freight train noise come through and we heard the roof getting sucked off our house, glass breaking and it lasted it felt like more like 30 minutes but it was probably more like 30 seconds."
12. Destroyed homes and debris.
13. SOUNDBITE (English) Shane Eldridge, Local resident:
“Kids were scared, you know, because we were laying over top of them in the laundry room, you know, they were saying, keep us safe, don't let us die, and that's, that's a hard thing to do whenever you, you don't have control over what's going on."
14. Wide shot of storm-damaged house amid debris in Kentucky after severe weather.
15. Destroyed house
STORYLINE:
Storm systems sweeping across parts of the U.S. Midwest and South left at least 23 people dead on Saturday.

In Kentucky, some 14 people were killed by severe weather, and the death toll is likely to rise, according to Gov. Andy Beshear.

Kayla Patterson, her husband and their five children huddled in a tub in their basement in London, the county seat, as the tornado raged around them.

“You could literally hear just things ripping in the distance, glass shattering everywhere, just roaring like a freight train," she recalled Saturday. “It was terrible.”

The family eventually emerged to the sounds of sirens and panicked neighbors.

While the family's own home was spared, others right behind it were demolished, Patterson said.

Shane Eldridge said he and his family took shelter in the laundry, "and the lights went out and then we heard like a freight train noise come through and we heard the roof getting sucked off our house."

The storm was the latest severe weather to cause deaths and widespread damage in Kentucky.

Two months ago, at least 24 people died in a round of storms that swelled creeks and submerged roads.

AP Video by Dylan Lovan

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