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U.S.|After a Deadly Tornado, a Small Kentucky City Starts Picking Up the Pieces
https://www.nytimes.com/2025/05/18/us/tornado-destruction-kentucky.html
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On Sunday morning in a small Kentucky city, the sun shone and birds chirped.
They provided an incongruent backdrop to a scene that looked like a war zone. Just two days before, a fierce tornado carved a 16-mile path of destruction through Laurel County, Ky., and in its county seat of London, the damage was clear: roofs ripped from homes, tree limbs sheared off, cars left as twisted hunks of metal. And several residents dead.
By the afternoon, the Sunshine Hills neighborhood of London was filled with the cacophonous beeping of backhoes, accompanied by an army of faith-based volunteers.
Those volunteers were among the many people in London, a city of 8,000 about 80 miles south of Lexington, who worked together this weekend to help not only those in need but also the whole community as it tried to process the disaster. Amid the grief and devastation, ensuring displaced people got the necessary supplies and assistance was top of mind for many.
“It didn’t seem right to be sitting at home with our property being untouched with so many people struggling,” said Hannah Clark, who lives in neighboring Pulaski County but came to London to volunteer.
The tornado was part of a storm system that tore through the central United States starting Friday, killing at least 28 people. Of those, 19 died in Kentucky, all but two in Laurel County. Outside of Kentucky, Missouri was also hit hard: Seven people died in that state, with five in St. Louis.
Most of the victims in Laurel County were killed in Sunshine Hills, according to Gilbert Acciardo, a public affairs official for the county sheriff’s office, who did not give an exact number. Many of them were older, ranging in age from 50 to 70.
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