As the remnants of Tropical Storm Cindy are expected to drench parts of Tennessee, Kentucky and West Virginia today, residents in parts of Alabama will be picking up the pieces.
A powerful storm system hit Jefferson County yesterday, leaving four people injured, downing power lines and destroying buildings in the city of Fairfield. The National Weather Service in Birmingham has confirmed that a tornado struck the Fairfield area. They have given it a preliminary rating of EF-2, with an estimated wind speed of 120 miles per hour.
At one point yesterday, over 17,000 customers of Alabama Power were without electricity. As of 9 a.m. Friday, there were 7500 reported outages statewide. Approximately 6900 of those outages were in Birmingham, with isolated outages in Tuscaloosa, Anniston and Montgomery.
Parts of southwest Alabama and much of Central Alabama are still under flash flood watches, and areas near rivers in the southern half of the state are under flood warnings as rivers are expected to rise well over flood stage in the next few days.