42 dead in severe storms and tornadoes that swept across U.S.

Main Idea: Severe storms, tornadoes, wildfires, and dust storms swept across the U.S. over the weekend, killing at least 42 people and leaving widespread damage and power outages.

Key Points:

• The deaths were reported in several states, with the highest toll in Missouri, followed by Kansas, Arkansas, Oklahoma, Mississippi, Texas, Alabama, and North Carolina.
• Tornadoes damaged homes, businesses, and power lines across the Midwest and South, including a strong tornado in Arkansas and another that threw a school bus onto a high school roof in Alabama.
• Two children died in North Carolina when a tree fell on their family’s trailer, and a dust storm in Kansas caused a deadly highway pile-up.
• The storm system was moving east, bringing heavy rain and flood watches to parts of the Northeast, while fire danger remained high in parts of the Plains and Florida.