New Orleans tornado
© APA man walks down the street past destroyed homes after a tornado tore through the eastern part of New Orleans
Parts of eastern New Orleans are looking like a disaster area following a line of severe weather that blew through the city on Tuesday morning.
An enormous storm ended up flipping over cars, tore the roofs off homes, ripped through a gas station canopy, broke tall power poles off their foundations, flipped a food truck upside-down and left a couch resting improbably on a pile of debris in the middle of a road.

Hail as big as ping-pong balls was observed near Kenner, Louisiana. More than 10,000 homes and businesses lost power in southeastern Louisiana because of the storms.

Severe thunderstorms swept across the Gulf Coast region, where at least four damaging tornadoes and large hail were observed in parts of southeastern Louisiana, including New Orleans.


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Natl weather service tornado new orleans
© NWSThe weather service says at least four tornadoes have been counted so far
One driver was trapped in his truck by power lines that wrapped around the cab.

As the storm blew over New Orleans, the sun could only be seen on the faraway horizon, below dark grey thunderheads that seemed to turn the day into night.

New Orleans East is home to at least 65,000 residents, down from 95,000 prior to Hurricane Katrina, which devastated the area in 2005. New Orleans East is a neighborhood in the city's Ninth Ward.

Eastern New Orleans resident James Thomas says his whole neighborhood shows storm damage, but his house escaped a tornado with a near miss.

He says, 'It's bad. I've never seen it this bad.' He says 'As far as I can see, treetops are off, power lines down.'

Thomas says he saw the twister coming, grabbed his motorcycle helmet and ran into his bathroom.

He says the room went pitch-black, he heard hail on the window, and came outside afterward to see a damage trail or about 20 to 40 feet from his house.

Officials say at least seven homes have been damaged in Livingston Parish, Louisiana.

Deputy Emergency Management Director Brandi Janes says two of the houses were completely destroyed.

Janes said she knows of two injuries in the parish, both minor. She didn't immediately have any information on whether the homes that were destroyed were occupied when the storm struck.

She says they are working to get trees out of roadways and with the Red Cross to get help to damaged areas.

Mike Saia, who works at a marina on the Tchefuncte River near Lake Pontchartrain, evacuated his office during one of numerous tornado warnings.

Saia watched the storm through a surveillance camera that feeds an app on his iPhone. He said it passed right over the marina but he saw no sign of any funnels or any damage to the marina. He did say there is debris from trees littering the roadways in the area.

Not far from the marina, a possible tornado was reported in the town of Madisonville, according to reports from the National Weather Service.