Severe Storms Leave 5 Dead Across Midwest

IRVINGTON, Ky. – Severe thunderstorms that lashed through Kentucky, Tennessee and Indiana left five people dead and a 4-year-old girl missing, authorities said Friday.

The girl's mother and another adult got out of their vehicle safely before a rain-swollen creek swept the car away with the child about 50 miles southwest of Louisville Thursday night, said Rick Priest, Breckinridge County emergency management director.

"We're trying to find the vehicle, and we're assuming that the 4-year-old is still in the vehicle," Priest said.

In central Kentucky, a 68-year-old woman died after being struck by lightning from the storms, officials said.

Shirley F. Cosby, of Lexington, was found early Friday on the sidewalk in front of her residence, the coroner's office said. It appeared she was placing her yard waste container by the curb for pickup when she was struck.

In Indiana, searchers found the bodies of Greg Kemp, 35 and his 4-year-old son Issac, both of Leopold, downstream from where their pickup truck was washed off the road by a rain-swollen creek in southern Indiana, Indiana Conservation Officer Mark Farmer said.

The search continued Friday for the boy's grandfather, Robert Edwards, 55, also of Leopold. Greg Kemp's 7-year-old son, Morgan, was able to swim away to safety Thursday, Farmer said.

In Tennessee, the bodies of two 15-year-old boys, Vincent Kruk and Philiip Siefert, were found Friday after they were swept away the night earlier while swimming in a creek just north of Clarksville, said Montgomery County Emergency Medical Services official Gary Perry.

Two emergency workers trying to rescue the teens were injured, one critically, when their boat capsized.

One of them, rescue diver Joe Snow, was under water for up to six minutes after he was caught in the undertow, Perry said.

Snow was in critical condition Friday at Vanderbilt University Medical Center.

About 187,000 Duke Energy customers in southwest Ohio and northern Kentucky without electricity at one point, and service to some Cincinnati-area homes was not expected to be restored until Saturday, spokesman Steve Brash said Friday.

On Friday, the storms were moving east through New York, Pennsylvania and Maryland, and hazardous weather advisories warned of severe thunderstorms bringing damaging gusts and hail.