Storm damage appears across the Pine Belt

PINE BELT, Miss. (WDAM) - Strong winds, bands of rain, and hail battered the Pine Belt Friday afternoon.

“It was pretty one minute and dark the next,” Sumrall resident Joshua Craig said. “We had customers getting under the canopies and we were just all worried trying to figure out what was going on.”

National Weather Service senior meteorologist Eric Carpenter said the storm cell overachieved.

“There were a lot of straight-line winds, but those winds were swirling around, and they can definitely give the appearance, given all the damage of everything, it can definitely seem like a tornado, Carpenter said. “It’s very strong winded in any case.”

The storm left plenty of damage, lots of downed trees. Even part of the roof blew off the Luxury Inn in Hattiesburg, causing damage to Randy Middleton’s’ vehicle.

“I was outside, cleaning the van, and all of a sudden the winds just came real strong and I just saw the metal coming straight at my van,” Middleton said. “I just went inside and then that’s basically what happened after that.

“At that point, it was raining real hard and just done a little damage to my van.”

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