(Continued from page 14)

• JEFFERSON CITY, Mo. (AP) -- Storms packing rain, snow and dangerous winds raked the Midwest and spawned a possible tornado outside of St. Louis that prompted an emergency declaration from Missouri's governor.
• To the north icy weather left thousands without power and prompted Minnesota Gov. Mark Dayton to call out the state Nation Guard to aid residents as the state braced for another storm system that threatened to dump several inches of wet snow Thursday.
• The most violent weather was centered near the St. Louis suburb of Hazelwood late Wednesday night. The St. Louis Post-Dispatch reported early Thursday that homes and vehicles were damaged in the area. There were no immediate reports of serious injuries.
• Butch Dye, a hydrometeorological technician with the National Weather Service in St. Louis, Mo., said crews would assess the damage Thursday.
• "We won't be able to confirm whether it was a tornado until teams get out there tomorrow," Dye said.
• Missouri Gov. Jay Nixon declared a state of emergency in response to the damage in the St. Louis region and power outages in southern Missouri. Nixon plans to survey storm damage Thursday.
• In Minnesota, Gov. Dayton said the weather was taxing the resources of local and county governments, and he issued an executive order activating the guard.
• The town of Worthington was using backup diesel generators to power sections of the city at a time, public utilities manager Scott Hain told Minnesota Public Radio. Roughly a quarter to a third of the city of about 13,000 people was without power at any given time, he said.
• "With the generation that we have available, we are conducting rolling blackouts through the community," Hain said. "From what we're hearing from the folks that own the transmission that's down right now, is we expect that we'll be operating under this same scenario at least through the rest of today and possibly into tomorrow as well."
• The National Weather Service said southwestern Minnesota could get 8 or 9 inches of snow by Thursday morning, while 8 to 14 inches was forecast for a large swath of southern Minnesota, including the Twin Cities, St. Cloud, Willmar and Mankato starting Wednesday night and into Thursday.
• In Missouri and Arkansas, dangerous winds were the threat Wednesday. A tornado was reported to have touched down near Botkinburg in north-central Arkan

(Continued on page 16)