Hail in Bolivar County, Mississippi

Golf-ball size hail fell near Benoit.

In the afternoon and evening of the 24th, clusters of strong to severe storms were stretched from southwest to northeast across southeastern Arkansas as robust instability and very strong wind shear served to produce a volatile severe weather environment. To the east in Mississippi, storm activity proved to be more isolated as deep convection struggled develop across the state. With much of the area not being convectively overturned, an area of thunderstorm activity near the Mississippi River near Vicksburg, MS began to become stronger and took advantage of the open warm sector environment, well east of the competitive storm environment to the west that had thus far impeded tornado development. This area of thunderstorm activity quickly consolidated into an organized supercell and produced a family of long track, strong to violent tornadoes from the Mississippi Delta, across central Mississippi, and finally into portions of northeast Mississippi. This cyclical tornado-producing supercell was responsible for the vast majority of severe weather reports from the day and would claim 22 lives across the state. Dozens more were injured, and hundreds of homes were damaged or destroyed by these tornadoes. Having wrought widespread destruction across the area, this tornado event by most any measure represents a historic degree of devastation for the state of Mississippi and the region at large.