Severe weather is rolling into Arkansas as Hurricane Laura makes landfall. Early Thursday, the Category 4 storm hit land in Texas and Louisiana, causing thousands to be evacuated and multiple deaths.
Now, the tropical storm is causing damage in Arkansas.
The National Weather Service’s Little Rock office has issued multiple warnings for the area. There are multiple flash flood warnings in place throughout the state. A section of Arkansas including Benton, England, Dewitt and Bryant is under a flash flood warning until 7:55 p.m. , while a swath that includes Little Rock, Stuttgart, Jacksonville and Carlisle is under a warning until 7:20 p.m. There is another flash flood warning in place for a section of Arkansas that includes Mena, Big Fork, Y City and Hatfield, which is in place until 7:10 p.m.
The NWS is also warning Arkansas residents about the possibility of tornadoes. According to a social media post, the NWS has detected the possibility of tornados and pea-sized hail in the St. Charles area. This warning is in place until 5 p.m.
Significant portions of the state are also under tornado watch. The NWS warns that multiple tornadoes are possible, along with marble-sized hail and isolated gusts of wind that could reach speeds of 60 mph.
Throughout the state, there will be scattered severe storms with isolated intense storms possible.
Entergy Arkansas has mobilized crews throughout its regional footprint to tackle electrical outages. As of 1:30 p.m., the utility company reported 17,706 customer outages in Arkansas, a decrease from its peak outages of 18,086.
In total, Entergy has 438,689 customers with power outages. This includes approximately 260,000 customers in Louisiana and 158,000 in Texas. However, Entergy representatives expect the number of outages to “grow significantly” as a result of continued storm damage.
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