Tornadoes, power outages as storm crosses Texas, Louisiana

DALLAS (AP) — Tornadoes touched down in Texas and Louisiana as a powerful storm system that dumped snow in California moved eastward. Wind gusts of over 70 mph were reported in Texas on Thursday evening, and National Weather Service teams planned to head out Friday to survey areas for likely tornado damage in the storms path that stretched from southeast Oklahoma into Texas and neighboring Arkansas and Louisiana. More than 310,000 utility customers in Texas had no electricity as of Thursday evening. The Dallas suburb of Richardson asked residents to stop using water after the storm knocked out power to pumping stations. Forecasters said the storm system would the Ohio and Tennessee River valleys with severe weather Friday and bring snow to New England.