As severe weather passed through eastern Mississippi Tuesday night and early Wednesday morning, Lauderdale County escaped the worst of the storm.

The National Weather Service had predicted heavy rain, high winds and the possibility of tornadoes for most of the state on Tuesday.

The weather service reported at least six tornadoes across the state, including one in Scott County and and one south of Satartia. Damage survey teams were sent to investigate storm damage in Rankin, Scott, Leake, Winston, Noxubee, Oktibbeha and Clay counties.

Another tornado in northern Alabama killed three people in Jackson County and a separate tornado killed a couple in southern Tennessee, the Associated Press reported.

The weather service reported hail across the state, ranging to dime-sized hail in Brandon to reports of baseball-sized hail in Sunflower County. 

However, Lauderdale County and the surrounding area escaped the worst of the storm, experiencing heavy rain and thunderstorms.

The Meridian Fire Department responded to a fallen tree on a home on Grandview Avenue Tuesday night, but the department reported minor damage to the house and no injuries.

Tuesday night’s thunderstorms followed a night of severe thunderstorms that disrupted power and knocked down trees.

Emergency responders in Meridian and Lauderdale County reported fallen trees and power lines, power outages and disrupted traffic lights but no major problems related to Monday night’s storm.

The East Mississippi Electric Power Association reported outages throughout Monday due to high winds, according to Julie Boles, the EMEPA communications manager.

“We had outages peak around 5 in the afternoon when the storm was the worst,” Boles said. At 5 p.m. on Monday, 1,300 customers were without power.

After Tuesday night’s storms, Boles said, “We had a few scattered outages across our service area (last night) but nothing major. The majority were in our Winston County district, around Louisville.”

Jeff Shepard, spokesman for Mississippi Power, reported that heavy rain, high winds and trees disrupted power to approximately 2,500 customers in the Meridian-Lauderdale area on Monday night.

On Wednesday, Shepard reported scattered outages but nothing major from Tuesday night’s storms. 

According to the weather service, Meridian set a rainfall record for Nov. 28 with 2.91″ of rain. The previous record was 1.43″ in 1958. Meridian also tied a record high of 79 degrees for Nov. 28.