Seven dead after powerful storms slam Houston, Texas

Thunderstorms have killed seven people and left more than half a million homes and businesses without power in south-eastern Texas. Residents in the area could be without power for weeks after Thursday's storm, which packed 110mph (177km/h) winds, said officials. The deaths were mostly caused by downed trees and power lines and lightning. The storm has moved on to neighbouring Louisiana with flood warnings in place for the Gulf Coast.In an update on Friday night, officials announced the deaths of three more people, taking the toll to seven.

An 85-year-old woman died in a fire sparked by lightning, a 57-year-old man died trying to move a damaged electrical pole and another man who required oxygen was found unresponsive after he lost electricity. Officials had said earlier that two people died from falling trees and another person was killed when a crane fell over. Mother-of-four Christin Martinez, 31, was killed when a tree fell on her car.

"She told her husband that she wanted to go out and move the car because there's an old tree back there, very large tree, and she was concerned about it falling," said Houston Police Department Lt R Willkens."Unfortunately, when she got in the car, it fell when she was inside." Mrs Martinez leaves behind three boys, ages 8, 10, and 12 and a baby whom she was still breast-feeding. In Friday's news conference, Texas Judge Lina Hidalgo, the top government executive in Harris County, said that at least two tornados hit the region on Thursday night.

In Houston, traffic lights were out on Friday, office windows blown through and glass strewn across the city's streets. The Houston Independent School District district cancelled school on Friday.On Friday evening, about 600,000 homes and businesses were without electricity, down from nearly one million customers one day earlier. The vast majority of outages were in Harris County, which contains Houston and is home to more than 4.7 million people. Judge Hidalgo said the winds reached speeds the area had not experienced since Hurricane Alicia in 1983.