Three Dead in Atlanta After Latest Storms

May 27, 2011— -- Three people died in the Atlanta area after straight-line winds gusted to 80 miles per hour on Thursday, ripping across parts of the South in the latest round of violent weather to tear through the U.S.

Nineteen-year-old Alonzo Daniel of Mableton was cleaning debris in his driveway on Stroud Drive when a tree fell on top of him, according to his family.

"As he was running, the tree caught him," Daniel's grandfather Robert Johnson told ABC News affiliate WSBTV in Atlanta.

Additionally, two women were crushed by a falling tree in the Buckhead section of Atlanta. The women were in a Mazda Miata convertible in the early evening when they driver lost control and crashed into a mailbox, firefighters told WSBTV.

Thursday saw more than 600 reports of severe weather across the country, including five tornadoes that stretched from the Gulf to Canada and as far east as Vermont. In New Orleans, four people were injured by the high winds.

Golf ball to baseball-size hail was reported in West Virginia, Maryland, Tennessee, Vermont and in western New York State, but resulted in only minor damage.

More severe storms are possible on Friday in the ravaged city of Joplin, Mo., and into Oklahoma. The interior Northeast, from Washington, D.C., to Pennsylvania and Maine will also experience extreme weather conditions today, but the storms will not produce as many strong tornadoes as have been seen this week.

This record-setting tornado season became even more remarkable with the rare appearance of tornadoes as far away as Northern California on Wednesday.

Meanwhile, in Joplin, which was devastated on Sunday by a massive EF-5, residents were still digging out and looking for victims though the death toll has been at 132 since midweek. Officials said today there are still 156 people missing or unaccounted for since Sunday's deadly twister.

Four schools in Joplin were leveled, while six were severely damaged, but the superintendent of the Joplin school district vowed that classes will resume in August, once the town recovers from the deadly hit that saw winds reach up to 200 miles per hour.

The death toll from the storms in Oklahoma, Kansas and Arkansas rose to 15 Wednesday.

This year has become the deadliest year for tornadoes since 1953, with over 500 deaths from 1,000 tornadoes so far, according to the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration.

April also set a record as the deadliest month with 361 tornado-related deaths, according to NOAA's records.