Watch raw video footage of Memphis tornado

Students in Tennessee told yesterday how they huddled in dormitory bathrooms to shelter from tornados that left a trail of death across the American South.

“I’ve never been through anything like that before. The noise ... Your ears pop. It makes your skin kind of crawl. It’s really creepy,” said Andrew Norman, 20, a second-year student at Union University in Jackson, Tennessee.

At least 48 people died as more than 50 tornados ripped across five states, fuelled by unseasonably warm weather. The twisters tore off the roof of a Sears department store at a Memphis mall. Several people sheltering under a nearby bridge were washed away, but were pulled out of the Wolf River with only cuts and bruises.

The storms also triggered a huge explosion at a natural gas pumping plant northwest of Nashville that sent flames 500ft into the air. Nobody was injured.

Tennessee was hardest hit with 24 reported dead, followed by 13 in Arkansas and 7 in Kentucky.

Four people died in Alabama, where a pregnant women suffered a broken arm when her trailer home was tossed by the winds. Mississippi was also affected.

The 1,200 students living on campus at Union University in Jackson, Tennessee, raced into dormitory bathrooms when sirens gave warning of an approaching tornado. The winds reduced buildings to rubble and left cars on top of each other. Rescuers had to dig out 26 students trapped by the wreckage, including three men who were stuck for more than four hours. About 50 were taken to hospital, 9 with serious injuries.

Candra Pennington, a final-year student, told CNN: “We went to look at the weather and we realised we couldn’t get the door open. We had to get all 15 girls in the bathroom. As we were closing the bathroom door, the debris, the windows were shattering in with us, the ceiling began to fall on us. We were able to get the door shut just in time.”

David Dockery, the university president, said that the college had been hit by tornados before but never suffered such damage. “You see these major buildings — $20 million academic buildings — and roofs are off of them. It’s hard to even think about what is in front of us in terms of rebuilding.”

As the extent of the damage quickly became clear, the presidential contenders Hillary Clinton, Barack Obama and Mike Huckabee paused in their victory speeches on Tuesday night to remember the victims.

President Bush called the governors of Alabama, Arkansas, Kentucky, Mississippi and Tennessee to offer federal assistance. “Loss of life, loss of property — prayers can help and so can the Government,” he said at the White House. “I do want the people in those states to know the American people are standing with them.”

Times Recommends

• Congo's rangers risk their lives to guard gorillas
• Pearl farming in China losing its lustre
• Axl Rose mystery as album arrives at last