Who are the victims of the Kentucky tornadoes devastating the midwest?

Deaths have been confirmed in at least five of the six states hit by a number of tornadoes over the weekend. The death toll is feared to be more than 100 in Kentucky alone, but casualties have also been reported in Arkansas, Illinois, Mississippi, Missouri, and Tennessee, with fatalities confirmed in all but one of the states.

While many of the victims remain unidentified, here’s what we know so far.

Kentucky

Kentucky was hit the hardest by the powerful storms on Friday night, with Democratic Governor Andy Beshear saying during a press briefing on Sunday that it was the “most devastating tornado event in our history”. The National Weather Service is still assessing the damage done by the storms, but Mr Beshear said he believes it’s the longest single path taken by a tornado ever in the US.

He added that it’s difficult to answer how many are missing.

“When your cellphones don’t work in these communities, how do you find people to truly know how many are missing?” he said. “Again, we’re 40 hours in, and just the level of devastation does make having the specific numbers … difficult to have.”

After initially saying that at least 80 Kentuckians have died, Mr Beshear revised that number to 64 on Monday.

But Mr Beshear cautioned on Sunday that it would probably get worse as time goes on. “Remember, we’re still finding bodies. I mean, we’ve got cadaver dogs in towns they shouldn’t have to be in,” he said.

“Undoubtedly, there will be more,” he added on Monday. The governor said the victims vary in age from five months to 86 years old and that six victims are younger than 18 years old.

One of the few identified Kentucky victims is 43-year-old District Judge Brian Crick. Kentucky Circuit Judge Brian Wiggins said Mr Crick was known for his “sound judgement”.

“Many of the defendants who came before him weren’t represented by attorneys, and Crick was very good about seeing to it that their rights were protected,” Judge Wiggins said, according to the Associated Press. “He had a very common-sense approach. He was very level-headed about how to handle cases and how to talk to people.”

He added that Crick “was just a consummate family man … very engaged with his children and his wife. They were number one to him”.

The Graves County Jail and Restricted Custody Centre wrote on Facebook that one of their corrections officers died in the storms. “It is with deep regret and sorrow that we report the passing of one of our deputies and friends, we will miss Robert Daniel forever until we meet again. He did his job honourably and professionally until the very end,” the centre posted. “We love you and pray for your family. If anyone wants to help in any way, please bear with us, it is chaotic right now and we have no information on arrangements or anything yet.”

Mayfield resident Angela Wheeler told WLWT-TV that when they got the storm warning, they rushed into the bathroom.

“Like everybody says, it was like a roar and it shifted the house where we were at and almost made us fall into the basement,” she said.

They were trapped inside their home and eventually escaped from a window. A family across the street was screaming for help. Their home was levelled and their three-year-old son was killed, she said.

Mayfield resident Jamel Alubahr, 25, said his three-year-old nephew died and his sister was in the hospital with a skull fracture after being stuck under the rubble of their home, the BBC reported. “It all happened in the snap of a finger,” said Mr Alubahr, who is now staying with another sister in Mayfield.

It was unclear whether Alubahr’s nephew and the three-year-old who was living across the street from Ms Wheeler are the same.

Missouri

Ollie Borgmann, 84, was found by rescue teams in a field after her house was blown off its foundation by the sheer force of the tornado in Defiance, Missouri. Ms Borgmann was taken to a nearby hospital where she later died.

The “typical grandmother” lived in her house with her 84-year-old husband Vernon Borgmann, who also suffered bruises and scratches, according to their son Mark Borgmann.

Their other son, Keith Borgmann, was reportedly on the phone with his father when the line went dead.

The St Louis Post Dispatch reported that Mr Borgmann’s one-car garage was gone and their white car overturned. The barn behind the home collapsed. Carpets and mattresses were in a pile surrounded by trees uprooted and fallen over.

Governor Mike Parson also announced that a child died in the state.

Illinois

At least six Amazon employees died in Edwardsville, Illinois when an Amazon warehouse caved in under the pressure from the tornado.

Officials identified the dead at the warehouse as Deandre Morrow, 28; Kevin Dickey, 62; Clayton Lynn Cope, 29; Etheria Hebb, 34; Larry Virden, 46; Austin McEwen, 26.

The family of Cope, a Navy veteran, told CNN that he talked to them just before the tornado struck and hit the Amazon warehouse.

Carla Cope said her son was trying to get the word out to other people about the tornado as she talked on the phone with him during his last call and warned him of the tornado. She said she asked him to take shelter but he said he needed to inform other people.

“He loved to hang out with his friends,” she said about her son who was going to turn 30 on 27 December. “He was big-hearted – he would do anything for anybody.”

She said Cope had been working for Amazon for more than a year as a maintenance mechanic and that his father also worked at the facility in the same position.

“Had [Clay] not been there, my husband would have” been, she said.

Cope had served in the Navy for six years as a calibration specialist on aircraft carriers. She described him as “a really good kid”.

The family of Virden, another employee killed at the Amazon facility, said the company had told him to stay put after tornado warnings were reported.

“I got text messages from him. He always tells me when he is filling up the Amazon truck when he is getting ready to go back… I was like ‘ OK, I love you.’ He’s like, ‘well Amazon won’t let me leave until after the storm blows over’,” Virden’s girlfriend Cherie Jones told the New York Post.

Another person who died in the facility has been identified as Etheria Hebb, 34. The single mother left behind her one-year-old son, Malik, and was described as the “kindest person” by the family, the New York Post reported.

“She was the sweetest, kindest person ever. She was such a beautiful soul,” her sister, Tiara Hebb, told the newspaper. “She was the life of the party and always did everything for everyone. She always checked on everyone.”

Her stepmother Baby Hebb said her son is struggling without her mother. “They were very close. It’s kinda hard but we will get through it by the grace of God,” she said.

Arkansas

The state has reported that at least two people have died – a 94-year-old man died when a nursing home was destroyed in Monette in the northeastern part of the state, and The Washington Post reported that Dollar General assistant manager June Pennington died as she shielded a co-worker as a wall collapsed on them, breaking the co-worker’s legs and killing Ms Pennington.

Two of Pennington’s children said the Manila, Arkansas, resident was devoted to her four children and nine grandchildren and had a particular soft spot for animals.

Pennington, 52, was working as an assistant manager at a Dollar General store in nearby Leachville, Arkansas, when it was hit.

“She didn’t love anything as much in life as her kids and grandkids,” Christie Pennington said. “She was truly selfless and loved whole-heartedly.”

David Benefield, the oldest of June Pennington’s four children, said he was born when his mother was only 14.

“She was a kid raising a kid. We were just like best friends,” he said. “It’s crazy how close you become.”

Her children remember her as someone who “would do anything that we asked her to do,” Mr Benefield said. Even after her children were grown, they said June Pennington wanted to spend as much time with them as possible.

Christie Pennington said her mother adopted dogs, cats, rabbits, birds, turtles, and even a ferret.

“If there was ever an animal in need of a home, we took it in,” said Christie Pennington, who said her mom blamed her, even though her children knew better.

“That was just her way out,” Mr Benefield said.

Tennessee

At least four people have died in Tennessee, with two deaths being reported in Lake County in the northeastern parts of the state and another fatality occurring in Obion County, according to the Tennessee Emergency Management Agency.

The Associated Press contributed to this report