In Mayfield, a US town razed by the weekend's tornadoes, locals say they are driven by their Christian faith to clear the rubble, collect supplies and turn their churches into shelters for those left homeless by one of the most devastating storm outbreaks in American history.

The small town in southern Kentucky is part of the "Bible Belt," a swathe of the southern United States where life centers on the church.

On Sunday, residents mentioned their faith as a driving force to move forward and help each other pick up the pieces.

Vanessa Cooper, 40, was trying to salvage what she could from her mother's apartment, of which only two walls remained.

Nearby, three friends cleared away twisted debris while Cooper rummaged through damaged furniture.

"Some people from my church came to help ... It means a lot to me," she said, adding that she couldn't have done it alone.

"I don't know what the future brings, but God brought me through a lot in life."

Solidarity comes naturally in small communities, Cooper said, as a neighbor asked if she needed anything.

Mayfield, a town of 10,000, "has always been close," said Cooper, who works at the local technical high school. "We show a lot of love to each other."

- 'I have nothing' -

Sitting on a chair in front of what was left of his house, Marty Janes stared blankly as volunteers worked around him.

A short distance from downtown Mayfield, his neighborhood was devastated by the twister. A tree fell on his front porch, his roof collapsed, and the exterior front walls were torn off.

"I'm devasted, it's unbelievable," Janes said.

He was trapped in the back of his house, while his wife, Theresa, was in the bedroom as their ceiling collapsed.

After their rescue by firefighters, the couple were separated for two days while Theresa was hospitalized, Janes said with tears in his eyes.

He didn't want his wife to see the damage to their house, now uninhabitable.

"I have nothing," said the 59-year-old, who managed to recover only an old photo of his college graduation and two American flags, which he put up in front of the ruined house.

Friends came to help him clean, but the task is immense. Young volunteers from the church also came to the rescue, cutting out the interior walls and partitions with saws, and clearing the rooms of unusable furniture and equipment.

Others cut up and removed the tree lying on the house.

- 'Need help' -

Faced with a number of now-homeless people, several places of worship are now acting as shelters.

In Paducah, about 25 miles (40 kilometers) north of Mayfield, Pastor Hank Garner opened his Lone Oak Baptist Church to house those in need and serve as a donations collection point.

"Folks just started pulling together everything they thought that we would need," the pastor told AFP, as water and power remained cut off in Mayfield.

Among the donations were warm clothes, blankets, baby supplies, bottles of water and food.

Finding shelter at the church, Randy Guennel said, was a miracle.

The 79-year-old retiree survived two days with his sick wife in their house.

On Sunday, he wrote "Need help" on a pizza box and put it in his mailbox.

"Some wonderful people from this church stopped. They brought us here," he told AFP, choking back sobs.

After hours trapped in ruin of tornado-hit factory, worker is 'happy to be alive'
Mayfield, United States (AFP) Dec 13, 2021 - Jemaryon Hart is bruised but grateful just to be alive after seven hours trapped under the rubble of a candle factory in Mayfield, a town devastated by the deadly tornado that swept across the state of Kentucky last Friday.

"I'm happy I'm alive," said the 21-year-old, who had been working for 10 days at the candle factory on the western side of the small town.

The factory looks like it has been stamped on by a giant's foot, nothing more than a heap of sheet metal, steel and wood that rescuers were methodically clearing in the ever-shrinking hopes of finding survivors.

On Friday night, "it was a normal day at work and it just kind of all happened at one time," Hart said. "Once we heard sirens, everybody tried to get to the safety area. But at that point it was just like it kind of all happened, and there was no way of bracing for it or anything like that."

As the tornado slammed into the building, the roof collapsed, trapping the workers inside.

"It was really scary, really painful, the walls, cinder blocks, metal, wood, everything just crushing you," he said. "The more we waited, the building like, settled in more and more on top of us."

"You went from being able to wiggle just a little bit at the beginning to not being able to move at all, everything just pinning you down," he said.

"I was just trying to control my breathing. A lot of people weren't able to do that, people were panicking," he told AFP. Some of the people passed out. Others were crushed to death.

The young man still managed to get his phone out of his pocket to call his pregnant girlfriend and then his mother.

"It gave me a little more hope to try to stick through it. Wait for help" that finally came after seven long hours, at 3:40 am.

The first rescuers, who arrived almost an hour after the tornado struck, took a long time to clear the debris, fearful that any false move could lead to the people trapped underneath being crushed to death.

Once he had been freed, Hart was carried to safety by firefighters because he could no longer feel his left leg.

"Just seeing my place of work just completely not there anymore... It was so unbelievable. The parking lot was gone. The building was gone. All the cars were gone," he said.

Beyond the physical pain, Hart also feels psychologically bruised. He discovered that a young coworker he knew was dead, and he suffers flashbacks every time he talks about the factory.

"It was so crazy. It's not actually believable that it happened. But you being there and the thoughts and images going through your head, you know it happened. So it's just kind of hard to cope with everything," he said.

He is angry at the lack of safety measures put in place by the factory management, who had decided to continue production despite warnings from the authorities. Asked if he was considering suing his employer, Hart said, "That's what they deserve."

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