OKLAHOMA CITY — Crews were assessing damage Sunday after a tornado outbreak killed at least four people and leveled neighborhoods in several Oklahoma towns Saturday night.

In downtown Sulphur, about 85 miles southeast of Oklahoma City, Gov. Kevin Stitt (R) told reporters he hadn’t seen anything like it since taking office in January 2019.

“You just can’t believe the destruction,” he said. “It seems like every business in downtown has been destroyed.”

A woman in Sulphur died after the storm hit Saturday, and about 30 more people there were injured, Stitt said. Twenty of those hurt were taken to a hospital and released. Officials were still assessing those numbers, which Stitt said could change.

At least two deaths were confirmed in the town of Holdenville, about 70 miles southeast of Oklahoma City. An infant was among those reported to have died there.

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The other death occurred on Interstate 35 near Marietta, about halfway between Oklahoma City and Dallas, the Oklahoma medical examiner’s office said. .

Saturday was the third day in a four-day stretch of severe weather that kicked off with intense storms across Kansas on Thursday. Friday featured 78 reported tornadoes — primarily in eastern Nebraska and southwestern Iowa — which besieged neighborhoods in the Omaha and Lincoln metro areas and hit parts of the Des Moines area. Then came Saturday’s storms from a separate weather system.

The National Weather Service received 35 tornado reports on Saturday from northern Texas to northern Missouri. Between Friday and Sunday morning, the Weather Service issued 250 tornado warnings and 494 severe thunderstorm warnings from Texas to Michigan.

The Weather Service rated the Sulphur and Marietta tornadoes at least EF3 on the 0-to-5 Enhanced Fujita scale for intensity.

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It’s virtually unheard of to have tornado outbreaks two days in a row from two storm systems, and the fact that it happened highlights how erratic — and dangerous — springtime weather can be in the Plains. More severe weather was expected Sunday, although strong tornadoes were less likely.

Saturday’s tornadoes devastated parts of Sulphur, where storm chaser footage showed scores of homes and buildings flattened, and vehicles overturned and demolished.

The woman who died there had been in a downtown bar, Stitt said. In Holdenville, the two people who died included a 4-month-old child, ABC affiliate KOCO reported. Oklahoma emergency services spokeswoman Keli Cain did not provide identifying details for the person who died on I-35.

The number of injuries statewide wasn’t clear Sunday afternoon, said Annie Mack Vest, director of the Oklahoma Department of Emergency Management and Homeland Security. She added that crews were trying to restore electricity at medical facilities.

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On Sunday, government leaders pledged aid for the state. The White House said President Biden had spoken to Stitt and “offered the full support of the federal government.”

Oklahoma House Speaker Charles McCall (R), who represents the Sulphur area, said he mourned those who were killed.

“Everything else can be rebuilt, but we can’t restore life and the wonderful Oklahomans we lost,” he said.

Saturday’s severe weather pattern included at least 16 tornadoes in Oklahoma, with a few additional twisters reported in southeastern Kansas and northwestern Missouri. The majority in Oklahoma struck between 9 p.m. and midnight Central time and repeatedly targeted a narrow zone of communities near and just east of Interstate 35 between the Texas border and Oklahoma City.

Sulphur may have been hit by two tornadoes within an hour. One tornado caused major destruction around 10 p.m.; as the next storm closed in, a new tornado warning was issued and urged that “first responders need to prepare for additional tornado impacts immediately!!!”

The National Weather Service in Norman, Okla., issued tornado warnings continuously between 8:59 p.m. and 1 a.m. Central time. At one point, five simultaneous PDS — Particularly Dangerous Situation — tornado warnings were in effect.

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Ardmore, Okla., was hit by a tornado about 9:30 p.m. It carved through the west side of town and tossed debris up to 20,000 feet high, indicating it was probably a powerful tornado of at least EF3 strength. Two additional tornadoes came very close to or sideswiped the town within the next 90 minutes to two hours.

Holdenville was hit by a tornado around 10:45 p.m.

Quick-hitting, weaker tornadoes spun up on the northern band of a line of storms that passed just south of Oklahoma City, impacting Cole, Dibble and Norman. One or more tornadoes danced dangerously close to the University of Oklahoma campus.

Forecasters had been confident that the storms would be dangerous. The tornadoes initially were expected to come in several rounds, possibly starting mid-Saturday. A few had been reported across Oklahoma before the sun went down, mainly over rural areas.

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Then, about the time the sky went dark, a low-level jet stream fed two supercells that surfed from south to north and produced intense tornadoes. The jet stream acted as a conveyor belt, sending multiple tornadoes through some communities.

It was among the most severe local tornado outbreaks in memory, with back-to-back-to-back tornadoes reminiscent of historic outbreaks like those in 1974 or 2011 — albeit on a smaller scale.

In Sulphur on Sunday, Oklahoma Senate Majority Leader Greg McCortney (R) looked over a devastated downtown area in his district and took stock of what could have been.

“We’re probably blessed that it wasn’t worse than it was,” he said as heavy machinery lifted wreckage behind him.

Brasch reported from Washington. Maham Javaid in Washington contributed to this report.

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