MONTGOMERY, ALA. - Lines of powerful thunderstorms pelted the South with heavy wind, rain and hail Wednesday, turning a skating rink into a hulk of twisted metal soon after the 31 preschoolers and four adults inside had fled to the only part of the building that turned out to be safe.

One child suffered a broken bone and another a cut to the head, but everyone else emerged unharmed from the crumpled wreck.

"I'm amazed that anyone got out of there," Montgomery's mayor, Bobby Bright, said.

Several states were battered by the storms, which unleashed tornadoes and straight-line winds that overturned mobile homes and tractor-trailers, uprooted trees and knocked down power lines. At least one person was killed.

Dozens of buildings were damaged in southwestern Mississippi and in Louisiana.

At least one tornado cut a two-mile-wide path through Greensburg, La., north of New Orleans, toppling trees and damaging buildings and power lines. A 43-year-old man was killed when the trailer he was in was destroyed, authorities said.

Along the Mississippi Gulf Coast, heavy rain flooded streets and closed some schools. As the storms moved eastward, as much as 4 inches of rain fell in southern Alabama, flooding some homes, authorities reported.

In Arkansas, the thunderstorms toppled tractor-trailer rigs along Interstate 40, and police said at least four people were hospitalized.