Towns in Texas, Oklahoma and Arkansas were hit by tornadoes on Saturday night, leaving trucks overturned, homes damaged and nearly 250,000 households without power, the report said.
"We're in the very early stages of the rescue operations. There has been heavy damage that we can tell," Justin Stamps, the police chief of Valley View, a city north of Dallas told Reuters, adding that a command center has been set up.
Oklahoma officials activated an Emergency Operations Center to coordinate efforts statewide in anticipation of the extreme weather, Governor Kevin Stitt said in a Facebook post on Saturday.
Police officials in Rogers, Arkansas responded to people who were trapped after a tornado led to gas leaks and downed trees and power lines, cutting off electricity in large parts of the city of Rogers, the police department said in a Facebook post.