Kansas tornado inflicts heavy damage and leaves thousands without power

A tornado has been filmed tearing through part of the US state of Kansas, with pictures showing cars crumpled into buildings and homes without roofs.

The National Weather Service (NWS) has issued severe thunderstorm warnings for Midwest states including Kansas, Iowa, Missouri and Nebraska.

In the city of Wichita, the mayor said 50 to 100 structures had been damaged, especially in the suburb of Andover.

However there are so far no reports of serious injuries.

At a press conference Saturday morning, local officials said there had been no deaths, despite the extent of the damage to buildings and cars.

“Good news is, we’ve found no more injuries than we talked about last night,” Fire Chief Chad Russell told local news. “We have no reports of fatalities…we have no rescues outstanding, so we have no one that we know of that is trapped in a building right now that’s waiting for us to rescue them.”