A deadly funnel cloud, dark as night, plunged from a rainy afternoon sky Sunday and left a large part of North Minneapolis in shambles.

One person was killed and more than two dozen were injured.

Scores more were left homeless as the tornado hopped and skipped block to block, pushing trees into houses, snapping utility poles, zipping off roofs, ripping up natural gas lines and wreaking havoc over an area roughly four miles square.

“Your heart just sinks,” Mayor R.T. Rybak sighed after viewing the area by helicopter. “It’s a swath of human tragedy, not just a picture.”

Some storeowners reported looting. City officials declared an emergency and established a curfew lasting from 9 p.m. to 6 a.m.; it’ll be in effect for at least three days and there will be police at checkpoints on the boundaries of the affected neighborhoods.

“If you don’t have a reason to be in the area, don’t come to the area,” Minneapolis Chief of Police Tim Dolan said.

His warning was too late for some, though. Throughout the afternoon, residents and sightseers flocked to the neighborhood and traffic was quickly tied up because downed trees left many streets impassable.

Another tornado, which officials suspect tore a path from Mitchell County, Iowa, to Fillmore County, Minn., caused significant damage as well.

Fillmore County Sheriff Daryl Jensen said residents were lucky because there were no deaths, only one minor injury was reported, and there’s a possibility for a few unreported injuries. However, Jensen added a lot of area farms were battered, and some roads were left impassable.

Officials suspect that tornado lifted, but later touched down again and caused damage from LaCrosse, Wis., to central Wisconsin.

“These folks have a real task at hand,” Jensen said about cleanup efforts on country roads, farms and recently planted fields.

Gas lines busted

“There’s a lot of galvanized steel out in the country,” he said. “It really did a lot of significant damage.”

As she stood in the yard of her family’s house in the 2200 block of Queen Avenue North, Roz Evans, 22, spoke of how she rode out the tornado with her family in the basement.

“Ever been to Universal Studios? There’s a ‘Twister’ ride. It sounded like the ‘Twister’ ride,” she said, recalling the sound of five minutes’ worth of airborne debris battering the two-story home.

“I thought tornados weren’t supposed to hit the cities. Mother Nature, I guess,” she said.

The tornado that struck Minneapolis descended about 2:30 p.m. from a roiling storm system that had hit the western suburbs moments earlier.

In St. Louis Park, it hit a condo complex and two businesses, then bore down on Minneapolis and made its way to Fridley. There, some homes were left without roofs, two railroad cars were overturned and three businesses were damaged.

But much of its wrath was visited upon Minneapolis’ Harrison, Near North, Jordan, Hawthorne and Folwell neighborhoods. As skies grew dark and tornado sirens wailed, people sought protection as the funnel skipped from block to block.

It uprooted trees by the dozens. Some of them crashed into the fronts or sides of houses, some of them crushed cars or trucks, some of them busted out windows and many of them fell across streets, closing them to traffic.

It also killed and injured. The Hennepin County Medical Examiner’s office confirmed one person had died, but officials said they had no details. Twenty-nine people were taken to various local hospitals; of those, two were reported in critical condition, 12 had “moderate” injuries and 15 had minor wounds.

About 22,000 Xcel Energy customers had no electricity. The power failures affected Minneapolis, Golden Valley, Brooklyn Center and Fridley, the company said.

Xcel officials said they had about 100 crews working through the evening to restore power, but because they hadn’t been able to assess the full extent of the damage, they didn’t know when power would be restored.

The city sent teams to begin a damage assessment. They had no immediate idea how many homes were uninhabitable, but the city set up an emergency shelter at the Northeast Armory at 1025 Broadway St. N.E.

The shelter was prepared to handle up to 500 people, Rybak said.

As of 10 p.m. Sunday, about 200 people were at the shelter, said Bridgette Bornstein, deputy director of communications for the city of Minneapolis. She said reasons included injuries, medication needs and hunger.

An hour or so after the tornado struck North Minneapolis, the streets were filled with people surveying the damage to their homes and their neighborhoods. The air was filled with the sounds of buzzing chain saws, wailing police sirens, the distant blare of the occasional car alarm.

There were smells of pine and fresh-cut wood and the occasional whiff of natural gas; later in the afternoon, there was the smell of barbecue grills as some residents held impromptu barbecues to grill meat imperiled by a lack of refrigeration.

When many of the massive trees were uprooted, their roots tore out gas lines. Minneapolis firefighters equipped with handheld monitors walked the streets, checking the gas levels, and Assistant Fire Chief Cherie Penn said there had been some homes evacuated.

After surveying the damage from the air with Rybak, City Council President Barb Johnson said the city was fortunate there wasn’t a higher human toll.

“I’m surprised our casualty count is where it’s at,” she said. She called the aerial view “very distressing.”

In the streets, neighbors gathered to compare notes on their damage and share their stories of survival.

A 2-year-old girl named Jhurnee Dorsey was sucking her thumb and standing in the living room when a 15-foot-wide section of the exterior wall to her bedroom was ripped off her family’s duplex in the 2300 block of Penn Avenue North.

The girl’s mother, Georgette Dorsey, and uncle, Demars Dorsey, frantically grabbed what they thought were all three of Georgette’s children and sought shelter in the basement. During their mad dash, they grabbed 6-year-old Khaden and 3-year-old Tylaan, but the boys’ sister was mistakenly left upstairs.

Jhurnee was untouched when they found her one minute later, Georgette Dorsey said.

“We heard everything crashing down,” Demars Dorsey said. “It was crazy. We saw a tree lift up, and we ran to the basement.”

As she looked out of the small bedroom her three children share, Georgette, 28, could see their Disney movies “Dumbo” and “Fantasia” and fluffy stuffed moose strewn across the grass. The torn section of wall, which stretched up to the second story, was left resting alongside the house.

“I’m glad that everyone is safe,” she said. “Now, it’s the long process of cleaning up from the tornado.”

Shocked and lucky

Randy McClendon, 39, of St. Paul, used a chain saw to cut a path allowing people to walk down his aunt’s street, the 2100 block of Russell Avenue North. A tree a couple of houses down from hers had fallen and blocked the entire street and the sidewalks on both sides. At least one crushed car lay beneath it.

“My auntie’s house got hit,” McClendon said as he took a break from cutting. “I’ve never seen anything like it. But we got to make some sort of start.”

James Chang was in an upstairs bedroom of a two-story gray home at 2630 Penn Ave. N. when sirens blared and the electricity cut in and out. His older brother, Fong, called for him to come downstairs and get in the basement. James Chang needed to be told because he has Down syndrome and is “unable to recognize threats,” said Fong Chang, 22.

James Chang heard his brother and was making his way downstairs when part of the roof was ripped off and another part collapsed in. The 18-year-old Minneapolis North student was uninjured.

“Aside from the roof…we are thankful that everyone is safe,” Fong Chang said.

On the 2600 block of Penn Avenue North, trees fell into the street, making it impassable for vehicles. People were trying to pass through narrow gaps in the dense foliage.

“It looks like we are in a forest,” said Mark Akpaka, who lives about 20 blocks away but came to the area to look at the damage.

Two streets away, a massive tree – standing at least 70 feet – had uprooted the cement curb and fell directly between two homes in the 3100 block of North Newton Avenue, leaving both homes grazed by branches.

Charquandra Henry, 16, was on her laptop on the front porch moments before the tree fell. It made a loud sound that shook the house, she said, but she and her mother, Charlotte Johnson, were unharmed.

She said she felt shocked, surprised and later on, really lucky.

“It could have been a lot worse,” Henry said.

Numbers to know

If a power line is down, Xcel Energy asks customers to stay away because it could still be live and to call the company’s hotline at 1-800-895-1999.

The city of Minneapolis asks residents to call 311 with non-emergency calls about storm debris.

To donate money, call the Red Cross at 612-460-3700 during business hours.