Five groups of assessors from the Federal Emergency Management Agency (FEMA) started assessing homes damaged by the Good Friday storms on Wednesday. The teams are surveying Maryland Heights, Ferguson and other areas hit by the storm. The FEMA officials are part of a Joint Preliminary Assessment Team, which consists of local officials, state authorities from the Missouri Emergency Management Agency, and an official from the Small Business Administration. Officials will assess home damage and will give the information to the state. FEMA spokesperson Josh deBerge told Maryland Heights Patch that…

Residents of greater St. Louis will not soon forget Good Friday 2011 and Easter weekend. A tornado that ranged from EF1 to EF4 on the Fujita scale (with EF5 being the worst) traveled 22 miles west to east across the St. Louis metro area on Friday, striking Lambert-St. Louis International Airport, as well as nearby communities. An estimated 750 homes were damaged in this latest tornado, Gov. Jay Nixon said at a press conference Saturday from the airport. Power was out to some 47,000 customers at the height of the storm. Here is a roundup of coverage from Patch around the region: The Good …

Griffith Elementary School students in the Ferguson-Florissant School District will have to get used to a different environment for the rest of the 2010-2011 school year. Due to storm damage from Friday, the elementary school building sustained damage that makes it unsafe for children to attend school there for the rest of the year. As a result, school district administrators have moved teachers and students to the Ferguson Middle School. Classes will proceed at their regularly scheduled time.  “I want to personally thank Griffith’s parents, students and staff for their flexibility and …