Montgomery, Ala. ? Lines of thunderstorms hammered the South on Wednesday, turning a skating rink into a hulk of twisted metal soon after 31 preschoolers and four adults 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 of the Fun Zone Skate Center, which doubled as a day-care facility.

“I’m amazed that anyone got out of there,” said Montgomery Mayor Bobby Bright.

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 and several injured.

Jon Slaughter, who owns two nearby businesses, arrived at the skating center with two employees about five minutes after the building was ripped apart about 10:15 a.m.

“What I saw was just utter destruction,” Slaughter said. “The children were scared, they were cold and dirty. They were crying and upset, but really they were calmer than I thought they would be.”

The manager of the day-care center operating inside the building had made everyone get into the section of the building that survived the high winds.

“She may have saved many of these children’s lives,” the mayor said.

Two people crawled under the beams and wreckage looking for kids, apparently in disbelief that everyone inside could have walked out.

Fire department personnel survey storm damage at the Fun Zone Skate Center, a skating rink and entertainment complex for children in Montgomery, Ala. The roof collapsed at the facility on Wednesday due to high winds. Two children suffered minor injuries, but the 35 people inside the building were all able to walk out on their own.

“I wasn’t panicked until I saw the building,” said Russell Grant, who showed up to take home his 5-year-old son, Justin, after hearing what had happened.

Dozens of buildings were damaged in four southwestern Mississippi counties and across the state line in three Louisiana parishes.

At least one tornado cut a path about two miles wide and three or four miles long in Greensburg, La., north of New Orleans, toppling trees and damaging buildings and power lines, said Maj. Michael Martin of the St. Helena Parish Sheriff’s Office. A 43-year-old man was killed when the trailer he was in was destroyed, he said.

Along the Mississippi Gulf Coast, devastated last year by Hurricane Katrina, rain flooded streets and closed some schools. City Hall in Biloxi suffered roof and water damage, and Mayor A.J. Holloway told The Sun Herald it appeared that a small tornado had touched down in the area.

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

The storms caused flash flooding in the Little Rock area, where police said they rescued two people who escaped high water by climbing trees.