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Crews have been searching for more victims of deadly tornadoes that killed at least 55 people and injured hundreds more as they tore across five US states, ripping off a shopping mall roof, demolishing mobile homes and blowing apart warehouses.

It was the country's deadliest barrage of twisters in almost 23 years. Dozens of tornadoes plowed across Mississippi, Arkansas, Tennessee, Kentucky and Alabama.

The storms flattened entire streets, smashed warehouses and sent tractor-trailers flying.

Houses were reduced to splintered piles of lumber. Some looked like life-size dollhouses, their walls sheared away.

Crews going door-to-door to search for bodies had to contend with downed power lines, snapped trees and flipped-over cars.

"We had a beautiful neighbourhood. Now it's hell," said Bonnie Brawner, 80, who lives in Hartsville, Tennessee, a community about an hour from Nashville where a natural gas plant that was struck by a twister erupted in spectacular flames up to 120 metres high.

"It looks like the Lord took a Brillo (scouring) pad and scrubbed the ground," said Tennessee Governor Phil Bredesen, who surveyed the damage from a helicopter.

Hundreds of houses were damaged or destroyed. Authorities had no immediate cost estimate of the damage.

President George W Bush gave assurances his administration stood ready to help.

Teams from the Federal Emergency Management Agency were sent to the region and activated an emergency centre in Georgia.