It's hard to recognize the debris as homes RELATED VIDEO CNN's Charles Zewe visits an Arkansas town that was almost wiped off the map by a tornado Real 28K 80K Windows Media 28K 80K

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• Twister a quarter-mile wide
• Clinton to visit
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LITTLE ROCK, Arkansas (CNN) -- Numerous tornadoes ripped through several southern states Friday, less than 24 hours after dozens of tornadoes killed eight people and injured dozens more.

There were reports of tornadoes in Louisiana, Texas, Arkansas, Mississippi Alabama and Tennessee. Most counties in Mississippi and Alabama were under tornado watches for much of the evening. To the north, in Kentucky and Indiana, tornado sightings were reported.

There were no reports of injuries, only minor damage in rural areas.

The storms followed one of the most violent days on record for tornadoes in the last 25 years. Across the nation, 55 tornadoes -- including 38 in Arkansas alone -- touched down, the most on a single day in January since 1975.

More than two dozen twisters slammed into Arkansas during a 12-hour siege Thursday. Both God and warning sirens are being given credit for keeping the number of fatalities down.

Forecasters began warning of big storms Monday. And on Thursday more than 70 tornado warnings were issued, and some counties sounded their sirens five or more times as storm after storm broke out over the same area.

Arkansas Gov. Mike Huckabee expressed sorrow for the loss of lives and property, but he called it a miracle that so many and so much had been spared.

"As tragic as it is to have seven fatalities, it is an extraordinary miracle that we didn't have 10 times that number," the governor said as he walked through the hardest hit town of Beebe. "We have to give credit to God."

Beebe suffered one fatality: An infant was blown from a house and killed.

Residents of Beebe try to salvage whatever they find

Beebe officials say the twister grew to a quarter-mile wide as it chewed up the town of about 5,000. The tornado ate up houses, churches and businesses and spit out their remains on the northeast edge of town.

"I lost my house and two businesses last night," said Kelton Keathley. His belongings were turned to a multicolored mush.

But he and five family members escaped unharmed, riding out the storm in a bathroom.

"The man upstairs watched after all of us real well.... We all walked off without a scratch," said Keathley. "Very seldom do you lose $500,000 and smile, but we all got up and walked off. I have no gripe. I can make the money back."

Damages in this small town alone are estimated in the tens of millions of dollars. The Beebe high school and the just-completed $2.5 million-dollar junior high were hit hard.

Huckabee trudged through the remains, saying "I'm so sorry" over and over again. He stopped to stare in amazement at Emmett Parker's 100-year-old house.

The front walls had been sheared off, leaving the second floor hanging over the exposed living room where an artificial Christmas tree with all its ornaments stood untouched.

"It hurts to see beautiful homes like this gone," Huckabee said, putting his arm around Parker.

Parker stands in his house with no front wall

Parker's daughter, Cindy Nachtigal, tearfully helped with the cleanup.

"We'll just have to fix it up so it will be there again for my daughter and her daughter -- and that's just what we'll have to do," she said.

President Clinton has pledged speedy assistance to his home state, and he plans to survey some of the damage himself on Sunday.

Trees were blown down at the governor's mansion in Little Rock where he once lived. One of those trees had contained Chelsea Clinton's treehouse.

"The fact that the governor's mansion where Hillary and I raised Chelsea for more than 12 years was actually in the path of the storm made it all the more real to me," Clinton said. "We are deeply committed to doing everything we can to help the people there recover."

Several tornadoes also tore through Tennessee, where a woman was killed when she went outside to try to rescue a pet in a rural area near Camden, about 60 miles west of Nashville.

Another tornado roared through Clarksville, heavily damaging a 14-square-block area in the city's center and injuring four people, but nobody was killed.

In central Louisiana, a tornado ripped through the Alexandria area, badly damaging about 18 businesses. A falling tree injured one person in a car, and about eight homes were damaged.

The tornadoes also played havoc with parts of the Southern U.S. power grid, knocking out transmission towers and cutting electricity to about 90,000 homes and businesses.

Arkansas, Louisiana and Mississippi were among the hardest hit, New Orleans-based utility Entergy Corp. said.

Correspondent Charles Zewe The Associated Press and Reuters contributed to this report.