Mar. 17, 2025

Here's hoping you came through Saturday's severe-weather outbreak unscathed. Not everyone in the state was as fortunate. We'll briefly outline some of what we know so far about the damage.

Also, We continue out "What's in a Name?" series with a peek at the origin on Birmingham's name.

Thanks for reading,

Ike

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At least three people died in Alabama as a result of Saturday's tornado outbreak, and the National Weather Service has some long days of storm surveys ahead.

Two died in Dallas County near Plantersville and one died in Talladega County. And a woman was injured by a lightning strike in Russellville in Franklin County. That took place at 4 a.m. during the first wave of stormy weather that came through the state.

From later in the day, the weather service on Sunday confirmed at least five tornado tracks, but survey teams are just getting started. There are at least 15 tracks that need to be studied.

Tornadoes have been confirmed in Dallas County where the deaths occurred, Shelby County and Bibb County. There were at least two tracks in Shelby: One in Calera and one between Montevallo and Calera.

The weather services plans to survey storm damage in Cullman, Pickens, Tuscaloosa, Walker and Pike counties today. And then it may be on to check out damage in Chambers and Sumter counties.

So we may not have a final twister count for a few days.

Flash flooding was reported in some places. Muscle Shoals shattered its record rainfall for March 15 with 6.01 inches on Saturday.

And a suspected lightning strike late Saturday night caused the fire that burned the First Presbyterian Church of Atmore building. A few hours later, the church met for Sunday service in folding chairs in the parking lot.

Doug Kiker, a singer from Alabama whose backstory received national attention on "American Idol" in 2020, died a week ago today, reports AL.com's Lawrence Specker.

Kiker was the man who revealed in his audition that he worked as a slinger on a garbage truck and had no singing background. He then struggled through "Bless the Broken Road" until Luke Bryan and the other judges coached him through it, and he showed enough talent to earn a trip to Hollywood to compete on the show.

He had sisters who posted about his death on social media. TMZ reported that he had been taken to a Denver hospital several days before he died. An official cause of death has not been released.

Doug Kiker was 32 years old.

Alabama basketball teams will be adding to the Madness beginning this week when the Men's NCAA Tournament tips off around the country.

Auburn and Alabama both lost in their respective semifinal games of the SEC Tournament this weekend, but they'll start the national tournament as a first and second seed.

Auburn is the No. 1 seed in the South Regional. The Tigers could open the tournament with an in-state matchup if Alabama State can get past St. Francis in the play-in game. It's been 14 years since Alabama State made the tournament.

Auburn faces the winner of that play-in game Thursday in Lexington.

Alabama is the No. 2 seed in the East Regional. The Tide will open against Robert Morris on Friday in Cleveland. Duke is the top seed in the East Regional.

Troy locked down another Alabama spot on the bracket with a 14th seed in the Midwest Regional. The Trojans play Kentucky on Friday in Milwaukee.

In the Women's NCAA Tournament, fifth-seeded Alabama will open Saturday against Wisconsin-Green Bay at Legacy Arena in Birmingham.

An Odenville native has won the 2025 Iditarod Trail Sled Dog Race, reports AL.com's Mark Heim.

It was Jessie Holmes' eighth time in the race. He's now a carpenter in Alaska, and a decade ago he was featured on National Geographic's "Life Below Zero." On the show he trained dogs for running marathons in blizzard-like conditions.

The famous race had to alter its route because of a lack of snow on the course, increasing its distance from 1,000 miles to 1,129 miles.

But what's an extra 129 miles in the snow?

The winning finish time was 10 days, 14 hours, 55 minutes and 41 seconds.

For finishing in first place, Holmes won $57,200. His awards for winning earlier race stages include $4,500 worth of gold nuggets and 25 pounds of fresh salmon.

I hope those dogs get to gnaw on ribeye for a while.

Birmingham

The U.S. Census Bureau released some population estimates last week, and possibly the most noteworthy part of it is that, for the Birmingham-Hoover Metropolitan area, the bureau had dropped "Hoover" from the name, reports AL.com's Ramsey Archibald.

It's now just the Birmingham, Alabama, Metropolitan Area.

Is it a mistake? Is DOGE forcing the Office of Management and Budget to cut back on ink? Has Hoover been annexed by Mobile in time for this fall's election?

We don't know why the name change. Neither the Census Bureau nor the OMB have responded to questions. We'll let you know when we hear something.

But we can leave you with this week's place-name origin: Birmingham.

Birmingham was founded to be an industrial center, along a couple of railroad lines and where the ingredients for making iron -- iron ore, coal and limestone -- were readily available.

Clearly, founders were forging that industrial identity in 1871 when they named the new Alabama city for Birmingham, England, then a major manufacturing center.

It's not clear whose idea it was to name it for the English city. But Mark Kelly of The Alabama News Center pointed out in a story that early city leader James Powell had recently spent time at the Birmingham across the pond. Powell was the president of the Elyton Land Company, a group of mostly railroad men who were investing in the area. Powell also would become Birmingham's first elected mayor.

So it could be that one European trip made a huge impact on the past 150 years of state maps.

Back in the old country, the original Birmingham is believed by many to have been originally named for Beorma of the Anglo-Saxon tribe the Beormingas.

9

That's how many men were recently arrested on charges related to human trafficking and child exploitation in north Alabama, according to the Limestone County Sheriff’s Office.

Score breakdown:

5 out of 5: 8.1%

4 out of 5: 19.9%

3 out of 5: 33.7%

2 out of 5: 26.3%

1 out of 5: 11.1%

0 out of 5: 0.9%

President Trump nominated this former Alabama gubernatorial candidate as U.S. ambassador to the Food and Agriculture Organization of the United Nations.

Lindy Blanchard (CORRECT) 60.3%

Bradley Byrne 26.6%

Scott Dawson 8.1%

Parker Griffith 5.1%

This Auburn basketball star was NOT an SEC player of the year.

Charles Barkley 41.8%

Chuck Person (CORRECT) 28.3%

Chris Porter 21.2%

Johni Broome 8.8%

This Alabama city's council voted to rebuild the entire police department, including hiring a new police chief.

Hanceville (CORRECT) 89.6%

Blountsville 4.4%

Daleville 3.7%

Graysville 2.4%

This season the Birmingham Barons' concession stands will offer a hamburger named after this former player from the Birmingham area.

Bo Jackson (CORRECT) 68.0%

Willie Mays 26.3%

Wimpy Quinn 4.0%

Bruce Benedict 1.7%

What foreign government is planning tariffs on wood products from Alabama in its campaign to target Trump-friendly states?

Canada 52.2%

European Union (CORRECT) 38.4%

China 8.8%

Ukraine    0.7%

In 1913, actor, musician and educator Charles Lampkin of Montgomery. His family moved to Cleveland with the Great Migration while he was young.

In 1919, jazz legend Nat King Cole of Montgomery.

In 1972, former soccer star and Olympic gold medalist Mia Hamm of Selma.

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