Tornadoes Devastate Oklahoma; Search and Recovery Effort Underway
JOHN BERMAN, ANCHOR, "CNN NEWSROOM": Welcome back to CNN's continuing live coverage of the aftermath of Oklahoma tornadoes. I'm John Berman standing in a neighborhood right now in the town of Moore, Oklahoma, and you can see what happened to this neighborhood, simply flattened. Everywhere you look there's metal, twisted metal debris like this. On the ground here, the wood is splintered everywhere. And take a look at this. You see this nail poking out of the wood. You see how dangerous something like this is as this wood was simply flying around in the force of the storm with winds topping 200-miles- an-hour. You look around this neighborhood here, dozens of homes, hardly a home left standing. I have to say, not that many walls left standing in the debris of this neighborhood. You've been hearing the story of Moore, Oklahoma. You've heard about neighborhoods like this one where I'm standing. You've also heard about the schools, the Plaza Towers Elementary School, which crumbled with students believed trapped still inside. So many third graders are there. Overnight search-and-rescue crews continued to dig through the rubble of that building by hand. The Briarwood Elementary School where teachers protected the kids and there were emotional reunions and hugs with parents and teachers and students, just after that tornado struck. At some points, this tornado, by the way, was two miles wide, and it tore a swath some 20 miles long through this town. The whole country is watching what's happening here as this city digs through the rubble here. And a short while ago, President Obama delivered remarks from the White House.</s>PRESIDENT BARACK OBAMA: In an instant neighborhoods were destroyed. Dozens of people lost their lives. Many more were injured and among the victims were young children trying to take shelter in the safest place they knew, their school. Our prayers are with the people of Oklahoma today.</s>BERMAN: The prayers of the entire nation with Oklahoma. You are looking at people dig through their homes right now. That's a refrigerator they just got their hands on, just one piece of the debris here. This neighborhood where I'm standing I suppose good news is we've been told by people who live here it's mostly a working neighborhood. Most people were away at work when the storm hit. They've already done one sweep through here, looking for people trapped in the rubble. They did not find anyone. They are asking people whose homes -- who live here -- they can come back for a second if they want to look around for a bit, but please do not linger. They say they fear it is still too much of a dangerous situation. Speaking of dangerous situations, I don't know if you can see behind me, but clouds are very dark here. There is some drizzle. We hear the occasional rumble of thunder. We want to get a sense of where there will be more today? Where is this storm center headed next? Let's go to CNN Weather Center. Chad Myers who is monitoring the storm system for us. Hey, Chad.</s>CHAD MYERS, AMS METEOROLOGIST: Good morning, John. There will be some weather for you today, but it won't be tornadic. You won't see weather with hail, wind, damaging tornadoes to you, but there will be that type of weather from Dallas up through Little Rock, even on toward the northeast of there. We're talking even the potential for severe weather, Chicago, Detroit, and Indianapolis. Now remember, we think about tornadoes as kind of a southern plains kind of Tornado Alley thing, but the truth of the matter is tornadoes have happened in every single state in the nation. So here you go. We can get all the way up into Detroit, Indianapolis, all the way down into Ft. Smith and into Memphis where the heaviest rain, the heaviest potential for severe weather will be Dallas and Shreveport. One thing that's going to stop the severe weather from being very severe in Oklahoma is the fact that it's raining. Yesterday at this same time it was sunny, and we talked about that. We don't want the sun. The sun is heating the ground. The ground is heating the air and that air is rising. Rising air makes thunderstorms. And we don't have that rising air today because we don't have a lot of sunshine. We will have showers and thunderstorms. There may even be some lightning that will scare and maybe even make the rescuers scatter, but it won't be a tornadic day for Oklahoma City today or Moore. John?</s>BERMAN: That is good news, Chad. I can tell you I feel the rain falling on me, and as you said, we might see lightning. There's thunder. I don't know if you can hear thunder right now, rumbling above me and there was lightning just a short time ago. Doesn't seem too close. I promise you, Chad, I promise everyone, including my wife and kids, that we'll be careful out here and keep one eye on the weather as it develops. There are so many stories to tell you about in this town and one of the most interesting ones is at the Moore Medical Center which isn't far from where I'm standing now. That's where we find CNN's Pamela Brown who has been there all morning. Pamela, tell me what you are surrounded by there right now.</s>PAMELA BROWN, CNN CORRESPONDENT: Well, John, you're right. I'm here at the Moore Medical Center, and as you can see behind me, it was obliterated from the tornado that moved through here yesterday. This was in the direct path of the tornado and, amazingly, 30 patients that were inside Moore Medical Center being treated were evacuated after the damage from the tornado. They were evacuated to surrounding medical centers. As I mentioned, this is primarily an outpatient center. It's a pretty small hospital in comparison. We've seen search-and-rescue teams out here today. There's a bowling alley to my left and they have been -- the dogs, the cadaver dogs, have been out here today searching for any humans that could be trapped underneath the rubble. I spoke to one member of a search-and-rescue team who said that because of this weather that you were just talking about, John, because of the lightning we're seeing, the rain, the weather conditions, they're in a holding pattern right now and they're not able to continue their search efforts here. And they also talked about the challenges of the chemicals and downed power lines and natural gas here at all these various sites around Moore, Oklahoma. There's been a lot of focus on the school, the Plaza Towers Elementary School where seven children were killed after the tornado swept through yesterday. Search-and-rescue teams have been there around the clock trying to find more survivors. We've seen dramatic images of parents rushing to the elementary schools, two in particular that were in the direct path of the tornado. One mother ran up and saw her son crouched down frozen on the ground with his hands over his head. He was terrified. Other parents rushed to the scene and were unable to find their child. Let's listen to one mother who went through an agonizing experience.</s>BROWN: You're looking for your son right now, aren't you?</s>UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: Yeah. His name is Dylan Zachary Hall.</s>BROWN: And he was -- where was he?</s>UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: He was at the Plaza school.</s>BROWN: OK, so he was at Plaza Towers Elementary. His name is Dylan.</s>UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: Dylan Zachary Hall. He's how old? And when was the last you heard from him?</s>UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: He's 13, and we haven't -- I haven't seen him since the school. I know his step mom was in the cellar at her house, and she -- I lost contact with her. And they're supposed to be sending people over there, so I don't know if she's still in the cellar or not. But I just can't find my son.</s>BROWN: We learned the fourth-, fifth- and sixth-graders at that school were taken to a local church, and the younger kids stayed at the school. Some were in the hallway huddled together when the tornado moved through, in their drill position, crouched down with their hands over their heads. It's important to pay tribute to the teachers here. They're being hailed as heroes for saving lives, for saving some of these kids by shielding them, lying on top of them as the tornado moved through, pulling a wall off some of the kids that were trapped. We've seen some dramatic images there of teachers hugging the students so tight after that tornado. You can just imagine how many times they must have practiced that drill and then to actually have to put it into play yesterday must have been a terrifying experience.</s>BERMAN: It must have been terrifying, Pamela, as you say. And when you see those teachers hug those kids, you know how much they care about the children in their classroom every day. It was a beautiful sight to see in so many ways. Pamela Brown, not far from us at the Moore Medical Center, thanks so much for being with us. I want to show you some live aerial footage right now of the destruction here in Moore, Oklahoma. You get a sense of the scope of this storm. As we said, at some times this tornado was some two miles wide. It tore a path some 20 miles long as it passed through here. The wind speeds, it was an EF-4 tornado which means wind speeds were up to 200- miles-an-hour. So you can see the destruction that it caused. We don't have an accurate count of the number of buildings damaged or destroyed. One of the reasons is it's frankly hard to count. You can see that from the air. And you also get a sense of that from the ground. I'm joined here in this neighborhood where I'm standing by Stephanie Elam who's been here all morning, walking through the debris here of these homes that have simply been flattened.</s>STEPHANIE ELAM, CNN CORRESPONDENT: It's unimaginable. And even as you hear it and you see images, it's nothing like seeing it with your own eyes. It's unbelievable what these people have lost. And what really symbolizes that, if you take a look, John, like -- I have to watch where I step because there's nails everywhere grabbing me on my pants. But if you look over here, you can see this personal artifact. You've got things that have just been tossed around just like rag dolls along with wood that are just stuck out here. There's a blanket and a little stroller and a bag stuck in that tree, one of the neighbors even telling me that that was a massive willow tree right there that got damaged. One other thing to point out over here is this right here, massive piece of guardrail here, and this guardrail, I asked one of the neighbors where this possibly could have came from. And he said that it probably came from the interstate which is not from anywhere around here. But it got tossed around like it was just a little splinter and landed here on these people's lawns. So it just shows you how dangerous it was to be out on the street, John, at the time.</s>BERMAN: We are not that near to the highway right now, by the way. To give you a sense, I mean, this thing must have traveled a quarter mile, half mile.</s>ELAM: And think about how dangerous that would be to be flying through the air and all things that it could hit, let alone the people that if they did not make it into a shelter at time. Just gives you an idea of just what these people were up against.</s>BERMAN: And to be clear, we're standing in someone's front yard right now and this guardrail, this girder, from the road has simply landed in their front yard here and, again, you can see these people, these poor people, digging through their homes, trying to get what they can from these homes.</s>ELAM: And, you know, one of the things that we did speak to one neighbor and his family also lived through Joplin. And so I asked him just about these tornadoes. How do you take it all in? And hopefully we have that sound. You can hear what he had to say.</s>BERMAN: (Inaudible). We have no ...