( CNN ) -- Photographer Paul Hellstern snapped his shutter just minutes after the tornado reduced Oklahoma City 's Briarwood Elementary School to rubble . In that fraction of a second , he captured the courage and selflessness that overcame adults at the school in the moments after the Monday devastation . `` I 'd just arrived , probably five minutes after the tornado passed , and came into that neighborhood and noticed that school there and children pouring out , '' he told CNN 's Chris Cuomo . `` It was pandemonium , with children crying everywhere , bloody teachers and so forth . '' Cameras ready , the photographer for The Oklahoman , the Oklahoma City area 's only daily newspaper , ran as quickly as he could to capture images from the scene . Teachers save lives during tornado . Police and emergency officials had yet to arrive , but Hellstern said teachers were carrying and escorting children out of the debris that once was their school . The teachers themselves were injured , Hellstern said . One had an ankle injury . Many were bloodied . With rafters and torn brick walls as his backdrop , Steve Cobb , a brown-haired man in a T-shirt and shorts , clutches a blond girl -- one of his daughters -- in brightly colored New Balance sneakers . She peers over his shoulder as he carries her away from the school . Inside a tornado-ravaged school . Following him is his wife , LaDonna Cobb , blood over her left eyebrow and smeared down her face and neck , onto the frills of her V-neck collar . She appears to have a black eye , and she 's holding the hand of a crying , barefoot girl with a large heart on her blue T-shirt . `` We 're lucky to be alive , and our hearts go out to those who were n't as fortunate , '' LaDonna Cobb told CNN 's Piers Morgan . `` We 'll heal . We 're here . That 's what 's most important . '' A teacher at Brairwood , she had the day of the tornado off . She and her husband were going to close on a house but they went to the school to check on their three children as the storm approached . `` Him , and I and the teacher just jumped on top of the kids and rode it out there , '' she said . Steve Cobb told Morgan that he had doubts . `` I was truly fearful . I did n't think we were going to live . I thought it was just going to flatten everything out and we would probably die . But somehow or another everyone survived . Mapping the twister 's 40-mile path of devastation . Hellstern said he was amazed by the adults ' response , especially those who gathered their composure to bring children out of the school , then returned to the rubble to search for more . Police and emergency officials soon joined them in the search . Hellstern said he was moved to see distraught children and parents reunite at the school of about 700 students , located in the Oklahoma capital . `` The emotion of seeing parents come together with their children for that first moment , finding them alive and still well , was exciting , '' he said . How to help . Another of Hellstern 's photographs captured a child leaping into a man 's arms . The man cradles the child 's head with one hand and hugs his waist with the other , his face flush with emotion . The man is Jim Routon , the child a 7-year-old boy named Hezekiah . They are just neighbors , but the love and relief in the photo bespeaks the bond of blood relatives . Hours after the shutter snapped and media around the world published Hellstern 's photograph , details of their story came into focus . Hezekiah , a first-grader , described the picture to Routon : `` I knew that you were going to pick me up , so I just jumped . And I just started hugging you really hard . I was crying a little bit , and I was happy that I survived . '' Routon said he needed the hug as much as Hezekiah did . `` It was so chaotic . We just were n't sure . The school was pretty much devastated and mostly destroyed . We were n't sure if anyone was going to come out alive , '' he told CNN 's Erin Burnett . `` To go over and see one of my favorite neighbor 's child emerge , it was awesome . It was just an amazing feeling . '' Routon said it 's hard to believe a photograph of him and his neighbor is among the dramatic images of the storm transmitted far beyond his state 's borders . But the stories of recovery that the photos tell are inspiring to many Oklahomans , too , he said . `` It actually helps us , you know , in the healing process , '' Routon said , `` and helps us to learn and see that ... we have to depend on one another to get through these types of things . '' CNN 's Dana Ford and Catherine E. Shoichet contributed to this report .
NEW : Woman in one of the images : `` We 'll heal . We 're here . That 's what 's most important '' Photographer for The Oklahoman arrived at school 5 minutes after tornado leveled it . Advertisement - Continue Reading Below Photographer : `` Seeing parents come together with their children ... was exciting ''