Page 37 - Ef 4 News Today

>> wow. an absolutely terrifying weekend in the midwest. tornadoes, monster tornadoes, more than two dozen of them reported in five different states. two people now reportedly killed. up to 300 homes damaged or completely destroyed. our george howell is standing by in shawnee, oklahoma, one of the areas hardest hit. and i can see the debris behind you. it is probably not surprising theyre now calling this an ef-4 tornado. at least one of them, that went through your area, george. >> ashleigh, an...

Was perhaps an ef-4 that came through shawnee. if thats the case, were talking wind of some 200 miles an hour. that is about the strength of a category 5 hurricane. but, it doesnt matter. i covered these last thursday in north texas and here we are in oklahoma. doesnt matter how many times you come out to scenes like this, when you see peoples homes littered around, bill and martha, there is really no words to describe. bill: indeed. casey, what are they expecting today? because theres a forecas...

Four years and it was during that time. this is the same exact path, martin. moore, oklahoma, i covered that storm. moore, oklahoma, was leveled. i cant emphasize enough. this is a very heavily populated area full of subdivisions and schools and churches and malls and things like that. it is packed. moore got hit so badly during that infamous tornado on may 3rd so many years ago and thats where a majority of the people died. you hear the e perts talking about an ef-4, ef-5. thats 160 to 200 mile...

Of the pictures. if you take a look, you can see some of the knapsacks that were hanging if you look up there near the right. there it is near the right-hand part of your screen. they were just there as this tornado, an ef-4 were told by the national weather service with speeds of 166 to 200 miles per hour. it ripped through this area of moore, oklahoma, right outside of oklahoma city, and literally leveled, leveled, this elementary school, the plaza towers elementary school. this is what it use...

Everything up in its past and some weather spotters say this could be ef-4, ef-5 material just by seeing the sheer image of this thing as it crosses the landscape. the real troubling part of this, neil, is that this is hitting areas that were already flattened yesterday with these tornadoes that ravaged the region. four tornadoes and the national weather service told us this morning, actually came down out of the clouds yesterday in various spots all around the state. specifically to the northea...

Prayers going out to all those folks and we hope all those children are safe tonight. take a look at the watches because we are not over yet, unfortunately, bret. tornado watches in effect for parts of texas, including class up towards oklahoma into missouri as well as parts of illinois and kansas. some the same areas that were hard hit yesterday in shawnee, oklahoma where we saw or heard from casey stegall ef-4 went through that area winds of close to 200 miles per hour. and again some of these...

History, the pictures seem to indicate this is close to unprecedented. do the facts support that? >> absolutely. something else that is unique about this storm, erin, eight miles west of where it touched down, there was nothing. there was a thunderstorm. then five minutes later, there was a funnel. five minutes after that, we were ef-2. then five minutes after that, we were ef-4. this developed so quickly. the warning system worked. but the first moore tornado in 1999, people had an hours notice...

250 miles per hour? do we know the extent of this tornado that caused this devastation? >> i dont think well know that until tomorrow. the national weather service will certainly be out there. they were looking at five separate tornadoes today. lets go through them. an ef-0 takes the shingles off a house. an ef-1 takes the shingles and gutters. an ef-2 were looking at 120, 130 miles per hour. that takes the roof with it, all of the 4 by 8 plywood off. ef-3, you lose all the trusses on the roof, ...

Responding as friends and neighbors. we know there are injuries. im not going to speculate too much beyond. that i flipped through enough of these things. you see something this size, even when people do all the right things, if youre not underground and, you know, an f-4 or f-5 packs a tremendous punch. and so we can get out of this with only injuries that will be an unbelievable blessing. >> were just learning that this storm could be dirve from all those other ones you mentioned in that in ot...

These houses will have basements. quite a few have safe room, reinforced rooms in the interior, concrete sometimes and that area for probably a square mile around plaza towers, homes are devastated and teachers made the right call. those kids were probably safer in that location with much thicker walls and in an interior wall with granite and all that. but you hit it on the head when you said theres not much that helps you if youre above ground you get a direct hit on an f-4, f-567 f-5. we had t...