the driver escaped with his life. it was not the only tornado on the ground. at least four people killed west of oklahoma city in canadian county. at one point the national weather service had to evacuate its norman oklahoma storm prediction center. take a look. >> wow. woe got lightning really close. where is it? yeah. >> okay, we got another tornado on the ground. we're going to have to get out of here, guys. we can't stay around here. >> multiple vortex tornado on the ground. where's the location towards the south? >> don't worry about it. >> we're good, we're good. >> we'll be all right. >> here's a remarkable view from reporter david payne. >> reporter: there it is on the ground. it's getting stronger. elephant trunk tornado on the ground. >> from i-40 and highway 102, where is it from you, where is that tornado? >> reporter: take my -- >> begin two. >> northwest of i-40. big elephant trunk. elephant trunk tornado, it's just northwest. it's over -- it's north of i-40. you'll see it in the stream right there. >> unbelievable. david payne is joining us live on the phone. david, how close were you to that tornado? >> you know what? that video was at the end of the chase. the first tornado, which i would love to give you -- i hope you can get some video of this. that was on the west side. you mentioned canadian county, west side of oklahoma city. at that one point, i lost a side mirror off my car today and we were within a couple hundred yards when it was nearly three quarters of a mile wide tornado when it sat down southwest of oklahoma city. an incredible storm. it goes back to what we witnessed in joplin, missouri, the deep south and april 27th and we go back to may 3rd of 1999. the tornadoes today were violence, long-tracking tornadoes. absolutely amazing, and these storms just went up hard, they were turning and rotating from start to finish and they were killer tornadoes today in oklahoma. >> and to get that close, what does it feel like? people talk about a pressure change. >> right. if you're really close, you often hear the noise that it sounds like. if you're really close, it sounds like -- we're close to the air force base, it sounds like you're standing next to a jet airplane. and sometimes i offer refer to it, when i tell people when i'm doing this, it sounds like a rushing waterfall, like standing next to niagara falls. it sounds like that, and your ear also pop sometimes. but they popped bigtime and you can have ear damage if you're caught inside a tornado. our plan is not to do that. what we do is try to bring home the viewer, while they're watching where the tornado is, and you heard me talking. take my stream, i'm talking about live streaming video. that's how we bring the pictures live to the viewer. when you're close to it, it's traumatic, it's chaos, there's drama. it's insane and your main objective is you're trying to tell people this is where it is. if you don't move, you got to get out of the way or go below ground or you're going to die. that's what we're trying to tell people today. this is going to be a horrible day, we knew it. we've been talking about it for a week. it's been a crazy day. i guess now i just talked to the news room. the death toll is officially ten year and they're still trying to find people. there were a lot of tornadoes on the ground for quite a while today. >> yeah. david payne, i'm glad you were safe and appreciate you talking to us tonight. there has been loss of life in oklahoma. joining us on the phone is the governor of oklahoma. we appreciate her talking to us. governor, what is the latest information about the situation in oklahoma? >> we still have storms going through the northeast and southwest part of oklahoma. so there's still possible tornadic activity in our state. we're still under a state of alert. what we do know is there was about 14 communities throughout the state of oklahoma that have been hit by tornadoes and sustained substantial damage. we're still trying to confirm the exact number of the fatalities. we know we've had over 60 people who have had injuries and some very, very severe injuries. we have almost 60,000 homes right now without electricity. we have some possible schools that have been destroyed in some of the rural areas. you know, we still have a long night ahead of us with these storms and they're trying to make sure we get out and do door-to-door search and rescue to find those who might have survived the tornado. and to send emergency responses -- >> are you able at this point to have people out looking or is some places is it still too dangerous to have search and rescue out? >> no, we do have a lot of people out. it's been incredible the response we've had throughout the state. the big challenge is, it's finally dark and we still have storms going through a certain portion. the storms are heading up towards joplin right now. these are very severe storms. and so it's going to be hard to find those tornadoes when they do come out. hopefully they won't, but they still might. we have a lot of power that's down right now, and that makes it very dangerous for those that are trying to do search and rescue and trying to open up some of the roadways, too. >> and has the national guard been mobilized or is that something you're considering? >> we have all kinds of emergency personnel. the national guard is out helping, our highway patrol, our health department, salvation army, red cross, all of our first responders are out across the state. the big challenge for us today, anderson, has been -- i mean, we've had a massive outbreak of tornadoes that's gone on now for the last five hours throughout the state. i've been in office for 20 years. i've been through a lot of these natural disasters, but i've never seen this many in a short period of time. the state capital area right now, earlier today we had three tornado sirens go out where i'm located within about an hour and a half, and that's highly unusual. >> wow. governor, i am so sorry for the fatalities in your state and i hope the numbers don't increase. governor, thank you very much. >> thank you so much. and we'll send our thoughts and prayers to joplin also. >> yeah. thank you. people here appreciate it and they know people around the world have been watching and sending their love and prayers. just starting to see some lightning here in joplin. let's talk with chad myers. chad, what a day it has been. >> it has been. you know, i was trying to in my head when david payne was talking, when the governor was talking, i was trying to add up how many square miles of oklahoma was devastated by tornadic activity today. and david payne's tornado was probably 60 miles long, a half mile wide the entire time. that's 30 square miles of devastated land in one tornado. and they are searching through 30 square miles of land to find survivors here. the storm is still not done. it's still moving through parts of eastern oklahoma. there you are right there, joplin. probably 45 minutes away, if not less, for the lightning. lightning always gets there before. so i need you to be careful out there, and the other crew out there, as well. let's take a look at something else going on right now. we're going to take you to dallas-ft. worth. here's ft. worth, here's dallas. a very large cell near the university, park city is here. and also out toward garland. we know some of these storms are rotating, there have been tornadoes on the ground in the metroplex, with damage. don't know how much. it's dark, hard to see. here's one of the chasers we have. this is rick burnie from chaser tv. we've been watching these chasers all night long on streaming video, the same video that david payne was telling you about a little bit ago. and now to you, anderson. what we have in store for you, joplin, missouri right here, here's i-44. you are only at interstate exit 10 to 12 here at joplin. so there's another -- you're 30 miles away and this is moving east at 50. that doesn't bode well for the end of your show. we'll be here to take care of you. we want you off the air if lightning gets close. we'll take care of it from here. >> starting to hear i think some thunder rumbling here. definitely seeing some lightning. we're -- chad, we're basically proceeding as if this is going to be a lot of winds, just like with a hurricane. so we're kind of hunkered down on the side of a brick building. our main concern is keeping the satellite truck on air and not letting it flip over. so we think we're in a good location. i want to go to ed lavindara in dallas. ed, how is the city doing? >> reporter: we're in the middle of a severe weather cell that's cutting through the heart of dallas and we've seen this over the last hour where a tornado was confirmed touched down in the northwest corner of terrant county, which is the ft. worth area. that same storm system has been making its way across the dallas area in the last hour. we've heard sirens wailing across the city for most of the half hour. severe lightning, hail in some places as big as tennis ball size. we've heard reports of so far. no reports on the extent of the damage or any kind of injuries that might have been caused by that tornado that touched down or how long it was on the ground. so we're still trying to assess that. but a very dangerous situation right now, anderson. at the texas rangers baseball game tonight, the stadium had to be evacuated. power outages have been going in and out. a very treacherous situation and hopefully this moves through rather quickly. >> yeah. ed, we'll continue to check in with you. we're on facebook, follow me on twitter @ anderson cooper. we're going to continue to update the breaking news. up next, the search for victims here in joplin. victims, survivors and hundreds of people who may be alive and well but cut off from contact for those who care most about them. we'll follow the details from joplin, ahead. 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>> we have more information from canine alerts. >> do you think they're alive? >> i think it's unlikely. >> doug westhof is the task force leader. >> in all likelihood if they were in the store or underneath those slabs and one gentleman knew his son-in-law and two grand kids were in that store. he waited around for the entire day yesterday. >> teams stand by to deal with the recovered bodies, but search and rescue personnel still hope to find someone alive. >> the dogs are trained to search for live people who are trapped or entombed underneath structures. this is the job we've been called out to do. >> this task force has four dogs working in joplin. >> they've got to be naked. if you can see all this debris, she has a collar or vest on, they can be trapped. i take this off when i send her in. >> many of the fatalities of the home depot have been found near the front of the store. if they were huddled near the front, that would have been the most dangerous spot for them. >> unfortunately. that's where the walls came down. >> they've used heavy equipment to drill through the collapsed walls and check underneath. this is a wall of the home depot? >> sure. what you've got is a piece of concrete, you can see the insulation foam and another layer on top of that. >> this is all insulation? >> absolutely. >> the walls may have collapsed, but many of the store shelves were left standing. >> this was a much more survivable environment here than in the front of the store. >> have you already been through in area? >> yeah, even with the front of the store being inaccessible, we were able to probe in. >> with so much heavy equipment needed, the search is sometimes frustratingly slow. how much are you working against the clock in terms of bad weather? >> we're working against if clock all the time, both for the survivability profile and the forecast for bad weather. so we're under the gun for that. we had to shelter our folks a few times yesterday just based on the lightning strikes and the hail and rain and that sort of stuff. just makes it impossible to move around and do it safely. >> time is running out, and there's still so much to do. doug westhof is trying to be optimistic. >> if the space is right, the void is big enough, people can last many days like this. so we're two to three days into this thing. and we're sort of the eternal optimist, anderson. we're going to maintain hope as long as we can. this is becoming less and less likely a rescue and more and more likely a recovery. but that's the reality. >> by the end of the day, they find one trapped person, but sadly that person had already died. the searching continues, however, even here in joplin amidst all this misery. even here there is still some hope. and there is still some hope. we showed you some of the accounted for a few moments ago, including will norton. he was sucked through the sunroof of an suv. he was in the car with his dad. his dad has been in the hospital recovering. he was on his way home from his high school graduation. he turned up at the local hospital and was transferred. no one knows exactly where. the sirens are now going off here again. there's been concern all day about an approaching storm. will norton's family went to one hospital. after hearing a patient there who matched will's description. it was not him we're told. right here on this part of the storm, on the southeastern part of the storm. it's beginning to rotate. this part of the storm is going this way. this part of the storm is going this way. that's enough rotation, especially with what has already happened in joplin, to put the tornado warning out for that storm. not saying there's a tornado on the ground. in fact, there probably isn't. this is a doppler radar indicated potential tornado. but everyone there in joplin needs to be taking cover in some place substantial. some place out of the weather. i'll be here watching it for the rest of the night. >> and gary tuchman is at a shelter where hundreds of people have sought safety tonight. i'm told we just lost gary. there's about -- i think gary told me before he left, there were about 400 people at a shelter tonight that they have gone to. and chad, one of the things we've been talking about yesterday is there's -- there's a lot of areas here that have been destroyed, so people don't have their homes to go to. even those homes, they didn't have basements in those homes. they were just built on concrete slabs. >> right. and the potential here is that all of that debris, that clearly is out there, will be picked up by the wind, easter in a severe thunderstorm, gusts of 50 or 60 miles per hour or picked up in a new tornado. the potential now exists for that tornado, with the warning sirens going, those sirens may not stop for quite some time, anderson. >> and one of the reasons we picked the location we have, not only is it against a brick building, there's not a lot of debris fields anywhere within sight here. i'm told we have gary tuchman on the phone. gary, you're at a shelter. what's happening now that the sirens are going off? >> reporter: there's more than 400 people, this is the largest shelter in joplin, missouri, and there's a little panic going on right now because police officials and red cross officials just came in the room and said get out, go into the basement, go into the shelter. we don't want anymore body bags. so you have a lot of traumatized people struggling to get out of bed and run down into the basement shelter. we're kind of the last ones going down there. they're insisting we go down with them. these poor people have been traumatized for 48 hours. the shelter is more crowded doonlts than it was last night and now these poor people are running down into the shelter to protect themselves. >> gary, there are a lot of people who are shelting with friends and family. >> reporter: these are people with no place to go. a lot of these people have lost relatives, there's a lot of grief and trauma. just the indignity of these poor people just trying to run down in many cases, they can't run, they're on crutches and some people are trying to get down in the basement. [ inaudible ] >> gary, you're breaking up. today, we learned that president obama plans to come to missouri on sunday. he said he wants to make sure the people of missouri have everything they need to pull through.