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Tornadoes Hit Texas; Glimpse at Tornado Aftermath; All Planes Grounded at Dallas-Fort Worth

Aired April 03, 2012 - 15:00   ET

THIS IS A RUSH TRANSCRIPT. THIS COPY MAY NOT BE IN ITS FINAL FORM AND MAY BE UPDATED.

BROOKE BALDWIN, CNN ANCHOR: Here we go, back to our breaking news.

Folks, you're looking now officially at live pictures, aerial pictures with our affiliate WFAA. These are the first images we have. Yes, Angie Massie, my executive producer in my ear, very astute in saying we are going to be careful as we're sitting on these live pictures. There could be people, there could be bodies inside of some of these structures that have been whipped around here as a result of the tornadoes. So we're going to be careful in what we choose to show you and what we choose not to show you.

But you can see. Guys, just tell me in my ear if we know specifically what neighborhood this is. This is Dallas County, Texas. Multiple homes.

Chad Myers standing alongside me, you can see one, two, third house from the left what appears to have possibly been a two-story home. It almost appears like the second story is gone.

(CROSSTALK)

MYERS: Yes.

And this is kind of the skipping nature of what kind of tornado we have had. Now the skipping is back, skipping down again, new confirmed reports the tornado is back down on the ground in parts of Mesquite, especially western Mesquite, Texas. As it moves to the north and northeast, the helicopter here not going to follow that storm.

It has found this much damage here, but Mesquite, Texas, especially the western parts of Mesquite, you need to be taking cover right now.

BALDWIN: Oh, the dog. This is why they tell people to go to the center of the house.

MYERS: The windows are broken. You would be cut if you were there. Do not ever open the windows in a tornado. This was a long- ago myth.

If you get near the window, you're putting yourself in more danger of getting cut than you do by helping your house by opening up the windows and what they thought was relieving the pressure. That simply doesn't work.

BALDWIN: It's interesting when you look at these and see the damage to the homes on the left, as you point, this skipping nature of tornadoes, the homes no the right seem to be for the most part untouched. Then all in between there, the threes on top of one another, sort of inward, I presume just because of the wind, the trajectory.

MYERS: Yes, that's why when we say we cannot confirm this is a tornado until the Weather Service goes out to look, they want to see whether everything was going -- all the wind was going in the same direction or a different direction.

When you see every tree going in a different shape and form all going in the middle of almost like a pyramid coming together, that's when you know there was circulation sucking in. This was certainly a confirmed tornado on the ground without even waiting for the National Weather Service to go out to actually confirm in.

That's what they look for. They look for trees going in different directions. They look for circulation. They look for this one house hit. The next house, there's not even a shingle missing over that house over the words breaking news and there's a complete half a floor missing on the house just off to the right.

BALDWIN: As we look at these pictures here, they look to be pretty sizable homes.

I noticed I saw fire on scene, fire truck. You see the flashing lights, police on the scene, they're all responding here as expediently as they possibly can to all these people. You see someone's SUV half in a tree there.

As we're looking at this and again we're trying to hone in on exactly where it was, look at this, half the tree snapped off in the middle of the road. Fire, perhaps someone in the neighborhood walking along. Just imagine. Obviously you're thankful that your life was spared for some of these folks walking around. But just the -- what that would feel like. My thoughts and prayers go out to folks in Lancaster, Texas.

Thank you, Angie. This is Lancaster, Texas. Now we have a location on what it is we're looking at. And that almost looks to -- almost looks like an R.V. on the side. I see a mattress on the right side. And it is toppled.

(CROSSTALK)

MYERS: There's a little part right there that would have been the bump out where you can push out part of the R.V. and make it a little bit wider as you go camping.

And this is what we tell people and why we tell people about why you must get out of a mobile home. It's attached to the ground. We understand there are wires. And those wires do nothing. A tornado will break, snap those wires in no time. You need to get out and into a safe structure for the simple reason why you saw that flipped over and those 15,000-pound semis, the back of the semi trailer 100 to 300 feet in the sky live on this air just 20 or 30 minutes ago.

BALDWIN: Again, live here on CNN damage in Lancaster, Texas.

I'm Brooke Baldwin sitting alongside meteorologist Chad Myers welcoming all of our viewers here in the United States and around the world as we are getting our first glimpses of the aftermath of one of two tornadoes that have been on the ground in and around the Dallas/Fort Worth area.

We saw not too long ago just the power of these storms, the power of the winds and the tornado just whipping massive tractor trailers through the sky. And these are now in daylight, now that the ominous gray skies have moved through and you can see what used to be perhaps a two story home absolutely gone. Fire, you see fire on the scene carrying along chain saws, carrying instruments to perhaps get people out of some of these homes.

Obviously, I have covered stories like this. So have you. People can be trapped so they want to make sure everyone is accounted for, safe. And so they're responding, Lancaster, Texas.

You mentioned there's a tornado now on the ground in...

(CROSSTALK)

MYERS: Euless, in Euless, Texas, and also in Mesquite.

We believe that we have two tornadoes on the ground. Mesquite has been confirmed. The Euless storm was the storm that was moving up the I-35W through Arlington, Texas. We all know Arlington. That's where the Texas Rangers play. There are obviously amusement parks in Arlington and so on and son. That storm was on the ground a long time and it was a bigger storm than this one that you're seeing now.

There are more storms to the south that may actually approach the cities, both cities, the Metroplex, in the next hour or so.

BALDWIN: I'm just reading this banner right along with you. Tornado approaching DFW?

MYERS: That absolutely could be because that's the storm that would be moving through Euless. As DFW is between the I-35E and W as it comes together on the north side of DFW, on the north side of Dallas/Fort Worth Metroplex, 35E and W come back together to make one interstate again on the way up to Oklahoma City.

Something else. More people get hurt going outside after a tornado because every board you see there has a nail sticking out. Every power line that you think is dead may be alive. Everything you think was OK before the storm is now not OK.

Things are broken, nails are everywhere. People get -- there's more tetanus after a storm like this. There are things in the air. There are power lines that are still -- you need to be so very careful. Then tonight, people are going to get their generators out, thinking they're doing themselves good. And all the generator will do for you other than make electricity is make carbon monoxide.

BALDWIN: Look at these people just rushing probably towards this police officer it looks like.

(CROSSTALK)

BALDWIN: Just to be clear, this is not live. We're being very, very careful as to what we're showing you live on air. But you can see they're rushing toward this R.V. Possibly, as we mentioned earlier, they're hearing screams. We don't know. We don't know. But that's one issue with storms like this is people trapped.

MYERS: The officer there talking on his walkie-talkie there, the microphone on his shoulder, pushing the button and informing other officers to come by.

This area is obviously cordoned off. That's why the people were running in. They were stopped on the way into this neighborhood. And they obviously had a good story, they had their I.D.s with them and they were able to come in and say, hey, there's somebody with us, there was somebody back there at that house, we need to go look at them and that's what these people are doing now.

BALDWIN: We're going to go back to these pictures in just a moment.

But if you're just joining us, I just want to give you a bigger picture as far as -- how long have we been talking tornadoes, about 45 minutes, 45 minutes here?

MYERS: At least.

BALDWIN: So this is the beginning. This was the beginning I should say, just about 45 to an hour ago in Dallas County. And this was the tornado on the ground. You can see the funnel. As it was moving, we were watching this, you and I, moving left of the screen. This is right in front of -- this was 35E?

MYERS: This is the Lancaster storm and this is the tornado that just caused the damage that we just looked at.

BALDWIN: This was the beginning. This was the tornado presumably 125, 120 miles per hour, at least, on the ground for how long, do we know?

MYERS: I would say this was on the ground for maybe 30 to 45 minutes. It is the same tornado that went and hit the trucking unit, the outfit where the trucks were thrown in the sky.

That's how long -- we were talking about this for a long time. Then this shot went away. We were talking about another shot and then all of a sudden the next shot came in and trucks, literally the back side of a semi, the trailer being thrown into the sky at least 200 feet. BALDWIN: And we're talking Dallas/Fort Worth. These are cosmopolitan. This is urban Texas.

Granted, some of these pictures do show fields, land. A little bit more. You can see the snapping, the bright lights. These are the pictures as you watch the tornado moving through, whipping through this tractor trailer parking lot.

And it's just you and I were practically speechless watching this. You see them tossed through the air, then landing back on the ground. We were talking to Dallas County public information officer and they are obviously very aware of what will happen at this specific facility. We saw pictures in the daylight.

MYERS: Look at that one go up in the air.

BALDWIN: Up in the air.

(CROSSTALK)

BALDWIN: This minutes after we saw them tossed about. We see the damage on the ground. In fact, as they pull out with some of these aerial pictures, you see how far some of these tractor trailers were tossed, hundreds of feet away.

MYERS: No question.

I have heard -- I worked in Oklahoma for a long time. There was a school bus, no children in it, not a driver. it was picked up and thrown one mile. A school bus in a school bus parking lot, they never found it for days. And it was thrown one solid mile away. That was about an EF-4 tornado, about 200 miles an hour tornado. This didn't get thrown quite as far, but obviously the suction power, the wind power, and just the sheer devastation that can happen when you get wind speeds like this.

BALDWIN: Chad, thank you.

I want you to let you know as we continue following the breaking news, the storms through the Dallas County area, Fort Worth, I want to let you know as we were talking about that tornado and the trajectory, we have now learned that Dallas-Fort Worth, DFW, the airport has now grounded all flights. Grounded all flights.

So heads up if you're headed to or perhaps at the airport. And also, we do have Red Cross on the phone as we continue to look at these new pictures of damage, emergency personnel, firefighters here on the scene. We're going to talk Red Cross after this quick break. Don't move.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

BALDWIN: Welcome back to CNN, Brooke Baldwin here at the CNN world headquarters. Working with Chad Myers, meteorologist, as we're covering this live as we go. There's at least one tornado on the ground at this moment in time in Texas in the Dallas-Fort Worth area. Here's what we know so far as we have been watching the tornadoes emerge and the damage afterwards which we will show you in just a moment.

But I can tell you DFW, Dallas/Fort Worth Airport, this was from a moment ago, this is a twister on the ground there. DFW has grounded all the flights, also heavy rail transportation, trains. That is shut down as well as people right now are in prevention and also response mode.

You look at these pictures. At one point, there were two tornadoes on the ground and you see the bright flashes of light. This is some sort of tractor trailer complex. These tractor trailers were parked. You can see one after the other after the other being tossed about.

Here's one in the middle of your screen. You see this, a darker color tractor trailer, two of them in the air. This was about 30 minutes ago. We watched it live on CNN. Once we saw that, we showed you some live pictures of the aftermath. Broad daylight, you see these tractor trailers, we're working on getting information for you as far as where specifically this was.

We heard this was just about southeast of the Dallas Metroplex area. I talked to a public information officer a moment ago. But just imagine, these things are thousands of pounds, thousands. Just tossed about. Looks to me like this one hopped the highway and landed on the ground in some cases like in this the middle of the highway.

As we continue to cover this breaking story, and again, folks, heed the warnings, the sirens. Do not try to outrun a tornado. That's what one of my last guest, a public information officer with Dallas County, so perfectly stated, don't outrun it. Duck for cover.

Get away from the windows, get in the middle of your home.

I do have Anita Foster on the line. She's a public information officer with American Red Cross in the Dallas area.

Anita, I know you have your work cut out for you today. We're thinking about all of you right now as we look at these pictures and the aftermath and roofs just absolutely wiped away off of some of these homes. Tell me what you know as far as injuries and potentially as far as fatalities.

ANITA FOSTER, AMERICAN RED CROSS: Well, we right now are actually in shelter ourselves, across much of the Dallas-Fort Worth area.

Some of our teams that are on the southern end of the Metroplex have been able to start making a plan on how we are going to respond. But I think for us at the Red Cross, right now, we are in the path of the storms and are seeking shelter. As you said, there's no question, there's a big job ahead. In fact, we very much believe we're at the beginning of the storm system and not the end. We're going to get some rain, and there will be more potential storm systems rolling up on top of the area. And many people are going to need help. We are actually in our shelter. We are formulating a response plan so that as soon as it's safe and we can open the door, we can get out into our neighborhoods with our friends, with our families that live here in our communities and be able to assist them with safe places to stay and food to eat and the things that they might need as a result of these storms.

BALDWIN: So, Anita, you with the American Red Cross are in shelter. You are sheltering in place. I have just been told here in my ear that Southwest Airlines over at Love Field, they're now sheltering in place. Can you give a little bit better guidance as far as who needs to shelter in place, what exactly they need to be doing?

FOSTER: Yes, absolutely.

Across the area, all day today, we have been tweeting to people, Facebooking, encouraging people if you're in the path of this storm, if your sirens are going off, it's not anything other than a serious warning to you that a storm system is upon you.

Now, in Texas, a lot of people don't know this, because we don't have basements. So it's imperative as Texans that make the best plan possible. That's the most interior part of your business or your home, that you put as many walls in between you and the outside as you possibly can. That's our safest bet to be able to survive these types of deadly storms.

BALDWIN: No basements, no basements in the Dallas area. So get in the middle of your home.

We're also learning that DFW, there was a ground stop at DFW Airport. Gosh, bottom line, Anita, I just want to wish you and the folks who are with you well, as I know you are sheltering and you have a big job ahead of you. And the advice is to just get in the middle of the home and hopefully stay safe and ride out this storm. Anita foster, I appreciate you very much for calling in.

(WEATHER UPDATE)

BALDWIN: Chad, just bring me up to speed. Where exactly are we as we look at more pictures of the damage and the emergency personnel responding here as we have some daylight? Where is the tornado?

MYERS: We still have tornado warnings for Dallas, for Tarrant County for a storm that has produced a tornado in the past and may still be making a tornado on the ground, up near, I would say near Farmers Branch and eventually towards Highland Village. This is the area north of Fort Worth that was the storm that moved through Arlington with damage, has moved just to the east of Euless, Texas, with the damage there and now a little farther to the north.

Some of these storms now are producing three-inch hailstones. So if you're outside, if your pets are outside, they're in danger just from hailstones falling down, let alone obviously the tornadic potential.

What are we seeing here now?

(CROSSTALK)

BALDWIN: These are live pictures, I'm being told. The rain is coming down. Guys, do we know specifically where this is? I'm assuming we don't know. We will figure it out.

(CROSSTALK)

MYERS: Now, this isn't over by any means.

(CROSSTALK)

BALDWIN: Ed Lavandera, he's the online.

Ed, tell me where you are. I understand there were sirens where you were or back where your home is?

ED LAVANDERA, CNN CORRESPONDENT: Right.

We're on the eastern side of Dallas now. It's interesting. I think Chad can speak well to this having the radar there in front of him. But it's just amazing just how many different little isolated cells of severe storms we're seeing all across the Dallas-Fort Worth area. As one comes through, it seems like there's another one right behind it firing up. You kind of really have to stay vigilant and figure out where the storms and where these specific isolated real severe breakouts and possible tornadoes are going to be.

There was one on the eastern edge of Dallas in a town called Mesquite and north there into a town called Garland that is an area where people are highly focused on right now, also the area you have been talking about in and that storm around the Dallas/Fort Worth Airport, which is moving to the north-northeast from what I can gather.

It's another severe situation with potential tornadoes breaking out of that as well. And also I have seen on some of the local stations here in the Dallas-Fort Worth area that are storms firing up against to the south where the storms originally originated from. Just because one storm passes through your area doesn't mean another one isn't firing up right behind it.

I think, Chad, that's what we will be looking at here over the next couple of hours, for sure.

MYERS: That's correct. Ed, you know what? Have you heard anything -- I know your information as you're driving is so limited. But the storm you were talking about in the Arlington area that obviously was on the ground and doing so much damage south of Arlington, did it stay on the ground through Arlington or did it lift, do you know?

LAVANDERA: That is such a highly populated area, that if it had stayed on the ground, we would have already seen -- that is smack dab in the middle between Dallas and Fort Worth.

If there had been a tornado that stayed on the ground from south Arlington up through where the Dallas Cowboys' stadium is and the Texas Rangers play in, Six Flags amusement park, we would have seen just absolutely stunning devastation by this point.

So my understanding is, is that is that same cell that's up by the airport now, so I can't imagine it stayed on the ground terribly long, which is an absolute gift at this point, considering just how populated that area is.

MYERS: Yes, it was on the ground in Kennedale. And it was a large and dangerous tornado reported by the National Weather Service at that time. The next stop would have been Arlington. If it lifted, that literally really would have saved dozens if not hundreds of lives.

BALDWIN: Eddie Lavandera, do me a favor. Stay on the phone. Stay on the phone. I'm going to ask you to stand by. Chad Myers, stand by as well.

Again, ground stop, DFW, heavy rail transportation shut down right now as we're watching and we're talking severe tornado warnings in the Dallas-Fort Worth areas of Texas. Again, I want to encourage all of you if you're in a safe location, grab your cell phone. If you already see the damage where you are, send us a picture, a video, iReport.com.

We will be right back.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

BALDWIN: Welcome back to CNN.

What a past 60 minutes it has been. You're looking at live pictures on the left side of your screen here, traffic. This is the Dallas/Fort Worth area of Texas. Radar on the right side.

I'm Brooke Baldwin. Chad Myers working right along with me, as we have been talking tornadoes the last hour here.

We have seen at one point in time one, two different tornadoes on the ground. And we have witnessed live the damage, the tractor trailers just spinning up in the air. You see the twister here. This was from just about 45 -- 45 minutes ago, these gray, ominous skies.

And now we're beginning to see the first bit in the daylight here of the damage. And as we take a look at that, and we look at some of the video from a little while ago.

as you can see the twister on the ground thanks to our amazing affiliates in the Dallas area.

Let me just let you know, and, again, here the tractor trailer is. Watch as after another is just picked up and the power lines are bursting all along the while as they are picked up and swirled around. These are 10,000, 12,000 pounds, some of them tossed around the interstate. And this is happening now in terms of these different storms, people right now sheltering in place, so it's tough for us to get an estimate as far as damage, as far as injuries go.

But here's what I can tell you, the DFW airport, Dallas Fort Worth, it is a total ground stop. They've grounded all flights now because of this weather they're experiencing. And also in terms of heavy rail, train, transportation, that is now shut down.

And you see these pictures and you see the man walking through. We've seen a number of people pulling out their cell phones, getting video of this. Just look at this. Some of these tractor trailers on their sides, thick, thick aluminum just obliterated. And as we look at these pictures, we have some ground-level pictures now. These are the first images we're getting. We saw the aerial pictures of some of those two-story homes, some of them now one-story homes in the Lancaster, Texas, area. Again, here are some of the aerial pictures.

Let's throw the ground pictures up, guys. Let's just look at these together at the first time. Do we have ground level pictures? OK, stand by for that, here we go. Ground level pictures, trees just snapped, a lot of trees. I'm sure a lot of power is out here. We've been talking to American Red Cross. In fact, a woman I spoke with said she's in shelter. They are currently sheltering in place, the Red Cross. And they have by the looks of these picture, they have their work cut out for them later as they're going to be getting out a I long with fire, EMT, police in Dallas county, Ft. Worth, Arlington, Lancaster, the list goes on as far as the cities we've been talking about that have sustained some sort of damage because of these tornadoes.

And again, Chad, let me bring you in as we're looking. That's the radar from one of the local affiliates. So no tornadoes on the ground as of now.

MYERS: I don't believe so. I've looked at the operators and there's still maybe sirens going, but if there's a tornado on the ground, it's very small, and I don't believe it's a devastating tornado on the ground. But if there's a warning for your country you still need to take precautions because these storms have been going up and down all day. They have been cycling. Just because I don't think there's one on the ground right now doesn't mean in three minutes it won't be back on the ground, especially the one north of Euless and the one close to DFW.

I believe DFW is in more danger of getting hail than anything else. Euless, Texas just reported at 360 and Harwood baseball-sized hail, baseballs falling out of the sky. And so that's how severe this storm -- these storms are 46,000 to 50,000 feet tall. They're moving 35 miles an hour and they are rotating.

BALDWIN: I want to bring in David Magana, a spokesperson for DFW. I understand you have a total ground stop. Is that correct? No one coming in, no one coming out.

DAVID MAGANA, SR. MGR. PUBLIC AFFAIRS, DFW AIRPORT (via telephone): I'm not aware this is a total ground stop. Nominally, that's what would be happening. Yes, Brooke, the FAA puts out a ground stop and that stops traffic in other cities from coming to our airport so that they don't get caught up in the storms. And so that's when you hear the term ground stop. But when there's lightning in the area the way we've had we're going to stop activities and pull in ramp workers and such. So yes, for all intents and purposes, we do have a lot of flights that are being delayed or diverted out of DFW.

BALDWIN: David, just for our viewers, those are live pictures out of the evident will hand side of the screen. On the right side, we're looking at radar. And let me ask you this, I presume you're in the airport now, is that correct?

MAGANA: I'm on the airport grounds.

BALDWIN: What are the skies like?

MAGANA: It got very dark as the heaviest part of the storm cell came overhead. And we did see some pea sized hail. But the skies have lightened a bit now and the heavier part of the cell has gone overhead and passed on. So we're starting to get a bit of a clearing. The rain has stopped. So we would anticipate there will be a resumption of flight activity here in the next few minutes, even hour. So, again, it's a wait-and-see.

BALDWIN: David, I have been through DFW, that is big, that is a busy, busy airport. I was hoping that you wouldn't have to do this, but kind of plan is in place, I think of a lot of glass, a lot of windows. If this thing were to somehow head towards DFW, what plan do you have in place?

MAGANA: Well, the plan we have in place, Brooke, for DFW airport include what we've been doing this afternoon, sheltering passengers, pulling them away from the glass that is typical of any airport waiting area where you can see the see the aircraft. We're pulling people away from this and into shelters. We use all of the available places we have including stairwells and stores and security checkpoints if we need to and restrooms and those types of things. So we're not shy about moving people around. So we've been taking care of our passengers this way.

In addition, you know, we do have a concessions plan where we keep our concessioners open on a day like today because we know that flights are going to be arriving late and well into the night and well into the wee hours in the morning because of a storm like this. So we have plans in place. We also have resources that we can provide to the airlines to assist them with deplaning passengers if that's necessary. And we do coordinate with all our local emergency management agencies so just in case we need them or in case we need us.

BALDWIN: So just so I'm clear, in case you have multiple plans, at the moment, are people -- do you have them in shelters? Do you have them in bathrooms in stairwells?

MAGANA: Yes. At the moment, we do have passengers that are being sheltered. And we expect that that will be lifted shortly if it's not already being lifted.

BALDWIN: OK. And then just -- what's the heads-up for people who are listening, who are either headed to Dallas-Ft. Worth area later today or headed out, what's the advice for them?

MAGANA: Well, the advice for people locally initially is keep yourself safe. Watch out for your personal safety. If you're trying to come to the airport, let's put that behind your own personal safety. We're not advising people to come to the airport if there's not a safe path there.

Second of all, we do have great flight information on DFWairport.com so you can check your flight. And check and see if there's any way to -- also we have our own twitter and Facebook pages that people can keep up with updates. So there's a lot of information that you can get without actually putting yourself in harm's way.

BALDWIN: OK, thank you.

MYERS: David?

BALDWIN: Go ahead, Chad.

MYERS: David, I just noticed you only have 22 planes inbound to DFW. Have planes now been diverted to other airports?

MAGANA: The way that works is that the FAA probably about 30 or 40 minutes ago did call a ground stop. So any flight that would have been headed for DFW was just held on the ground. Rather than have them take off and circle and put passenger lives in danger, just hold them on the ground. And so that's a very typical and a recent change in FAA procedures over the last three or four years that they' done. So that's what you're seeing there. And that's the result of it, that you've got a lot less traffic come into DFW than you would under normal circumstances on a sunny day.

BALDWIN: OK, David Magana, thank you again. For folks headed in or out of DFW, he mentioned DFWairport.com. We appreciate it.

And just to call the attention to something we saw a moment ago, if you're not just listening to us but watching us, as we've been dipping in and out of Dallas Ft. Worth coverage. Did you see that hail?

MYERS: I did. It was hitting the pickup truck.

BALDWIN: You were saying there was hail --

MYERS: There's much bigger hail. Even Euless just picked up some baseball-sized hail. That videotape was pretty amazing. It was a red pickup truck and it was splashing into the back of the pickup truck. Anything smaller than about a nickel will not dent your car --

BALDWIN: Turn around, look at this TV, look at this hail. Looks I don't know, in between a marble and a golf ball. MYERS: But there's much larger stuff than that out there. This is hard hail, too. Sometimes hail is a little bit softer where it's a con conglomerate. There might be 10 or 12 small hailstones all glued together. That was hard hail. That would hurt hitting you on the head or your pets. Make sure the pets are inside. If you have friends at home, maybe they could open up the garage door so the dog or cat can be inside or rather outside in that.

BALDWIN: In case you are just joining us here, Brooke Baldwin, Chad Myers, we have been talking and watching live on the air multiple tornadoes touching down in the Dallas county Ft. Worth area of Texas here. In fact, these are the pictures. I'm just about speechless, watching the last hour. These are tractor trailers just tossed around in the air.

The tornado, the actual funnel as you described is sort of in the background. This is the wind and the rain, and it's just being tossed about. The bright flashes of light, those are the power sources popping, breaking, multiple, almost like dominos being tossed about like feathers because of the power of some of these winds. We watched that.

Then we saw the aftermath. Look at this. Tractor trailer after tractor trailer damaged. And people have been assessing damage, taking videos hundreds of feet away. And as we look at these pictures and the damage, and this is all just happening. So as we've been talking, different public information officers from the different jurisdictions, some of these people are sheltering in place. The woman we spoke with a moment ago sheltering in place at the American Red Cross. And after we look at this, let's pull up the pictures. We're getting more and more images of ground-level damage. So we're all going to do this together at the same time. You see, I don't know if that used to be a roof, assessing damage, screens gone.

MYERS: The trees sheared off, no limbs left. That tells you they just got twisted off the top. That's probably something we would call an s-car tent. There you see just the stripping of the limbs and of the leaves on that storm. Something we haven't really been to yet, we've been focusing a lot on Dallas County. And Brooke, there's been a lot going on in Ft. Worth.

There's been a lot going on in Tarrant County that we haven't been able to talk about. Not so much in Ft. Worth or the town of Dallas proper. We're talking about the storm that came out on 35 w. After it went up and down, it went down and stayed down for a very long time as it rolled across I-20. So I suspect that as soon as we get our helicopters from our affiliates on the other side of the city, the affiliates are in Dallas. They're not going to fly to Ft. Worth until they covered everything in Dallas proper.

BALDWIN: Let's take a quick break. We still have our Dallas bureau correspondent Ed Lavendera out and about on the road. He's safe, but he is reporting quite a bit of, you know, rain, clouds. We're going to get a picture from him in terms of the -- mental picture, if you will. We'll talk to him here after the quick break. Stay right here. (COMMERCIAL BREAK)

BALDWIN: We are just now seeing some of the damage from these Texas tornadoes playing out in Dallas County, Ft. Worth, multiple jurisdictions in and around that massive area. We're talking to Lieutenant Tim Jones with Johnson County a little while ago. I'm going to bring him back in. He's on our phone line. You were talking to me last hour about damage. But what's happening where you are now?

LT. TIM JONES, JOHNSON COUNTY SHERIFF'S OFFICE: At the present time we have our unit command post set up with the Joshua police department, Joshua fire department, Burleson fire department, and Johnson county emergency management. We have not had any more damage. We have had reports with multiple touchdowns. We have received reports of one touchdown in a city south of our location.

BALDWIN: I'm sorry, say the city again?

JONES: Cleburne.

BALDWIN: But as far as damage, when we talk about a touchdown in a city, do you have any information as far as damage there?

JONES: Sorry, we do not have any information on the city of Cleburne. We're taking care of the rural part and the city of Joshua and we have no more damage out here than what we previous spoke of.

BALDWIN: OK, tell me, lieutenant, what kind of calls are getting right now?

JONES: 911 is going off the wall, people calling in, sightings of tornadoes, possible sightings of tornado as of up to about 20 minutes ago. Now we get people calling to make sure their relatives are OK.

BALDWIN: So as recent as 20 minutes ago, you've had people calling into Johnson County saying they've seen tornadoes. So is your advice for people in your neck of the woods to still shelter in place, stay in the middle of the home?

JONES: Yes. We would like them to stay. Even though it's safe at the present time, to stay alert, listen to the local and the national weather and the National Weather Service alerts and be prepared at any time to take cover.

BALDWIN: OK, Lieutenant Tim Jones, thank you so much for calling in. As we're calling in and looking at some of the images for the first time, a number of our Dallas TV stations have been working the story from the ground or the air. This is from a reporter from FAA. His name is Wyatt Goolsby. Take a look.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Is the damage extensive?

WYATT GOOLSBY, WFAA REPORTER: Good afternoon. Yes, the damage looks very extensive here in Lancaster, at least the north parts or Lancaster. I came out here on the side of the road and found all these trailers, what appears to be a trailer storage area. We're really getting a firsthand view here. I'm walking around with my camera, giving you a view of all the damage. It appeared about five or six trailers were just picked up and tossed around, quite a bit of damage.

Now, in addition to these trailers they were picked up and thrown around in this area, I want to pan and show you the road over here as well. You'll see another trailer picked up and thrown this way as well. One actually managed to get all the way to the service road of 20. That was blocking traffic on the service road. You might be able toll see in the distance, there are still police officers out there trying to clean up quite a bit of damage out there.

So, as I said, it looks like at least seven trailers in this trailer storage area that were picked up. From what we can tell right now, still a lot of people out here, including Tex-dot, trying to at least assess the damage and figure out just how bad this thing is. This stuff looks pretty bad.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

BALDWIN: That was Wyatt Goolsbee talking about what was on the ground. And I want to talk specifically now about Arlington, Texas, Chad Myers. It's right smack-dab in between Dallas and Ft. Worth, home of the Cowboys, the Rangers, Six Flags, and a number of people who live there, and you have news.

MYERS: Yes. We just got confirmation and I knew it would be coming in and trickling in slowly and the affiliates in damage, they're taking care of their closest city first, but now damage is being confirmed in Cannondale and confirmed in Arlington, and a new tornado warning for Arlington proper right now. We said that there may be storms behind the storms making damage in places that already had damage and that now is happening for Arlington, Texas. Arlington needs to be taking cover again with this second storm. You're hearing the storms and you're hearing the warnings, hopefully you are because sometimes with the first tornado the warning sirens are inoperable. The power lines go down and things can happen to those sirens. If you're anywhere near the Arlington, Texas, area this is moving south to north, take cover now.

BALDWIN: Chad Myers, thank you. We have Ed Lavandera on the phone and we'll check in with Ed after this quick, quick break.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

BALDWIN: All right, welcome back to CNN here. As we are talking about a number of tornadoes that have been popping in and out of these different areas in and around Dallas and Ft. Worth, Texas, and in the areas south and north, I do want to point out some of the things we've been getting from Lancaster, Texas, some of the roofs are gone from the two-story homes. You can see damage to one arm of this particular building. And so Lancaster, Texas, that is where our correspondent, Ed Lavendera is headed. He's in the car right now. Ed, are you with me?

ED LAVENDERA, CNN CORRESPONDENT: I am here, Brooke.

BALDWIN: Tell me, a, that you're safe, b, where are you right now and what do you see?

LAVENDERA: I'm on the eastern edge of Dallas trying to -- the storms are so scattered all over this part of the Dallas, Ft. Worth. We're trying to figure out the best place to go at this point. I think it's important to bring out at this hour that we're about 20 minutes or so away from public schools or most schools across the Dallas, Ft. Worth area that are breaking for the day. These storms are coming across, and that's a lot of personal problems for many people across the area as they try to figure out how to get their kids home from school safely and how to understand these situations. You'll be urged to stay off the roadways because it comes at a difficult time as people try to figure out how to get their kids home from school.

BALDWIN: That's a great point, an absolute headache for parents trying to figure out how to get their little ones.

Let me ask you this. One of the public information officers out of Dallas County. She made the point that folks in the Dallas area, for the most part, don't have basements so that's why she was advising so many people, look, you have to get in the middle of your homes away from the windows and away from the glass. Why is that? Why no basements?

LAVENDERA: The soil here in this part of Texas just doesn't lend itself to be able to build homes like that. It's very tough ground to build into and that sort of thing, and it's the engineering and architectural reasons for why that hasn't happened. And that's why homes are built and one of the things you have to pay a lot of attention to is making sure you have a downstairs, interior room that doesn't have any windows. Some places that you can get to quickly and some place where you can bring a mattress or cushion or something to cover yourself with in these situations because that's what's going to best protect you at this point when these storms break out.

And also the city of Dallas doesn't have a whole lot of experience over the last several decades of tornadoes taking a direct hit at the city. So that's another thing, people get lackadaisical about how severe and how dangerous these situations can be, and that's also something that probably causes a lot of headaches for emergency teams across the area. But what we're seeing first hand today, Brooke, just how quickly and how powerful. I'm still getting over the images that you've shown of those trucks being thrown hundreds and hundreds of yards. It's left me speechless today.

BALDWIN: And by the way, Ed Lavandera. I'm being told this is your camera. What is this, your iPhone? I hope someone is shooting in your car, and I can see a lot of rain and windshield wipers are on. Is that right? Is this you?

LAVENDERA: Right. Yes. That's the car we're in driving down the highway toward downtown Dallas at this point, so you can see the vantage point that we have. And the visibility is really cut down and -- I don't know if you saw that lightning strike there right in front of us. But on the edges of these storms, Brooke, is really the scary sight. These storms roll through and you have that wall of clouds, and it's almost like these clouds you can tell that they're trying to get formation and they're trying to spin and they look like mangled fingers coming out of the sky and dropping down. And you just sit there and stare at them for a while and you wait to see if it's all going to come together and create a tornado.

More often than not, it doesn't, but as you see those clouds kind of start dropping and a little bit of that rotation trying to pick up right over your head or various neighborhoods across the area that you've seen many times repeated today, that's the scary situation.

BALDWIN: And I'm being told, Chad Myers is telling me that there is a tornado that's developing right in front of you -- right in front of you.

LAVENDERA: Right in front of us?

MYERS: Right in front of you. It's an H.P. which means high precipitation which means you'll never see it coming. It is wrapped in rain, and it is in the clouds and when you see brake lights and you see people this is the most dangerous thing you can happen is to get out on the roadway. I know you're a reporter and doing it for us and doing it for everybody to stay safe, but right now you need to be safe yourself.

LAVENDERA: Absolutely. Can you offer more specifics as to where --

MYERS: It's now crossing I-20 just east of 35E and if you're on 35E, it will not affect you. It will be east of you, but the rotation is at the I-20 corridor which is the south interstate, so it will be east of 35E.

LAVENDERA: That's a good distance from where we were. We're headed in that direction and it's a good distance away from us. I thought we were just a few miles away.

But you can definitely tell this storm is much stronger than what we've seen throughout the day in Dallas proper. I think the city of Dallas itself has dodged the bullet for the most part today and the communities around it have taken the hardest hit at this point, but this is definitely -- you can tell by this image that the visibility has dropped down and this is the heaviest rain that I've seen inside the city of Dallas throughout the day.

BALDWIN: Quite a bit of rain, Ed. Please, please, to you and whoever is driving this car, be safe to you and your crew. And I know you'll talk to Wolf in just a moment. We've been watching these tornadoes and the aftermath for the better part of the last two hours live on CNN. We appreciate you being with us. To our viewers around the world, CNN International back to regular programming.

Now, for you THE SITUATION ROOM with Wolf Blitzer starts now.