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Coverage of Oklahoma Tornado Strike

Aired May 19, 2013 - 22:00   ET

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

DON LEMON, CNN ANCHOR: Hello, everyone. I'm Don Lemon. Breaking news as we go on the air tonight.

Violent tornadoes wreaking havoc in the Midwest. Take a look at that monster storm. It's not the only one, and this is not the only place. Tornadoes, one after another, this afternoon went from dangerous to disastrous in Oklahoma and in Kansas.

Whoa. That thing is huge.

Extremely powerful storms, and the tornadoes that spun out of them. They ripped roofs off some houses, and others were flattened completely. Tonight, these people in Oklahoma and people in Kansas and now Iowa, everywhere that tornadoes ripped along the ground today, some are hurt. Some have lost everything they own, and if there is a way to make this worse, it is this. The massive line of storms are still tearing across the country right now.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE REPORTER: This look like somebody got a giant cat bulldozer and just went to town on these houses. I mean, they are completely destroyed. 102 runs north and south, just south of fire lake casino.

LEMON: That is a wide swath of damage, and it is a very over Sewanee, Oklahoma just a short time ago.

CNN's Nick Valencia is en route to Sewanee as fast as he can go. And I've got Nick on the phone with me now.

Nick, you are -- where are you now, and tell us what you see.

NICK VALENCIA, CNN CORRESPONDENT (via phone): Hey, Don. We Are about 200 miles or saw outside of Oklahoma city. We don't see much severe weather right now. Where we're at it's clear, but I just got off the sheriff for pot was my county where you see the devastation and neighborhood flattened. Mike booth, the sheriff, tells me that one person is confirmed death in Pottawatomie county. That death happening about one mile south of the local casino there.

He also tells me, Don, that there are currently two people missing in that trailer park and they are unaccounted for right now. They are missing. He is very stressed out, as you can imagine. There is a lot going on locally. We are about three hours outside there, rushing there with the producer and team to give you the latest coverage. But, we can confirm right now one person is dead in Pottawatomie county and two people missing in that trailer park -- Don. LEMON: Our Nick Valencia, in route to that town that you are looking at right there where you see emergency workers and rescuers and emergency personnel on the ground there. These are live pictures from our affiliate KFOR which is outside of Sewanee.

Nick Valencia, thank you very much. If you get an more information, get back to us.

In the meantime, let's go to the person who knows everything about this now, Chad Myers now.

Chad, three states. Who knows how many tornadoes. ?You don't have enough hands or enough eyes to watch all of this violent weather tonight.

CHAD MYERS, AMS METEOROLOGIST: Yes. More than 40 tornado warnings. At least 20 something tornado reports of tornadoes on the ground. The funnels not on the ground, but tornado reports of damage by tornadoes on the ground already tonight, and the night is still young literally. Though it's getting dark, and that darkness means that typically the air gets cooler. Tornadoes get stronger when the air is warmer. So, that's something good, as night falls typically swarms don't get big.

Started out in Wichita. Boy, you guys just dodged something else. This is a big tornado southwest of your city and it died as another storm interacted with it right there. Those two storms kind of bumped into each oh, and that bumping into each other stopped that storm from being the super cell that it once was.

Shift your folk U.S. a little bit farther down to the south because we watched them roll through parts of Oklahoma, not that far from Edmond into north of chandler and then right through here to Carney, a lot of damage. At least 140 to 1650-mile-per-hour tornado there.

About 30 minutes later, trying to keep up with all of this, another storm system south just to the east of Norman, Sewanee, that's the storm system. There's a line, a solid line of that tornado being on the ground for at least 50 miles, my estimation. Obviously tomorrow we'll get in the hospitals and see, but there's a long, long line of damage and that scouring of the earth, those pictures, I'm just looking at you said live. That's 100 to 250 miles per hour.

Honestly, I can't get my head around it. So much damage, probably close to an f--4, probably some are around the 200-mile per hour tornado, Don.

LEMON: It is unbelievable. Look at this pictures. And earlier, and some towns that we said it was good news that we didn't see people scrambling or panicked.

MYERS: Yes.

LEMON: But we can see rescue workers have gotten to some areas now, Chad, and they are looking for people. And as we heard from our nick Valencia, Chad, this line of storm has turned deadly. One person dead and two people unaccounted for and that's in Pottawattamie county, and we'll be hearing about more damage and possibly more victims later on.

MYERS: Typically it comes in overnight. You know, the sheriffs contact them, we call them and then little things trickle in. But so far right now I don't believe, that even though I have storms all the way from Minnesota all the way down to Oklahoma, I don't believe that right now I have a tornado on the ground. That's some good news because we haven't had too many minutes today where there hasn't been at least some something, some tornado on the ground in one state or another. It gets better from here tonight. It's not over, but I don't think we are not going to see a 200-mile-per-hour storm overnight. That typically doesn't happen when it begins to cool off.

LEMON: Chad, I appreciate you helping me all evening and I'm sure the viewers appreciate you helping them out as well to get a handle on all of that, and I want to show you and our viewers what happened in the small town of Luther, Oklahoma. It is about 25 miles outside Oklahoma city and was right in the path of one of these tornadoes.

Tiffany Tatro is with our affiliate KOKH, and she is in Luther tonight.

(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)

TIFFANY TATRO, KOKH REPORTER: This area, it got hit hard. If you look over here, this used to be this family's barn. Not so much of it left over there, and if you can just look a little bit over this way, you can see where this tornado actually ripped through here and went straight through these trees tearing up pretty much everything in its path.

Now, the family tells us likely they were able to get to shelter in time. They tell us it was terrifying to see, and we are actually going to talk to Karen who was there when all of this happened.

Karen, what was it like for you?

KAREN, RESIDENT: It was super scary. We were very afraid and it was very loud. The hail was coming down. It was raining. It was very, very windy. It was very, very scary.

TATRO: I bet. Now, tell us about the damage. We saw the barn. Is your house OK?

KAREN: There is some damage at the house. The garage door is just bowed in. It won't be able to be opened, I don't know for how long, but fence, which we just put up.

TATRO: Oh, no.

KAREN: Is damaged in quite a few places. The swing set, but we don't really know about the house. We're trying to get all the power tools and the animals taken care of first.

TATRO: Now, you were telling me you actually still have a neighbor. She is elderly. It was tough to even get her in the shelter. What's going on right now with that? KAREN: Well, she had surgery last week. She had a hip replacement. And she's pretty good at getting around. But she needed a little help and luckily for us she called and made us get over so we got in the shelter with her, and it was lucky for us.

TATRO: That is the great news is everybody out here is OK. The other great news, guys, is Karen was telling me they have people from all over coming to help them. You were telling us the church, boy scouts. Who do we have helping you guys?

KAREN: A lot of men from our church, ladies from the church, Edmond church of Christ is here. They came right out immediately. My phone is dead so I haven't been able to talk to anyone, but a lot of people are here. And the Luther high school, a couple of kids came out from Luther high school, and I don't remember their names, but they are both eagle scouts so they came out and offered just to help.

TATRO: It truly is amazing to see everybody coming out here. Now, Karen was telling us this is the first time that they have had something so extreme like this, and we are just thankful that everybody is OK.

(END VIDEOTAPE)

LEMON: All right. A huge continue doe ripped through Carney, Oklahoma.

Just take a look at this twister. An affiliate's helicopter pilot estimated the funnel cloud was about half a mile wide. The tornado devoured homes and ripped down power lines. Priscilla Luong with affiliate KOKH is tracking the storm damage in Carney.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

PRISCILLA LUONG, KOKH REPORTER: The home over to my right has the roof tornado off. The home behind me was completely destroyed. We spoke to a woman who lives at this house and she said basically a family of five basically packed into the storm cellar, and I think we are getting in, the winds basically pulled off their door and blew it off. Their home is completely destroyed. No one here was hurt, but we are getting word of lost pets in the area. No word on any fatalities here in Carney, but we will keep you updated throughout the evening.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

LEMON: All right, Priscilla Luong.

One of those twisters caused havoc on interstate 40 near Sewanee, Oklahoma. The highway was shut down in both directions as first responders checked on people. Several 18 wheelers were overturned, cargo thrown all over the road. Cars and vans tossed all around the highway. It gives you another idea of just how powerful these storms were.

Let's go now to Jason McLaughlin. He is a storm chaser, and has been chasing this storm all day. Tell us where you are right now.

JASON MCLAUGHLIN, STORM CHASER (via phone): Right now I'm about an hour east of Sewanee. Actually I would say stayed with that storm as it moved east to keep warning to those residents out ahead of it. That storm has kind of dissipated. I'm headed back towards that Sewanee direction now.

LEMON: And Jason, you're going back towards Sewanee, but you have been following these storms all day. Where did you pick up, and where did you -- you ended up where you are now, but where did you start earlier?

MCLAUGHLIN: My day started right off there in Edmond, Oklahoma, which is where the first tornado touched down. And we were out there with good warning, had about a 20-minute lead time before the tornado touched down in Edmond. That tornado lifted and Edmond is on the northeast side of Oklahoma city. That tornado lifted, and immediately we had just a very large tornado, around half a mile wide touchdown, and it continued to track just north of I-40, and that's the storm that I stayed on, and then the southern storm formed down there on the southeast side of Oklahoma city. And I actually headed south back out of the storm that I was on just in time to catch it. You had another tornado near the community of Prague when it touched down shortly before dark.

LEMON: Jason, tell us about the damage that you saw.

MCLAUGHLIN: So far I have not been through the damage path. I have tried to stay out of the way and let the paramedics and the first responders do, you know, the job that they are required to do. And I think that's really important because a lot of time the onlookers tend to get in the way of emergency vehicles trying to get into the areas and things like that. I will be headed back that direction to help out with the efforts here over the next couple of hours.

LEMON: Jason McLaughlin, a storm chaser, thank you very much and stay safe out there.

So what are emergency officials doing? How are they helping people out? What's the extent of the damage in Oklahoma? Will we know even this evening, or will we not find out until tomorrow?

Also, we are learning tonight, as we look at live pictures now from near Sewanee where that tornado touched down, as they are looking through a trailer park. We're told by our Nick Valencia that two people are missing here, and the storm has now turned deadly. One person is dead.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

LEMON: Tornadoes targeted Oklahoma today killing one person, two others reported missing right now. Homes are demolished, neighborhoods in ruins. Families in Oklahoma are scared, and they are seeking shelter right now. Look at that damage. It's unbelievable.

I want to bring in now Ken Garcia. He is with the Oklahoma red cross. Ken, how many people do you know are seeking shelter right now?

KEN GARCIA, OKLAHOMA RED CROSS: Right now we're just trying to get out there and find out how many people are going to be needing that assistance. We have what we are doing what's called damage assess president where our volunteers to go out and look to see what has happened.

Obviously, with the pictures that we are seeing there is going to be a need for shelter. And we' have had multiple tornadoes in the area. So, it could be hundreds of people that need help. Some may have somewhere where they are able to go. Others may not have somewhere they are able to go. But either way, the Red Cross will be there for them. And our hearts just go out to those who are impacted by these storms.

These storms, I mean, we have had multiple tornadoes hit down. I know where I live in Edmond, Oklahoma, the tornado touched down about a mile and a half from where I live, so these were -- these were very, very close to us. And so, I mean, you know, the Red Cross, they are a community volunteer so they are affected just like the communities, and I know that we are going to be opening up shelters here very soon.

LEMON: I want to tell our viewers before I continue on with the questioning here that what you are looking at is live pictures from our affiliate KFOR, and these are rescuers who are combing through debris here. This is a trailer park. They have managed to -- they have lighted big sections of this park. This is a trailer park, but what they are doing when the light doesn't cover, they go further into this debris with flashlights, so it's a very emotional time right now. And the reason they are doing that is because there are reports of two people, at least two people missing, in that particular neighborhood, that particular trailer park.

I want to get back to you now, Ken. What are your volunteers reporting back to you after getting on the ground?

GARCIA: Again, they are just seeing a lot of damage in the area, just people obviously very happy to see that the Red Cross is in those communities and able to at least get them some water and some comfort to just know that there's someone there. We're going to have our mental health volunteers. They will eventually get out of these communities and talk with folks. This is obviously something very traumatic that's happened. So, we have got very well trained mental health volunteers that are going to able to sit down with these folks and just kind of talk with them, let them talk and let them say what they need to say to help them grasp what has happened here. And this is going to be for all ages. It could be from the elderly down to children that were going to be kind of assisting here to make sure that everyone gets the help that they need

LEMON: Ken Garcia with the Oklahoma Red Cross. Thanks so much for what you do and for your volunteers. And, of course, we want them to be safe as well. Appreciate it.

GARCIA: Absolutely. And can donate to the Red Cross at 90999. Just text red cross for a $10 donation.

LEMON: Thank you, sir, appreciated.

On the phone with me right now is Jerry Lojka from the Oklahoma department of emergency management.

Mr. Lojka, thank you so much for joining us. First of all, tell me about people, about the people. How many people are hurt, and can you confirm that our reporting tonight that one person has been killed from this storm and two others are missing?

JERRY LOJKA, OKLAHOMA DEPARTMENT OF EMERGENCY MANAGEMENT (via phone): I cannot confirm any fatalities or missing people at the moment. We know that the emergency manager from Pottawatomie county is down in the area where the mobile homes and another home development were substantially damaged, and they are still actually going from home to home trying to account for everyone. And we know that they are in there, but we haven't received any confirmation at all. We are hearing the same things you are, but we have no confirmation.

LEMON: And we're also, as you are speaking, looking at live searches now going on in Sewanee, Oklahoma. And there are searches, I would imagine, going on in different communities. What about where you are, and what are you hearing? What are you hearing back?

LOJKA: Well, there's another little community that's -- that was in the same track near Sewanee it's called little axe. We know that rescue efforts are going on there also. We know that there were a large number of homes that were damaged or destroyed there also. That was a pretty -- a very large tornado, and it was on the ground for quite a while. So that's a fairly significant area.

The other one is up in Lincoln County near a small town called Carney. That's in Lincoln County, and -- so, once again, there's still the emergency management and the responders are still in there just trying to go hunt for everyone at this point.

LEMON: And, you know, this happened before sundown, a couple of hours before sundown. And I would imagine that you would probably know most of the extent of the damage, not the entire extent of the damage here. Are you expecting it to be any worse from the reports that you're hearing?

LOJKA: Well, the problem is that they just finished up. I mean, the storms are still -- we still have a couple of active cells so we don't know for sure that it's over yet. I don't think that the larger storms have finished tracking, but now we are into the dark hours, and we are -- they are going to be doing searches with -- with spotlights and so forth. So, you know, until tomorrow midday, I mean, we honestly really are not going to have a real good handle on the extent of the damage.

LEMON: Jerry Lojka from the Oklahoma department of emergency management, best of luck to you, sir. It is a very busy night. We appreciate you joining us here on CNN. And that's a good chance to get to Chad Myers, our meteorologist here. You said, probably won't know until tomorrow. You said, Chad, that it's cooling down which means it will probably slow down, but it's not over yet.

MYERS: Certainly, not over. The storms are ling up into what we call a squall line, and a squall line will make a small hailstone, but it will make a wind event, it will make a wind damage event, 70, 80 miles per hour, but not a typical tornado event. Not a big tornado, small ones but not big ones. To get the big tornadoes, you have to have the one cell out by itself, we call them super cells.

Don, one thing about the cells, one thing about the cells, that a one thing tornadoes is that there was plenty of warning. Doesn't happen all the time, but in Oklahoma they know what they are doing. I mean, all these little weather service offices, they all do training, but of all the ones I know best, Oklahoma, Kansas, Nebraska, Missouri, tornado alley, they are well trained.

What you can do for yourself is to pick up a NOAA weather radio. They are 30 bucks. They used to be a lot more. And also used to go off all night for every county in your state and by the time you were hearing your county you were throwing this thing out the window. Now they don't do that. now, you program your own county, you program your own area and it only goes off if you need the warning. So, it may be the best 30 bucks you ever buy yourself a memorial day present, whatever you want to do.

Kansas city, we saw some showers and thunderstorms moved through Columbia, Missouri seas, so might even see a shower or thunderstorm just north of Chicago with some small hail tonight. So, if you want to pull the cars inside, that wouldn't be a bad idea.

It's calming down. It is winding down. Like had a hot air balloon that wants to rise, storms in the heat of the day want to go up. The higher they go, the stronger they are, the more significant they are. Also, the more they could rotate. So now, that it's cooling down at least a little bit, the big storms have lost some of the punch.

LEMON: Chad, stay with me here. This is just in. I'm getting it now from e-mail. The governor Fallin has declared -- Mary town of -- Oklahoma has declared a state of emergency due to the tornadoes. Again, I'm reading it just now off the wires. Straight line winds and flooding. Governor Mary Fallin declared a state of emergency for 16 Oklahoma counties.

MYERS: Wow.

LEMON: Due to tornadoes, severe storms, straight line winds and flooding that began on Saturday. The counties included in the declaration are Caddo, Cleveland, Comanche, Creek, Garfield, Grant, Greer, Kiowa, Lincoln, Logan, McClain, Okfuskee, you should know that, Oklahoma, Pawnee, Payne and Pottawatomie. It says nothing about the missing people or about the one fatality that's been reported by the officials in Pottawatomie. But, again, in 16 counties, that is -- that's major, Chad. MYERS: It gives emergency managers and it gives sheriffs deputies, it gives all law enforcement a slight upper edge on what they can tell you to do or not do. They can tell you don't go there. That's a state of emergency. You can't go there. You can say, well, I want to go help. No, thank you so much but you go that way because now we are state of emergency. It just gives just a slight different edge to where we are at this point in time with the cleanup and search and rescue.

Now, we have search and rescue. Earlier we were kind of looking for the damage and saying, OK, don't go there because that's not so bad. Another storm is coming. but now, we know that we have two missing people or so, 3,000 people without power around Des Moines. It's not over, but certainly it was a long night, and it will continue to go. This is just one of many nights of severe weather that's still to come this spring.

LEMON: All right. Chad Myers, stand by. We will be getting back to you, and as we continue on with our coverage tonight, they are searching the debris for two people who are missing in one Oklahoma county. And we have learned from our Nick Valencia that one person has died, according to an official in Pottawatomie county, and that's where the video you're looking at now, Sewanee, Oklahoma there. We will continue on with our coverage. A very short break. Don't go anywhere.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

LEMON: All right. I'm Don Lemon. You're watching breaking news here on CNN.

And we're looking at several disaster areas in the American Midwest tonight. Sunday started normally enough in Kansas and Oklahoma, and then this.

(VIDEO CLIP PLAYING)

LEMON: Tornadoes, lots of them, in Edmond, Oklahoma and then in a straight line to Luther, then to Carney. They ripped up trees and tore up houses in a wide path.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Whoa, that thing is huge.

LEMON: The same storm system sent tornadoes into towns around Wichita, Kansas. Here's what we know about the people and the storm zone.

One person is dead. At least two people are missing now, and emergency crews are frantically searching for them tonight. A quick update from the town outside Oklahoma city.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

TATRO: Now, I knows it's hard to believe but if you look right here where I'm standing, this actually used to be a barn, and we have the remnants over it here. This used to be some sort of part of it. Not a whole lot of it left, and if you take a look even further past us, you can see these guys are trying to pick up what's left. Now the scary part they were telling us is they had animals who were actually lost in the storm. All day they have been trying to round them up. Last we heard they have found a majority of them so that is the good news. The even better news, nobody out here was injured. Obviously just a mess out here and a lot of damage and a lot of rebuilding for them to do, but, again, the good news, nobody was injured.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

LEMON: Meantime, Nick Valencia is on the phone now with some new information for us. By the way, Nick is en route to Sewanee, Oklahoma, where we are seeing a whole lot of damage.

Nick, what can you tell us?

VALENCIA (via phone): Hey, Don. Yes, we are about 160 miles outside of ground zero there in Oklahoma. We have got a new update of information from the Oklahoma state department of emergency management. There is an accident there on I-40 and I-70 where four people were transported to the hospital. They told me that a tractor trailer, at least one tractor trailer was blown off the road. We don't know any details about the severity of the injuries, but we do know that they were transported by ambulance to a local hospital. That's in Pottawatomie county. And in neighboring Lincoln County, there are four other injuries there near the town of Carney. You were just talking about that town to our viewers. Four people injured there. I spoke to the deputy director for the Oklahoma state department of emergency management, Don, and she's telling me things there, they just don't look good -- Don.

LEMON: Nick Valencia, thank you very much for that.

Chad Myers, as we -- as Nick has been reporting now, they are starting to get reports of more injuries. We are hearing about, as we said, probably more reports and it will probably get worse before it gets better.

MYERS: Well, if that's what we're seeing on those pictures there live is a mobile home park, you know. A 100-mile-per-hour wind event will pretty much take apart a mobile home. It won't take apart a home. It will take the shingles off a home, maybe the 4 x 8 sheet of plywood off your roof. But if you start to see 130, 140 like what we know that we have, 150-mile-per-hour wind storm with a tornado rolling through a mobile home park, there's devastation, and that's what they are digging through right now looking for those missing people.

LEMON: All right, Chad, don't go anywhere. Stay right here with me because I want you to help me with this interview.

Juliette Kayyem is on the phone from Boston now. She is CNN's national security analyst.

Juliette, thanks for joining us. This is right up your Bailiwick. This is exactly what you used to do. Tell us about the storm response and recovery. It looks like it's going to be pretty extension you have.

JULIETTE KAYYEM, CNN NATIONAL SECURITY ANALYST (via phone): Yes, it is. I mean, it actually begins with just the challenges of dealing with tornadoes which are unlike hurricanes, both are bad. You know, these are no-notice events. People are -- have minutes. They don't have minutes or hours or even days. We had had some suspicion that there would be tornado watches, but the exact placement of any tornado is not known until minutes before. So what that means, not only are people at risk and they can die, but that you can't pre-position response needs as you might be able to in a hurricane, what we call sort of moving assets towards the potential place where something bad is going to happen.

So in communities like this, there's just not, you know, it's not like a metropolitan city that's going to have a lot of different, you know, hospitals, ambulance services, doctors and emergency management teams that can come in. So, you're dealing both with the problems of this sort of quickness of this as well as not a lot of redundancies that can -- that can come and help, and it may very well be, although we don't know yet, that a lot of those emergency management services including communications are down which just makes it even harder.

LEMON: So tell us about -- talk to me about this, Juliette, and I'm trying to read more of the governor's state of emergency declaration there.

KAYYEM: Yes.

LEMON: What does this mean for Washington, if anything? I would imagine folks in Washington are paying attention, but what does that mean what when she declares a state of emergency?

KAYYEM: This is actually part of the post hurricane Katrina, some of the changes made after hurricane Katrina that a governor can request an emergency declaration at the moment, sometimes even before, but at the moment something happens just to be able to begin to let the federal resources flow. Sometimes that's just, you know, FEMA, the department of defense, whatever else may be need down there, and then eventually it positions the state to be able to get disaster declaration relief a lot faster.

People remember in hurricane Katrina one of the problems was is that the way the law was set up at the time is that everyone had to wait until sort of the worst of it was over and, you know, forms were filled out. Some of the changes after Katrina were that we don't have to way. All we want to do is save lives and get these communities back to normal. There's still problem with a system, and this is one of the fixes that occurred after Katrina.

LEMON: And all I had to do was read down to the last line. That's exactly what you said, Juliette. It says under the executive order state agencies can make emergency purchases and acquisitions in order to expedite the delivery of resources to local jurisdictions and the declaration also marks a first step in toward seeking federal assistance, should it be necessary. KAYYEM: Right. And one thing, too, that it will be necessary, if only because a lot of those local assets are probably destroyed so, you know, the way it works is if the locals can't handle, it they ask the state. If the state can't handle it, they ask the federal government, and some of this, you know, it's not always money, it's not always the military. Sometimes it's just they need extra helicopters or they need extra search and rescue.

FEMA has a lot of search and rescue capabilities, so this will unfold, unfortunately, overnight and into tomorrow as people see the extent of the damage to or the harms that people may have faced. The damage is to structures. That will take longer just because you have to figure out, you know, how much was the building, how big should the check be to the people who lost their home, but the most important thing now is saving life, anyone who may have been harmed or hurt and we know that there's already at least one death.

LEMON: Juliette Kayyem, CNN's national security analyst, thank you very much for that.

And Chad, as we look at this, as we look at the pictures that we saw, some rescuers, rescues happening earlier, and then there it is right there. People, volunteers I would imagine and also emergency workers helping folks out there, and then, of course, we had those live pictures. I don't want that to go unnoticed.

Live pictures still at this hour of people in Sewanee searching for at least two people who are missing, and then, there we go. That's the video right there, searching for people who are missing, and we also know that one person is dead now. There it is, Chad Myers.

MYERS: Yes.

From the governor, her state of emergency, and it says since Saturday, and it gives all the information about all the counties and all the damage that they have given.

MYERS: Something else, too, Don, people get hurt after the storm. There are nails out there. There are boards. There are things in places that you don't expect them to be. There are still live power lines, whether it's on the ground or not. There may still be some live power out there. I want you to be careful, if you're cleaning up or trying to help or trying to volunteer, you have to understand it wasn't the same way. This is not the same as it was at 2:00 this afternoon. All bets are off, everything is different, just like after a hurricane, more people sometimes can get hurt after the event than during the event. You immediate to be very careful tonight.

LEMON: Here's the operative phrase that you've said tonight, not over yet.

MYERS: That's true.

LEMON: And more coverage right after this break.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK) (BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

UNIDENTIFIED MALE REPORTER: This looks like somebody got a giant cat bulldozer and just went to down on these houses. I mean, they are completely destroyed, 102 runs north and south, just south of fire lake casino.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

LEMON: The damage is enormous. Oklahoma's governor has declared a state of emergency in 16 counties after tornadoes ripped through the state. We have video showing a huge tornado in Carney, Oklahoma. Watch this.

(VIDEO CLIP PLAYING)

LEMON: Want to bring in now the man who shot that powerful video. His name is Lawrence McEwen with live storms media.

Lawrence, how close did you get to the twisters?

LAWRENCE MCEWEN, LIVE STORM MEDIA (via phone): We got about 100 to 250 yards from the actual tornado there that you're watching in the video.

LEMON: Many people would say that is way too close for comfort.

MCEWEN: Yes, I mean, definitely if you're not sure about what you're doing. It's very dangerous and, you know, there's a few points there where we are a little uncomfortable doing what we're doing, but what I do and for trying to get the word out there, and let people know what exactly is coming their way. We feel it's kind of important to do.

LEMON: You said 100 to 200 yards, Chad. I mean, that's pretty close. Before you start to get sucked into something like that, I mean, doesn't that thing, that vortex sort of pull you in, the spinning of the tornado?

MYERS: Well Mr. McEwen, this is not your first rodeo, I assume. You have been out there a long time. You actually have a company and a business, but you know, that is quite close. Tell us again what did you see on your chase? Did you ever get to the damage path?

MCEWEN: We usually try to avoid the damage path because for what I do on my side is we do storm video research, so we are interested in the damage, but we are trying to get as close as we can to the tornadoes and to catch the damage that they do, as they are doing that damage, whether it be of houses, power lines or what have you.

MYERS: Well, go back to Don's question. He just said do you ever feel like you are going to get sucked in?

MCEWEN: No, not really. I mean, we've been doing it now -- I've been doing it personally now for over six years, and, I mean, this is not our first time that we have gotten this close to a tornado before and certainly won't be our last time. LEMON: So you know when to get out, you're saying?

MCEWEN: We definite know when to get out. All the technology that we have, we always have an escape route. The same in case with the day today, the route that we, the road that we chose. There was only us and one other car on that road. The other car on that road was also with my team so we knew if we needed to turn around and escape immediately we knew we'd be able to do so.

LEMON: But also, you have to watch out for debris, and sometimes that debris can be farm animals. It can be anything. It can be roofs, it could be trees. And as we're looking at the video, just the video you shut just a moment ago. We saw rain. Was that hail? Tell us what you see when it's that close. What's jetting by you, speeding by you?

MCEWEN: That's definitely all the rain. With the storms today, they were kind of getting wrapped up into the super cell so there was a lot of rain. And a lot of time the tornado was getting rain-wrapped. That's a lot of what happened today. We did -- with largest tail that got hit was golf ball-sized, which is not too bad. A lot of small debris leaves, tree branches, paper, stuff like that. We didn't really get hit by anything big. We did come up on damage path of that tornado. We went right up ahead and went as far as we could go on that road as we shot the tornado pointing away from us. We did get a little bit bigger tree branches but not anything that would be harmful to us or our vehicle.

LEMON: All right. Lawrence McEwen, thank you very much. He's a storm chaser.

Chad, he said he's been doing it now for six years, but it's not just getting sucked into it, as I said. There's debris that is going on it. It is a very dangerous thing to do, but they are doing it because they want research.

MYERS: Don, and you have to make sure you never get on a two track or a dirt road because dirt turns into mud rather quickly, and all of a sudden you think you have an escape route and you have nothing because it's a mud road you can't move on. So, that you see right there. He's on a blacktop, knows where he's going. Not going to get himself on dirt roads. Please don't go chase these storms by yourself.

LEMON: Yes, if you don't know what you are doing.

MYERS: Exactly.

LEMON: Knows when to get out of there. Again, out thanks to Lawrence McEwen.

The governor of Oklahoma is declaring a state of emergency -- 16 counties, 16 counties there. The damage is extensive, and we have now learned it's deadly. One person dead. At least two people are missing. Numerous others are injured. Details on the other side.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK) LEMON: Back now to our breaking news coverage of the storm situation happening across the Midwest. Our Nick Valencia on the phone now with some new information. By the way, he is en route to Sewanee, Oklahoma where we are seeing a whole lot of damage.

What do you know, Nick?

VALENCIA (via phone): Don, I just got off the phone with the Pottawatomie county sheriff Mike Booth (ph). He tells me that a fatality is an older adult male. Died as a result of the tornado. He was a resident of the trailer home, trailer park.

Also, two people still missing and still unaccounted for. He tells me that the sheriff's office, deputies there are conducting search and rescue operations. There's just piles of debris everywhere, Don, making it really, really difficult for the sheriffs there.

He also tells me in regards to the injuries. He says a few people, he didn't have an exact number for us, but he says a few people were transported by ambulance with minor injuries. He also said there were two serious injuries with lacerations, and currently the medical examiner is on the scene. Don, the sheriff, Mike Booth, tells me they are going to be there a while.

LEMON: All right. Thank you, Nick Valencia. Safe travels to you. We will get back to Nick as he gets more information.

I want you to take a look at this video.

(VIDEO CLIP PLAYING)

LEMON: This video was shot in Wichita, Kansas, and joining me now on the phone is a storm chaser who shot this video for us.

Chris, hey, it's Don Lemon and Chad Myers here. You were making your way through these storms. Tell us about this particular one before we ask you about the rest.

CHRIS CHITTICK, STORM CHASER (via phone): Yes.

LEMON: What was happening here?

CHITTICK: Yes, with that one we started out in kind of eastern southeastern Kansas, and then the storm popped up, you know, just west of Wichita and, you know, that was pretty much the only storm in play. Out in front of everything else, kind of isolated so we decided to go after. It got up on it and started rigging cameras up outside the vehicles, and within minutes had a beautiful wall cloud, dropped the tornado, and we started chasing it east towards Wichita. And before you know it, it got kind of shrouded with rain and then we got rain between the rain and actual trailer itself and got some great, great shots as you can see in the video.

MYERS: Hey, Chris, it's Chad. This isn't over, you know. Tomorrow is going to be another big day.

CHITTICK: Yes.

MYERS: What are your plans?

CHITTICK: We're kind of, unfortunately, for this area it's going to be in the same area, maybe a little bit east, but it's really -- I mean, it's, you know, all season it's been such a slow season for tornadoes, and then, boom, like two, three days, you know, like just kind of going nuts.

LEMON: So you are watching this one, this one near Wichita, and then you move on. Tell us about the order of your day.

CHITTICK: Yes. So we are on that storm, and then literally 45 minutes later we drop south and we get another beautiful tornado that just drops out. It's a nice little needle there and turns into a nice little stovepipe. Unfortunately, you know, the rain affected that one, too, so we lost visual of it, but we did get some good stuff, and then we kept going east to try to catch up so some other storms to get out in front of them, kind of going south to east, and they just started moving so quickly. I think it just passed over a sort of a kind of boundary and just wind just started go nuts. And unfortunately, we were not on the storms that went through Norman and Sewanee, but it's pretty bad down there, I hear.

LEMON: This for you is a passion because I hear you describing a beautiful wall cloud, a beautiful storm and, you know, a needle and what have you, but most people would say I don't want that coming anywhere near me, but this is your passion.

CHITTICK: Yes, yes. I've been storm chasing since '98 and then just recently joined a new team out of Canada, Gregg Johnson and Ricky Forbes, tornadohunters.com is our Web site. And you know, it's just I can say it's my job. I love storm chasing. I love trying to capture things that no one else out there can capture. And you know, I'm not a meteorologist by any means, but just by doing it for the last 12, 13 years, I've learned a lot.

LEMON: Chris, we appreciate you joining us and your passion. Don't mean to cut you off. KFOR, speaking to someone affected by this. Let's listen in.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Looked like it was going to be south of there. So, we didn't go over there real early. We went over there and were watching it. And I left my dog in my house. We have a chocolate lab, and I seen it was going to hit us. So, I ran over here and got my dog and I got back over there with my wife and two kids and my neighbor and his wife, mother, they were all down there, and then I just started taking everything I had.

UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE REPORTER: Tell me a little bit, that's your master bedroom. That's just gone.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: That's my master bed room, the ceiling fell out of it. I have two out barns. They were gone. My pickup, it picked it up and put it on top of my tractor, and all my barns are gone, all my trees. UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE REPORTER: How are you feeling? Is your family OK? They seem like they are pretty sturdy.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Everybody is fine. I mean, it's -- I will make it.

UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE REPORTER: It's a bit of a shock though.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Yes. I mean, I don't -- everything I own now is out of house. We got everything out of my house, and they are in three different enclosed trailers.

UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE REPORTER: You obviously are a big part of this community to see the effort to come here and, Lance, we wish you well. Again, we all live in Oklahoma and it's amazing when something that happens a lot here happens to you, correct?

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Right.

LEMON: Our coverage from our affiliate KFOR, and you see in the background there people helping people.

Chad Myers and I will be back after the break with more on this breaking news story.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

LEMON: All those pictures that we have been getting, especially from the chopper pictures, there is a pilot who is on the air now, KFOR, an interview in progress. Let's listen in.

UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE REPORTER: John Welch, our chopper pilot. You're the one who gave us the scenes from the air to let us note extent of the devastation.

JOHN WELCH, KFOR HELICOPTER PILOT: Yes. I mean, we saw especially the Sewanee area, we saw some damage from the earlier northern storm or Edmond, but nothing as severe as where Sewanee was. That area was really hit very hard, especially the trailer park that we showed you several times there just south of I-40 east of highway 102. But, I mean, coming back, we are trying to go to little axe and flew over that area. We saw a lot of mercy lights, but it's unbelievable how when there's no streetlights or star light how dark it is, and our camera couldn't really iris in to show a lot of the stuff down there. But there's still crews working in the little axe area trying to find people. Just that whole second storm, it did a lot of damage.

LEMON: That is John Welch. He is a chopper pilot for KFOR. And Chad, he is a brave man.

MYERS: He certainly is.

LEMON: He's been giving us those pictures.

Listen, one person is dead now and we understand there are more missing, and they are still searching live now in Pottawatomie county for those two people. And when the sun comes up, we will see the extent of the damage.

Stay tuned for more on "EARLY START" 5:00 a.m. Eastern Time.

I'm Don Lemon here with Chad Myers.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)