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By ALAN SCHER ZAGIER and JIM SALTER, Associated Press


      JOPLIN, Mo. (AP) - Rescue crews worked into the rain-soaked
chill of night, ignoring lightning and strong winds to dig through
splintered homes, crumpled businesses and crushed cars in this
Missouri town walloped by the deadliest single tornado in nearly
six decades. Even more ominous: More storms, possibly strong ones,
were on the horizon.


      The death toll in Joplin reached 116 on Monday and was expected
to climb. But there were glimmers of hope: Rescuers pulled 17
people from the rubble, and Gov. Jay Nixon vowed that crews would
keep searching until everyone is accounted for.


      "They still think there are folks that could be alive," Nixon
told The Associated Press. Searchlights were brought in for work to
continue overnight.


      The killer tornado ripped through the heart of Joplin, a
blue-collar southwest Missouri town of 50,000 people, Sunday night,
slamming straight into St. John's Regional Medical Center. The
hospital confirmed that five of the dead were patients - all of
them in critical condition before the tornado hit. A hospital
visitor also was killed.


      The tornado destroyed possibly "thousands" of homes, Fire
Chief Mitch Randles told AP. It leveled hundreds of businesses,
including massive ones such as Home Depot and Wal-Mart.


      Speaking from London, President Barack Obama said he would
travel to Missouri on Sunday to meet with people whose lives have
been turned upside down by the twister. He vowed to make all
federal resources available to help in recovery and rebuilding
efforts.


      "The American people are by your side," Obama said. "We're
going to stay there until every home is repaired, until every
neighborhood is rebuilt, until every business is back on its
feet."


      It was the second major tornado disaster in less than a month.
In April, a pack of twisters roared across six Southern states,
killing more than 300 people, more than two-thirds of them in
Alabama.


      In Joplin, much of the town's landscape was changed beyond
recognition. House after house was reduced to slabs, cars were
crushed like soda cans and shaken residents roamed streets in
search of missing family members.


      The danger was by no means over. Fires from gas leaks burned
across town. The smell of ammonia and propane filled the air in
some damaged areas. And the forecast looked grim.


      The April tornadoes that devastated the South unspooled over a
three-day period starting in the Plains. The Storm Prediction
Center in Norman, Okla., said a repeat could be setting up, with a
possible large tornado outbreak in the Midwest on Tuesday and bad
weather potentially reaching the East Coast by Friday.


      "This is a very serious situation brewing," center director
Russell Schneider said, citing a moderate risk of severe weather
Tuesday in southwestern Missouri and in Oklahoma, Kansas and parts
of North Texas.


      Heavy rain fell from dark skies all day Monday, finally letting
up only as night fell, and lightning was so frequent that it slowed
the rescue and recovery effort, Randles said. A police officer from
Riverside, Mo., who was helping with the rescues, was burned from a
lightning strike and hospitalized. Another officer was slightly
injured in a near-lightning strike but kept working.


      The rainy, cool weather - the forecast called for an overnight
low of 62 degrees - raised concerns about its effect on anyone
still trapped in rubble. A whipping wind, perhaps strong enough to
finish off homes left barely standing by the tornado, made things
more dangerous for searchers and potential survivors.


      The twister that hit Joplin was one of more than 50 reported
across seven Midwestern states over the weekend. One person was
killed in Minneapolis and another in Kansas, but Missouri took the
hardest hits.


      At the destroyed Wal-Mart, perhaps 200 ruined cars lay crumpled
in the parking lot. They were among thousands of shattered vehicles
around town, including dozens of tractor-trailers tossed on their
sides or tops.


      Kim Weathers, 48, looked at her black Envoy and could only shake
her head - a piece of the roof from the Wal-Mart had pierced the
windows and crushed the side of the SUV.


      "We were in the store and all of a sudden somebody yelled, `Get
down!' Weathers said. "I could feel the wind coming, then stuff
was flying, hitting me in the head. I looked up and it was outside
- the roof was gone."


      St. John's took a direct hit, leaving debris dangling from the
top of the structure and blowing out almost every window. The
town's other hospital, Freeman, was overflowing with patients, and
makeshift hospitals and triage areas were set up at several other
locations. More than 400 people were treated for injuries, Randles
said.


      Unlike the multiple storms that killed more than 300 people last
month across the South, Joplin was smashed by just one
exceptionally powerful tornado. Not since a June 1953 tornado in
Flint, Mich., had a single twister been so deadly. That storm also
killed 116, according to the National Weather Service.


      Nixon did not want to guess how high the death toll in Joplin
would eventually climb. But he told AP: "Clearly, it's on its way
up."


      While many residents had up to 17 minutes of warning, rain and
hail may have drowned out warning sirens. Some residents said the
sirens are so common in "Tornado Alley" that they pay them little
heed.


      Nancy Hood, 63, is bedridden after suffering from diabetes and
cancer. She said she often ignores warning sirens, but didn't on
Sunday, telling her husband to grab their two grandsons, ages 4 and
7, and get to the hallway. The tornado destroyed most of Hood's
house - except the bedroom where she remained and the hallway.


      "Praise God," Hood said. "It was divine intervention."


      As rescuers toiled in the debris made soggy by the latest storm,
they moved gingerly around downed power lines, large chunks of
jagged metal, and boards with nails sticking out. Fires, gas fumes
and unstable buildings also posed threats.


      Teams of searchers fanned out in waves across several square
miles. The groups went door to door, making quick checks of
property that in many places had been stripped to their foundations
or had walls collapse. Some condemned homes were spray-painted with
a big "X."


      National Weather Service Director Jack Hayes said the tornado
was given a preliminary label as an EF4 - the second-highest rating
assigned to twisters based on the damage they cause.


      Hayes said the storm had winds of 190 to 198 mph. At times, it
was three-quarters of a mile wide.


      The tornado got the attention of those who suffered in the
South, including in Tuscaloosa, Ala., at the epicenter of the April
storm.


      "We're praying for those people," said retired Marine Willie
Walker, whose Tuscaloosa home suffered more than $50,000 in damage.
"We know what they're going through because we've been there
already."


      Once the center of a thriving mining industry, Joplin flourished
though World War II because of its rich lead and zinc mines. It
also gained fame as a stop along Route 66, the storied highway
stretching from Chicago to Santa Monica, Calif., before freeways
diminished the city's importance.


      The community, named for the founder of the area's first
Methodist congregation, is now a transportation crossroads and
manufacturing hub. It's also the hometown of poet Langston Hughes
and "Gunsmoke" actor Dennis Weaver.


      City Manager Mark Rohr said the city "will recover and come
back stronger than we are today."


      Buck Nordyke, 53, planned to stay in his south Joplin home to
ride out the rest of the storms, even though he's without power and
has some slight roof damage.


      "We could go to a neighbor's house or a hotel," Nordyke said.
"But what about the next day, or what about the next day?"


      Associated Press writers David A. Lieb in Jefferson City, Kristi
Eaton in Norman, Okla., and Nomaan Merchant in Joplin contributed
to this report.
      
      
      

Gallery

Rescue crews worked into the rain-soaked
chill of night, ignoring lightning and strong winds to dig through
splintered homes, crumpled businesses and crushed cars in this
Missouri town walloped by the deadliest single tornado in nearly
six decades. Even more ominous: More storms, possibly strong ones,
were on the horizon.

For reeling Mo. city, possible 2nd punch on the horizon

Go Deeper.

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