exchange for a meeting between judge goldstone and jewish groups. now the judge tells us i am delighted to attend this important day for my grandson and family. see your program whenever you like at amanpour.com/podcast. for all of us here, good-bye from new york. hello. i'm fredricka whitfield. welcome to a special edition of the "cnn newsroom." you're about to see live pictures right now, actually, out of west virginia. this is where a memorial service will be taking place this hour for the 29 people killed in this month's coal mine explosion. the worst u.s. mine disaster in 40 years. president barack obama is delivering the eulogy. he will be momentarily. we will be joining that jeweulo as it happens roughly about 30 minutes from now and bring that to you live. obviously, the president will also be meeting with family

members of those miners who were killed in that explosion. the other major story we're following for you, this hour tornado devastation in the south. mississippi's governor calls it utter obliteration in some places including his hometown. alabama was also hit hard and fast. >> talked to my dad on the phone. he said, son, they say it's coming right downtown. just as he said that, it lightened off in the distance and i could see the wall cloud and see the funnel cloud drop down. i said, dad, it's not -- it is coming through downtown. >> here's what's happening right now as a result of that severe weather. rescue crews are out in force across mississippi after a mile wide twister tore through that state yesterday. at least ten people are confirmed dead, including three children. a tornado also touched down in northern alabama. part of a huge band of storms that stretched from missouri all the way to the florida panhandle. obviously, cnn correspondents are on the scene in so many

different locations. ed lavandera is in mississippi. richard lui is in albertville, alabama. jacqui jeras is here in the severe weather center tracking all of this nasty weather that has swept across the country this weekend. let's get started with ed lavandera. he's actually joining us on the phone. you're seeing the worst of the damage where you are, ed. you've been hiking through mississippi really trying to tra version this state that was hit so hard by this tornado. give me an idea what you're witnessing. >> reporter: >> all right. therein lies part of the problem. the devastation that has hit much of the southeast, communication is spotty, very difficult to get confirmation, sometimes, of being able to reach out to people. we'll try to reach back out to our ed lavandera momentarily when we can. meantime, let's go to albertville, alabama, where we find our richard lui there. the devastation is quite

widespread there as well. richard, give us an idea. >> reporter: yeah, fred. you talked about utilities and difficulties there. surely that is the case here in albertville where electricity still not in many of the homes that were hit overnight. we're in the center of downtown albertville. about a three by five mile area. 15 square miles where they believe most of the damage is. that's where officials are really zoning in on. behind you can see some of the damage. this house over here to my right, the rear part of the roof has been torn off. this carport is down here. and the back part of this entire building here, gone. now, if you look down this road right now, it is clear. but last night it was absolutely filled with brush and trees and remnants from the houses that were hit by this storm. but they came through around 3:00 a.m. and they were able to clear out the entire road. one of the residents here, which is francis willisson. she was in her house when it did

happen. tell us how you learned about the storm coming through. >> they said that the storm was coming through about 10:15, 10:20, whatever. at 10:00 i thought this is not going to be any more than what the other one was. i went to stairs and went right to bed. i evidently went right to sleep. at 10:25 i heard a very large boom. i woke up. the girl that stays with my aunt had already called me once before. and she said let's go downstairs. my aunt's 82. she had dementia. she did not want to go down stair. we got her downstairs finally. when we were coming down the steps you could hear the air being sucked out of the house. it sounded like a real heavy wheezing, that sort of thing. we went in the den. we just waited for it to pass. you sit by the plate glass window, that sort of thing. we really didn't know it was a tornado. amber that stays with my aunt was going to go check on her children. she stays with jane from 7:00 to 7:00. when she went out the back door,

she said, oh, my gosh. we went out and looked. that's when we saw the street scape had totally changed. >> reporter: francis was telling me earlier she had just had three of her trees cut down here right behind me from 19 down to 16. as you can see she only has three left now standing. whether she actually needed to have them cut down the day before, maybe not in this case. >> richard lui, thanks so much in albertville, alabama. let's try this again, go back to mississippi, one of the hardest hit from this storm. ed lavandera we think is on the phone with us now. ed, give us idea what's happening where you are. >> reporter: hi, fredricka. we're in a small town of ware, mississippi, in choctaw county. this is an area where five people were killed in this tornado yesterday. we are along a little street called white grove where we believe that three of the youngest victims of this storm were killed yesterday. a 14-year-old girl, a 9-year-old girl and a 3-month-old baby girl

as well. we just pulled into the neighborhood trying to get a sense of how it all unfolded here yesterday. what we're seeing is massive trees all splintered and shattered to pieces as well as dozens of homes. it's a small country roads that we're on. this was a heavily devastated area with a very tragic unfolds as three of the youngest victims were killed in the area where i am right now, fredricka. >> all right, ed. what about these three children among the ten killed in that state? what's your understanding about how that family's doing? >> reporter: we understand that the -- the 14 and the 9-year-old girls were sisters. and that their parents are being treated in hospitals as we speak. the mother of the 3-month-old baby girl we understand is a 24-year-old girl who survived.

and so we're actually just pulling up to the location where all of this unfolded yesterday. we're kind of beginning the process of talking to folks and family and friends that knew them well. >> ed lavandera, thanks so much. appreciate that. let's check in with our jacqui jeras in the severe weather center. we know this was one big nasty system. is it still producing severe weather elsewhere? >> absolutely. it doesn't hold quite the punch as yesterday. we could see weaker tornadoes that still can produce a lot of damage and can be life threatening. the area we're focusing on at this hour is across north central parts of florida. that red box you see means there is a tornado watch in effect. we did have a warning which just expired at the top of the hour for this cell here, which is now producing maybe winds in excess of 60 miles per hour. we've also had some reports of hail with these storms as they move through the gainesville

area. severe thunderstorm warning in effect for putnam and st. john's cowan tis. this includes you in flagler beach as well as the -- you can see the spin in the atmosphere here. this is the main upper level part of the system. we think the threat in this area is going to be more wind damage if anything today. you see a couple lines east of columbus and on up towards the cleveland area. there is a severe thunderstorm watch in effect here. that will eventually make its war into the northeastern quarter later on tonight. the severe weather threat really stretches from pennsylvania all the way down into florida today. again, damaging winds and hail will be the greater concern. and then tomorrow this storm system, most of the energy will be offshore here. we're just looking at some winds associated with this low along with some heavy rains that will cause you some travel delays for your commute tomorrow morning. >> just in time, as always, right?

jacqui jeras, thanks so much. momentarily we're going to take you back to beckley, west virginia. live pictures right now. this is a place where a memorial service will be under way for the 29 miners killed in that explosion earlier this month. president barack obama meeting with family members of those victims, and he will be delivering the eulogy as well. we'll take that live. also coming up, a new arizona law continues to generate heated controversy. we'll have a live report.

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with our 100,000-mile, 5-year powertrain warranty to guarantee the quality. and the unmatched life-saving technology of onstar to help keep you safe. from new energy solutions. to the designs of tomorrow. we invite you to take a look at the new gm. welcome back to the "newsroom." live pictures right now out of arizona where demonstrators are apparently staging a rally against that new immigration law. govern eor jan brewer signed it two days ago. it requires police to question people they suspect of being illegal immigrants. and it requires legal immigrants to carry registration documents at all times as well. you're looking at aerial views there coming out of phoenix. on the ground we understand a

number of people have converged for these protests or organized gatherings. many arizona latinos actually fearing this new law will lead to racial profiling. and cnn's casey wian has been talking to a number of people. he's joining us right now from phoenix. give me an idea right now the sentiment, what people are saying and how they have they can perhaps macon impact on this new law? >> reporter: free ree fredricka had a festive atmosphere. we've got now a couple thousand people who have joined together here to denounce this law. they believe it will lead to racial profiling in arizona. we've had music this morning. i have to say it's been really a festive atmosphere. the anger the last few days has really turned into a coop ti spirit, if you will, by folks who wont ant to work against th law. they're working against one of the most controversial provisions that would require

police who have reasonable suspicion that a person is in the country illegally to check the immigration status of the person. it does not allow police to pull over anyone who appears to be latino or a certain nationality without some sort of other reason to contact that person. it is very clear these opponents of the bill do not believe that police will abide by that. let's listen to what some had to say. >> what is reasonable suspicion? are we going to get pulled over just for a broken taillight? or just because of the color of our skin? if so, is everybody going to get stopped? white people? you know, are they going to be looking for europeans as well? or is it just is brown people? >> reporter: what do you have to say to those concerns? >> they're really unfounded. the arizona law enforcement community is made up of many hispanics. and the state of arizona has a very high hispanic population. we've never had a policy of racial profiling. in fact, quite the contrary. it's been -- it's been outlawed.

>> reporter: now, we're not going to know how this is all going to play out in the streets for another 90 days or perhaps even more than that, late july, early august. that's when this law will actually take effect. 90 days after the current legislative session. opponents of the law say they're going to continue to work against it. there already are plans for lawsuits to be filed, trying to stop this law. we're not sure if it's even going to go into effect. but there will be a march over to a church here in phoenix, arizona, later this afternoon. folks will be praying for, i guess, divine intervention to overturn this law. for right now things are very peaceful and very festive. >> casey wian, thanks so much. momentarily we're going to take you back to beckley, west virginia, where soon a memorial service will get under way. we understand the location where this service is to take place, people are beginning to file in. and we also understand the president of the united states

ahead of his eulogy that he'll be delivering, he is meeting with family members of those 29 miners who died from that explosion. you're taking a look right now at the live image right now of that service to get under way in this hour. of course, we'll be previewing it straight ahead and also taking you there live. heel pressure. high arches. (announcer) people everywhere are discovering what's going on with their feet. dr. scholl's custom fit orthotic center. backed by foot care scientists, its foot mapping technology identifies the areas you put pressure on then recommends the right orthotic. for locations see drscholls.com. i have missed you. pollen in the air kept hunter cooped up itching his eyes and sneezing. but now i found zyrtec®. it's #1 allergist recommended.

with children's zyrtec® he can get 24-hour allergy relief indoors and outdoors. ♪ now he can run wild... with the rest of the pack. with children's zyrtec®, he can love the air®. and now try children's zyrtec® perfect measure®. a premeasured spoon. just twist squeeze and go™. president barack obama dplifrs a eulogy this afternoon for the 29 victims of this month's coal mining explosion in west virginia. he'll be speaking at that memorial service. meantime, ed henry is traveling with the president joining us now from beckley. ed, what's the expectation as to what the president will be saying today? >> reporter: fred, it's a very poignant scene. let me set that first. you may have seen that there are 29 very simple white crosses on

stage right here on the podium where the president will speak. we've seen that the families representing all 29 of the miners who perished have been given miners' hats. and they'll be able to place a hat on each cross representing the loved ones who are lost. we've gotten a preview of the president's remarks. when you ask he'll say, among other things he'll say, quote, we cannot bring back the 29 men we lost. they are with the lord now. our task here on earth is to save lives from being lost in another such tragedy. to do that, what must be done individually and collectively to assure safe conditions under ground. on that safety issue, of course, the mining company, massey, has come under heavy scrutiny in recent days for its safety record. white house aides have said in advance of the president's eulogy that, of course, he is not going to be ripping the company here. this is neither the time nor the place for that. there's ongoing investigations looking to the company, looking into the incident, what went wrong. even though this happened days, weeks ago, i can tell you, of

course, emotions still very raw. i saw one very young girl who was walking with a stuffed animal in one hand and her other hand she was wiping away tears. as family members consoled her. obviously this is about this community trying to come together and grieve together, and the president coming to show his respects, fred. >> it's interesting, is it not, and very poignant that the president is going to be there, will be delivering this eulogy? because there has been a lot said about whether this community would have under other circumstances really embraced this president, particularly because of his approach on climate change and what many in the coal mining community believe to be a threat to their livelyhood. so how is he being received? >> reporter: you're absolutely totally on point, fred. president's environmental policies have upset people here in west virginia who think he's going to hurt the coal industry. his motorcade just arrived a couple of moments ago and among the signs, one said, god hates

obama. you can imagine, there are clearly as you noted some people in this community who are not big fans of this president to say the least. going back to the democratic primaries against hillary clinton, barack obama lost badly. deep double digits against hillary clinton. also lost to john mccain by a bad margin. so he has a challenge here in general. but, of course, nobody is going to be talking about politics. there'll be some people on the sidelines who as i mentioned with some of the signs, maybe some protesters. but inside this convention center, you can bet, from the people i've seen filing in, they're certainly going to put politics aside. this is about coming together for these miners. this is clearly an opportunity for the president, as i noted, despite the fact there are people here who might not normally welcome him here, to show his respect for the miners who lost their lives. >> in the meantime, this journey comes after an interesting time

spent in north carolina and meeting with reverend billy graham. give me an idea what took place in their meeting at the graham household? >> really fascinating. i've learned from reverend graham's office while he's known to the pastor to presidents, he's now met with 12 of them from truman to obama, barack obama is actually the first sitting president to ever visit the graham home in north carolina. richard nixon also visited, but while he was a sitting vice president. it shows you that, again, this president trying to show respect to reverend graham who's 91 years old. we're told when then candidate obama in 2008 visited asheville, about 20, 25 minutes away from reverend graham's home, he wanted to meet with him then. the schedules didn't come together. it finally did today. what i've learned from the meeting, from a spokesman for reverend graham, is that the president sort of opened up a little bit about his faith. talked a little bit about the loneliness of the job sometimes. and at the end they prayed together. the president praying for this

91-year-old spiritual leader who has been in difficult health in recent months and years, but then reverend graham concluded by giving president obama two bibles. one for him, one for first lady michelle obama, and basically prayed for him, his family and his administration, we're told, fred. >> all right. ed henry, thanks so much. we'll check back with you over the course of the next hour and a half or so out of beckley, west virginia. thanks so much. topic of conversation that dominated a lot of the sunday talk shows today included what the president has on the front burner for this week. financial reform among other thing. we'll give you a preview of all the other topics that made the headlines on the sunday morning shows.

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a look at our top stories right now. emergency crews and damage assessment teams are out in force today across south central mississippi. they're looking for more victims and tallying the costs from yesterday's deadly tornado. at least ten people including a 3-month-old baby were killed when the twister slammed across several county. dozens of people, of course, were injured as well. the death toll from a massive earthquake in southern china is rising. more than 2,200 people died in the 6.9 magnitude quake which hit earlier this month. dozens of people are still missing. some 15,000 homes were destroyed. more than 100,000 people have fled their homes in the area. confirmation from al qaeda that two of their senior leaders are dead. last night an islamic website called the deaths of al masri

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welcome back to the "newsroom." you're hearing the sounds now of the memorial service that's about to get under way for the 29 miners who were killed in that underground explosion earlier this month and the 29 white crosses and photographs also there inside this building to symbolize the lives lost. president barack obama will be delivering the eulogy. he'll be arriving shortly after meeting with many of the family members of those 29 victims. we'll take that live there in beckley, west virginia. >> i started seeing the

spinning. you could see the debris as it started spinning around in a circle. and i started hearing trees snap and telephone poles snap and power just went immediately out. and it pushed through here in just a matter of moments. there's a lot of damage back towards the city. and, like i say, as a lifelong resident, it's going to be a little hard to -- to stomach at first, but we'll be able to pick up from this. >> albertville, alabama, where as you just heard, people are reeling from severe storms that spawned a tornado late last night. at least one mobile home park and homes were destroyed. earlier yesterday in neighboring mississippi another tornado tore through that state, killing at least ten people. three of them children. right now rescue crews are out in force searching for more potential victims. entire neighborhoods were leveled and governor hayley barbour describes what he saw in

his hometown of yazoo city as utter obliteration. the tornadoes were part of a massive band of storms that stretched from missouri all the way to the florida panhandle. we'll check in with meteorologist jacqui jeras in a few moments. she'll show us where the storm is right now. all right. let's go back now to beckley, west virginia, and we know now that momentarily president of the united states will be carrying out the eulogy there as this memorial service for the 29 victims of that underground mine explosion. that's also where we find our senior white house correspondent, ed henry, outside the hall where this will be under way momentarily. people have already filled in this building and we're seeing pictures now of children who are singing as well, ed. >> reporter: part of the reason why there's a delay is that the president is meeting privately now with families of the 29 miners who died. and so, you know, while there are a lot of people in there, there's still a lot of key family members who are not

there. and the president is going to take as much time as he needs. that's obviously a lot of families to work his way through, pay his respects privately. that's, of course, closed to us in the media. the president's remarks will be open. we expect him to speak about 4:15 eastern time, approximately. that was based on this starting, though, at 3:30. that's been pushed back, of course. i think also something to look for at the very beginning, once it gets started, we're going to see governor manchin welcome in not just the president, but vice president joe biden is here as well. the first lady, mrs. manchin, is going to announce the family members to come into the hall. you see there were 29 white crosses on this stage right here on the podium where the president will speak. each family member will get a miner's hat. they'll be invited to come up, have at least one family member place a miner's hat on each one of those crosses to signify the fallen, of course, fred. >> wow. this is going to be a heartbreaking ceremony as i'm

sure it already is for the family members who are there and loved ones. this is a very powerful, close knit coal mining community. everyone feels like they have been hit hard by this, even if they did not lose an immediate loved one. >> reporter: you're right, fred. i mean, i saw in addition to family members here, i saw some people wearing -- men wearing t-shirts that said they were part of the rescue team. of course, all of that played out on our air over many days where people were valiantly trying to save these lives and risking their own lives to do that. some of those rescue team members are here. also, of course, you mentioned the families. i saw one little girl. she couldn't have been more than maybe 7 or 8 years old. she had a stuffed animal in one hand. her other hand was wiping tears from her eyes as she walked in. family members were consoling her. just one story of so many when you see 29 who perished. each one, i remember my colleague john roberts doing a story on one woman who had, you

know, a husband, a son, multiple family members who perished. and it's such a tragedy and this is a way of life here. and the president in the remarks we've seen already, a teaser of them, really is going to talk about how much mail has flooded into the white house from various mining families around the country reacting to this and urging the president to make sure that safety is stepped up, for example, so that this doesn't happen again, fred. >> and so while he will be talking about this collective grief that the entire country is feeling for these 29 lives lost, will he go into detail as far as you know about how to step up security, how to prevent another loss on this kind of scale? >> reporter: he will go into great detail. let me read real quick something that the president will say. it's more of a broad brush, of course, for a eulogy. he will say, quote, we cannot bring back the 29 men we have lost. they are with the lord now. our task here on earth is to save lives from being lost in

another such tragedidy. to do what must be done individually and collectively to assure safe conditions underground. so he's keeping it very general. white house aides in advance have been saying that's in part because this is not the time to go after massey, you know, the mining company involved here. and sort of start beating up on them in this kind of a setting. that's something the president has already talked about previously, that there are investigations ongoing to see what went wrong here. and what needs to be done moving forward. so this is going to be, we're told, about ten minutes from the president in his jeweeulogy. that's going to be about helping the families with the grieving process. >> had there been a great expectation the president would be arriving, or did people learn of this just in the past couple of days or did they know for a long time the president would be in attendance? >> reporter: it was fairly recently, fred. that's a good question. as you know, there have been

many funerals since there are 29 people who pebished that have played out over recent weeks. this is the sort of collective memorial service. the president when a lot of this played auto, we were in prague with the president. once he returned, you'll remember he made some remarks. the white house was looking for the right venue. it was only a few days, a week ago they settled this would be the time, this would be the place where, you know, for any president. remember incumbent president bush as well, as much as they want to help a community grieve, they don't want to interfere. a great amount of security around any president. you don't want to sort of invade the space, the privacy of individual funerals that families may have. this might be, perhaps, where the white house saw a better chance to show respect in more of a group setting after each family has had their chance to grieve more privately. and so it was only just in the last few days, last week that locals here knew that the president was coming for sure, fred.

>> all right. senior white house correspondent ed henry, thanks so much. in beckley, west virginia, where maybe in about 35 minutes or so the president of the united states will be delivering what could be a ten minute eulogy has ed was describing. they're a little behind schedule because the president is spending some important one on one time with the family members of those 29 miners killed in that underground explosion. perhaps his eulogy might have to slide a little bit. we'll carry that live when it does happen, nonetheless. much more straight ahead from beckley, west virginia, and elsewhere. [ female announcer ] sometimes you need tomorrow

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in washington trying to reach a bipartisan compromise on wall street reform. the senate has called a test vote for tomorrow to move the debate forward and that was the topic of the sunday talk shows this morning. here is an excerpt from nbc's "meet the press." >> tomorrow if another crisis occurred in the country we're no better off than we were in the fall of 2008. we have no cops on the beat. major sectors of our economy are unregulated entirely. you have all of this going on out there, could happen again. too big to fail could happen again if we don't change the law. >> i think we're closer than we've ever been. will we get a bill by tomorrow? i doubt it. i would always hope so because there's so much involved. but i think we will get a bill if the democrats want a bill and will give us some things that we think that are substantive in nature like make the too big to fail, send a message that nothing is too big to fail in this country and tighten up the

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ask me how to take the first step to your own cloud... take the first step! call for your free information kit with dvd. call the number on your screen or visit tempurpedic.com/cloud. tempur-pedic. the most highly recommended bed in america. a look at our top stories this hour. rescue workers spanning across the southeast today after a series of severe storms. at least ten people were killed. tornadoes were reported in louisiana, mississippi, arkansas and alabama. and in mississippi, what's being described as a monster tornado almost a mile wide tore a path of destruction against that state. in china, the death toll from another massive earthquake keeps rising. more than 2,200 people died when the 6.9 magnitude quake struck northwest china earlier this month. thousands of homes were destroyed, and more than 100,000 people fled the area.

the chinese government is increasing assistance for orphaned children, elderly widows and disabled people in the area. the british government is not amused. it has apologized for controversial memo about pope benedict's upcoming visit to britain. the memo from inside the british foreign office suggested the pope might like to sponsor a brand of condoms or bless a same-sex marriage while he's on a four-day state visit to britain in september. we're told the author has been transferred to other duties. mystery shrouds the latest unmanned vehicle launched into space. the air force calls it the x 37 test vehicle. very little else is known about this classified project and as you see in this photo, it looks like a smaller version of the space shuttle. and it's reusable. it was launched from cape canaveral, florida, on thursday and can stay in orbit for up to nine months. some people worry that it could eventually be used as a kind of

space age weapons system. the air force denies that. and we do know a lot more about the hubble telescope. the hubble has taken the world on a heavenly journey through the universe for decades now, and this weekend actually marks the 20th anniversary of its launch into space. hubble's cosmic voyage has been filled with star gazing, breakthrough discoveries and some pretty stunning views of far away galaxies. take a look. >> one and liftoff of the space shuttle "discovery" with the hubble space teltelescope. >> i would have never believed in 1990 the hubble would have turned out this great. i knew it was going to be great. it just exceeded all of our expectations. >> i had my own personal list of 10 or 20 things that could go wrong like most astronomers did. none of us, of course, anticipated the thing that actually did go wrong. we had a mirror with the wrong

shape that was actually going to be launched. that was the shock of the century for all of us gl there's a definite kink at the upper edge of the second panel there as you can see. >> we found a way to fix it which we did. and the astronauts did in 1993. >> hubble sees the universe as our eye would see the universe. our eyes are actually sensitive only to a very narrow range of colors from blue to red. when hubble was launched in 1990 super massive black homes were a fantasy of theory. something you saw on "star trek." one of our goals was to find at least one and prove it exists. as it turned out, hubble surprised us. not only did it find one, but it basically showed us super massive black holes are pervasive throughout the universe. >> liftoff of space shuttle -- >> i was on that mission. as the lead spacewalker in may of last year. to me it was phenomenal to go

back and see it in such great shape. >> we had hoped to get 10 to 15 years out of it with frequent shuttle visits. perhaps every 2 1/2 or 3 years. as it turns out we're now 20 years into this program. thanks to the work of john and the crew on the last mission, we're looking forward to at least another five years and maybe seven, eight, or nine or ten years more. >> the nebula is an example of a stellar nursery where stars are born inside of stars. carbon and oxygen in our bodies is all built inside of stars. hubble has answered fundamental scientific questions that in the end tell us about how our earth, how the earth was formed and the solar system and ultimately how we were formed. >> the unique thing about the hubble is more than any other science projects probably in history, it's truly brought science to the public. >> wow. extraordinary images. it's as if they added food colors or something to the images. of course, we know they didn't.

those were real live photos. filling in the cracks. plugging up the leaks. how uncle sam could reward homeowners for taking such steps to reduce energy costs. [ male announcer ] designed to function the way you function. the lexus rx. ♪ at your lexus dealer. exxonmobil has many employees in africa where malaria has touched their own lives; their own families. we're a part of a pioneering venture to get bed nets hung in every dwelling and medicines to babies and young children, which should save hundreds of thousands of lives. this is not gonna be solved by single doctors, governments or global agencies. it's gonna be solved by all of us working together.

storm survivors have some pretty terrifying tales to tell. ed lavandera found out firsthand when he visited people in yazoo city, mississippi, in the aftermath of that storm.

>> reporter: i guess the sense from what you guys were describing to me you were right in the middle of it, it was on top of you, literally. >> it was. it was glass, debris flying. when i got out of the car thinking she was going to get out behind me, i looked back and she wouldn't even get out of the car she was so scared. i was standing up against the building and debris was just flying by me. it was hitting my legs and glass was flying. i said, debris could kill me. i dove back in the car and tole her, come on, we got to go, we got to go. >> reporter: what was it like for you? >> it was terrifying. it scared me to death. i've never been in anything like this before in my life. >> reporter: the road that brings you into the hardest part of yazoo city is almost impassable. hundreds of these trees snapped along the way. in the last few hours they've cleared the roadway to a pretty decent extent. we had to find a couple guys here kind enough to bring us in here on four-wheelers to navigate through most of the

area to see the extent of the damage and talk to people who survived this. >> we've been here 15 years. my wife and i have been in the house for five years. believe it or not, it was pretty at one time. me and my wife and my daughter was out in the front yard and we sat out there. the weather kept getting bad. i thought i heard something back over here. my wife heard something coming out of the southwest. it sounded like a freight train whistle. my wife and my daughter and i were down here. and we were just balled up. you could -- the wind was like it was trying to suck you out from under the house. >> reporter: this blue truck you see right here along the road, we're told it was driven by a man who's name is ricky shivers. he was in that car when it flipped and rolled three times. he was able to get out of the car, but we understand right now he's one of the injured in the hospital. >> wow.

some pretty extraordinarily and very frightening images there. jacqui jeras in the severe weather center. hopefully no more tornadoes could be spawned from this particular system. because it is still on the move, right? >> yeah. absolutely. we have that threat at this hour across parts of florida. we did have a warning at the top of the hour which has since expired. but you can see those storms as they moved across central parts of the state caused a little bit of wind damage. some trees reported down in the gainesville area. also we had some reports of small hail about the size of nickels. you can see the area has cleared out now. we're watching as this next batch of showers showers across the gulf of mexico is going to make its way. the north side of this system, see that swirl here. we're expecting a greater potential for maybe some wind damage out of these storms. severe thunderstorm watch in effect for northeastern parts of ohio into western pennsylvania. nasty storms around pittsburgh at this hour. >> appreciate that.

we'll check back with you. we are just minutes away from president obama's eulogy for victims of the west virginia coal mine disaster that took place earlier this month. right now you're seeing a montage of photographs right there in this hall. you're also seeing all those white crosses representing the 29 miners who were killed in that explosion. we'll have live coverage right after this.

all right. plugging up drafty windows. beefing up insulation in the attic. homeowners who make their houses more energy efficient could see double the benefits. one by reducing their utility bills. another from the government. cnn's kate bolduan explains. >> i swear i just cleaned up. >> reporter: herb and kimberly mott say like any family they're trying to plan for the future. just look in their basement and attic. the motts are greening their ft. washington, maryland, home. >> if i do something, then my

children will benefit from it, they'll see the importance. and then they'll keep going. maybe we can reverse this awful cycle that we've gotten into with our planet. >> i'm interested in green, but i'm interested in saving green in my pocket. >> reporter: that's the kind of thinking the white house wants to persuade more americans to adopt. through a proposal called home star. the plan is still working its way through congress but would offer rebates of up to $3,000 for upgrades like new appliances, furnaces and insulation. with additional rebates possible after a full home energy audit. it's quickly earned the nickname cash for caulkers. this government program is modeled after another government program from last year. cash for clunkers. which offered car buyers a rebate for trading in their gas guzzlers for more fuel efficient vehicles. now people could get a payback for investing in energy savers at home. let me show you. from drafty windows to leaking ducts, the government's goal here is to promote energy

efficiency as well as jobs. and that's where people like david comes in. david, what is the problem you're trying to fix here? >> in most homes some of the biggest leakages in the basement area. what we're doing is sealing off where the basement foundation wall meets the main level. by properly sealing this we're eliminating the source of a lot of air leakage in the basement. >> reporter: what's the benefit? >> the less leakage the homeowner has the less their energy bill is. the only function of heating and cooling equipment is to replace the air lost in their house. >> reporter: the benefit for his energy company? he hopes for a bounce in business. not everyone sees the program as a win/win. >> yes, people will be happier. they'll be more likely to buy the energy efficient appliance. if somebody else helps pay for it. but that doesn't mean that it stimulates the economy or creates jobs. because that money they give to me has to come from somebody else who now is spending less. >> reporter: the motts say it's