moving out of the west into places like alabama, tennessee, georgia, mississippi. here's what we know so far. take a look at these pictures, and i tell you having covered stories like this, looking at these pictures really doesn't do it justice as far as fatalities go. eight people are confirmed dead after tornadoes have hit several mid western states, much of this happening in the wee hours, so people really just had mere minutes for any kind of warning to try to seek shelter. pitch dark out. as far as these fatalities go, we know two of the deaths are in missouri, six are in illinois. all of them in the town of harrisburg in the southern part of the state. southeastern harrisburg we're told, and i just spoke with the mayor moments ago. he told me that was the area hardest hit. but as we look at the pictures of devastation, really widespread. some of these images what used to be homes, structures. we saw one wall from the harrisburg med center just totally wiped out. as we continue to follow this story here, let's move on.

okay? now we're going to go to missouri governor jay nixon spoke a little while ago about the status of his state and the aftermath. take a listen. >> i think put into context of a couple of things, first in the context of this particular site here, no loss of life. that's for preparation and also for the emergency responders that were here to make a real difference for folks in the middle of the night and the middle of a storm. just that training makes a serious and appropriate difference. but this is a lot of damage. the insurance issues here, the property damage issues here are going to be significant, but the bottom line is joplin is going to be a real sounding board for everybody else across our state, that you can rebuild, that you will rebuild, you'll stay calm during that. the bottom line is we are confident that branson will be back bigger and better than ever. >> particularly, what can you do to help branson from a state level? >> right now we're in emergency response, making sure each one of the locals are backed up by

what we have, that we keep the rule of law, that we begin to get the folks from sefema to ge here to do the evaluations, that we organize all the various parts of this, that we make sure the first responders working down here are backed up, protected, fed and clothed and whatnot, that we begin the damage assessment here so we can get dollars back in here as soon as possible. [ inaudible ] >> i think people should take -- we saw this in a number of disasters across the country, quite frankly. in fact, i just came back from a national governor's meeting and we were talking about some of these issues. i think people understand the early warning systems we have in place now are serious. we've seen lives saved across our state, whether it's joplin or other areas in the country. i think people understand when these sirens go off, when people say go to the basement, the best thing to do is follow those plans to do it, and if you do, you're here on a pretty day

afterwards talking about rebuilding branson, talking about another 11 to 12 million tourists coming here instead of talking about the number of folks that have been lost. emergency preparation is a very, very important, serious part about what we've learned from a number of natural disasters we've had. >> governor jay nixon speaking just in the last hour there in branson, missouri. missouri, as we mentioned, already suffered two fatalities and the story has continued to move. six deaths in harrisburg, illinois specifically, and now this is moving into the southeast. and we have chad meyers standing by. chad, i just want to take a breath, because just taking in this story, it's tremendous because it's sort of twofold as i talk to you. one is the path of destruction. it's how fast this happened. did people have warning at the damage on the ground right now, and two, it's where it's headed. first let's just begin with how huge was this storm? how big is the path of destruction?

>> they believe it was on the ground between 6 and 7 miles. it was supposed to be at 2:00 central time, a national weather service press conference as well telling us that. they're still out there looking at that and may be delayed a few minutes. we'll get you that as soon as we know, but probably a 150, 160-mile-per-hour storm that knocked through there. there will be another storm after dark, probably while you're sleeping. those will be in parts of ohio, kentucky, west virginia as well, down to tennessee, and now a new watch box for mils mississippi parts of alabama. this is typical. in the springtime -- close to spring, it's still winter -- they keep rotating all night long. it doesn't really happen in oklahoma and kansas, nebraska. typically it dies off. but the air is so moist and thick here that the storms keep going all night long. if you are in any of these states where the red boxes are, all the way down to charlotte,

north carolina and upstate south carolina, you will get storms in the middle of the night. if you hear things going bump in the night, seek shelter. there was a warning there, but if you didn't have a tv or radio on at 4:00 in the morning, you wouldn't have heard that. if you had a norad radio, it would go off, that's what it's supposed to do, but those sirens outside don't wake you up. those sirens are made to tell you to go inside. that's all it's for. >> especially when you're sound asleep at 4:00 in the morning as i know so many people were in harrisburg, illinois, specifically. when you cover stories like these, it's just so stunning, the pictures, and in person it's tough to look at. when you mentioned that we could be seeing pictures potentially like this in the southeastern states, specifically are you saying tornadoes, are we talking golf ball sized hail, are we talking winds? >> all of the above. i do believe there will be tornadoes on the ground tonight.

maybe not as big as the ones last night, but that certainly is the potential. and there will be hail. hail will ding your car, it won't hurt your house or hurt you, but the winds at 70 miles per hour, that could knock down part of your garage, and if you're in it or if your pets are in it -- make sure the pets are safe, too. a night like tonight only happens 20 times a year. so take precautions. >> chad meyer, thank you so much. i'm getting information in my ear, and that is the fact that the governor of missouri, governor jay nixon, is now on the phone with me. governor, we are thinking of all of you. we played a little sound and i know you were peppered with questions from reporters earlier. governor, if you can, just set the scene for me. how bad is it? >> well, we're here in branson, missouri where the tornado stretched across almost nine miles right down central here in the entertainment zone of branson. there are hundreds of millions of dollars of physical damage,

but the key here is folks were prepared. and i think it clearly saved lives. while we did lose lives across missouri and had significant injuries here in branson, even though there is a tremendous amount of property damage, branson will secure this site, we're finishing all of going through each building to make sure there's no folks there, but the bottom line is it would appear here in branson, while there is significant property damage, a nine-mile stretch of the strip here hit and hit hard, that we didn't lose any lives. >> we love hearing that people were prepared. can you be more specific? what kind of plans were in place, preparations, alarms? what went right? >> sirens went off, the alarms went off, the hotels got people into the basements. our firefighters and others were on alert, our alert system worked here. i don't mean to minimize the significant amount of damage, but the bottom line is the people of branson are prepared to rebuild and welcome once again 11 million tourists into

this mecca and heartland here in the coming months and as the summer season starts again. >> sir, we have heard two people in the state of missouri have died. is that the number you have at this hour? >> at this point i can confirm three deaths. >> three. >> the storm -- the series of storms went all the way from the kansas border all the way over to the illinois border. we had significant damage here in branson, also a town called buffalo where we had a fatality, town of casto where we had a fatality and all of way to the missouri border where we had significant damage and here in branson with the incredible property damage. it's a wide-ranging series of storms that moved very quickly but caused deadly damage across the state of missouri. >> just to reiterate to our viewers as you just broke news for us, the kind of news i don't want to sit here and report, but the fact you are now saying three fatalities in the state of missouri. we had initially two. you are saying that is now up to three. governor, what kind of help are

you getting, what kind of help do you need? >> well, i've been meeting with local officials here in branson. we've also -- you know, we have our state of emergency up and operating and was working hard this morning in jeff city before i came down here. the bottom line is we have our highway patrol, we have our safety, we have our state of emergency, we have our national guard folks here with us, we're working hard to make sure we get a quick response and save lives for folks out there still in danger. >> governor nixon, thank you so much. i am hearing on the loudspeaker. there is a news conference there in harrisburg. let's go. >> 6:45 a.m. we took a down. we traced it back to meadow hills. we believe it went all the way

to galping county. to my right here, our governor declared an emergency for the county at the state and federal level. now i want to introduce you to mayor eric gregg to brief you on the actions going on in the city. >> this morning, the city of harrisburg had a horrific event. we have suffered the loss of lives, we've suffered many injuries, and we've suffered millions of dollars worth of damage. but first and foremost, the loss of our lives breaks my heart today. the outreach that's happened within this community the last few hours from other communities, from agencies, not only in illinois but across the

midwest, has been very heartfelt and appreciated. this is something that you never want to see happen in your community. we watched this happen in joplin, missouri last year. several of our people from this area went there to help, and today we find ourselves in need. so, again, as mayor of this community, i'm very grateful and very appreciative of awful the suppo support we're getting from top to bottom. i've been on the phone with the governor's office since 6:00 this morning, and he's en route here now as we speak. many of our elected officials, representative brandon phelps, has driven in to be with us today. and i can't begin to tell you what this feels like as a mayor to sit here and talk about losing lives in a tornado. when the sirens were going off this morning, i walked out of my home with my family. i looked, and it was eerily

quiet and the sirens were bla blaring i had a gut feeling that something was dreadfully wrong. we had devastation in our community like we've never seen. we can deal with floods, we can deal with lots of other things, but dealing with a tornado like this is heartbreaking. we are doing everything we can to protect this community. we are going to protect those that have been hurt, have been displaced, we are going to take care of people. that is our mission, that is our caste n now. we're going to make sure every man, woman and child is accounted for. we are in the search and recovery mode. i cannot begin to thank my own city staff, their work that's going to be going on not only from the time this had been happening this morning now and

for days to come. we will build this city. we will make this city strong. this will not stop us. it will make us stronger. the agencies have stepped up, they're going to continue to step up, and at this time i'd like to ask chief bob smith to come up and talk about exact plans of what we're doing moving forward. we're communicating constantly on what we're going to do in this city. chief smith, thank you. >> i'm chief bob smith with the harrisburg police department, and i'm going to touch on the law enforcement side of issues we've got at hand. starting this evening at 6:00 in the evening, we will have a curfew that will be imposed upon the affected area inside our perimeter. the curfew will last until 6:00 a.m. in the morning. we have an evacuation, which is something chief summers is going to talk about in a few minutes. as far as we know, it's been

completed. again, we had six confirmed fatalities in the city limits of harrisburg since the onset of this storm this morning. we have command centers that we've established. we have one incident command center that is established here at the sheriff's department, and then we have secondary command centers and allocation distribution centers at rural king and the fcc financial building. one is for manpower, the other is for equipment we're storing in those areas. as soon as they're needed in an area and it's secured, we'll be sending those assets to that location. we have been issuing rural king as well work permits. those can only be obtained at the rural king facility. charlie will, who is the city treasurer, is in charge of that command center down there and he's the one issuing the permits. no one will be allowed to work in harrisburg unless they bring a form of identification and the proper paperwork and show them.

i'm not trying to hamper the recovery process but to speed up the recovery process and also take care of our citizens here in harrisburg. we don't want -- there are no charge for the work permits. you especially take your information. we have 24/7 law enforcement protection that has been established and will be. we've had agencies from all over the state. that is establishing our perimeter and some place. we have donations. at this point we're not really sure what to do with the monetary donations or the

perishable donations. we're still trying to establish that, and we ask the director and perish house director, we're going to try to coordinate where those things can be taken to and an anonymous donors collect. we're asking that you refer all volunteer requests. i know there are a large of number of people calling, a money they can't find. i've got a telephone number here for you to call. . that telephone number is 620-25 #-3722. just a few minutes ago, i talked to the sheriff, and he assured me that that they would be prosecuted to the full extent of the law.

thank you. chief summer? >> good afternoon. my name is bill summers, i'm -- it's been a long morning, but we had res from all the area. they worked very hard. a lot of the houses are unreal, it's like a war zone. right now as i look at the crowd, i'm seeing numerous ammo trucks headed our way. we're getting all the help we were promised. i really appreciate it to everybody who is in the area. we want to tell you we appreciate the help that's been given to the city of harrisburg. >> so you have just heard from a number of officials. they're not going to be getting a lot of sleep in the next couple days. we just heard from the fire chief and he basically said he's

been going out, pulling people from homes. describe what you see here as a war zone. essentially they are creating this perimeter around the sort of epicenter hardest hit. that's so they can continue to do their job. if there are people trapped, they are in search and recovery mode, and also to keep some of the looters out. we are hearing -- again, the same number is holding in myth myth as far as the -- the total number as of this hour here is nine. we just want to invite your pictures here of the storms. you can always head to ireport.com. please stay safe as you take some of these pictures. and part of this story here, you're seeing places just

levelled. this is where a wall should be. completely demolished. i spoke to a nurse who was working a 12-hour shifts. she was there, she took the pictures. she's going to tell us what she saw, what she heard. next on cnn. removes 99% of dirt and toxins without dyes, parabens or harsh sulfates. so skin feels pure and healthy. [ female announcer ] from neutrogena® naturals. and who ordered the yummy cereal? yummy. [ woman ] lower cholesterol. [ man 2 ] yummy. i got that wrong didn't i? [ male announcer ] want great taste and whole grain oats that can help lower cholesterol? honey nut cheerios.

back to our breaking story. this tornado hit harrisburg, illinois right around 5:00 this morning local time. a lot of people were in bed

still asleep. few people heard the sirens, had a chance to seek some sort of shelter, but there was one woman i spoke with last hour, she was working. she was at the harrisburg medical center. she was working a 12-hour shift, and just before she was about to leave, this tornado hit. she took pictures as one entire wall of this med center, gone. take a listen. >> well, it was around 4:30 when we got the warning and the announcement was made over the loudspeakers to go into tornado disaster mode, so the patients started getting moved out of the rooms that had facing windows and into the middle of the building, into the radiology suite which, you know, radiology equipment is big and heavy, and so that part of the hospital is very well reinforced. and i think it was right about quarter to 5:00 when i really couldn't hear the tornado so much as i heard the explosion

when the windows blew out and the wall came out. i was about 10 feet -- i'm sorry? >> i just want to interject and say this is one of the pictures you took, and we're looking at a hospital bed. do you know if anybody was in that bed when the twister hit? >> no. that whole wing had been evacuated and the patients moved to radiology before the tornado hit. >> okay, please continue with your description. >> and the electronic door on the south side was taken out, ceiling tiles started falling. there was this white/gray kind of mist that rained down from the ceiling. we started getting water. all the fire alarms went off, the power went out and all the electric doors closed, and it was total chaos for a little while, but the staff was just incredible. they were very efficient getting all the patients moved to

safety, and the one room that you can see in that photograph that has no outside wall, i found that when i was checking those rooms to make sure everybody was out of them. >> jane, what did it sound like when it hit? >> well, you know, they say a tornado sounds like a freight train, and i sort of heard something that wasn't really as loud as i would have expected. what i really heard was the explosion when the walls came out and the windows came out. >> so what has happened to the patients? you mentioned there was a tornado -- you went into tornado disaster mode, so i imagine the staff at the med center very much prepared for events like this. where are the patients that were evacuated? is this hospital still up and running, just in different wings? what's the status? >> well, i can't really officially comment on that because i'm not the public relations person for the hospital. but the plan, as i understood it

when i left this morning, was to send everybody home that could be discharged, transfer everybody that couldn't because they have an engineer coming in to look at the building and see what repairs need to be done before they can go back and service our patients. >> and just finally a question to you. are you doing okay? >> oh, yeah. it was kind of rough for a while, but, you know, everything sort of kicks in automatically, and i've worked on a trauma service for many years, and they drilled us over and over and over again on disaster management. and so things just kind of automatically jump in. >> again, that was jane harper, nurse practitioner of all people whon h

wh who know how to react in an emergency situation is a nurse. i want to go to chad. when we talk about these disasters, especially the harrisburg, illinois tornado. it is rated as an ef-4. put that in perspective for me. >> ef-4 is about a 170-mile-per-hour tornado. back in my day, that would be considered an ef-3 tornado, not an ef-4. from 166 to about 200, you're looking at this ef-3 to ef-4, and 5 starts at 200. very intense tornado. this is a devastating tornado at about 170 miles per hour. this storm was 200 yards wide, 600 feet wide, two football fields being plowed over by a

1 160-mile-an-hour tornado. >> thank you, sir, appreciate it. we're going to get back to this breaking story in just a moment. but first, happening right now, cnn is watching history unfold. hollywood director james cameron trying to reach the deepest part of the ocean floor. i'm talking 7 miles underwater. but there's more to this. this is actually a race. bruce cousteau is going to walk me through it, next. [ woman ] dear cat, your hair mixes with pollen and dust. i get congested. but now, with zyrtec-d®, i have the proven allergy relief of zyrtec®, plus a powerful decongestant. zyrtec-d® lets me breath freer, so i can love the air. [ male announcer ] zyrtec-d®. behind the pharmacy counter. no prescription needed.

i want to tell you about this race to the deepest part of the ocean, a world that only two sets of eyes, two sets, has ever seen before.

at the helm of this effort, the biggest director of all time, james cameron, and cnn got in on the action as he's trying to reach the challanger deep. 7 miles down in the pacific ocean, the most remote place on earth. james cameron wants to be the very first person to make this dive solo in his one-man watercraft. the depth, the danger here of this cannot be overstated. just a couple reference points for you. first the titanic, a ship that cameron knows very well. it rests about 13,000 feet below the ocean's surface. and this is one-third of the distance he plans on diving. look at this graphic. mount everest is more than 3,000 feet shorter than the length of the dive. so if you flip mt. everest upside down in the ocean, it won't reach where he's trying to

go. "the abyss" went deep in the ocean, but this time there is no yelling "cut." the x-prize foundation is going to give a purse, a million dollars, to the team who gets there first. right now it appears james cameron is closer. he's been doing test dives off new guinea, and cnn is the only team aboard james cameron's ship. in fact, our crew includes jason carroll, so he's going to be filing reports as this whole thing gets underway. two other men made it to the challanger deep, actually did it together back in 1960. don walsh and swift oce oceanographer, made it to that

part of the ocean. and i want to bring in a man i know has ocean in his veins. he is cnn special correspondent and environmentalist phillipe cousteau. nice having you back on. you actually knew don wal is this -- walsh, but first, the technology has changed significantly since then, yes? >> yes, it has. and the bath escape triast, that was the vessel she took down in 1960 was revolutionary at the time, made global headlines and it took them over four hours to descend, and they only spent about 20 minutes at the bottom and then went straight back up. so it's very different than what's planned this time around. sgrz so is t. >> so is the point to go down, touch the ground and come back up? is that ultimately the prize, or is there more to this? >> in 1960 that really was the goal.

nobody had been down there. they were trying to understand what exists at the bottom of the ocean? since then we have placed 12 people on the moon. i think a lot of folks out there have a misunderstanding that we know about the ocean, when the truth is we've barely scratched the surface. now i understand that cameron plans to spend six hours exploring this area, providing vital insight into science, geographical science, biological science existing in the deepest part of the ocean that we know nothing about. >> so i guess you wouldn't know the answer to my question about what he could find 7 miles deep. nobody really knows. do we have an idea what's lurking down there? >> we do have somewhat of an idea. certainly when don walsh and jack pickard went down in 1960, they reported some fish and flounder, so we do know there are vertebrates down there. but we don't know a lot.

what we do know, though, is that at that depth the temperature is just above freezing, it's pitch black, the pressure is absolutely enormous, like 8,000 elephants standing on top of a car. so the pressure is crushing, and those species that do exist down there are likely animals like clams, moll sur lrmollusks, and creatures that may exist down there. we virtually know nothing about this part of the world. >> so as you're mentioning 8,000 elephants on a car for some sort of analogy as to the pressure. all i can see is my ears popping. it sounds so dangerous. >> it is dangerous. it's harder to live underwater than it is to live in space. we think about it on a jetliner,

we travel about 35,000, 36,000 feet all the time. going up in the air is not nearly as difficult as it is going under water at that depth. and the pressure is just tremendous. but there is incredible scientific knowledge that can come from that exploration. of course, the oceans, as i said, we've barely scratched the surface, and for james to be able to go down there and begin to do biological and chemical and theological research, begin to understand how the oceans work, how they're a carbon that regulates our climate, we certainly got a lot of biological and health sentiments from our exploration of the ocean, treatments for hiv, treatments of breast cancer have been derived, a very different type of exploration expected. >> 7 miles down. thank you very much. james cameron doing the deep sea

diving. we'll have those pictures. of course, the devastating tornadoes that have killed eight people in the midwest. three in missouri, we've learned from the governor, six at harrisburg, illinois. we're getting new video here on national debt working so, so hard. we want to follow the pity of our car. one of the other cities devastated by these storms, branson, missouri. and coming up next, we'll talk to the mayor of branson about the damage they're seeing, next. . i have hemorrhoids and yes, i have constipation. that's why i take colace. [ male announcer ] for occasional constipation associated with certain medical conditions there's colace capsules. colace softens the stool and helps eliminate the need to strain. stimulant-free, comfortable relief. no wonder colace is the #1 stool softener brand recommended by doctors. say "yes" to colace!

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so far nine people have died, three in the state of missouri, six in illinois, specifically harrisburg, illinois, because of these horrendous tornadoes that ripped through many, many small towns, really in the middle of the night, very early this morning. as we continue to watch, they're now headed southeastward. i want to focus specifically on

missouri. i talked to the governor a couple minutes ago, and now we have the mayor on the line. i know you told me you have lived in this town for 40 years. just describe for me what you're seeing, describe the destruction. >> well, it's a beautiful, sunny day here in the ozarks, and unfortunately it marred by some destruction of a tornado that hit us overnight. that makes us very sad, but we are getting through it. >> the governor mentioned to me that the tornado ran along the ground, i want to say nine miles, he said. can you be more specific as far as what this thing hit? how many neighborhoods are wiped out? do you even know yet? >> well, we are beginning to do more detailed assessments. it did travel a path through branson that was along a lot of our commercial districts, so we did have some damage through some hotels and some of our

attractions. we did have one neighborhood damaged, but we did not have a large amount of residential structures damaged. >> what is concern number 1 for you right now? >> well, certainly just to make certain that the people who are struggli struggling, we have no power right now, we want to make certain that people who have had roofs and damage to their homes that they are safely sheltered, and then we want to make certain that our businesses are protected for the evening, and then want to work with them to make certain that they can rebuild. >> where were you this morning, raeanne, when this thing hit? >> well, during the tornado, i was in my basement. the sirens went off in plenty of time. we had had advance warning that the storm was coming. that was good, and i think led to very few injuries. so we are very grateful for that. >> you know, i know we talk about tornadoes.

how could we forget joplin, specifically, and now we're talking branson. has the town of branson, how many times have you dealt with a tornado of this magnitude? >> we were talking about that. it's been many, many years and we've never had a tornado that anyone can remember that hit so many structures in our community. so we have been blessed, and joplin was a reminder, of course. i think that was at the top of the mind and probably led people to seeking shelter last night and led to, as i said, less injuries. >> raeanne, presley, we're thinking of you all. best of luck to you in the next couple days. >> thank you, and i encourage people to visit branson. they can find more on explorebranson.com and we have lots of places open for business. the pentagon is pushing ahead with plans if military action is necessary in syria,

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the. we're not going to go too far from the breaking news of the tornado in the west now heading to the southeast. but i do want to pause and take a look at some other stories here today. we have to focus on syria. syria and the besieged city of homs feel a full-scale invasion by the troops. for the first time, they fired on parts of the city and ground troops entered the off-targeted neighborhood known as babamir. hold that thought, because cnn has heard that while america looks for an answer to the crisis, it crisis, a solution is pick up speed at the pentagon. barbara, we keep hearing none of the options are all that good, but what are the options being considered right now.

>> none of them are very good in the eyes of the u.s. administration, brooke. they're getting the planning up to speed if, if, the president was to ask -- to execute some options here. what are they looking at? what do they mean when they say we have a full range of options that the u.s. military could execu execute? it ranges from everything to arming the opposition, which is considered unlikely right now, because nobody really knows who the opposition really represents, to outright military action, u.s. military intervention. at the other end of the scale, you just have to look at the pictures today. helicopters, gunships, ground troops pounding away at civilians. very, very tough for any kind of u.s. or allied combat action on the ground there. the syrians have a very significant air defense, surface-to-air missile system, very hard to do anything there. possible humanitarian relief supplies. that's other option, being

staged in neighboring turkey or jordan. that might be one of the intermediate steps they could take. but right now, officials tell us here, even as they continue planning, they refine their plans, they begin to look at what units they have, what equipment they want, what they could tell the president. all of these options look very troublesome, brooke. >> as we talk about options, barbara, is the planning of the pentagon farther along that if the president called up tomorrow and said, give me a list of options, would that list be ready to go? >> yes. by all accounts. that is exactly -- you hit the nail on the head, brooke. that is what the military is doing right now, putting together that list so if the president asks, they are ready. you know, the u.s. military says we don't sit around and wait to be asked by the president, we know we need to plan all this, we know we need to look at it. we need to be ready to hand him a set of options and explain to him what the art of the possible is so that if president obama wants to proceed, they will be

ready to go. but i don't think you can say it enough times. it's a huge if. this would be, of course, the president's decision to make. and the u.s. position remains very clear at this point. they want to see international action, they want the arab league nations to get involved, and the real hope is that diplomatic pressure, sanctions and all of that will get assad's regime to change its course of action, but it doesn't look very likely right now, does it? >> it doesn't. it doesn't. barbara starr, thank you. back to our breaking news and this weather. we are now hearing of new warnings in kentucky. kentucky here as a tornado ripped through the region. stay right with me. [ woman ] dear cat, your hair mixes with pollen and dust.

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ask your rheumatologist if enbrel is right for you. [ male announcer ] enbrel. the #1 biologic medicine prescribed by rheumatologists. back to our breaking story. we're looking courtesy of our after yay wave. this is hopkinsville, kentucky, clearly an entire roof gone off the top of this home. car -- perhaps that was the garage. let jacqui jeras i want to bring you in. goodness, we say it time and time again, it's kind of unreal. >> this is the storm if you were watching earlier around noon, 1:00 we were live on the air showing you the doppler radar that we thought was showing debris. there's the ground truth of that. it intensified moving through

this area, in fact it got hit almost twice. with these lines of storms as they went through. >> but you look at the pictures, now that they have pulled out, some of the homes are just fine. that's typical of a zigzagging tornado. >> you know, we haven't seen why those wedge or stovepipe tornadoes that stay on the ground for a long period of time, these are storms that have lasted a long time, but they drop a tornado, bring it back up, 200 yards wide when we've been talking about monster tornadoes in the plains, right? so these are very different tornadoes, this is hillier terrain, more hopper skipper jumper type of tornadoes than something that's going to create a huge lawn mower type of swath that would move on through there. yeah, a lot of devastation, so very, very sad. didn't hear of any injuries in that one, by the way, so let's hope that continues to hold true as they assess the situation in

hodgenville, kentucky. we have three reports from the national weather service confirming tornadoes and confirming intensity. a couple of them are preliminary, which basically means it could change, okay? the big one we are talking about there is the one in harrisburg, in illinois, the national service sell it was a ef-4. here's the enhanced fujita scale. we consider a 3 to be a major tornado, so we certainly topped that one there in harrisburg -- the one in kansas in harveyville, that is an ef-2, and then also an ef-2 in elizabethtown, kentucky. that's the video you're seeing on the screen next to me. even an ef-2 can cause extensionive damage, injuries,

fatalities, and extensive damage to homes and buildings where they're just not livable. unfortunately we're seeing some strong tornadoes. we do have one warning that's still in effect here. it is kind of a strong rotator that's been stick, in mccreary, between kentucky and ten seer. they're moving so fast, 50, 60 miles an hour, that's driving you down the interstate, that fast. so you can't outrun them or get away from them, you have to seek shelter. we have many watches and warnings in effect. i know we're going to "the situation room." my computer is getting locked up. >> we'll get it juiced back up for you at the top of the hour. and thanks to our affiliates for giving us this pictures. switching gear, former team

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he wall street the baby-faced member of the '60s band the monkees. ♪ of the bluebird as she sings davy jones died today in florida from an apparent heart attack. he was 66 years of age. he was the voice behind the hit "day dream believer." as you can see from the video from youtube, the band had all kinds of hits. rescue units are working to

rescue five hikers on a mountainside outside phoenix. a boulder is reportedly broke loose, hitting one of the teens, one of whom who may have suffered a broken leg. it's happening in the white tank mountains. tiger woods brushing off questions about a reported wish to join the military. in an upcoming book, the former swing coach says that considered -- and as we continue to watch the breaking news here out of the midwest, just to quickly recap, nine deaths in total. i spoke with the governor of missouri not too long ago, he confirmed three deaths in his state, six specifically in harrisburg, illinois, i know wolf blitzer will continue to cover this. thank you so much for watching me. stay with us. wolf blitzer and "the situation room" begins right now.