flattened. after 90 minutes of being battered by a tornado, it was perfectly obvious that the city of moore no longer resembled a proud residential suburb. instead, it was like a scene from the book of revelation. where the sun became dark, and the sky was split apart. "hardball" is next. good evening. i'm chris matthews in washington. rescue efforts in the oklahoma city suburb of moore are still under way. more than 24 hours after a devastating tornado ripped through the region. here's what we know right now. at least 24 people were killed. that number includes at least nine children. seven of whom died at al elementary school stuck in the storm's path.

nearly 240 others were injured. both those numbers could go up in the coming days. throughout the community, homes were blown away. schools and hospitals were demolished. neighborhoods are in ruin. today, heavy rain and lightning slowed the rescue effort. more than 100 people have been pulled from the rubble just so far. meanwhile the national weather service upgraded the storm to an ef-5, strongest rating for a tornado. ef-5. the president declared a disaster area in oklahoma today. he spoke from the white house earlier. >> the people of moore should know that their country will remaining on the ground, there for them, beside them, as long as it takes. for there are homes and schools to rebuild. businesses and hospitals to re-open. there are parents to console. first responders to comfort. and, of course, frightened children who will need our continued love and attention. >> well, the president also reached out to oklahoma governor

mary fallin. this afternoon the governor, herself, spoke about the unbelievable tragedy in oklahoma. >> it's been a very trying couple of days for the state of oklahoma. it's a sad time for us because we've experienced one of our most horrific storms and disasters that the state has ever faced. but yet in the midst of tragedy and loss of life, we've also seen the resilience and the courage and the strength of our people, and we will get through this. we will overcome and we will rebuild and we will regain our strength. >> meanwhile, there's potential for more severe weather this evening in northern texas, arkansas, and parts of louisiana and oklahoma. msnbc's chris jansing has been on the ground in moore, oklahoma, all this day. she joins us now. thank you so much, chris, my colleague. what is it like down there? i just want to get a sense that we can't see on the tv. >> reporter: it's hard. really to put into words, chris.

as i drove in here, it almost didn't really seem real. it seemed like it was the set of a movie, it wasn't possible. that i had never seen. and people who cover storms had never seen. destruction like this. this is what happens with 200 mile per hour winds. entire neighborhoods wiped out. i mean, there you see some folks who are just going through the painstaking work of looking at what's left of their house which isn't much. some people just trying to find usually things that are sentimental to them, like photographs or pieces of jewe y jewelry. it goes on block after block after block. we heard stories of horses -- there's a lot of farmland around here. horses flying in the air. we see piles of cars across the street in the parking lot. five, six deep. there's even a car on top of the medical center across the street. the devastation is almost unbelievable. they are still doing the painstaking work of going through the rubble. they don't believe, chris, at this point that there are any people trapped, but they don't

want to rule out the possibility and they're getting calls. they got a call just a few minutes ago. we were listening on the radio of people who think they hear or see something. in this case, it was at one of the storm shelters, and so they sent people over to check it out. so this is going to be an ongoing process here. obviously. the first thing they're doing is making sure that there isn't anybody trapped. beyond that, to even assess the damage and then start to think about rebuilding, chris. >> you know, it looked like a neutron bomb hit. you've heard about neutron bombs in the old days. i'm sure they still exist where they bomb the buildings, they don't necessarily kill the people through contamination. people, we've watched all these pictures -- we've seen live horses. we haven't seen dead horses. we've heard about casualties. we certainly have them by the hundreds now. we haven't seen them on the ground. did a lot of people just basically get the word and get out of there? >> reporter: well, one of the things that happened, chris, was this happened during the day and a lot of times this happens at night and people are asleep in

their beds. though there was only 16 minutes warning, people had an idea it was coming and they were able to, you know, get to their shelters or get into a basement. we're just down the street from a movie theater, and people who were in there watching a movie described that all of a sudden all the phones started to light up. it was a weather warning that people were getting on their phones so they all were moved out into a hallway. they were up against the wall. and when they walked out of that movie theater, which by the way is still standing, everything else they saw around them was pretty much gone. so that's what it was like, but i think they do believe that the fact that it happened during the day, and one more thing, chris, i think this is important, you know, this storm hit this town, this suburb of oklahoma city almost exactly the same way that it hit in 1999. and the folks who were here in 1999 will tell you they offered them the opportunity to get some help to build storm shelters, and a lot of people did. and the mayor told me this

morning that he thinks if that help wasn't available and so many people hadn't built storm shelters that the devastation and the loss of life could have been much, much worse. >> we've heard so much from the local people, and it's got to be authoritati authoritative, because there are lives at stake, that the ground is too hard to get through, that the water table is too high. what is the safe place -- is there a known structure or a known, i guess, a basement? what is a safe place to reliably wait out one of these tornadoes when you know an ef-5 is coming your way? is there a safe place for sure? >> reporter: there are storm shelters. there are storm shelters, and people went there. is any place safe absolutely for sure? people will tell you it's not. but the other thing that folks here will tell you, because you ask them, well, if you were here in 1999 and are still here again, will you stay? everybody i talked to said they would. this is something you're brought up with and you learn and you drill it in school and many parents talk to their kids about

it. and it almost instinctively when i talk to some people, one guy was across the street and decided he had to get home. instinctively he knew what closet he was going to go to and everything fell around him and he was okay. >> wow. >> reporter: so is anything 100% safe? no. but there are storm shelters. people have built their own storm shelters. and they do know where to go. and there are procedures. because if you think, chris, of a multiplex movie theater and the people that we talk to, they got into the hall and everybody seemed to be pretty organized. nobody talked about it being chaotic. that's pretty remarkable. i think it speaks to the fact that this is a place where tornadoes happen and people know what to do. >> you mentioned schools. tell me what we know about plaza towers. last night we got a report, fortunately it wasn't accurate, of 24 kids being killed. a local news report apparently was being passed around by authorities. it turns out it was less than that. but the fact that they chose, the teachers, as the smart move,

the safest move was to keep the kids in a stronger structure at a school building, get them against a wall in the safest part of the building and hope for the best. what do we know about what happened following that procedure? >> reporter: well, let me tell you. one of the things that gave me chills, and there are always stories of heroism that come out of these tragedies, chris. one of the stories is of a teacher who got her kids to the safe place and then worried that the roof was going to come off, and, in fact, the ceiling did collapse. had them all go down and she put her arms around them and covered their heads. one of the fathers said that he has absolutely no doubt she saved the life of her young students that day. she is hospitalized. he said that the storm was so powerful it actually pulled eye glasses off of the kids. but there she was taking care of them. another teacher who was at a preschool and the kids were understandably very upset. some of them were crying and some of them were yelling. and she had taught them this song "you are my sunshine" and

got them all singing the song so they would stay calm and nobody would try to run away and they would all be safe. i think that's just more of the remarkable stories. it reminded me so much of newtown and the heroism of teachers and how under the most stressful circumstances they seem instinctively, and i'm sure through training obviously ad l well, know what to do. >> so do you, chris jansing. it's great to have you on the ground when something good or bad happens. thanks for being here. savannah guthrie spoke with a teacher at plaza towers, an elementary school that chris jansing mentioned. crosswhite protected her students as we herd from chris by lying on top of them and comforting with them throughout the deal. crosswhite reunited with one of those students during her interview with savannah. here it is. >> i was in a stall. it started coming down. i laid on top of them. one of my little boys said, i love you, i love you, please don't die with me.

i never thought i was going to die. the whole time i just kept screaming to them, quit worrying, we're fine, we're fine, we're fine, we're fine. >> reporter: i do have a student here who wants to say thank you to you. this is damian klein. and his mom, brandy. >> i told you we were going to be okay. >> alfredo, marimaria, and vivi th th th that luna survived yesterday in their storm shelter. thank you. tell us your decision to build a storm shelter. what works or doesn't in these ef-5 tornadoes? >> the only thing i can say about the storm cellars, that's the only way to go especially when you have a tornado this big. you know, the news, the weathermen tell you all the time if it's that big, if you're above ground, you're not going to survive it. so i mean, really the only thing i can tell people is, you know,

the seriousness of having a storm cellar is at a ten. >> and people have told me in the last 24 hours that it's hard to build because the ground is so hard down there. is it expensive or difficult to put a shelter in? to dig it in the ground? >> you know, i mean, the clay here, it's red clay so the clay is -- the dirt is hard. expensive-wise, honestly, i mean, it's probably a few thousand dollars. >> yeah. >> $5,000 or $6,000 the last i knew. >> and let me ask maria luna, your wife about how you managed to get the whole family to the shelter in time to avoid horror. >> well, to be honest with you, i was at work when all this happened. it was alfredo and actually vivi, my daughter that was there by herself at the house. and then alfredo got home. he's the one who told her to go into the shelter because the

tornado was close. but me being at work, i was really worried because there were no cell phone lines. there was no communication. i couldn't get ahold of them. so i was really worried about them. >> viviana, you just survived one of the biggest tornadoes ever to hit your area. what are you going to be able to tell people what it was like, how you got the warning, how much time you had? what it was like racing to the shelter? >> this is something that is honestly unexplainable. i can't even begin to tell you how i feel or how i felt during this whole experience. there wasn't much time between getting from my house to the shelter just because the tornado was already so close. i'm just still in shock as of everything that's been happening. >> how much warning did you get? >> i got maybe about five or ten minutes' warning, then once alfredo got home, he told me to get my butt in the shelter an

that's exactly what i did. >> alfredo, how much time did you have to get your daughter, or get this whole thing organized? >> you know, we actually, you know, we listened to the news the day before, you know. we had the big tornadoes that hit shawnee. and the weathermen basically told us we were going to have the same type of outbreak the next day. so we were already kind of a little bit warned on that part of it. so we kind of knew when the outbreak was going to kind of form and start up and we just, you know, i was at my office with a few of my business partners, and we just got on our laptops, pulled up the radar to kind of see where things were going. they were just getting really bad so we made the executive decision to go to my house where we have the storm cellar. it was probably, you know, from getting there to the house, we probably orchestrated, oh, we probably had less than maybe five minutes at the most. >> good work. good work for you.

congratulations. i shouldn't say that because this is still a horror for the community, but you did the right thing. alfredo, thank you. maria and viviana, great accounts from you all. our coverage of the tragedy in oklahoma will continue in just a minute. ♪ i' 'm a hard, hard ♪ worker every day. ♪ i' ♪ i'm a hard, hard worker and i'm working every day. ♪ ♪ i'm a hard, hard worker and i'm saving all my pay. ♪ ♪ if i ever get some money put away, ♪ ♪ i'm going to take it all out and celebrate. ♪ ♪ i'm a hard, hard worker... ♪ membership rallied millions of us on small business saturday to make shopping small, huge. this is what membership is. this is what membership does.

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stand in front, and i heard the roar of the tornado. and then i grabbed my dog and we went and laid down in the closet. saw the glass breaking, things crashing and rumbling. and the ceiling, the roof tore off. and i could see little holes starting to develop in the ceiling. and i could actually see the

tornado. >> that's a good account there. welcome back to "hardball." local, state and federal officials have been out in full force responding to the disaster left by yesterday's tornado. let's go back to moore, oklahoma, where lieutenant governor todd lamb is there. joins us there. welcome, governor. thank you for joining us. give us a sense in your authority position rite nght no what's getting done, fema, how things stand in terms of dealing with this incredible disaster? >> chris, it's absolutely who risk. you see the images on the television. it pales in comparison to real life. absolutely, the devastation is horrific. i was with the governor yesterday at the emergency operations center. she spoke to the president. she made the request to fema. everything that's been requested by the state of oklahoma to the federal authorities, to the president, and to fema, every request has been granted. and we're receiving federal assistance at this time. >> so how does it work now, just so we'd like to get a sense, i would, of how it works.

you call washington, you call fu fwr gate. how does it work state to government, in these kind of catastrop catastrophes? >> yesterday, shortly after the tornado completed its devastation in moore, oklahoma, governor fallin called the regional, ashwood and went through a formal procedure of requesting federal assistance for the four counties affected from the tornadoes the day before and a tornado here in moore yesterday. that was the semantics of going through the process. that would allow us in oklahoma, in any state for that matter, that goes through the process to begin removing the regulation to hire contracts, contract workers, and remove the competitive bid process to seek relief on a quicker basis for emergencies such as this. >> i've gotten an education on what you do in these situations and how devastating it can be. under around the new york city area, breezy point, places like staten island, the rockaways, where all the electricity is

blown away. you have people's homes elect c electrical systems are blown away, where the houses are declared basically unlivable and you have to deal with almost a rock bottom situation where whole communities have to be rebuilt, especially the electrical systems, sewer systems, water systems. how do you do the triage in the next couple months, in fact, the next couple of days? >> it's the assessment process. you hit the nail on the head, chris. it's one thing to go through the rescue efforts we're going through right now and the recovery efforts we're going through right now. the cleanup we're going through right now. i've talked to many people that asked me, what are my thoughts? well, don't forget oklahoma in three days. don't forget oklahoma in one week. don't forget oklahoma in three weeks. moore, oklahoma, where we are, you've said it many times, i know already, on your program. this is the third time we've had this go through moore. 1999, 2003, and yesterday. we will rebuild. we're a strong people. we're a people of faith and a people of hope. but it's going to be a long process to go through the

rescue, recovery and cleanup. as you said, power's out. electricity is down. there are water issues right now. there's a long road ahead of us, but we will overcome once again. >> you know, we were just talk to a family whose lives were saved by being in a shelter. it didn't look like a very expensive shelter. a couple of thousand dollars. alfredo corrales told us his personal family shelter. is that something that should be part of the rebuilding? i know the ground down there is tough. there's a water level problem. but is there a possibility we can -- you can't ensure against this kind of disaster. is there any way to prepare better than it's been prepared? without casting any blame, of course, in the future. >> no, i understand your question. i think it's a fair question and an appropriate question whenever you see devastation of this magnitude, particularly as i said to the exponential number of three. i have a great relationship with congressman tom cole. i've known him for over two decades. he's a great statesman.

and we're in his district right now. he's got boots on the ground, it's my understanding he's already arrived from washington. he's taking a tour right now with the governor. and i'll defer to congressman cole with any legislation he sponsors on capitol hill and what he thinks is best for his district that has been so devastated yesterday. >> i was just thinking maybe tax breaks for people or any kind of subsidy because we're all in this together. maybe it's a good thing to encourage people to do the kind of thing the corraless family did. you live in that part of the country, the god be with us, it depends on the luck of the draw. i heard in the last 24 hours sometimes you can be on the same street and one house will get blown away and one won't. what are the vagueties of the tornadoes? they' they seem to cut almost irregularly. you can't figure them out. what's your experience in that regard?

>> the term "freak of nature" applies no better than to the force of a tornado. i passed as i was coming down to moore this morning about 5:50 a.m. i passed by a shopping center. about four or five stores long. the bookend stores almost completely in tact. but the store in the very middle hollowed out. and the storm actually passed north to south over the mall. so my point is, they're freak of nature. you hear about straws of hay going through stock-a fences. that happens. there was a window knocked out. two tornadoes -- excuse me, two days ago in a tornado. the window was knocked out in the shape of a heart in one of our hospitals in north oklahoma city in the edmond area. they're frooebeaks of nature. you never know what they're going to do or how they're going to impact a structure or a community. >> as a lifelong movie buff, i was happy to know, i mean this in all seriousness, they had an organized system at one of those cineplexs down there in that

area and were able to get the people into the most strongest part of the movie structure. the cineplex structure. they got them in the hallway. everything was done in an organized regular, really gutsy way and it worked. the people made it. >> it did work, and i'm -- chris, as i'm looking at the camera, that is just -- i'm looking right now at the theater of which you speak to show you how close it is to where we are standing. i know a father and a son who was going to see "star trek" yesterday afternoon and they hunkered down in that hallway and it was a horrific time is what the father said. >> and they got through it. >> they got through it. they survived and they got through it. >> governor, it's great to talk to you. lieutenant governor todd lamb of oklahoma. hold in there, sir. for oklahomans affected by the tornado, relief organization are on hand to help tonight. if you'd like to help, i'm sure you're thinking about it, here's the number. you can't forget this one. 1-800-red-cross. 1-800-red-cross. or go to redcross.org. also text red cross to 90999.

90999. from your phone to automatically give 10 bucks to relief efforts. the red cross is specifically requesting, by the way, they always do this, giving blood. good thing to do. shows a little guts to do that when people need it. our coverage will continue in just a minute. ♪

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i knew devry university would give me the skills that i needed to make one of those tech jobs mine. we teach cutting-edge engineering technology, computer information systems, networking and communications management -- the things that our students need to know in the world today. our country needs more college grads to help fill all the open technology jobs. to help meet that need, here at devry university, we're offering $4 million dollars in tech scholarships for qualified new students. learn more at devry.edu. welcome back to "hardball." the tornado that hit oklahoma yesterday was remarkable for its size, strength and the devastation it left behind as you can see. what were the conditions that called us to create such a monster funnel? look at it there. oh. look at it. well, it hit the town of moore, oklahoma. it hit so hard and so often. what caused all that. joining me now is an expert. the weather channel's dr. greg forbes. dr. forbes, thank you for being with us tonight. you know, we always like to understand nature because maybe

in some part of our brain we think, our our soul, we hope we can have some impact of protecting ourselves and understanding what god's plan is, if you will. this tornado went to an ef-5. what does that tell you? is this really the peak of what a tornado can be? >> reporter: yeah. the enhanced fujita scale, ef goes from 0 to 5. 5 is the highest. that means it had wind gusts at least in one location in excess of 200 miles an hour. >> when i'm looking at it, there it is, this is frightening. it's getting wide. it's getting wider. it starts as kind of a winding snake. first a fragmented snake then a complete snake. then this winding funnel. then apparently it widens to up to two miles. what is -- that didn't touch ground, would there be any devastation? does it have to actually get to the ground visibly to cause the destruction? >> reporter: sometimes for the very narrowest of tornadoes, the funnel coming down from a cloud will remain there, but if you look down near the surface, there will be a little bit of a

dust swirl kicked up. so that's where it will look. typically, though, those kind, the funnel doesn't come all the way to the ground. they're a little bit on the weaker side. it's not usual that you get those to be the ef-5 type. those more often are the big, wide wedge kind of tornadoes like it ultimately was as it came through moore. but the tornadoes go through cycles. sometimes they begin narrow, get very wide and then rope out and get very narrow again at the very end of their lifetime. >> the ropy part is the scariest part. when we were kids, "wizard of oz," that is the scariest. let me ask you about the weather conditions that create this. can you predict given certain climates, not climates but different weather fronts hitting each other between the appalachian mountains or whatever, rather the rocky mountains and the mississippi river? can you predict one of these with any accuracy? >> reporter: yes. these kind of big outbreaks like this one were foreseen for days in advance.

not the exact location of where they'll hit, but the general area of central oklahoma was known days in advance to be the prime threat day there on monday. what happened was big upper air disturbance, cold pocket aloft, up 20,000 feet, 30,000 feet in the air came eat. the gulf of mexico moisture was getting stronger and stronger coming to the south. the meeting up and overlapping of the two kinds of air masses made for the vulnerable conditions that allowed explosive thunderstorms and ones that rotate and produce long-lived destructive tornadoes. >> without getting into the politics of it, we have a different climate, it seems. we had a tornado hit western massachusetts. we've had very strange, in fact, scary weather. unpredictable, out of season. you know, used to be you got snow in the winter and the weather changed gradually until june then it got really hot here in july in washington then even hotter in july, a little less hot in august. there was a predictability of

the weather we grew up with. can you say it's called tornado alley with any accuracy and say you're safe somewhere else? >> reporter: certainly what we've learned in research over the years is that what has traditionally been called tornado alley, the north texas/oklahoma/kansas/nebraska/ iowa area has been a little bit overdone. there is also an extension of that that has sometimes been called dixie alley across the gulf coast states. in 2011, those were extremely active with alabama in april 2011 seeing such a devastating outbreak. so part of the tornado alley now that we realize goes from places like kansas and oklahoma, east texas, then swings all the way over into alabama. those are where typically the most destructive tornadoes occur. >> and this time of year, may, is this the height? is this predictably the height of the tornado season? >> reporter: in an average year, may is the most active. somewhat less so in april. somewhat less so in june. but it does vary somewhat from

year to year. thus the first half of may this year was very, very quiet. nearly on a record low pace. but obviously now the pace has picked up more toward what we expect in mid to late may. >> what do you expect? >> reporter: well, it certainly looks like the pattern the next few days is going to calm down a little bit relative, slowly, relative to what we have seen these last few days. but given that we are in that prime time now, we've gotten away from the late-season snowstorms that made a lot of the united states so cold that it didn't have the instability. it looks like we're going to be active now from late may into june. >> we're looking at the pictures, now, right, of the -- let me ask you about the personality, it seems, of these things. when you study them -- we were using the word monster the other day. people were. they have almost it seems like a personality, these conditions if you want to call them that. >> reporter: yeah, indeed. these strongest of all tornadoes are, indeed, monsters.

they're so wide and have so much power and have thrown so much debris within them that it's not just the wind force. it's the force of all the objects that are being thrown and those are hitting the next house down and adding even more force to it. these strongest of tornadoes, ordinary homes are no match for them. the only really safe place to be in the core of this tornado was underground storm shelters. fortunately there were a number of those including the home we're at right now. >> yeah, we were with a family that survived because of that. again, the question of climate. and climate change. is there something that you see happening? it could be caused by all kinds of forces, but is there a climatic aspect to this? it's not just seasonal or that kind of thing? is there a cycle going on now? a trend going on? how would you describe it if there is one? >> reporter: the jury, so to speak, is out a little bit in terms of the climate relationship to tornadoes. my own thinking is that as the

atmosphere is slo warming, that has allowed in the cool months warm air to get farther north. we've seen over the past decade or so a lot of tornadoes at more northern latitudes in the middle of the winter months that in the past we were having snowstorms. so that is my own take that we can have tornadoes in bigger parts of the country year-round. there's been some computer model research that suggests that for the core of the spring and summer that the kind of wind shear, the strong winds aloft, actually will be decreasing over the decades and that might actually reduce the tornado threat a little bit in primetime. may, late april, may/june months or perhaps shift it a little bit farther north than it typically has been. >> i think i can't ever get over the idea of a tornado in western massachusetts. up where i went to college. the idea of a tornado in massachusetts is just unnormal to me. anyway, dr. greg forbes, thank you so much for your expertise

at this time. our coverage of the massive devastation from yesterday's tornado will continue after this. and what were you looking at -- you're looking at right now is a time lapse video of yesterday's tornado. there it is. we're getting the full pictures. it rips through moore, oklahoma, with wind speeds now clocked at over 200 miles an hour. the tornado was at one point three miles at its widest. covered nearly 20 miles in a span of just 40 minutes. look at this.

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i was able to find pictures which everything else is pointless. >> i got out here after it passed, and i just fell to my knees. that's all -- all i could do.

me and my fiancee, everything we own was in the trailer. and this is saall we got left. >> welcome back to "hardball." when a tornado hit, of course, you think people would run away from the danger. these guys run toward it. storm chasers. analyze, document and help forecast superstorms up close and personal. some play hosts to tornado tourists, might sound crazy, but people pay to ride along with the guys and get up close to nature. chris mcbee with rapid rotation storm tours. he joins us from moore, oklahoma. you might know simon brewer from the weather channel series "storm riders," he's actively chasing these tornadoes right now and joins us on the phone. let's start withchris. this turns out to be a big one. ef-5. tell me how that differs when you get up to 200 miles an hour, what that's capable of doing to property, human, animal life, whatever? buildings? >> just as you can see, it's

just utter destruction everywhere you look. there are houses completely ripped off their foundations. it's an awful scene here, as you can plainly see. when you get up into the ef-5 range, that's incredible damage. that's how they categorize that. and it's just awful, as is obvious on the ground here in moore. >> we're looking at kind of a snaking, it's a little bit wider than a snaking twitter. it's one of those that sort of to me is iconic. an iconic twister. how close can you get to watching that when you take people to go look at it and hopefully are safe when they do it? >> well, we do everything safely. my storm tour company. a tornado that large, we would not get very close to with a tour company -- with, i'm sorry, with a tour group just because it's just not safe to have people just in the line of fire like that. we did what we could to help in the aftermath. when you deal with tornadoes

this large, it's -- like i said, it's just incredible devastation. >> what were you able to do to help people yesterday? >> well, we were in a 15-passenger van and came down here to the movie theater which is just down here. and they had a triage unit set up. we asked if we could help with anything. we actually transported some people out of there that needed to get out of town that had lost their cars in the tornado. we were able to help some people get out of the danger zone. >> so going to the movies, apparently "star trek" was playing, the new one. they were huddled apparently in a corridor among the various movie screens. and they got through it. and then they come outside and what happened? their cars were gone. >> yeah. yeah. i think that happened to a lot of people. were just enjoying a normal day and then this utter destruction just comes through. >> let me go to mr. brewer. let me ask you about this. when you're chasing these cells right now, where are they now? what kind of dangers are we

facing still in the oklahoma area, somewhere in tornado alley? >> oklahoma is okay, but we're on some pretty big storms in northeastern texas. and we just drove through one near mt. pleasant, texas. and it was really blasting some strong wind. saw a lot of tree limbs go down. some some cars having a lot of trouble driving. got some hail. there is a chance you can have tornadoes along the edge of this line. >> are we at the beginning, the middle or the end of the tornado season, historically? simon? >> historically we're really at the peak of the tornado season. this year has been a little what you call slow as far as tornadoes are concerned. but some large hail patterns got together and now we're in a very active pattern. >> again, to you, i asked this earlier. what is -- is there any difference between what we're watching now and what we would have watched 30 years ago in terms of the climate? the climate aspect? is there a climatic -- without

getting, again, into the politics, is there a warming situation we're facing that makes more likely to have tornadoes or any way it's influencing these weather conditions? the climate? the heat? >> well, as far as tornadoes are concerned, climate really doesn't pay any attention to tornadoes. i mean, tornadoes are such a small-scale event. now, as far as tornado description, you can make some arguments that maybe tornado description would be shifting aa little further north. the same things that come together to make tornadoes aren't the same things that come together to make large-scale effects like droughts and flooding events. tornadoes are on such a smaller scale than that. >> let me go back to chris mcbee and storm chasing. tell me about what you do? i mean, i'm always fascinated by how people make a living in this country, and all seriousness, tell me about the kinds of people that want to be tourists, if you will, who really are fascinated with this weather condition known as a tornado. >> yeah, tornadoes are big news,

obviously. this is just wall-to-wall news about tornadoes. but they're very interesting to people in all walks of life. we have people from other countries coming to tour and see the tornadoes with us as well. you know, these people just are -- they're weather enthuse wrasts. they want to learn more about it and be a part of it. we try to help them achieve that. >> so they come in may? when do they come? is it like selling christmas trees? essentially you better sell them at christmastime? i'm dead serious. it's something i don't know about. do they come and you tell them to come in may? that's a good season to possibly experience a historic tornado if that's what you're looking for? >> well, i mean, we offer, you know, tours between april and june. so, yes, there's a certain time of the year that is more favorable and we're right in the middle of that right now. and these kind of things happen. >> give me a distribution of where around the world people come from to see this thing.

>> we've had a lot of interest from the uk and australia mainly. some interest from germany and some other european countries as well. >> what's it cost? >> $2,800 for a week. about $300 a day. you know, we offer daily and weekly tours. but, yeah, i mean -- >> fascinating. because i'm fascinated now. i guess i can imagine people building a, you know, not a hobby, that's lighthearted, but fascinated by the power of nature. when you're with them and giving them the tour, what do you tell them about this power that they're looking at? this nature at its worst? >> really when we're up close and personal with the storms, nature kind of speaks for itself. we'll explain what's going on, explain the weather situation and show them all our equipment. but the tornadoes can really speak for themselves which is with their power and just really mother nature at its worst.

>> thanks, chris mcbee, thanks, simon brewer, for joining us as well. our coverage will continue in just a minute. ♪ ♪ wonder if i gave an oreo ♪ to somebody out there who i didn't know ♪ ♪ would they laugh after i'd gone? ♪ ♪ or would they pass that wonder on? ♪ ♪ i wonder how it'd change your point of view ♪

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in the last 24 hours you've heard many stories of survival and heroism. let's listen now to the voice of some of those who watched the tornado close up as it happened and others whose lives were up ended in the storm. >> the thing is it's huge. keep going left, travis. keep going left. right there, boom there it is. there it is, mike. on the ground. >> right down 19th approaching santa fe. it was coming right at us. >> i've never seen anything like this in my 18 years covering tornadoes here in oklahoma city. >> you see the latch coming undone. we couldn't reach for it. it ripped open the door. we thought we were dead, to be

honest. >> just like on the movie twister. there was horses and stuff flying everywhere. >> we just started grabbing and throwing debris, trying to get anybody out. we successfully got people out. just not alive. >> the teacher covered us up. >> i was on top of six kids. >> on top of six children. >> i was lying on top of them. >> they're all okay? >> all mine are okay. >> if you live in this telephone road, you better not get in your house, get underground. i was like, my dad, he's going to be outside watching the tornado. oh, my gosh. luckily by the grace of god he just went in the closet, the only room standing. >> i felt it coming at me. i just held on to the door and said we will not be harmed. we were not be harmed. and we weren't. >> drive down through here and see eight houses gone. you don't know if you're going to have a house or not. >> my wife and i, we worked hard for everything we have. we just now paid off our house. we were debt free. had no house payment.

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"time" magazine's jane newton small has been on the ground. she's talked to the people of moore, oklahoma, who've seen their homes destroyed and saved their own neighbor's lives. the new issue of "time" magazine is dedicated to devastating tornado itself. we don't have jane yet. this has been an amazing experience for us up north to cover an area of the country i've never been to, oklahoma. i think it's the only state i've never been to. it's got an incredible history of weather. the dust bowl changed so much of american history in the 1930s. "grapes of wrath" is all about the weather conditions down there and what it caused to the agriculture and killing of kag culture for a long period of time in the dust bowl. this one an ef-5 which is the worst of the hurricanes you can face. only matching up to one they had earlier back in 1999. so it's clearly in that same area that we call tornado alley going through the same city, the same suburb of 40,000-some

people in moore, oklahoma. there it is, we're looking at now, hit again with the same kind of damage. lucky, the pictures you're seeing are not represented by that many deaths or injuries. the devastation is physical. as i said, it looks like a neutron bomb blowing away homes, blowing away cars. you're at the movie theater, you come out from the movie theater, you're still alive. your car has disappeared into the 300-mile-an-hour wind. in this incredible situation where people got a warning and acted on it. most of the people got out of there. they got away. got in their cars and moved on. or they had real shelter like the corales family that had the little refrigerator like shelter. we saw how they were able to save their lives by that emergency decision. we're going to come back and talk about this tomorrow and throughout this evening. msnbc is committed to covering this story well and in human terms without the politics. i think we're going to do a

great job tonight, so stay with msnbc. thanks for being with us tonight on "hardball." our coverage continues now on "politics nation" with al sharpton. thanks, chris. i'm live tonight from atlanta. continuing our breaking news coverage on the tornado disaster in oklahoma. officials today said at least 24 people are dead, including 9 children. last night officials said 51 died, but they revised that today. more than 200 people were injured. most from the town of moore, just south of oklahoma city. the fire chief says he's 98% sure there's no more survivors.

all or bodies left to be found in the town. including at plaza towers elementary school where seven of the nine children were found. late today we learned the name of the first victim of this story. 9-year-old janay hornsby who was found at plaza towers. our prayers go to her family and all the grieving families, the victims of this terrible storm. the governor talked about the school. >> our hearts and prayers are certainly with those that have lost their loved ones. it has been a very, very hard experience. a heartbreaking experience. especially the loss of children in the schools themselves. it was very surreal coming upon the school because there was no school. there was just debris. >> president obama declared a federal disaster area and promised victims will