At least 11 dead in Central US in new round of tornadoes

KANSAS CITY, Mo. — Thunderstorms and tornadoes tore across the nation's heartland Saturday evening, killing at least 11 people, mangling buildings and trapping people in rubble in areas still reeling from other recent bouts with severe weather.

A twister killed at least six people in the northeastern Oklahoma town of Picher, then skipped over the Missouri state line to wreak further death and destruction, authorities said.

The death toll in Oklahoma could climb, said state Emergency Management spokeswoman Michelann Ooten. The Picher tornado caused major damage in a 20-block area, she said.

"I know they are going through the rubble, trying to find people missing," she said. "There are numerous injuries."

At least five people died in southwestern Missouri after the storms plowed through, the National Weather Service said. Three people died after the Picher tornado hit near Seneca, about 15 miles away in Newton County, said meteorologist Bill Davis.

Other tornadoes were reported near McAlester and Haywood in Pittsburg County and in rural Pushmataha County, both in southeastern Oklahoma.

Television footage showed some destroyed outbuildings and damaged homes west of McAlester and near Haywood. At a glass plant southwest of McAlester, the storm apparently picked up a trailer and slammed it down on garbage bins.

"These are rural areas that we are in," Pittsburg County Undersheriff Richard Sexton told KFOR-TV in Oklahoma City. "These are good people coming together at this time."

In storm-weary Arkansas, a tornado collapsed a home and a business, and there were reports of a few people trapped in buildings, said Weather Service meteorologist John Robinson.

Central Park Elementary School in the northwest Arkansas city of Bentonville had roof and window damage, and damage was also reported at Pine Creek Center School.

The storms remained active into the evening, with watches and warnings abundant across a wide swath of the Plains and South.

Tornadoes killed 13 people on Feb. 5 and another seven were killed in an outbreak on May 2. In between was freezing weather, persistent rain and river flooding that damaged residences has slowed farmers in their planting.

Comments

[MarieMeyer]

I wonder why God is punishing Arkansas? Possibly for Mike Huckabee claiming that his success in the primaries was due to divine intervention.

[sparkandy]

Well this time the tornadoes were in OK and MO and WE didn't do anything to deserve punishment for Huckabee,, any more than the people of AR did, any more than the people of New York were targeted for divine vengeance on 9/11 for their evil ways.

[cheneyhasawarmachine]

global warming, global warming! Bush's Fault Bush's Fault!


does that cover it libbies?

[rextrek]

so is Pastor Hagee or Parsley - gonna blame the "gays" for this too? I mean...what has the midwest done to "provoke" GOD and make him do such things? (insert sarcazm)

[mamacat]

It's a good thing the National Gaurd isn't off doing something stupid in Iraq, instead of being available to help with disasters here at home.

[TimmySlagle]

Yeah good thing.

Otherwise, Gov. Henry wouldn't have been able to order them into the disaster area:

"... Oklahoma Gov. Brad Henry had ordered National Guard troops to arrive in Picher by Sunday morning to help in rescue and recovery operations.

http://news.yahoo.com/s/nm/20080511/ts_nm/usa_tornadoes_dc

[watchingthings]

This powerful "La Nina" episode is causing bigger then normal storms by pushing colder then normal air far into the southern regions, now laden with very warm air. Jasper, in Alberta got 3 feet of snow on wednesday. Snow is not unusuall in Jasper at this time but 3 feet [a meter] at once ia a record.

[Midnightrain]

And people actually argue that climate change is an illusion.

[cheneyhasawarmachine]

its not an illusion the climate has been changing for billions of years long before man had SUVs and non curly q light bulbs. The illusion is that people have the arrogance to think we can change the course of the climate. If anything the devastating nature of these tornadoes proves that weather and climate are things we cannot control and are far more complex than being 'solved' by replacing a light bulb.

I wish you alarmists would make up your mind first it you called it global waming now the mantra is 'climate change' how about you stick with one scare tactic.

~"TO CAPTURE THE PUBLIC IMAGINATION, WE HAVE TO OFFER UP SOME SCARY SCENARIOS, MAKE SIMPLIFIED DRAMATIC STATEMENTS AND LITTLE MENTION OF ANY DOUBTS ONE MIGHT HAVE. EACH OF US HAS TO DECIDE THE RIGHT BALANCE BETWEEN BEING EFFECTIVE, AND BEING HONEST."-Stephen Schneider, lead 2007 UN IPCC report author and climate alarmist, who made this statement back in 1989. He also wrote one of the reports that led to the gobal-cooling scare of the 1970s.

[shockmagog]

"The illusion is that people have the arrogance to think we can change the course of the climate."

We are changing it NOW, so why shouldn't we consider the possibility that we can change it if we try to? In light of this, your "logic" doesn't make sense. Arrogance is as arrogance does, don't you think?

Of course the intensity (or lack thereof) of any El Nino or La Nina events should not even be considered in the context of Global Warming. The subject of Global Warming should not even be discussed here.

[NoPCZone]

Picher is a superfund site and the citizens have had the ability to buy their way out for quite some time. A recent PBS Independent Lens centered on the toxic contamination from the Lead mines.

http://www.pbs.org/independentlens/creekrunsred/

[provoice]

Back when Katrina hit New Orleans a few of us pointed out that the storms were getting stronger and more frequent, quite likely as a result of global warming... of course the flat-earthers all said we were crazy, that global warming is a myth.

Well now the US Geological Survey and NOAA have confirmed our belief, and the tornados are not only becoming stronger and more frequent, but we are now having them in places we have never had them before, like California and Maryland.

Sooner or later, people will learn that is downright dangerous to their well-being to listen to idiots like Limbaugh, O'Reilly and Hannity. They aren't telling you the truth, they are telling you what Bush wants you to hear.

[cheneyhasawarmachine]

~"TO CAPTURE THE PUBLIC IMAGINATION, WE HAVE TO OFFER UP SOME SCARY SCENARIOS, MAKE SIMPLIFIED DRAMATIC STATEMENTS AND LITTLE MENTION OF ANY DOUBTS ONE MIGHT HAVE. EACH OF US HAS TO DECIDE THE RIGHT BALANCE BETWEEN BEING EFFECTIVE, AND BEING HONEST."-Stephen Schneider, lead 2007 UN IPCC report author and climate alarmist, who made this statement back in 1989. He also wrote one of the reports that led to the gobal-cooling scare of the 1970s.

[sparkandy]

It's May. We're SUPPOSED to have tornadoes here this time of year. What shocks me is that so many people were killed. I'm wondering if they ignored the tornado sirens because they go off every time there's any rotation anywher within a hundred miles. I'm guilty of it myself. The last time they blew the sirens here, I didn't even go inside. However, I do feel really bad for the people of Picher and my thoughts and prayers are with them.

[TimmySlagle]

Actually, most scientists dispute that Global Warming increases storm intensity and frequency.

Turns out, the ones who blame storms on the activities of humans are the real flat-earthers.

People like you and Rev. Hagee.

[shockmagog]

'Among the first to publish (during 2005 season) was (Kerry Emanuel of the Massachusetts Institute of Technology), who " just three weeks before Hurricane Katrina's landfall " published a 'paper in Nature that concluded a key measurement of the power dissipated by a storm during its lifetime had risen dramatically since the mid-1970s.'

'In the future, he argued, incredibly active hurricane years such as 2005 would become the norm rather than flukes.'

'This view, amplified by environmentalists and others concerned about global warming, helped establish in the public's mind that "super" hurricanes were one of climate change's most critical threats.'

"Kerry had the good fortune, or maybe the bad fortune, to publish when the world's attention was focused on hurricanes in 2005," Roger Pielke Jr., who studies science and policy at the University of Colorado, said of Emanuel. "Kerry's work was seized upon..."

'After the 2005 hurricane season, a series of other papers were published that appeared to show, among other things, that the most intense hurricanes were becoming more frequent.'

'What has not been as broadly disseminated, say Pielke and some hurricane scientists, is that other research papers have emerged that suggest global warming has yet to leave an imprint on hurricane activity.'
http://www.chron.com/disp/story.mpl/front/5693436.html

Conflicting studies and data suggest more more data must be collected over the long term. Satellite data was only available since Essa was launched in 1966, for instance.

[TimmySlagle]

Magog,

Your information is three years old.

Science moves much faster than that:

"One of the most influential scientists behind the theory that global warming has intensified recent hurricane activity says he will reconsider his stand.
The hurricane expert, Kerry Emanuel of the Massachusetts Institute of Technology, unveiled a novel technique for predicting future hurricane activity this week. The new work suggests that, even in a dramatically warming world, hurricane frequency and intensity may not substantially rise during the next two centuries."

http://www.chron.com/disp/story.mpl/tech/news/5693436.html