CNN news 2013-06-06 加文本

cnn news 2013-06-06

It is 10:00 on the East Coast, 9:00 in Oklahoma, where the breaking news is taking place, also now in Saint Louis and Missouri and areas around it.

The immediate threat of tornadoes is now in the Saint Louis, Missouri, area, where one confirmed twister has hit. Here's the latest, though, out of Oklahoma. One tornado warning is still in effect there for the far eastern side of Oklahoma City metro area, also, a serious flash flooding threat. At least three tornadoes reportedly touched down, one near El Reno. That tornado then moved toward Bethany and was also seen near the fairgrounds(露天市场) and by the airport, one north of Union City and another outside Tinker Air Force Base.

A short time ago, the National Weather Service tweeted that the tornado threat is decreasing. That is certainly the good news. KOCO is reporting one confirmed fatality in Union City. Police said the person killed was in a car. KOCO is also reporting multiple injuries on Interstate 40, where cars and tractor trailers were said to be flipped over. How many, we don't know.

Earlier, the Oklahoma Highway Patrol described this situation as dire, with thousands of people believed to be stuck in the traffic. More than 50,000 customers in the area right now without power. The Will Rogers Airport has lost power as well. More than 1,000 people have been seeking shelter there.

Chad Myers joins me now from El Reno, west of Oklahoma City. Then Chad, explain though what we have been witnessing over the last hour or so.

It's been the regeneration of storms, Anderson. One storm would move over the top of where another storm just was. And that's not very typical, because when a storm runs over the area, it uses up the atmosphere, which means it takes all the humidity and all the heat away and the air gets much cooler. So there's no real hot air for the next storm to come in.

But because the wind was so strong from the south and because we were so hot today, 92, 94, you couldn't walk outside without feeling it. It just hit you right in the face. Our dew point(露点), you know what that means, 74 degrees. You walk out, you're about 70 relative humidity(相对湿度) and it's just really sweltering. So all that energy, all that humidity was used by the second storm and then a third storm and then a fourth storm. So, people were, they couldn't get out of the way of this. We couldn't even feel like we were getting out of the way either because the traffic got so bad.

We probably went two miles in almost an entire hour where people were just trying to get away. Rather than shelter in place, they were trying to drive away from this system, and then realize that, oh, no, that's not the only system I need to drive away from. There's another. There's another. There's another. And that's what it was like all day, not being able to, out of the way, just getting stuck in the traffic and feeling like, well, I can't be going two miles an hour. Another tornado may come right over the top of me.

(Clearly having some trouble ... )

Mayor Lewis, how are things in Moore right now, Mayor Lewis, hear? Are you still in shelter?

It's flooded. No, sir, I'm out about in the, in my truck right now. And we're kind of taking a tour of the damage. Everything is dark. The power is all out on the south side, the east side, or excuse me, the west side of town and most of the east side. So, there's very little power here. The streets are flooded. I can't even get home to see if my house is OK.

Or I'm headed out now to see if my mom's house is OK. So, I don't really know. So, we have seen probably seven or eight ambulances heading into town very similar, just about two blocks south of where it hit last week, as a matter of fact. And it's looks like there's trees in the road. There's damage everywhere.

So, we're pretty concerned. We can't really see how much damage is done, but everybody from every station is going in right now and they're getting back out in their vehicles and kind of just trying to figure out what's what and where we are right now.

And, obviously, with so much water on the ground, it's important for people in that area to not try to go into that area for safety reasons and also to allow any first-responders to ...

Absolutely, because there are power lines down too all over. So, you know, you don't want to touch any metal when you go over them. That's for sure.

You were saying in one area it's about two blocks or so from where the last tornado was more than a week ago.

Yes, sir.

Is the track similar to that tornado?

No, it actually went catty-corner(kitty-corner斜对角) from it. It went, this one went from north to south. The other one came up from south to north. So, it's almost like a diagonal(斜的；对角线的). It's like, an X across the city is what it looks like. But over where you guys were reporting the other day, it was right by that same location by the Warren Theatre again. And that was kind of where it met in the middle again this time.

But I didn't see much damage there. I think it just skipped over the top of it, because on the other side, there's damage, and on the other side of the interstate, there would have been a lot of damage, but it's already gone. So ...