Oh, my god. We need to be. Its right there. This ominous sight was videotaped from the interstate near mobile, alabama. The driver wisely stopped and turned around. I want you to listen to the funnel cloud as it approached the city. Christmas day tornado. Going through mobile. Oh, my god, look, thats a tornado. Oh, wow. Oh, jesus, look at that tornado. Look at that. It caused a lot of damage. And knocked out power to more than 20,000 customers. Incredibly, no one was killed, although at least two stormrelated deaths were reported elsewhere. But even natures most Destructive Forces can have a beautiful side. The storm generated this endtoend rainbow as it passed near jackson, mississippi. Lets get to alexandra steele. The legs on this thing are insane. Certainly one for the record books. On the snow side and on the severe side, mobile, two tornadoes, one yesterday and then one five days before that. It was the greatest Christmas Day tornado outbreak on the records, for the record books
Keep the country from going off the fiscal cliff . A dangerous winter storm roaring across the eastern half of the u. S. Bringing blizzard conditions and travel nightmares. Plus, the nras controversial proposal to put armed volunteers in every school, well go indepth with the man in charge of the National School shield program. Im joe johns. Youre in the situation room. The u. S. Is now just six days away from the socalled fiscal cliff. And a mad scramble is on here in washington to avoid the drastic tax hikes and spending cuts that many fear will plunge the economy back into recession. President obama flies back from hawaii tonight to be ready if the senate comes back with a plan when it returns to work tomorrow. And house leaders are huddling with members on standby to return. Senior Congressional Correspondent dana bash is following all of it for us. What are you hearing . There was a Conference Call of course members of the house leadership even, theyre back in their districts, but
Day. They were hunkered down and watching at least one tornado rip up trees, whip around power lines and just in this one spot from east texas to the gulf coast of alabama you have weather officials counting 28 tornadoes that hit ground on Christmas Day. Now, in southern alabama right now more than 200,000 homes are without power. We are live from mobile in just a minute with the full picture of the damage there. All right. You are watching this is an enormous funnel cloud. It formed and touched down near interstate 165 in mobile. David and whitney sarasino were driving to see their family for christmas and realized they were headed right into the tornado. Well, the first thing was i had asked my wife it to pick up the camera and start getting some footage of it, because i know that the local news stations and everything were want wanting to see what was going on. At that point we just kind of drove as fast as we possibly could get out of the way. I know we were actually on i165 northb
Costello now. Tornadoes in the south and blizzards from arkansas to ohio. Do you have the right to know if your neighbor owns a gun . A newspaper in new york says yes and publishes the name of those who have gun permits. Christmas is over but shopping is not. If youre heading out to return the gift that wasnt exactly what you wanted, you will not be alone. Tom cruise may not be the ideal action hero but his love life made it into the top ten. Newsroom starts now. Girnlgs low. The day after christmas means relaxing or wracking up deals at the mall. For people in the west and the south its cleanup after Severe Weather ripped through the region. Waterspout was located in lake pontchartrain. Parts of arkansas saw several inches of snow and snapping power lines and of course canceling flights. In mississippi the governor declared a state of emergency after at least eight counties reported damage. Strong winds and heavy rains made the commute along this stretch of i20 east of jackson a diffi
severe weather expected elsewhere in america today. and talk about in-flight entertainment. what happened when the philadelphia orchestra got stuck on a tarmac for three hours? love that tarmac story. there is a lot happening this morning. let s get straight to that breaking news out of south africa. that country s beloved former president, the global icon of peace, 94-year-old nelson mandela rushed to the hospital. in an unprecedented move, officials calling his condition serious for the first time. abc s brandi hitt is in pretoria, south africa for the very latest. brandi? reporter: good morning. i have to tell you people here are feeling anxious on the streets of south africa with mandela back in the hospital after his health deteriorated rapidly overnight. we re told he was rushed to the hospital around 1:30 a.m. local time this morning. it s believed the former president and civil rights icon is being treated here at heart hospital for a reoccurring lung infe