beginning to end. if you look down here, you ll see a brown line. it starts with debris field going in this direction. that is actually the tornado s trail. it s going to get much more dramatic as we get near a populated area. you can trace with your finger a line where the torrent went. the path is the obvious. it s about a block and a half wide. you notice it by seeing everything that s destroyed. everything that looks like paper on the ground, they are homes, timber, roofs, cars. 16 minutes. that was the warning window before it touched down. then a ten minute window during which it went from heavy wind to destroying everything in its path. oh my god! this is where the tornado was. look at the difference between life and death, between losing everything and losing nothing.
just one street, just one neighborhood. but countless reminders of the enormity of what happened here. the living room set with no living room. a muni van in a space that defies the laws of physics. we give you a sense of the power of this storm, this is a guard rail this heavy piece of twisted metal. part of a highway which is a few blocks that way. somehow this tornado moved this guard rail from the highway right to here, this shows you how powerful it is. but there is another sight i want to show you which gives you a sense of the damage that this storm could do. it s a simple, small image. this. a kid s toy. a little car or truck here. it s part of someone s life, we haven t seen anyone at this house today. someone s life that will be changed forever. in yard after yard, giant wooden splinters, spears
discoveries. 24 people lost their lives here in moore, oklahoma, including 9 children. you remember, yesterday the government came out with numbers much higher than that, a little bit of solace. those numbers are not expected to change. part of the story of this epic tornado here. search and rescue mission here is now really transitioning into a recovery operation. the national weather service confirming that the tornado that carved up this town was an ef-5, winds topping out at 210 miles an hour. reporter: according to state insurance officials, damage claims likely to top $10 million. 2400 homes damaged or destroyed. hard to imagine what it s like to put this into perspective. 200-mile-an-hour winds, only 10 minutes to prepare. we took to the skies to look at
helpful. so many groups, agencies, organizes here on site. helping to make a difference. any chance there was good fortune in this? there isn t more loss of life? we saw how widespread the devastation is? it s odd to say, a tough balance to strike when we say we re fortunate. but we don t want to lose one life. so the fact that it s 24, not 25, if the number was 100 and it wasn t 101. we were worried about that. right. with the initial reports. the enormity of this tornado, and the violence of this tornado, the destruction that has occurred and wiped out businesses, flattened neighborhoods, wiped them out, obliterated, we have 24, it s a blessing to some degree. still tragically lost 24 lives. let me ask a question. a lot of people are asking about shelters, particularly in schools. a state rep proposed a bond
we have tremendous traffic jams on our highways right now with i-35 and i-44 that took a direct hit with the tornado crossing those areas and there are many side streets that are also jammed up with traffic. communication is very hard with cell phone towers and also with downed power lines throughout various areas of the state, in particular in moore and this vicinity, too. so communication s very, very hard so we re asking the public to be as patient as possible in letting us work through what we need to, and knowing that we re doing every single thing that we can to assist those that are in need right now and bring out the resources. i want to say thank you so very much to the media. the media has done a superb job over the last couple of days of keeping people informed about the current weather conditions, especially our weatherman and those that have been on the ground driving and tracking the storm itself. as i visited around bethel acres