this morning on world news now, mean season. the deadly and violent tornados hitting the middle of the country go down in history. and even more stormy weather is now slowing down recovery in the hard-hit city of joplin, missouri. it is thursday, may 26th. good morning, everybody. i m rob nelson. and i m peggy bunker. we are hearing astonishing stories of survival from these storms including the trucker who got hit by a twister. his rig smashed to bits. but the driver did live to tell about it. one of many incredible stories. you see cars just being picked up like that tossed into the air. mother nature s power is astounding. we ve seen that over and over again in the past couple of days. heartbreaking. also in this half hour of
a spa and gym. we ll take you inside on this american morning. good morning to you. thanks so much for being with us on this thursday, may 26th. welcome back. what a whirlwind few days it s been for you right there in the heart of what s going on joplin, missouri. it continues. and more bad weather. another night of meteorological mayhem as tornadoes wreaked through the region. from louisiana to the great lakes. oklahoma s governor declaring a state of emergency in 68 counties hit by tornadoes. this video taken by storm chasers is about as close as you can get. 16 people were killed in the latest round of storms. in memphis tornado warnings ringing out again last night, the sirens sounding. you can hear them there as the sky grows darker by the minute. an ominous sky, a funnel cloud that was in the distance. the national weather service warned people in memphis as well as nashville to take shelter and in some cases to evacuate. right there, you got it. we ve got a
luckily a tornado did not pass through that region. jen delgado, thank you. more storms are lashing the city of joplin as she was saying, where a tornado killed 124 people on the weekend. gary tuchman reports from a shelter where hundreds are taking refuge. reporter: this is the largest shelter in the city of joplin. missouri s southern state university. we re in the basement because of a tornado warning on tuesday night. there are more than 400 people in the cots above us, sleeping in many cases, having their dinners. all of a sudden authorities came into the shelter and started yelling down in the basement. people started running down in the basement. but a lot of people are in no condition to run. some people were hurt during the tornado and other people are elderly. people have oxygen tanks, people have wheelchairs and are very scared as they tried to come into the basement shelter as quickly as they could. ironically, the children were having a good time, because they
grounded as volcanic ash clouds a continent. and nato keeps up the pressure on moammar gadhafi. tripoli comes in for more bombing. we begin in london where the u.s. president is kicking off day two of his state visit to britain. right now barack obama is at 10 downing street for talks with british prime minister david cameron. they ve got lot on their plates, the talks mark a shift in tone for the president. tuesday was mostly about pageantry, meeting the royal family and getting the vip treatment over at buckingham palace. today it is all about politics. and washington s close ties with the uk, that s really going to be at the heart of mr. obama s address to parliament today. he s expected to say american relations with the uk and nato are essential to global security. to number 10 downing street and to our white house correspondent, brianna keeler. what is president obama s message going to be to david cameron? we re just a short distance away from 10 downing street
what did you see? has there ever been anything quite like this before in your storm chasing career? yes. back in 99 there was the most intense storm and how fast the tornado came down on the southwest side of the city and then how fast the width of the tornado literally exploded from a few hundred yards wide in the first 30 seconds on the ground to almost a mile wide and about two minutes later. and that s what i witnessed. and then moving through the city at close to 50 miles an hour at mile wide ef-4 tornado created tremendous damage is what we witnessed. yesterday in joplin and that s what we witnessed this powerful tornado that moved through the city of joplin. you re an experienced storm chaser. you do this for scientific reasons and create very valuable research by doing this. there must have been moments last night when you were fearful