out there work, just to stay out of down can town mayfield because this is a lot of traffic for people that s trying to get everything clean up and debris out of the way. eric: united way and other folks, ryan s townsfolk and residents, they need help in mayfield, folks. [inaudible] just■2hope for the best. that s about all we can do. eric: hope for the best as we see and witness and you undergo the worst. ryan, the president about to speak. thank you. arthel? arthel: yeah. eric, we are told that president biden s moments away from addressing the nation about those deadly storms and tornadoes, so right now we take a pause so our fox affiliates can join our coverage. okay. and what we re going to do is our fox station will join us momentarily, but the president is going to offer words about what he s going to offer in terms of federal assistance as well as he is going to be
the western part of the state. some of the worst damage at a candle factory in mayfield. 110 people were inside as the twister hit and the roof collapsed. the governor estimates dozens were killed at that site alone. steve harrigan is live in mayfield now with more. steve in. ■ç reporter: arthel, this is where the candle factory was, right behind me here. at peak efficiency 250 people working there. overnight more than 100, roughly 110 people working overtime late at night trying to make some extra money for the holidays. and as you can see from the movement, this has gone really from a rescue operation to more of a recovery operation. the cranes are idle right now, a lot of first responders standing around. didn t have that frenetic activity that we saw earlier on. the last successful rescue was about 3 a.m. since then we ve been watching a body truck for cadavers here with the coroner s cree here
before christmas is vast, extensive and heartbreaking. the suspected tornado destroyed a nursing home in arkansas, killed one person there, then trapped 20 others at that facility as you can see just collapsed around them. meanwhile, up north illinois was also hit hard. search and rescue crews combing through rubble at an amazon warehouse in edwardsville which was partially collapsed by the tornado, almost completely, as you can see there. that roof just i destroyed, no walls. devastation everywhere, at least two people killed. but kentucky may have gotten the worst of it. the city of mayfield in the southwestern part of the state basically flattinged, destroyed. emergency teams addressing and assessing the damage there as the rescue and recovery operation. this may be the deadliest tornado outbreak in the state s history. complete coverage, let s begin with charles watson who s in atlanta. charles?
really with a yellow legal pad just taking names out on the list there. this becomes more of a recovery operation. this might be the most intense point here from these storms when you talk about concentration of death. but when you drive in here and you drive in through the heart of mayfield, if you pan over there a little bit, you start out a few miles from the town and you see, okay, some trees are down. then you■ç get a little closer d some roofs are down, and then you come into the town itself, and ordinary ally tornadoes are ordinarily tornadoes might take out one house but not another. this storm was not specific. there are entire blocks, buildings, houses, government offices that are just simply gone in this town of 10,000. we re seeing a lot of heavy equipment continue to move in, national guard is here, rescue operations are still continuing. but really there s the sense