rebuilding or even cleaning. the only activity going on here is search and rescue. the destruction is so colossal that they are finding bodies in rubble and the whole island is full of rubble. i am not asking you to give an official number on the death toll. given how you just zridescribe things, those rescue officials pulling bodies and they would have pulled more if they were in a different situation. how much bigger do you think the number could get? has anyone told you? reporter: let me tell you, we went over to the mud and half a mile out, you can smell death. wh what does it mean? reporter: obvious piece of rubble. i have not experienced much in my life. i reported on a lot of stories but there are a few times in my
of our footage from, and as it started approaching you can see the violent motion near the ground. and it was you can it was a mile and a half, a mile out, you can hear the roar. when we moved back to the east, dropped south to get out of its way, a little bit looked like it was going to be too close, so we were dropping back south a bit the roar was almost deafening. just from the wind and all of the different debris? the debris swirl, the wind. debris colliding with the ground and the air. it was incredible. we have it here. let s relive what the storm chaser made it through. go ahead and play it. go north. back behind it. back through the debris field, guys. search and rescue, guys. this is the damage. damage path right now. houses are completely levelled. it s unrecognizable. houses are levelled.
reporter: local officials in smolensk say they contacted the pilot and mentioned to either come to moscow and land here or fly to minsk, in belarus next door. but it is very close. smolensk is near the border. they say that the pilot decided to still try to land in smolensk which is why the visibility, even when he was just a little over half a mile out, still potentially wasn t able to see the trees, wasn t able to see the runway. that s the version they re working with now. okay, thank you so much. president obama s issued a statement in reaction to the polish president s plane crash. president obama says, in part, our thoughts and prayers are with the kaczynski family, the loved ones of those killed in this tragic plane crash and the polish nation. president kaczynski was widely admired in the united states as