0 we'll see you back here live at 11:00 from boston as our coverage of the new fbi breakthrough continues here on cnn. also, the coverage of the horrific explosion in west texas which has claimed more lives than anyone thought. anderson cooper is there in west texas and "ac 360" begins right now. good evening, everyone. there is big breaking news in boston and utterly horrific breaking news right here in this small texas town of west. search, rescue, recovery and damage assessment from the blast that rocked a fertilizer plant here just north of waco. it registered as a small earthquake, flattening entire buildings, burying people alive, killing them in some cases where they stood. claiming the lives we're now learning of many volunteers who rushed to help. this story is changing even as i stand here and we're going to bring you all the latest on it throughout the evening tonight. we'll be back on at 10:00 again for another update. we begin though on the story out of boston which just a short time ago became a national manhunt. take a look at these two photos and all the images we'll be showing you from here on out. these are the two men the fbi says it is looking for. two men they are calling suspects, warning they would be considered armed and dangerous. two men with backpacks, one of whom, the one with the white hat, was caught on tape planting one of those bags shortly before the blast. the bureau did not provide footage of that, but did supply this clip of the two men making their way, one after the other, down sidewalks near the explosion sites. you'll be seeing plenty of this video here and everywhere in the coming hours and days. >> today, we are enlisting the public's help to identify the two suspects. after a very detailed analysis, of photo, video and other evidence, we are releasing photos of these two suspects. they are identified as suspect one and suspect two. they appear to be associated. suspect one is wearing a dark hat. suspect two is wearing a white hat. suspect two set down a backpack at the site of the second explosion just in front of the forum restaurant. we strongly encourage those who were at the forum restaurant who have not contacted us yet to do so. we consider them to be armed and extremely dangerous. no one should approach them. no one should attempt to apprehend them except law enforcement. let me reiterate that caution. do not take any action on your own. if you see these men, contact law enforcement. if you know anything about the bombings or the men pictured here, please call the telephone listed on the photo arrays, 1-800-call fbi. >> special agent deslaauriers could not emphasize that enough. we will give you different angles to help you better recognize these men. again, this is by no means perfect. the hats obviously do make it harder. we have also slowed things down a bit in case that helps. goes without saying the fbi has trained photo interpreters and more video to work with than they're releasing just now. we should also caution that many people may resemble these men. the fbi, though, is counting on someone seeing something that stands out and points clearly to a name. i wants to bring in susan candiotti, who has new information from a source about the behavior of the suspects. what have you learned? >> that's right. this is a federal law enforcement official who has seen the videos and this official tells me that after the two are seen on videos planting the bombs, that they don't run away, they casually walk away, apparently to avoid drawing attention to themselves. according to this official who told me this information because with the belief it would not hinder the investigation in any way, anderson, stated that when the bombs blew up, when most people were running away or lying in the street injured, these two individuals did not leave. they stuck around to watch. then in the words of the official who has seen the videos, they casually walked away. now, this is information coming after these videos have been watched by various officials and of course, they're still working on this investigation. and we also can tell you now that of course, nonstop investigators continue to trace phone calls, cell phone calls that were made before and after that attack. they are using techniques that are commonly used and have been for a long time in criminal investigations, in this case, tracking calls made in the area of copley plaza using the cell phone tower in this area, and using phone records, and are trying to look up names. they are looking up names of individuals to connect to those phones. now, of course, this is a very difficult process because sometimes the names simply won't match. sometimes people don't use their real names. sometimes they use a disposable phone, for example. but this is the kind of thing that is going on. anderson, another thing that we've done for you is to isolate, give you a closer picture of the two hats that those two young men were wearing. now, these appear to be the same hats. we have gone on the internet and searched and searched and used various other methods because the ones that we've seen -- are seeing on the images provided to us by the fbi are just a little bit blurry. so these appear to be the same kind of hats. take a look at them. one first on the one is the hat worn by suspect one and there's also one by suspect number two. if you see something like this, this might be a clear indication of the hats those two young men were wearing. anderson? >> you know, i was just looking at this video a lot. it seems like suspect number two has kind of a distinctive walk. seems like his right leg is almost bow-legged. i don't know if i'm sort of imagining that. have authorities said anything about that? >> no, i haven't heard any discussion of that. but it is the kind of thing that they will be taking a very close look at. every move they made, how they walk, how they move, the features on their face, the hat that they wore, maybe down to the pants and the shoes, with the kind of technology they have now, obviously you can imagine all kinds of records that they must be trying to match those pictures up against with all the techniques that they have these days to see whether, going in tight on those faces, they can match them up in that way as well. >> yeah. i just noticed that on the right leg. again, i might be imagining it. joe johns is in washington with new information. joe, what are you learning? >> anderson, a federal law enforcement official briefed on the investigation tells our producer that the current thinking is that the devices were remotely detonated, but that official would not go into any details. the official would not say if they were set off by a cell phone or by some other method. now, this official also said the bulk of the material recovered by the authorities apparently came from the black bag you've heard so much talk about. the official added that bag showed up in a lot of pictures yesterday, showing something next to a mailbox which appears frankly to have nothing to do with the explosions. the official also said it is accurate that the fbi has video showing the reaction as you just heard of suspect two to the explosion from the first bomb. the official said you can see the reaction of suspect two along with others around him, but the official was pretty vague as to how revealing that reaction was and said it's subject to interpretation. so a little more detail there about what the authorities think they know right now, anderson. >> subject to -- suspect two is in the white hat, i should point out for our viewers. i want to ask about that report of remote detonation. does that contradict earlier reports over the last several days about a timing device or timing devices were used and there was a circuit board? >> it certainly does. it certainly does seem to contradict reports of a timing device. authorities even at that time told us they weren't 100% certain of that, and you may know, anderson, we had some additional reporting today about the battery that was discovered at the scene, apparently connected to this bomb. we found out through a company out in california that that battery apparently is used in remote control hobby cars, which would lend some to wonder whether this was some type of remote control that was used to detonate one of the devices, anderson. >> interesting. stand by. i want to bring in drew griffin. he's also in boston working his sources. what is your sense from law enforcement about these suspects? is the assumption that if two people had enough of a plan to coordinate these attacks that they likely had a plan to escape? >> reporter: that's the likelihood based on past experience. this rules out the kind of lone wolf crazy person scenario. if two people are together practicing, potentially, buying these products together, assembling together, they're also planning their escape or departure from the scene. that is kind of standard thinking. so you have to think now one, two, three, four days after, that that plan was initiated. they may be huddled down in a basement watching all this attention on tv. that may have been their plan. but they also may have had just as calculated a plan to leave or flee the scene as they did setting up what seems to be a calm and cool and collected bombing of the boston marathon. anderson? >> drew, obviously law enforcement is now poring over and has been poring over other photos from subway stations from bus stops, any other closed circuit cameras, any other security cameras all over the city, i would imagine, in the hours before and the hours after these videos were taken. >> reporter: yeah, most likely not only just the subway system here, the train system, but the bus depots, perhaps even the airports. i must tell you that the fbi is getting calls. they are getting calls. we know just a couple of miles away, we'll have more details on this later in the night, but a false alarm, a college student with a white hat was surrounded by police. this happened just within the last half hour or so, and he described that you know, they came, they had him put his hands down like this. so many people had called because here is a guy, a college kid with a white hat on. so they're acting on the tips that they are getting. obviously they wish they could have found these people without opening up the public to all this speculation, but they are at the point now where they need these tips to find these people. somebody knows these people. and it's just going to take the right call to find them. >> if i may, anderson, just like they did with the new york city subway bomber, they're also looking for another way they could find him is to try to find out where they bought some of the ingredients to make the bombs. so for example, we spoke with a hobby store here in boston and they told us that in fact, they had been contacted by the fbi to find out whether they had sold nails or a remote device, i believe it was. however, they had not and referred them to another store. so clearly, the fbi is trying to track this down as well. >> right. trying to follow up all leads. susan, drew, stay with me. cnn analyst, fran townsend and tom fuentes joins me now. tom is currently on the cia and department of homeland security external advisory boards. tom, what stands out to you from these images? >> i think the complete poise and nonchalance of these two walking down the street. they just seem like they're so proud of themselves, comfortable, mr. cool, especially the guy with the hat on backwards, he's just strolling along thinking he's just the greatest. i think that -- i think what jumps out at me is actually in the discussion about whether it's a lone wolf, the lone wolf, even if it's with firearms like the lanzas of the world, they don't socialize with other people. they stay in their basement and stay on their computer and they don't meet a lot of other people. they're not social. these two seem like they would be social, like they would go to parties, like they would have friends, like they might have pictures of themselves with those hats, not from that day, maybe, but there might be something on one of the social media sites where they've gone to a party or met with friends or went to a football or baseball, basketball game, something. so the pictures that strike me is that the two appear like they would not be necessarily reclusive and the less reclusive, the more social they are, the more likely that they move in circles where people would know one or both of them. >> fran, what jumps out at you? >> well, one of the things that you take from that, anderson, they know where they're going. they're not wandering around. they're walking very deliberately. what we know from prior terrorism investigations, both domestic and foreign, is that these people do preoperational surveillance. so it's likely they have been in that neighborhood. they've walked that route. you know, they talked about the forum restaurant where suspect number two, the guy in the white hat, puts the bomb down. well, they may have been in that restaurant on prior occasions and there may be store and shop owners in the neighborhood who will recognize these guys from prior to the day of the bombing. you don't walk around there with two bombs, you know, each with a bomb in your backpack and feel that confident unless you've been in that neighborhood and walked those streets before. that will also be a source of leads for the fbi. >> interesting. i hadn't thought of that. appreciate it. we're going to be checking in with you throughout the night. let us know what you think of these videos. follow me on twitter right now. later, president obama joins boston and all of us, remembering boston's fallen and all bostonians now standing prouder and stronger than ever before. next, the latest on the damage here in west texas which is extensive. the effort to save lives, come to grips with what happened last night which is very much ongoing. dr. sanjay gupta got an up-close look at some of the effects of the blast some compare to a war zone. 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>> i can't hear. i can't hear. get out of here. please get out of here. >> the father and his girls are unharmed. the explosion is so powerful, it registers as a 2.1 magnitude seismic event. the rumblings felt as far as 50 miles away. >> there has been an explosion. there are firefighters down. >> firemen who were already on scene battling the flames are reported missing. >> it's just overwhelming to us. we're a town of 2400. we have three ambulances. and there are literally hundreds of people hurt. i know, i haven't been there, but i'm very worried that my ambulance was on scene. those personnel are probably deceased. i think some of the firemen may be deceased. >> buildings near the plant are blown out by the blast, including a nursing home. >> the rest home has been seriously damaged. we have many people down. please respond. >> patients were already being evacuated from the nursing home because of the fire, but not everyone made it out before the blast. >> everybody was trapped. >> do you know how many people [ inaudible ]? >> just a guess, i don't know for sure. i don't know. maybe like 115 or something like that. >> the plant continues to burn, raising fears that toxic gases may be released into the air. the fertilizer plant had 54,000 pounds of anhydrous ammonia which can cause illness or death. hospitals record more than 160 wounded patients, some in critical condition. in the light of day, the devastation from the powerful blast becomes clear. >> over here, there's a hot water heater and you can see the bathtub. this is obviously the bathroom of this home that is now gone. >> by 9:00 a.m., heavy rains helped control the flames and also helped dissipate any chemicals which may have been released. but residents of the town remain missing. emergency workers are now in the middle of a search and rescue mission and authorities say they don't know how many people may still be trapped under the rubble. you heard a bit from dr. george smith a moment ago, his face bloodied there. he's the ems director for the town of west and joins us now. also with us, jill jenkins, a triage nurse who rushed to the scene. thank you for being with us. first, how are you doing? >> i'm doing all right. exhausted but doing all right. >> you got injured in the blast. you were a quarter to half mile away and still got injured. >> yes. >> from what? >> i was in the nursing home evacuating the station closest to the fire, because i was afraid of hazardous materials and smoke, and luckily we had gotten everybody on the other side of the building when massive explosion t ro. the roof fell in on me, glass. i thank god i'm alive just looking at it. >> it's a volunteer fire department here, a volunteer ems. if you had been on the scene where firefighters were -- >> i probably would have been dead. i normally go to the scenes but i saw the toxic smoke and i knew i needed to get to the nursing home. >> firefighters and ems responded about half an hour or so before the actual explosion when there was a fire, and then wisely decided we got to evacuate people because of the possibility of an explosion, possibility of toxic fumes. >> right. yes. >> as you know, you and i have been talking about this, we have not been speculating about fatalities or anything like that. we know more than 160 people have been injured. the mayor of this town did give an interview to "usa today" saying 35 dead, ten of them firefighters or first responders. he then seemed to walk that back in another interview with "wall street journal" saying 14 or 15. are you giving out numbers at this point? >> no. they've asked me not to give out numbers. we're still in the search and rescue mode. the ems and fire department personnel, bodies have not been removed yet. atf has not let us into the scene to remove the bodies yet. we hope to do that shortly tonight. >> there are a lot of first responders who have been killed? >> yes. i believe we lost five or six volunteer first -- volunteer from west ems. >> i'm so sorry. >> thank you. >> how are you doing? >> i'm doing well, thank you. >> what did you see, i mean, where were you when the blast went off? >> we had just turned the corner up here. we just thought it was a fire so we turned the corner and then the explosion occurred, and it was just devastation. it looked like 9/11 to me, what you saw on tv. >> is that right? >> yeah. >> you went to do whatever you could. where did you go? >> i went to some of the yards first because some of the windows were blown out of the homes and people were in the yards, and then i helped triage the nursing home patients and people from the apartments. >> it's a miracle that more people weren't killed in that nursing home. >> yeah, i don't know, you know, i don't know the numbers or anything. we're fortunate that we had a lot of nurses from local hospitals, hillcrest and providence, here in west that were able to get down there and help because we didn't have, you know, the ambulances couldn't get through and i don't think they really knew what they were dealing with. so we were fortunate for those nurses that were here. >> have you ever seen a situation like this? with so many people affected? >> no. never. on tv, but never could imagine. >> where do things stand now? about how much of the area has been searched? because it was about a four or five block kind of radius around the explosion that was most severely affected. >> the last i heard, about 80% of the devastated area's been searched. there was about 20% left. my understanding is urban search and rescue because of their time constraints were going to work until about 7:00 tonight and resume in the morning about 7:00. >> they've got to be exhausted. they have been working through the night as everybody here has. i know there are a lot of folks here who don't even know if their homes have survived still. they haven't been able to go back since they were evacuated. >> no. they won't let us back to the houses. >> it is amazing how this community is pulling together. people handing out free food in the bakery, people collecting clothes in the pharmacy just down the block. this is a close-knit community that's really pulling together. >> yes. we're a community of 2500 and everybody knows everybody else and we're here to cry together, support each other together. >> yeah. well, dr. smith, i'm so sorry for all you're going through. i appreciate you talking. >> thank you very much. >> jill jenkins, thank you so much. really appreciate it. my best to you. for information on how you can help survivors of the explosion here in texas and also of the boston bombing, go to cnn.com/impact. coming up, inside the disaster zone. dr. sanjay gupta was able to get into the cordoned off area closest to the explosion site. he tells us what he saw next. neil and buzz: for teaching us that you can't create the future... by clinging to the past. and with that: you're history. instead of looking behind... delta is looking beyond. 80 thousand of us investing billions... in everything from the best experiences below... to the finest comforts above. we're not simply saluting history... we're making it. ♪ [ male announcer ] this is a stunning work of technology. ♪ this is the 2013 lexus es and the first-ever es hybrid. this is the pursuit of perfection. for him, who dares to get in the picture. for her, who dares to show her love to the world. for the daring ones, there's crest plus scope. the only toothpaste that combines the freshness of scope with the whitening power of crest.