tonight we have some amazing pictures to show you of research being done real time inside a real tornado. storm chaser reed timor rode inside a twister last night in oklahoma. somehow he managed to launch probes to measure pressure and wind speed. you've got to see this. take a look. >> watch out for these trees. wait for it. we've got to do it, joel. wait for it. ready? go ahead. get a little closer. launch. we got to go again. get closer. launch it again. launch it again. >> launch, launch. launch. >> get down, get down. >> we're good. >> get down, joel. drop it down. drop down. debris hitting the car. -- the tornado! watch -- did it go up? i saw it. went all over the place. oh, wow. huge. are the air cans ready for this? we got to get the air cans. stop it. look at that vortex. >> truly amazing. we spoke to reed a couple weeks ago. that car is built like a sherman tank. it can drop down so no wind can get under it and lift it up into the tornado. we'll be talking to reed later in the program. first, we return again to what is left of joplin, missouri. mike is searching everywhere for his 16-year-old son. mike came on our show last night and pleaded for help finding his son. since then, thousands of people from all over the country and even the world have poured on to the family's facebook page to offer help and prayers but none of it has brought lance back to his family, at least not yet. they're still hoping and so are we. mike joins us tonight from joplin. i want to know the latest in the search for lance. for those who missed your interview last night, let's start by getting a skrings description of them out there again so anybody who has information can get back in touch. tell us again about lance. mike, mike, tell us about lance, if you're hearing me, we want to hear about lance, give us that description so folks can get back to you, go to your family's facebook page and help us reach him. tell us again how tall he is where you know about when he has been, any leads you've got. all right. i'm not sure that that connection there to mike has been working. we'll go back to him as soon as we get that hooked up better. we're going to go to chad myers here who will tell us about where there's severe weather and the latest about the potential tornado in memphis. >> the warning on that has been going for about 20 minutes, the sirens going off in memphis proper. the energy and the circulation is the northern half of memphis but now rolling over the river, literally rolling over the river. i don't think i can explain it any better than i can show it to you. the storm has just been rotating all the way from arkansas. and then across the river and into memphis, tennessee. there you go, this is some of the video we've been seeing earlier in the day. i have the video from memphis in my weather wall right behind me. it sure looks ominous now, and there we go, you see that. we believe the one on the right, this over here is the rear flank downdraft. not a tornado on the ground but under that, this would be upward wind pushing down, could get wind gusts to 80 or so miles per hour right here. we're still waiting to see as the storm moves further to the east here maybe the wall cloud back here in the bright area with a tornado in it. hard to tell from the angle i'm in but it still could drop down through here. we could still get a tornado on the ground. with a tornado warning in effect, literally the weather service knows the whole storm is rotating and the tornado could fall out of the sky at any time. some dramatic pictures here. even whether this is a tornado or not, and i don't believe it is, you can still get damage from the wind coming out of the storm as the air gets forced down to the ground. it can't go anywhere. it's like pouring a bucket of water on to the ground. when the bucket of water -- we the water hits the ground, it has to spread out. that's what the air has to do too. it has to spread out and then winds can become intense. memphis, tennessee, especially the northern half of the city, you should be taking cover now. there's the pyramid. there's the river, the big story in the past couple weeks, how much flooding is going down here. water coming down a little bit in the mississippi river. the pyramid through here rest of northern downtown memphis right through here, bealle street not that far away and this storm ominous. we'll see on up towards the north part of shelby county, we'll see probably some significant hail. believe it or not, eliot, we had reports today of 3 1/2 inch hail. a softball-sized hailstone falling out of the sky in st. louis, missouri. in the city. >> man, chad, sounds like there's no end to the horrors that can be generated in tornado valley. what is it that take, the winds, as you just said, 80 miles an hour, devastating enough just there, and turn it into a tornado with that rotation and updraft that makes it more devastating? it's a separate part of the storm and the metho cyclone i'm still not seeing here. it's almost like a secondary, a low pressure center that exists on the southwest side of the tornado. and southwest side of a mesocyclone. and it's been hard to find all day long on that cell. but it would be just here -- if you look due north, it would be in this spot right there, and we just haven't seen significant enough rotation in the cell to make a tornado yet. when you get any rotation in the storm, you certainly want to be on the -- now, like -- confirmed tornado on the ground? i don't see it here but there's a confirmed tornado downtown -- >> midtown. >> in midtown memphis. let me back up, maybe i can get a better view. i see rising area. the clouds that kind of hang down like we're seeing there. confirmed tornado by some reporter, some spotter, maybe the national weather service as well. we'll keep you advised if we hear of any damage. >> not good news and let's just hope that doesn't do severe damage in memphis. not a good piece of news to have a tornado in downtown memphis obviously. mike joins us again from joplin. i want to know the latest in the search for your son lance. for those who may have missed last night, take us from the top, what do we know about lance, what can you tell us? start at the top for us. >> sunday night, i got reports that he was missing and we've been here ef since and i finally got with you guys to give the story that i gave last night about the car and jonathan taylor and finding him and him being in springfield -- or in springfield, missouri, in the hospital, and the reports to find the car and -- it's just been a crazy deal. the phone calls that i've received, the friends and family, thank you so much. and you guys for getting lance's story out there. he still hasn't been found. we've been to every place. missing persons to the morgue and there back to here. and we can't just stand by any more and wait. there's been reports of kids that look like him that other parents have called us, that it wasn't their child, and they want us to just sit here and wait and we can't do it no more. no more from springfield, missouri, to the hospital, to kansas city, missouri, to wichita, kansas, to anywhere that we've gotten some pretty steady deals that it can be him or it could be a kid that looks like him. >> once again, he's about 190 pound, six feet tall. his picture's been up on the screen. your family has a facebook page. why don't you tell us what that facebook page is, for people who have any leads -- >> yeah. >> give us that information. >> any leads, if you guys can put my cell phone number up there again, that would be great. find lantz at facebook.com. between them two, we've got so many hits. last night after it aired, my phone has rung off the hook with people, prayers. i can't say enough how much it means to all of us. we've just got to find my son. he's six foot tall. 190 pounds. long brown hair. brown eyes. he rode his bike a lot at the bridge ministers. i can't say enough about the bridge and their volunteers that helped find the car with danny selldago. i can't say enough to -- just get the car out of the way. in the trauma unit, but he's going to be okay -- >> mike -- >> we just want to know that lantz is. >> he was in the car with jonathan taylor. enormous damage to the car. has jonathan, who's going to make it through this, you said he's been in the trauma unit, has he been in a position to assist in any way? >> he can just tell us that he ended up in a van and then he was at freeman hospital here in town but he woke up in a van. it started with the windows on lance's car imploding and him getting into the back seat and that's the last time he's seen my son is when he jumped into the back seat. their car flew maybe 250, 300 feet from where they got pulled into the grocery store at dylans over the railroad tracks and then where we found the car to 250 feet and we still don't know who the good samaritan was that took jonathan in the van to freeman's or if they helped lance but we can't say enough because without them taking jonathan, we wouldn't have that lead, we wouldn't have been able to find the car. we searched an eight block by 25 block and you can see the devastation here. it's unlike anything i've ever seen. you see it on tv all the time. i can't say enough about all the families that are out here that aren't getting the opportunity i am getting now. i feel for them. i'm just lucky you guys got me right here. >> mike, we're going to do what we can do. >> thank you. >> we know -- last question, we know they asked you to go in and give a dna sample today. any idea why that might be? what they're going to be doing with these samples? is it good news? how do you interpret it? where do we go from here? >> the way i took it is, you know, state is okay, you know, but with all the different reports that the state was getting, you know, d.a. or somebody else higher up in the government has come in and they're taking it and in order -- whether lance is found alive or dead, they still need that identification so my mother and my ex-wife michelle and myself had to give swabs and, you know, if that leads to us finding him somewhere in a hospital or that leads us to finding him in the morgue, at least we'll have closure. a lot of these family, out here won't get that. >> all right. look, mike, thanks so much for joining us tonight. we're praying for you. we're going to do everything we can to help you. we know you're doing everything you can. all right. be well. >> i can't say enough about your cnn team that's out here. >> all right. thank you. be strong. >> thank you. >> we turn now to anderson cooper in another part of joplin, missouri. anderson, thanks for being with us. >> thanks for having me. you hear that father and i mean, there are people like that -- you run into them wherever you go. and it's really hard to listen to. we're on three days now. and there's a lot of people volunteering. they just gave a press conference saying there's 5,000 people who volunteered and stuff. there's still 1500 people unaccounted for. there's a lot of frustrated parents who are being told you can't go to the morgue, you can't identify bodies, you got to wait a week or two. so there's a lot of questions about how organized this effort is. and whether it's going to be able to ramp up in the next day or so to get some of these parent's answers. for many, there aren't any answers right now. i've been out today with a family of a young man named will norton who just graduated high school. was going home from the graduation ceremony with his dad when the tornado struck. they were in a hummer and an suv. his dad tried to hold on to will. will according to his dad's account, will got sucked up through the sunroof of the suv, they haven't found him since, and i was with will's aunt today and will's sister, sarah, as they were watching basically two ponds being dredged to try to find will and they're trying to hold on to hope. here's some of what they told me earlier today. >> i think sarah's mom is having the toughest time as any mama would have. you don't want to think your kids are gone. it's really tough. so we just ask for prayers for everybody. absolutely everybody. people that are following it on facebook, we really love you and just pray. pray for everybody. it's what we want. >> and now the confirmed death toll is 125. again, they're not even giving out the number of unaccounted for. yesterday, one official said it was 1500 but there's no official toll or number of how many people are missing and it's kind of disorganized. there's not really a central place where information is distributed. for will norton, there was a story going around he was at a hospital. someone had written down found when he had not been found. he's not in any of the hospitals. they've called more than 100 hospitals they've said. so, you know, there's a lot of frustration and just -- it's really agonizing here. there's no other word for it. >> you know anderson, as you pointed out, that number, 1,500, is absolutely enormous. we're also hearing reports, you're there on the ground, you're probably hearing much more of the same, there's frustration going because word we got was hundreds of people in the morgue, hundreds of people -- bodies, i hat to be so graphic, being stored and people not being allowed to go in to see if they can identify their missing family members. can you validate that? what it means? >> the first i heard of it was earlier today, john king talked to a foam who had been told that they weren't being allowed to go to the morgue. they were being told it might be two weeks before they were allowed to actually identify or until identifications were made of some of the people made in the morgue. i don't understand why that would be the case and i'd like to try to get further confirmation on that. we were in sri lanka in the wake of the tsunami there and sri lankan officials would photograph the remains of people and allow family members to try to identify them. it's very difficult. it's very gruesome. it's not an easy task. but i know -- i mean, i've talked to family members who are missing their loved ones and they want to do whatever it takes to try to identify those who are still missing. >> you know, anderson, these are very tough decisions. there's something kind of ghoulish about the idea of taking pictures or letting people into the morgue for that purpose. on the otherened th enehand, it only way to get closure. have you been told why they won't let families go through this process? >> i have not. i'm going to try to find out more information about it tonight. i have not. and just you mention that word closure, i -- that's kind of a tv word. when you're hear on the ground, there's not -- there is no such thing as closure. for people who have lost a loved one like this. you know, time will make things a little bit easier i suppose. but what people have seen here, what people have been through here, that's not something that's ever going to go away. >> you're so right, anderson. thank you for that report. when we come back, we'll check back into memphis. naomi pryce: i am. i'm in the name your own price division. i find empty hotel rooms and help people save - >> - up to 60% off. i am familiar. your name? > naomi pryce. >> what other "negotiating" skills do you have? > i'm a fifth-degree black belt. >> as am i. > i'm fluent in 37 languages. >> (indistinct clicking) > and i'm a master of disguise >> as am i. > as am i. >> as am i. > as am i. >> well played naomi pryce. ♪ ♪ when you're resonsible for this much of the team, you need a car you can count on. ♪ cnn's david mattingly joins us now on the phone from memphis. i understand there was a confirmed tornado in midtown memphis. what can you tell us? >> what we saw was a spectacular sight, was a wall cloud, the leading edge of this storm front that's across the mississippi river, headed east through the city of memphis. this spectacular wall cloud appeared to have some rotation in it. at least that we were able to see from here open the ground. no defined funnel that was formed with this. and there was some rain and some very vivid lightning coming out of it. from our vantage point no tornado. there is a tornado warning here in the memphis area for this county. we've been listening to sirens going off for about the last half hour. but we saw the dramatic cloud coming through. now there's actually a huge hole in the clouds above us, some sunlight streaming in to downtown memphis right at the moment. very dramatic. some rain falling. again, some vivid lightning off in the distance as this continues to move to the northeast. and you might be able to hear some of that siren -- sirens going off right now but again you hear those stories from joplin and it really brings in to focus that these storms are not to be trifled with. these warnings going off. i'm sure people very much paying attention to them. everyone around us watching the skies. watching the media to make sure they know what to do here. but again, it was quite a spectacular sight as this came across the mississippi river and who knows what it might mean for people to the northeast of here. >> you know, chad myers, we're on the -- chatting with him just a few moments ago, looking at the imagery. he said there were reports of winds up to 80, 90 miles an hour in memphis. you've had reports of damage? that alone is up to severe hurricane force i think so what is the capacity of the city to withstand that, whether or not it actually becomes a severe tornado? >> well, this city is well prepared. they have their emergency management that's been completely geared up and working daily on the problems they had with the flood. they had their resources in order. i've had conversations with them this evening. and they're watching to see what this does and they're ready to respond. >> you know, this is a city that is prepared for these national disasters. have tornadoes gone through memphis in the past? is this something the city has actually experienced? >> you can't live anywhere in the south without having an experience with a tornado. this is something everyone here treats as a fact of life during this time of the year and anytime the weather starts to get warm and that's what we're seeing right now. these communities prepare for this. it's part of the culture. it's part of the history. this is something they do not take lightly. >> thank you so much for that report. let's hope that does not form into another tornado. all right. i'm joined now by storm chaser andy gabrielson in memphis, tennessee, what are you seeing? >> we're just to the east of this storm, going northeast on interstate 40, southeast of lakeland, and what we have is a storm that is very powerful. taking on inflow which is often a signature of a supercell, capable of producing a tornado. we're watching it right now. we did see a funnel. we were in memphis. we were looking over houses and buildings. this storm does have the potential to produce a tornado in my opinion at this time. >> how quickly is the storm right now? is it moving towards downtown memphis? what information can we pass on so folks are better prepared? >> it's moved east of memphis slightly, over the northern parts of the metro area. could be affected. there's it is -- it's closer to bartlett, which is -- of memphis -- >> all right, thank you so much for that. we'll have more on the tornadoes in tennessee when we come back. ♪ [ male announcer ] in 2011, at&t is at work, building up our wireless network all across america. we're adding new cell sites... increasing network capacity, and investing billions of dollars to improve your wireless network experience. from a single phone call to the most advanced data download, we're covering more people in more places than ever before in an effort to give you the b