>> i was sitting there watching tv. the tv went off. so i got up to go in the kitchen and get a cup of coffee. and all of a sudden, boy, the windows went out just like a big shotgun went off. and i told my wife, hit the floor. she says, i'm down there already. >> today's most devastating losses are in southern illinois. officials in harrisburg say a tornado with winds of up to 170-mile-per-hour stayed on the ground for several miles killing at least six people, injuring around 100. at one point it hit the hospital. after sur vague the devastation to his town the mayor and fire chief spoke to reporters just a short time ago. >> this morning the city of harrisburg had a horrific event. we have suffered the loss of lives. we've suffered many injuries. and we've suffered millions of dollars worth of damage. this is something that you never want to see happen in your community. we watched as it happened to joplin, missouri last year. several of our people from this area went there to help. and today we find ourselves in need. >> we did have some fatalities which we couldn't control. but we did. nd we're able to get a lot of people out of the houses. just unreal. it's like a war zone if you haven't seen that area there. >> the destruction of this storm system is quite far-reaching. here's one man's story from greenville, kentucky. he went back home after a tornado put seven stitches in his chin and four staples in his head. >> when they say you hear a train you do. i got up and took two steps off the couch and then me and the two dogs i have and the trailer started rolling down the hill. and you can see what's left. and after i rolled five times, i can remember everything about it. i was -- once it hit the ground on the fifth time everything just -- i saw daylight. and i was sitting up against the stove down there just leaned up with my back against it like i was sitting in a chair. i don't know how i'm here. no doubt. the good lord just didn't call me is all i know. wasn't my time. >> this afternoon the storm swept across kentucky and tennessee. meteorologist chad myers is here at the cnn severe weather center. as we hear about the devastation this morning, at this moment tell us who should be worried now. >> parts of kentucky, tennessee, mississippi, alabama and even here in georgia. and in virginia and the carolinas later tonight. the problem is, they've been asking me all day, will this be as bad of a night as it was last night. i said, you know what? there will be as many tornadoes tonight but will towns get in the way? in the weather office we don't say that tornadoes hit towns. towns get in the way of the tornado. because that tornado is going to go that way, anyway. will something be in the way of its path? and last night 170 miles per hour, tornadoes were just ravaging parts of southern illinois. 16 of them at least. probably still more than that because they'll be out looking at them. now look at this. john, 750 miles across from east to west. 670 or so miles from north to south. that's the area of severe weather that we're worried about. this is the area that got hit last night but now it's moving to the southeast so all of these areas could also be hit by those same tornadoes. hopefully it just hits farmland. that's typically what happens. people here are saying are towns now getting hit more? you have to understand, towns are bigger now. towns are bigger than they were before. there are more people living in the city. cities are bigger. there's less farmland out there. so yes, cities are getting hit more often. but only because what was the outskirts or just a suburb or just an empty farmland of a city is now part of a new subdivision. there are more people living in these bigger cities. cities are getting bigger. the odds of getting hit are bigger yet. we're going to watch it for you be back tonight. we're going to tell you what this ef 4 tornado means. 170 miles per hour through harrisburg, illinois last night. that's a monster storm. john. >> 170 miles per hour. chad is going to be with us throughout the evening to help us assess this as what goes on later tonight and what happened earlier today. to find out more on how you can help those affected by the midwest tornadoes go to cnn.com/impact there. you'll find all the organizations and all the ways you can help people in need tonight. that's cnn.com/impact. just a short time ago i spoke with vince ashley, the ceo of the harrisburg medical center, a local hospital in southern illinois which had to evacuate patients today after extensive tornado damage as you can see in that photograph. mr. ashley, let me just start with the hit the medical center took this morning. what happened? >> well, about 5:30 this morning a tornado came through town. and the hospital was on the very northern end of the damage trail. it did hit the hospital and took out about 80 feet of exterior wall, which exposed three patient rooms, an office and a diagnostic room. and then it took out four windows and other patient rooms and took off significant amounts of the hospital's roof. and fortunately the weather alert system had given us about a 20-minute advance notice. we were able to evacuate all of the patients from those areas into a more secure section of the building. and as a result we had no injuries. >> thank god for that, sir. to do all that damage, that's some pretty powerful force that hit the hospital head on. >> it did. >> and what now? with the damage you suffered are you able to take care of the people in the community who have been hurt in this tragedy? >> fortunately the emergency room and all of the activities that support it were on the other side of the building and were undamaged. so the emergency room, radiology, laboratory, pharmacy, all of those services were still functioning. we had an influx of about 50 patients very quickly. we were able to accommodate them through our e.r. and outpatient areas. we had physicians and nurses from all the surrounding communities that just showed up, and as a result we had plenty of professional personnel. and we were able to take care of all 50 of those patients. the problem we have now is that all of the air handler units which were on the roof of the building were blown away. and so we have no heat in the building. and because we have no heat and obvious holes in the roof, we have evacuated all inpatients and we have successfully done that. but we are still operating the emergency services. >> and in terms of the emergency services, sir, help me understand the range of the injuries and the trauma you're dealing with. >> we had four fatalities that came through our e.r. we had three more major traumas that were airlifted to other facilities. and the rest, they ran the gamut from chest wounds to a lot of broken bones and a lot of cuts and bruising. but it was a very long morning. >> i understand your point about the heat and your inability to keep inpatients because of that. in terms of the emergency services, are you short any medical supplies you need ower ? >> we were on generator for probably four hours. and we have received back-up supplies from several of the hospitals in the area and local businesses have shown up at our back door with things like cases of bottled water, and just a wide variety of supplies and food items. and it's been quite an outpouring. and so we're still in business and still seeing emergency patients. and they are still finding people in the debris and bringing them in. >> still finding people in the debris and bringing them in. what is the prognosis, sir? do you have any sense of how many are missing in the community? how long you have to find them? >> no, i don't. >> have you ever seen anything like this? >> i have not, no. i know these things happen. and i've seen tornadoes before but i have not seen one quite like this. and to have it hit the hospital and we continue to operate is i felt quite an aachievement and tribute to my staff. >> vince ashley the ceo of the harrisburg medical center. sir we appreciate your time on this traumatic day. god bless you and those working to help you in the community. >> thank you, sir. the illinois governor pat quinn as we speak is in the town of harrisburg devastated tonight many we're going to talk to the governor in just a moments. also late-breaking political news we want to tell you about tonight that takes off a bit of the luster off mitt romney's wins last night. mitt romney and rick santorum will split michigan's convention delegates even though romney clearly won the popular vote. romney gets all the arizona delegates that state winner take all. a campaign source tells me the former pennsylvania senator will report raising $9 million from more than 100,000 contributors in the month of february. that same source says today he's been one of santorum campaign's best fundraising days of the cycle. coming up we'll have an update on where today's deadly storms are heading tonight. plus a major policy shift today from north korea's new leadership. we'll dissect the new developments with the bush administration's former top korean negotiator. well, online dating services can get kind of expensive. so to save money, i've found a new way to get my profile out there. check me out. everybody says i've got a friendly disposition and they love my spinach dip. five foot ten... still doing a little exploring. but... my sign is sagittarius, i'm into spanish cheese, my hairline is receding but i'm getting a weave. getting a weave. there's an easier way to save. who wants some ronald tonight!? 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[ female announcer ] discover what's next in your life. get this free travel bag when you join at aarp.org/jointoday. get this free travel bag when you join ah, welcome to hotels.com. i get it...guys weekend. yeah! if you're looking for a place to get together, you came to the right place. because here at hotels.com, we're only about hotels. yeah! yeah! noooo. yeah! finding you the perfect place is all we do. welcome to hotels.com right now we're watching a line of strong storms moving into the mid-atlantic states and across the southeast. tornado warnings from ohio through kentucky, tennessee, georgia, alabama and mississippi. right now we're seeing reports of 100-mile-per-hour wind gusts associated with a line of thunderstorms in northwestern alabama. storms killed at least nine people in illinois and missouri today. the illinois governor pat quinn joins us now live from harrisburg, a southern illinois town devastated today. governor i spoke to the hospital ceo earlier today. said they were taking care of patients but he didn't know how many more they were going to bring. in how many are missing tonight in that community? and what is the potential, sadly, for the fatalities to go up? >> well, there's nobody missing as far as we know. everybody's accounted for. got about 100 injured, various grease of injury. we want them all to recover. we lost six people. we prayed for their repose of their soul and we thank god for their lives. it was really inspiring, i think, how people came together at 4:30 and 5:00 this morning telling their neighbors to get to safety. right now you can hear the sound of chain saws and carpenters with hammers and fixing up roofs. we've already deployed our whole state government resources and we're working with the federal government. i got a call from the white house to use all federal resources to help people get back on their feet. >> we can see the shopping center over your shoulder, sir. we're showing other pictures of the devastation on television right now. as you make your way through the community you say everyone's accounted for. if that's the case what's the biggest need, the biggest question mark at this hour? >> well, anytime you have a traumatic event like, this 175-mile-per-hour winds coming right through your house and your stores, it's traumatic. people have to kind of get back on their feet, say prayers that they recovered, and just sort of hold each other. i've been doing that with lots of people all over harrisburg p and southern illinois. folks have come from every part of our state and other states to help their neighbors. folks from joplin, missouri came. and i think that's what america is all about. it's the heart of america, it's the heart of a volunteer. we have a lot of volunteers helping their neighbor. >> is there anything that people need, the community needs right now that people from surrounding communities could maybe help out with before the government can get its resources together? >> i believe in the power of prayer. you can always pray. also i think the resources of our state government are being deployed. we have a great emergency management agency. our state police, our conservation folks. everybody's. in nobody's left out. and then the other thing we're going to have to do, i declared it a state disaster area. we've got to assess all this damage and then ultimately we'll file something with the federal government for federal disaster area. but federal government has really been rise together occasion. i got a call from janet napolitano a few minutes ago. i was told by the white house that the president asked right away this morning what can we do to help illinois and the people of this wonderful town of harrisburg. it's really enspiring to see americans come together in tough times. >> it certainly is, governor, we wish you the best. we wish those communities the best and we'll keep in touch in the days ahead. thank you for your time on a difficult evening, sir. >> thanks, john. >> take care, sir. we want to shift. we'll continue to track the severe weather systems that move across the country. want to move important international developments today. in a very significant policy shift today from north korea's new leaders, they've agreed to suspend their nuclear weapons program and they say stop testing long-range missiles in exchange for food aid from the united state united states. secretary of state hillary clinton confirmed it today. >> today's announcement represents -- north korea's new leaders by their actions. >> with us now the former state department spokesman christopher hill. he led the bush administration's talks with north korea and its neighbors. you could hear the caution, maybe a bit of skepticism from secretary of state hillary clinton there. is the first issue trust? >> well, i think the first issue is really where we're going with. this i think secretary clinton was absolutely right to be very cautious in her statement. it is indeed a first step. on the other hand it's the first step that we've seen from this new government, the first decision they've made in this regard, during this kim jong-un period. so i think it is significant. but we need to be careful with it and regard it as modest. >> you understand this regime, the prior regime as well as anybody on the planet, sir, from the american perspective. do you believe there could be an opening under this new young untested leader? >> well, it suggests that they might be prepared to move back to the negotiation. the problem is they essentially made the negotiation impossible back in '08 when they wouldn't give us the verification we needed to go check on suspicious sites. they would only allow us to verify the actual plutonium which we could already do from outer space and frankly from everywhere else. so the real question will of course be in the details. but the fact that we have this kind of prestep as ambassador davies referred to it is something that i think we need to follow up and we need to see if this can get us somewhere. >> and the administration previously had declined and been very reluctant to link food aid to any concessions if you will in the nuclear standpoint. is this a good move, smart move? >> well, i think the administration is still reluctant to do that. you notice the state department statement was very careful in that regard. but as i understand it there's going to be a discussion directly with the north koreans some discussions to determine precisely their need and also the monitoring requirements of food. so i think that assuming a food deal does go through, it will be very consistent with how we do food aid in the rest of the world, that is to assess the need, to assess the relative need elsewhere, and very importantly to make sure that we have the monitoring of the food aid that we need. i'm sure all those conditions will be met. >> let me ask you lastly, how long will it take for you to be satisfied that when the inspectors go in, international atomic energy inspectors go in they're getting all the access they need and want as opposed to this being some kind of a stunt? >> well, first of all, the inspectors who go in there will be monitoring what the north koreans have said they're doing, which is to stop the any enrichment activities. so it will be very interesting if they get into the enrichment facility. so far only one u.s. scientist had a very fleeting glimpse of it. so this will be important. but in terms of finding out whether they have another facility which everyone suspects that they may have, i think that's kind of down the road. and i think there's going to be a lot of negotiation. i do believe, though, this is an important day for the u.s. and china relationship. it appears that the chinese worked hard on this. and also the south koreans. so i do believe it's a step in the right direction. >> chris miller, appreciate your help and insights on this very important development. thank you, sir. >> thank you. we're tracking that violent storm system that swept across the midwest and continues to threaten parts of the country today. coming up where it's headed and the destruction it left behind. plus closing in on a deal that could allow 16 americans to leave egypt. new details tonight on just how they might come home. to keep big winter jobs on track, at&t provided a mobile solution that lets everyone from field workers to accounting, initiate, bill, and track work in real time. you can't live under a dome in minnesota, that's why there's guys like me. 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