Surge and torrential rain all slamming louisiana 16 years to the day hurricane katrina made landfall. More than 400,000 customers without power right now. That number expected to keep going up as ida makes its way inland. Ida is tied with hurricane laura as the strongest storm on record ever to hit louisiana. The storm s strength no match for the mississippi river, partially reversing its flow. Let s begin with jason carroll in houma, louisiana. What can you tell us? reporter: jim, we have shifted position again to an area that s even closer to this brick building, because the conditions have deteriorated to a point where we just need to be more mindful of our safety. That s where i was standing during the last live report we did with you just a few moments ago. You can see another tree as come down over there. Looking from that vantage point you get a real sense of just how strong the wind is. I could stand there ten minutes ago. Ten minutes later, no longer. If you look right out her
at least six people there killed during a shift change. a nursing home ripped apart in arkansas. families describing terrifying moments, hunkered down in their basements. on the ground here, we see it firsthand. neighborhood after neighborhood destroyed. the grandmother huddled over her grandchildren, one just 14 months old, saving them. one of the only things still standing her christmas tree. late today, kentucky governor andy beshear calling it the deadliest tornado event in state history. tonight, the national guard has now been deployed here, helping in the search for survivors. tens of thousands in the cold and in the dark without power and the temperature dropping. meantime, hospitals here in western kentucky already overwhelmed with covid patients, now treating a rush of victims pulled from flattened homes and buildings. a doctor describing the chaos inside the e.r. victims being brought in on pickup trucks. everyone jumping in to help, pounding on the hospital door
reichmuth live in mayfield, kentucky. good morning, rick. rick: sometimes you get into down, pretty much the entire town looks like this. so anywhere you pull up, you see these kinds of images right here. i m standing in front of what was the first presbyterian church here in mayfield. you see a little bit one of, i believe that is the altar on the inside of the church we re looking at. might be a little hard to see. this is the front door. you come over, this is a car, i bring this up from this tornado according to what we can see radar, you can see debris is in the air and there was debris 35,000 feet in the area. all of these things from this town, from towns before it, shooting up 35,000 feet in the air and traveling potentially 50 to 100 miles in the air. items from this town likely around 100, 150 miles away from here. you have really he no idea what you will be looking at, and where these items are coming from. one of the other danks here, all of the wood shattered or
the tornadoes were spread. they covered a great deal of land across the midwest. about 30 tornadoes known to have touched down. spanning six states. one lone tornado, at least what we think of one lone tornado took a path through four states, covering 250 miles of countryside, including here where i am in western kentucky. according to nbc news, as of this morning, 15 people are confirmed dead in kentucky, but state officials say the number is probably upward of 70. and the majority of those deaths are likely occurring or have likely occurred at the nearby candle factory. it s a place caused mayfield consumer products, it s about eight minutes from where i am right now. there were roughly 110 people working in that factory at time of the storm, at night. the factory, by the way, had been working 24 hours a day, 7 days a week, to meet christmas demand. only 40 of those 110 who were thought to have been in that building have been located so far. we ll be speaking to one of them
words. this has been absolutely devastating. we have entire towns flattened. my count, i know we have lost over 80 lives. i think it s going to be over 100. it may be well over 100. it is so hard to describe. there s not a camera lens big enough to show the path of absolute destruction. people have lost everything. we re talking in the rescue effort of going door to door. there aren t doors. well, today, the extent of the damage is becoming more clear in places like dawson springs, kentucky. one of the hardest hit areas. a survivor relived the moment it struck when he and his family were taking shelter. i m trying to get my mother-in-law picked up, but it was more than my little frame could do. so i hollered to the guy, he come over and help me get her picked up. we got her inside, and then i just i don t know. we just all went around to each of them and tried to make sure i had all the bleeding stopped, and then i started working on trying to figure out how to get us