that, i want to emphasize something that has only been eluded to. that s the thing that differentiates this particular case from the dugard case, to the hornbec case is that this is a situation where the individuals themselves affected their own release. amanda berry was not to be denied in this. this was very unusual and very different. here s what i was thinking. that, you know, we ve had six months of inclement and treacherous weather in this country. we had a mass shooting that took the lives of many, many which i shall. children. we had a terrorist attack that killed people and sorried in a horrible way one of our premier sporting events. we ve had a fert liezer plant blow up like an atomic bomb. we have a completely ineffective government.
differentiates this particular case from the dugard case, to the hornbec case is that this is a situation where the individuals themselves affected their own release. amanda berry was not to be denied in this. this was very unusual and very different. here s what i was thinking. that, you know, we ve had six months of inclement and treacherous weather in this country. we had a mass shooting that took the lives of many, many which i shall. children. we had a terrorist attack that killed people and sorried in a horrible way one of our premier sporting events. we ve had a fert liezer plant blow up like an atomic bomb. we have a completely ineffective government. this is the tonic america night right now to feel good about itself. it is a miracle. what is your understanding about what thought?
a nursing home, a school has been affected. at this point, they are hoping to go house to house this is a residential area around this fert liezer plant. so there is much concern about the impact of this blast. so we ll continue to watch that story. and, rose mary, more than 30 departments from two different counties are assisting in the hazmatt and fire fighting efforts. joining me now is a spokesman for the waco police department. waco texas is about 18 miles north of where this explosion happened in west texas. sergeant, thank you for being with us. my first question, a lot of concern about the number of fatalities and the number of people who have died. is there any update on that? yeah, i can tell you, at this point, we have confirmed fatalities. we are not giving out a number. there have been lots of estimates and guesstimations on numbers. but we are not doing that short of saying we have hundreds that have been injured in the
explode again. we re not worried about property right now. our main goal right now is to get people safe. do you have a rough number of lives that were lost? i do not know right now. it s going to be a number, you know. i can t give you a number right now, but there s going to be a number. i cannot confirm or deny that. i wish i could tell you something, but i do not have that number. is this fire under control? the firefighters are not fighting the fire right now. they re in the area, but they cannot get close to it because of the toxic fumes that are coming off of it right now. is there a danger of fumes outside the plant? there is. i think they ve cleared the area. they ve moved people back even further. so half of that town is totally, totally evacuated. what we re worried about now is
know, other ingredients there on the facility. we don t want that to explode again. right now, question cannot get firefighters in there. right now, we re not worried about property. we want people safe. that s our main goal. and just to confirm, what d.l. wilson, the department of public safety spokesperson was saying there, emergency officials now believe that 60-80 homes and apartments have been levelled. rescue workers have been unable to get anywhere close to the plant because that fire is still burning and releasing toxic chemicals into the air. the west fertilizer plant is about 15 miles west of waco. west texas is home of about 2600 people.