Estate offices is inundated. callers are begging. they were desperate. they said we have to have this house. we have to, there is nowhere else to go. so bad, fema is considering housing 50 miles away. this in my experience is the most intensely devastating disaster that i have ever seen. reporter: hotels fully booked. then tonya made this extraordinary offer. we re welling to open up our home to any body who might need a place. reporter: that puts everything into perspective. people are like wow, you lost everything. i didn t lose everything. i still have everything. that s just stuff. reporter: the devastation here has been so vast that a full week after that tornado ripped through here, the federal government and the city of joplin are still trying to figure out exactly how many homes were destroyed and how many people were displaced. matt gutman, abc news, joplin, missouri.
Fewer homes here in joplin to rent so they have nothing to offer their clients. there is a bidding war on right now. and we canvassed hotels and found not a single room available. we ran into one person who had no rooms available. had 100 calls that day, asking for rooms at the marriott and said i have nothing to offer you. but i have two rooms in my own house. i can offer them to any body who wants to come. we have seen other signs of generosity here in town. the circus came out, elephant helped move debris. some found it amusing. others did not. found it slightly cruel to the animal. either way an effort to try to make these people s lives a little bit better. we re finding two things in the city because of the housing shortage. one some say they can t ever come back here. others say because this community has bonded together and is now so tight-knit, how could they ever leave. matt gutman, abc news, joplin, missouri. chicago is expecting more hot weather today after memorial
Workers sprayed the reactors with chemicals to prevent radiation from spreading. there are increasing concerns the storm could carry contaminated material by air. the rains already caused radioactive water levels inside reactors to rise, prompting fears that water could spill out into the ocean. in fukushima s soma city, flooding forced roughly 80 evacuees to return to a familiar place. but there are little complaints. aikiko fujita, abc news, tokyo. just unbelievable. they have endured so much. let s take a look locally at your forecast. isolated tornados, 80 mile an hour winds and large hail in st. louis, chicago, and milwaukee. also severe around abilene, oklahoma city and joplin, missouri. rain in the pacific northwest, light snow in the cascades. and rockies. and the heat wave in the east continues. 95, baltimore, 93, atlanta,
71, boise. 78, salt lake. 84 in albuquerque. the number of people unaccounted for after the joplin tornado is down to 29. the original list had more than 200 names. most of these people have turned up alive. in the meantime, there are housing challenges for those who survived the devastating storm. matt gutman reports from joplin. reporter: what do you do when your house is eviscerated in seconds? where do you go? holly fleming had no choice. i had to get a roof over their heads. reporter: she packed all ten grandchildren and children off to her mother s house and scrambled to find a rental, competing with other bidders. i said i will pay you a year in advance. reporter: there went her nest egg. the tornado flattened 30% of the city. destroying an estimated 8,000 buildings, leaving up to 20,000 people homeless. most are with friends and family. others in hotel or shelters. rebuilding joplin could take years. but these people need a home now. one of joplin s biggest real
In fort pierre, north dakota. voluntary evacuations are under way in the state. fema is considering bringing in hurricane katrina-style trailers for the thousands who lost their homes in joplin. officials are appealing to landlords within 50 miles of joplin to make more rental properties available. with more about the housing crisis, here is matt gutman. reporter: this is the highest point in all of joplin, offering this panoramic view, west to east, of this destruction. 13 miles long. most of what you see around me are people s homes destroyed. now adding to that misery, now learning of a housing crunch here in joplin. even people with money to spend can t buy or rent a house. we spoke to one woman who said she had to pay a year s worth of rent as a deposit to get into an apartment there were so many other people competing for it. realtors are telling us they re getting hundreds of calls a day, the phones don t stop ringing but the problem is, there is 30%