Twisters kill 8 people in heartland, others injured

LONE GROVE, Okla. - Emergency crews searched for more victims Wednesday amid the wreckage of homes and businesses smashed by a cluster of tornadoes that killed at least eight people.

One young woman was lifted into the air as a tornado pulled the roof off a house, but her mother and others held her down.

Firefighters moved aside bricks and fallen walls as they sought to ensure there were no additional victims in Lone Grove, Okla. where all of the eight victims died Tuesday and 14 people were seriously injured, said Oklahoma Department of Emergency Management spokeswoman Michelann Ooten. Each building that had been searched was marked with a large, spray-painted “X.”

Rescuers found one woman injured but alive under an overturned mobile home.
Ooten said the National Guard was sent to help. “We will do everything we can to get Oklahomans the assistance they need,” Gov. Brad Henry said.

Buildings were damaged or destroyed throughout the town of about 4,600, some 100 miles south of Oklahoma City, said Chester Agan, assistant emergency manager for Carter County.

The eight confirmed deaths included seven people in Lone Grove and a truck driver who was driving through the area, said Robert Deaton, interim chief investigator for state Medical Examiner’s office.

Most of the deaths were in an area of mobile homes that was virtually wiped out, said Paul Sund, a spokesman for the governor.

“Some were outside, some were inside,” said Cherokee Ballard, a spokeswoman for the medical examiner’s office. Most of the deaths appeared to be blunt force trauma to the head, some apparently hit by flying objects, she said.

“One victim was found underneath a pickup truck the tornado had lifted and dropped on him,” Ballard said.

There was no storm shelter near the mobile home park.