Master Zoro

Deadly tornadoes hit the Midwest

A massive tornado that blasted its way across southwestern Missouri on Sunday slammed into this city with apocalyptic force, tearing into a hospital, upending dozens of cars and scrubbing entire neighborhoods to the earth, leaving only a forest of splintered tree trunks behind.An unknown number were killed in Joplin, and officials struggling to communicate without power and cell phone service were leery of putting a hard figure on a death toll they feared would rise after daybreak.

Asked about a report that 24 people had died, city spokeswoman Lynn Onstot said grimly that officials were "afraid it may be more. ... Our fear is that's a low number." The Missouri National Guard planned to search for the injured throughout the night.

"You see pictures of World War II, the devastation and all that with the bombing. That's really what it looked like," said Kerry Sachetta, the principal of a flattened Joplin High School. "I couldn't even make out the side of the building. It was total devastation in my view. I just couldn't believe what I saw."

The same storm system that produced the Joplin tornado spawned twisters along a broad swath of the Midwest, from Oklahoma to Wisconsin. At least one person was killed in Minneapolis. But the devastation in Missouri appeared to be the worst of the day, eerily reminiscent the tornadoes that killed more than 300 people across the South last month.