TORNADO'S TRACK

New Zealand Times, Volume LII, Issue 12093, 21 March 1925, Page 5

TORNADO'S TRACK

ENORMOUS DEVASTATION THIRTY-ONE TOWNS WHOLLY OR ' PARTIALLY DESTROYED. PEOPLE CAUGHT UNAWARES. By Telegraph.—Press Assp.—Copyright. Australian and N.Z. Cable Association. (Received March 20, 9.46 p.m.) NEW YORK, March 19. Twenty-four hours after the disastrous tornado, details which are coming in only intensify the horror of the tragedy which claimed so large a toll of life in five States. Reports from Tennessee now indicate that 30 people 'were killed there. No less than 31 towns were completely dr partially destroyed, and damage to property is as yet untold. President Coolidge immediately ordered the National Red Cross to marshall all its efforts for relief work, and this organisation combined with Federal State and private institutions in the great task of caring for the injured, sheltering the Homeless, hunting for bodies in tangled debris, helping families to identify their dead, and improving morgues. ! WHOLESALE BURIALS. Many little towns and villages were filled with victims, while makeshift hospitals were founded. Physicians and nurses were working incessaptly, taking no rest. In all, 160 car loads of supplies and provisions hare been despatched to the various afflicted centres. . , , The burials in most places will be wholesale, there being neither time nor opportunity for- individual interment. -The presence of troops at various places proved a godsend) as looting was going on. Six arrests already have been reported. The trdjjpefs, moreover, pressed sightseers into their service, with axes and shovels, and as stretcher hearers. WaEer_ and light proved two great needs, since rescue Work was impeded at night owing to the severance of all electno wires. Bind broken water-mains increased the risk of pesitilefice. Women and children provided . the greatest number of deaths. NO PREPARATION POSSIBLE. The storm came with such suddenness that any preparation against danger was impossible. This area, which is often subjected to oyclones and wind disturbances, is generally provided with adequate means of protection, in the shape of so-called cyclone cellars, to which people hasten on the first sign of disturbance, hut this tornado caught the populaoe unawares. The wind was freakish, whipping close to the ground at times and then lifting high 1 , and carrying aehris like a black flying cloud, moving with the greatest imaginable rapidity. Relief efforts are bqing centred in towns and villages, but isolated rural dwellers «Ibo suffered great damage, and there, with the exception of introcommunity aid, people are virtually without assistance. Hundreds throughout* this area are homeless. The month of March, which usually is bitterly wintry throughout the afflicted area, is mercifully mild just now, -and this circumstance is partially reducing the suffering. ' MONTHS OF WORK AHEAD.,; The storm came a few minutes before the schools were ’ let out in most plabes, and thus caught the children within toe schoolhouses, killing large numbers of them. Fires are still burning ip many communities, and the work of extinguishifig -them is rendered more difficult by the inflammable nature of the debris, and the lack of water. Months of relief work will he neoessary before anything like adequate care can be given to the afflicted areas. It is thought that toe deaths number between 700 and 1000, and that the injured exqeed 3000.