US President Barack Obama visited tornado-devastated Moore, Oklahoma, consoling people staggered by the loss of life and property, and promising that the government will be behind them “every step of the way.”
The extraordinarily powerful twister that struck Moore was known as an EF5, ranking it at the top of the enhanced Fujita scale used to measure tornado strength.
“I’m just a messenger here,” the president said during the visit on Sunday. “Folks are behind you across the US.”
He offered moral and monetary support in the wake of the monstrous tornado that killed 24 people, including 10 children, on Monday last week.
Standing with Oklahoma Governor Mary Fallin and other state and federal officials, Obama talked about the substantial rebuilding job ahead and said: “Our hearts go out to you.”
The White House said the US Federal Emergency Management Agency has already provided US$57 million in rebates and incentives to help build about 12,000 storm shelters in Oklahoma.
“These storm shelters can be the difference between life and death,” presidential spokesman Josh Earnest told reporters.
For Obama, Sunday’s visit had an all-too-familiar ring.
Only five months into his second term, he has traveled to the northeast to console people in the wake of the Boston Marathon bombing, and visited Connecticut and Arizona to comfort people traumatized by shooting rampages. He also has undertaken his consoler-in-chief role at the site of plant explosions and mine disasters, not to mention a series of natural disasters, including Joplin, Missouri, which was hit by a tornado, and the Jersey Shore, which was heavily damaged by Superstorm Sandy last year.
Obama urged the public to make contributions, saying the damage was “pretty hard to comprehend.”
Obama said the tornado destroyed about 1,200 homes and damaged thousands more.
Shortly after his arrival on a partly cloudy day, Obama rode past grassy fields strewn with scattered debris, witnessing devastation so awesome that it appeared as if garbage had literally rained from the sky. His first stop was the demolished site of the Plaza Towers Elementary School, where seven students were killed when the tornado turned the one-story building into a heap of bricks, broken concrete and twisted metal.
“I know this is tough,” he told superintendent Susie Pierce as he gripped her hand.
As he walked, the demolished school was on his left and on his right, homes as far as the eye could see were reduced to piles of rubble. Vehicles were turned upside down and toys, like a pink doll carriage and children’s books, were strewn with furniture and ripped-out wall insulation. Every tree had been stripped of its leaves and bark.
Obama at one point joined the Lewis family, who lost their home behind the school. He said the important thing was that they survived and could replace their things.
“What a mess,” he told their son Zack, a third-grader at the shattered school.
Zack’s father, Scott, ran into the school just before the storm hit and ran with his terrified son back to their home’s storm shelter.
“You’ve got some story to tell,” Obama told the boy. “This is something you’ll remember all your life.”
An endangered baby pygmy hippopotamus that shot to social media stardom in Thailand has become a lucrative source of income for her home zoo, quadrupling its ticket sales, the institution said Thursday. Moo Deng, whose name in Thai means “bouncy pork,” has drawn tens of thousands of visitors to Khao Kheow Open Zoo this month. The two-month-old pygmy hippo went viral on TikTok and Instagram for her cheeky antics, inspiring merchandise, memes and even craft tutorials on how to make crocheted or cake-based Moo Dengs at home. A zoo spokesperson said that ticket sales from the start of September to Wednesday reached almost
‘BARBAROUS ACTS’: The captain of the fishing vessel said that people in checkered clothes beat them with iron bars and that he fell unconscious for about an hour Ten Vietnamese fishers were violently robbed in the South China Sea, state media reported yesterday, with an official saying the attackers came from Chinese-flagged vessels. The men were reportedly beaten with iron bars and robbed of thousands of dollars of fish and equipment on Sunday off the Paracel Islands (Xisha Islands, 西沙群島), which Taiwan claims, as do Vietnam, China, Brunei, Malaysia and the Philippines. Vietnamese media did not identify the nationalities of the attackers, but Phung Ba Vuong, an official in central Quang Ngai province, told reporters: “They were Chinese, [the boats had] Chinese flags.” Four of the 10-man Vietnamese crew were rushed
Scientists yesterday announced a milestone in neurobiological research with the mapping of the entire brain of an adult fruit fly, a feat that might provide insight into the brains of other organisms and even people. The research detailed more than 50 million connections between more than 139,000 neurons — brain nerve cells — in the insect, a species whose scientific name is Drosophila melanogaster and is often used in neurobiological studies. The research sought to decipher how brains are wired and the signals underlying healthy brain functions. It could also pave the way for mapping the brains of other species. “You might
PROTESTS: A crowd near Congress waved placards that read: ‘How can we have freedom without education?’ and: ‘No peace for the government’ Argentine President Javier Milei has made good on threats to veto proposed increases to university funding, with the measure made official early yesterday after a day of major student-led protests. Thousands of people joined the demonstration on Wednesday in defense of the country’s public university system — the second large-scale protest in six months on the issue. The law, which would have guaranteed funding for universities, was criticized by Milei, a self-professed “anarcho-capitalist” who came to power vowing to take a figurative chainsaw to public spending to tame chronically high inflation and eliminate the deficit. A huge crowd packed a square outside Congress
RSS