Deadly Storms Hit Oklahoma

Samaritan's Purse | Updated: May 21, 2013

Deadly Storms Hit Oklahoma

Samaritan’s Purse is responding to a series of vicious storms that pounded the Oklahoma City area Sunday and Monday.

Staff members are on their way to the affected area to determine how we can help the people impacted by the tornadoes that raked the area. A Disaster Relief Unit is being deployed from our North Carolina headquarters.

A mile-wide twister pounded the Oklahoma City suburbs Monday, leveling homes, businesses and schools in Moore. The funnel cloud could be seen for miles, creating a debris field several miles wide. Weather officials estimated the strength of the tornado to be an EF-4 or EF-5, with radar estimates suggesting it had the potential to produce 200 mph winds.

Samaritan’s Purse responded when Moore was hit hard by a tornado in 1999. That storm included the highest winds ever recorded near the earth’s surface, 302 mph, and killed 41 people.

On Sunday, another large tornado hit Shawnee, a town southeast of Oklahoma City, leveling several mobile homes, overturning vehicles, and killing at least one person, according to news reports.

The storms were part of a severe system that generated tornadoes in Kansas, Oklahoma, and Iowa. Dozen of counties in Kansas, Nebraska, Iowa, Oklahoma, Minnesota, Wisconsin, Illinois, and Missouri were placed under tornado watches and warnings.

Samaritan’s Purse is already responding to tornadoes that hit Hood County in Texas on Wednesday night. Volunteers began helping in Granbury on Monday, the first day we were allowed into the affected area.

Please pray for the people impacted by the storms, and for those in danger from the severe weather. Please pray for Samaritan’s Purse as we work in Texas and prepare to help in Oklahoma.

If you are interested making a donation to help tornado victims, please contact Samaritan's Purse.

c. 2013 Samaritan's Purse. Used with permission.



Deadly Storms Hit Oklahoma