Massive twister kills at least 91 in central US state of Oklahoma

A massive tornado has ripped through part of the Central US state of Oklahoma, near its Oklahoma City capital, killing 91 so far, including many elementary school children, and leaving a trail of devastation with winds of up to 200 miles (320 km) per hour.

The killer tornado struck the Oklahoma City suburb of Moore Monday afternoon, flattening homes, two schools and a hospital, leaving at least 120 injured with numerous people reported missing.

According to the National Weather Service, the dangerous storm system remains a threat to as many as 10 more US states as more twisters are expected emerge from it.

While rescue and emergency workers searched for more survivors through the rubble of an elementary school that was directly hit by the tornado in Moore, Oklahoma state authorities confirmed 91 deaths on Monday, a figure that is still expected to climb.

The National Weather Service Storm Prediction Center alerted the town about the incoming twister 16 minutes before the tornado touched down at 3:01 p.m. local time, which is more than the average eight to 10 minutes of warning, said Keli Pirtle, a spokeswoman for the center in Norman, Oklahoma.

The weather service further assigned the twister a preliminary ranking of EF4 on the Enhanced Fujita Scale, meaning the second most powerful category of tornado with winds up to 200 mph.

More than 120 people were reportedly being treated at area hospitals, including at least 70 children. Two elementary schools were hit by the major twister. While Plaza Towers Elementary School was directly hit and demolished by the tornado while the school was still in session, Briarwood Elementary was also on the storm’s path and destroyed.

“The whole city looks like a debris field,” Moore’s Mayor Glenn Lewis reportedly told the local media. “It looks like we have lost our hospital. I drove by there a while ago and it’s pretty much destroyed.”

Witnesses, meanwhile, said Monday’s twister in Moore’s seemed quite stronger than the massive tornado that tore through the region in May 1999, killing over 40 residents and demolishing thousands of homes. That tornado reportedly ranked as an EF5, which means that it had winds over 200 mph.

Monday’s storm has been described by the National Weather Service as the deadliest US tornado since the one that killed 161 people in Joplin, Missouri, just two years ago.

Throughout 2012, according to the weather service, there were only 70 reported tornado deaths.