More than 150 injured in Picher w/ Wally Kennedy interview audio

By Roger McKinney

rmckinney@joplinglobe.com

PICHER, Okla. — Tressie Gilmore was preparing dinner for her two daughters on Saturday when she looked out the window. She saw a tornado on the west side of a chat pile, stirring up debris.

She said she grabbed her girls — one in each arm — and dived into a closet along with her mother and stepfather, Joan and John Hutchison.

Gilmore, who lives in Miami, was visiting her mother and stepfather on Saturday.

While inside the closet, Gilmore said, she felt the house move from its foundation.

“We slid with the house on top of us,” she said. “The girls were in my arms.”

The house came to rest several feet from its foundation.

They were trapped inside the wreckage for 20 or 30 minutes

The girls, Kaitlynn, 5, and Layla, 2, were unharmed except for a few scratches. Gilmore also was uninjured.

Her mother required hospitalization for bruised ribs, but Gilmore said she was expected to be released Sunday afternoon.

“They’re just going to start over,” Gilmore said when asked what her mother and stepfather were going to do next.

Six dead

Six people were confirmed dead from the tornado in Picher, said Michelann Ooten, public information officer with the Oklahoma Department of Emergency Management. She said more than 150 people were injured.

George Brown, public information officer for the Oklahoma Highway Patrol, said it may be several days before the names of the dead are released. He said Sunday that the victims have not all been identified, and relatives must be notified after the dead are identified.