Joplin News

Some of the photos are crumpled. Others coated in crud. But what the monster tornado couldn't obliterate are the memories captured in the images.

Doctors treating victims hurt badly in Monday's devastating Moore, Okla., tornado should be alert for a rare but deadly complication of wind-whipped debris: fungal infections like those that killed five people after the Joplin, Mo., twister in 2011.

When disaster strikes, Maureen Welborn instinctively wants to help. Though she lives hundreds of miles away, the Buffalo Grove resident converted part of her home into a temporary warehouse as she collected relief items for the victims of the Joplin tornadoes in 2011 and Hurricane Sandy in 2012 .

The devastating tornadoes in Oklahoma that left at least 24 people dead and more than 200 injured probably caused insurance losses totaling in the hundreds of millions of dollars at a minimum, according to Insurance & Technology , a trade publication.

On this day, two years ago, just after 5:30 p.m., a tornado roared into Joplin, Missouri.

Having grown up in Tornado Alley, my husband and I both learned from a young age what to do when the tornado sirens go off.

The deaths of seven children Monday after a mile-wide tornado demolished an Oklahoma public school raises anew questions about America's infrastructure and whether we can do a better job of guarding against the threat of tornadoes and dangerous winds.

Joplin's St. Mary's Catholic Church was destroyed but has plans to be rebuilt and reopened by December 2014.

Monday's monster tornado in Moore, Okla., was a terrible reminder of nature's tremendous wrath for people in Joplin, Mo., a town also hit by one of the country's worst twisters.

The cost of a massive tornado that battered an Oklahoma City suburb could be more than $2 billion, according to a preliminary official estimate announced Wednesday.

A nearly mile-wide tornado struck Joplin, Missouri on May 22, 2011, resulting in more than 160 deaths and destroying a significant portion of the city.

A former U.S. vice president is indicted for treason, the most powerful earthquake ever recorded hits Chile, "Pac-Man" makes his debut, Johnny Carson signs off, and a deadly tornado devastates Joplin, Mo., all on this day.

The tornado that struck the Moore, Okla., area Monday afternoon left an almost 2-mile wide path of destruction, flattening homes and businesses and taking at least 24 lives.

The tornadoes that struck the Midwest this week, killing dozens and destroying hundreds of homes and schools in the Oklahoma City-suburb of Moore, likely caused more than $1 billion in damages.

When tornadoes tore across the Midwest this week, they set their fury against buildings made from the same wood, steel and concrete architectural components used to construct homes a hundred years ago.

By the time I visited Joplin on Labor Day 2011, after the May 22 tornado had struck the southwest Missouri community, much of the damage was still visible.

Robert Siegel speaks with John Farnen, executive director of strategic projects for Mercy Hospital Joplin, regarding lessons of the Joplin, Mo., tornado for rebuilding large structures like the Mercy Hospital Joplin.

Less than three hours after a deadly twister on Monday flattened a swath of Moore, Oklahoma, tornado warning sirens sounded in Joplin, Missouri, 215 miles to the northeast.

Barbara Garcia, a survivor of the massive tornado that struck an Oklahoma City suburb, was being interviewed by a television news crew when her pet Schnauzer was seen peeking out of the rubble.

The damage from Monday's tornado in a suburb of Oklahoma City is likely to exceed that caused by the 2011 twister in Joplin, Missouri, that killed 158 people, Oklahoma Insurance Commissioner John Doak said.