The death toll jumped to 116 on Monday after a massive tornado tore through Joplin, Mossouri on Sunday. leaving six miles of destruction: a forest of splintered tree trunks where neighborhoods once stood; a hospital and high school destroyed,; and cars crushed like soda cans.
Emergency crews searched through the night and through a thunderstorm with driving rain on Monday for additional survivors. June report: Death toll now at 159.
Stories like the following have been told:
"Beth Lansaw has been left devastated as her son, Don Lansaw, 31, paid the ultimate price to save his wife in the Joplin tornado. Reports indicate that he threw his body over his wife as they sheltered themselves in the bathtub when the 200 mph tornado tore up their house in Joplin, Mo.. “Why him? And I won't know that until I'm there with him – there with our maker, to ask him why.” Don Lansaw's wife, Bethany, 25, has told the heartbreaking story of how her husband Don bravely put himself between the destructive tornado and herself. She said, “He got on top of me to take the brunt of most of it … he’s my hero.”
She added, “The house was ripping apart, it all happened so fast. The pillows were flying off us, and the only thing I managed to do was keep one in front of my face.” However, as the tornado passed and the storm died down in Joplin, the tragedy of the situation was soon made clear to her, as she noticed her husband had turned blue. He died soon after. Speaking of her childhood sweetheart and husband of six years, Bethany testified to NBC News, “He just had so much love in his heart …People kept saying he wouldn’t have wanted it any other way, but if I could have taken twice as much damage just to have him alive, I would have.
“He did what he could to protect his family.”
