PHL execs checking for Pinoy casualties after deadly tornado in Oklahoma

Philippine officials in the United States are coordinating with Filipino communities in Oklahoma City and surrounding areas to check if there were Filipinos among the casualties of a new tornado there.

In a radio interview, Philippine Embassy Consul Elmer Cato said Tuesday (Manila time) they have not received any information about Filipinos being among the 51 fatalities so far.

"Mino-monitor ng embassy at consulate ang situation. In touch ang Consul General sa members of the Filipino community," Cato said in an interview over radio dzBB.

He said there are about 100,000 Filipinos staying in the US midwest, adding that about 10,000 Filipinos are staying in Oklahoma City and surrounding areas.

"Wala pang reports, sana walang naapektuhan na kababayan natin," Cato said.

On Twitter, the Philippine Embassy in Washington said it continues to monitor the situation.

"Consul General (Leo) Herrera-Lim says the Consulate wants to make sure the 100,000 Filipinos in affected areas are all accounted for," the consulate said.

The Consulate had reported there were no Filipino casualties in an earlier tornado that struck Oklahoma City on Sunday.

Three-kilometer wide tornado

 A three-kilometer wide tornado tore through the Oklahoma City suburb of Moore on Monday, killing at least 51 people including 20 children, destroying entire tracts of homes and trapping two dozen school children beneath rubble.

Rescue teams raced against the setting sun and worked into the darkness in search of survivors as the dangerous storm system threatened several southern Plains states with more twisters.

The Oklahoma medical examiner confirmed 51 deaths including 20 children, making it the deadliest U.S. tornado since one killed 161 people in Joplin, Missouri. Area hospitals reported at least 230 people injured, including at least 45 children.

Emergency crews searched the rubble of Plaza Towers Elementary School to look for two dozen missing children, Oklahoma Lieutenant Governor Todd Lamb said. The school took a direct hit from the tornado, Lamb told CNN.

The National Weather Service Storm Prediction Center provided the town with a warning 16 minutes before the tornado touched down at 3:01 p.m. local time (2001 GMT), which is greater than the average eight to 10 minutes of warning, said Keli Pirtle, a spokeswoman for the center in Norman, Oklahoma.

The notice was upgraded to emergency warning with "heightened language" at 2:56 p.m., or five minutes before the tornado touched down, Pirtle said.

The National Weather Service 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 (320 km per hour).

The U.S. Federal Aviation Administration (FAA) imposed a temporary flight restriction that allowed only relief aircraft in the area, saying it was at the request of local police who wanted quiet to search for buried survivors. - with a report from Reuters, VVP, GMA News