Names of 232 missing after Joplin tornado released

JOPLIN, Mo. (AP) — More than 230 people remain unaccounted for four days after the deadliest single tornado in more than six decades tore through the middle of Joplin, Missouri officials said Thursday.

Officials released a list of names and urged any survivors on the list to check in. They said previously they thought many people who are unaccounted for are fine, but simply haven't checked in with family and friends. Cell phone service in Joplin remains spotty.

"Our goal is to get that number to zero," Andrea Spillars, deputy director and general counsel of the Missouri Department of Public Safety, said of the missing. "We will dedicate as much state resources as needed around the clock to ensure those families who have loved ones that they cannot find are connected."

But Spillars also said officials know some of the people on the missing list are dead. She wouldn't say how many or say when names of the deceased would be released.

One example of the potential overlap: 12 residents of the Greenbriar Nursing Home are listed as missing. But nursing home administrators reported earlier that 11 people died in the tornado; only one resident was known missing.

The death toll rose Wednesday to 125 people, not all of them identified, and officials have estimated more than 900 were injured.

Some families have complained about not being allowed into the morgue to try to identify missing relatives. Asked about that Thursday, Don Bloom, the deputy commander for family assistance for the mortuary team, said "the process has to take its time. We have to be 100 percent accurate."

Search-and-rescue teams have made multiple sweeps through the destruction, using dozens of dogs and listening devices in hopes of picking up the faint sound of anyone still alive beneath the collapsed homes and businesses. No new survivors have been pulled from the rubble since Tuesday.

Greenbriar Nursing Home resident Dorothy Hartman is among those missing. Pamela McBroom, 49, who lives near the nursing home, said one of her daughters used to work there, developed a soft spot for Hartman and introduced them. Hartman, who had Alzheimer's disease, was frail "but very positive and full of life," she said.

McBroom said she and her 16-year-old daughter were hiding in a closet when the tornado tore their walls and roof away. Her walls gone, McBroom could see the mayhem at Greenbriar.

"I could see people flying out of the nursing home by my house," McBroom said. "I could hear them screaming. Just screaming. It was horrible."