The horror of the Joplin tornado is the subject of a new documentary film, released nearly 14 years after the twister struck Missouri with cataclysmic force, ripping into a hospital, destroying neighborhoods and killing around 160.

“You see pictures of World War II, the devastation and all that with the bombing,” Kerry Sachetta, then the Joplin High School principal, told The Associated Press on the evening of May 22, 2011, after the school was destroyed.

“That’s really what it looked like,” Sachetta said.

As he spoke on that dreadful night, fires from gas leaks burned across town. The EF-5 twister, then the single deadliest in six decades, packed winds of 200 mph (320 kph). At times, it was nearly a mile (1.6 kilometers) wide. Left in its wake was a hellscape of cars crushed like soda cans and shaken residents roaming streets in search of missing family members. About 7,500 homes were damaged or destroyed.

“The Twister: Caught in the Storm” was released last week by Netflix following a recent spate of deadly storms that have unleashed tornadoes, blinding dust storms and wildfires.

Hospital became a disaster zone

Some of the most startling damage in Joplin was at St. John’s Regional Medical Center, where staff had only moments to hustle patients into the hallway before the 367-bed hospital was knocked off its foundation.

Flying debris blew out windows and disabled the hospitals’ exposed generators, causing ventilators to stop working. The winds also scattered X-rays and medical records around 75 miles (121 kilometers) away.

Five patients and one visitor died in the immediate aftermath. And other patients later died of injuries they suffered in the storm.

On the morning after the storm, Dr. Jim Riscoe told the AP that some members of his emergency room staff showed up after the tornado with injuries of their own but worked through the night anyway.

“It’s a testimony to the human spirit,” Riscoe said, comparing the scene to a nuclear disaster. “Cars had been thrown like playing cards. Power lines were sparking. I couldn’t believe it.”

The building was so badly damaged it had to be razed the following year.

Recent grads and nursing home residents among the dead

The deaths from the storm were so numerous that a makeshift morgue was set up next to a football stadium in Joplin. Hundreds of others were injured in the city of 53,000.

Among the dead was 18-year-old Will Norton who was headed home from his high school graduation when he was sucked out of his family’s SUV through the sunroof. His father desperately held on to his legs. Norton’s body was found five days later in a nearby pond.

In the following years, his family kept his room as it was: an open pack of chewing gum, his trademark mismatched socks, his computer and the green screen that helped earn him a YouTube following for his travel chronicles.

“It’s a little comfort to go in there, go back in time and remember how it was,” his father, Mark Norton, said close to the five-year anniversary.

Around a dozen died in a single nursing home after the tornado tossed four vehicles, including a full-size van, into the building. Those who survived were scattered to nursing homes in four states, their records and medications blown away. Widespread phone outages then complicated efforts to locate the residents, some of whom had dementia.

Officials still disgree about the final death toll. The federal storm center says 158 died while local officials count the deaths of three additional people, including a person struck by lightning after the tornado blew through the city.

Schools were devastated but persisted

The tornado forced school officials to end the spring term nine days early. Six school buildings were destroyed, including the high school. Seven other buildings were badly damaged.

The district scrambled to rebuild with federal funds, donations, insurance money and a $62 million bond, cobbling together a hodgepodge of temporary locations while construction was underway. Seniors and juniors took classes in a converted big-box store in a shopping mall, while freshmen and sophomores went to school in a building across town.

Then-President Barack Obama was the commencement speaker during the high school’s 2012 commencement and then-Vice President Joe Biden attended the 2014 dedication of the new high school, calling the community the “heart and soul of America.”

The dedication included two live eagles, the school’s mascot. During the first home football game after the tornado, a single eagle flew over the football field and became a symbol signifying that the students, like the bird who returns to the same nesting spot each year, would come home again.

Small groups of young men were invited to join Young Men General President Steven J. Lund and his wife, Sister Kalleen Lund, while visiting historic sites of The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints in Missouri as part of his ministry there March 13-16.

At each historic site, President Lund and the young men discussed the events that took place there and issues facing youth today, according to a report posted March 18 on ChurchofJesusChrist.org.

At the reconstructed Liberty Jail, President Lund encouraged them to have hope in Jesus Christ and remember the final words shared by Joseph Smith from that very location in March of 1839 — Doctrine and Covenants 123:17: “Therefore, dearly beloved brethren, let us cheerfully do all things that lie in our power; and then may we stand still, with the utmost assurance, to see the salvation of God, and for his arm to be revealed.”

The Prophet Joseph Smith and others were imprisoned there on false charges for several months from December 1838 to April 1839.

At the Far West Temple Site, where cornerstones were laid but a temple wasn’t built, President Lund bore his testimony of priesthood keys by speaking of modern-day prophets and apostles.

In Independence, Missouri, the theme discussed was “Building Zion” in individual lives, quorums, wards and stakes.

Early Church members moved to the frontier town of Independence in the early 1830s, but tensions with earlier settlers resulted in the Saints being driven from the county. The Church has a visitors’ center there.

Speaking at an evening devotional, President Lund told experiences of youth who are changing the world in places he has visited, including the Democratic Republic of Congo, Kenya, Pakistan, Thailand and Uganda.

“I feel the strength of the youth of Zion that are the leaders of the Church already and will continue to lead throughout their lives,” President Lund said. “The youth battalion we have spreading out over the world is changing this world.”

Additional activities during the four-day ministry included a service project with young men clearing debris and planting trees near the Kansas City Missouri Temple grounds, as well as a devotional and music festival in Olathe, Kansas, with young single adults in the Kansas City metropolitan area.

Sam Benson, a young man in the Lenexa Kansas Stake, said: “Knowing what the early Saints sacrificed in that time to serve the Lord and to build Zion showed me that this work of the Lord left such an impression on them to continue in faith despite the many trials they went through. We need to work together, and like the people of Enoch, with ’one heart and one mind’ so that we can prepare the world for the Savior’s return to Zion.”

Ole Miss faced a gut-check moment in the fifth inning on Friday.

Missouri led by a run and had the bases loaded after two errors sandwiched a hit by pitch. Ole Miss reliever Mason Morris entered the game and kept the score there with a five-pitch strikeout of Jackson Lovich, who had three hits.

The Rebels scored two runs minutes later to take the lead and then put up a four-run seventh to ice the 9-6 victory over the Tigers in Columbia for the series opener. Ole Miss is 16-5 overall and 2-2 in the SEC, while Missouri falls to 8-12 overall and 0-4 in the league.

“We didn’t play our best, but we gave ourselves a chance to win,” Isaac Humphrey said.

While it’s still somewhat early for RPI to show an accurate picture, Missouri is 215 in the metric and has five losses to teams outside the top 100. Ole Miss needs to take advantage of the weekend in its pursuit to get back to the NCAA Tournament for the first time since 2022.

The win broke a three-game losing streak. Mason Morris allowed one run in 2.1 innings for the win. He walked three and gave up two hits. Starter Hunter Elliott yielded four hits and three runs in 4.2 innings. He struck out seven and walked two, pitching with a hitter’s wind blowing out for much of the night.

“Not my best performance but big night from our hitters,” Morris said. “They put up a nine-spot, and you won’t lose many Friday nights with nine spots.”

The Rebels threw Brayden Jones and Connor Spencer 17 pitches and 19 pitches, respectively.

Ole Miss had 12 hits and walked seven times. Mitchell Sanford, Will Furniss, Austin Fawley and Humphrey all had two hits. Humphrey hit a home run, and Ryan Moerman and Furniss both doubled. Luke Hill, Fawley, Furniss and Judd Utermark reached base three times. Humphrey had four RBIs including two on a single in the seventh inning.

The Rebels committed three errors, struck out 11 times and went 3-for-15 with runners in scoring position, but it was enough for the needed victory. Missouri struck out 16 times and went 2-for-9 with runners in scoring position.

It was Cheng’s first game since last Friday versus Arkansas, when he suffered a concussion.