Various Towns, TX - OK Devastating Tornado, Apr 1947

TEXAS TWISTER KILLS 29.

INJURED TO RUN INTO HUNDREDS.

Canadian, April 9 -- (AP) -- A tornado cut a path of death and destruction tonight across the Texas Panhandle and northwestern Oklahoma.
Reports of deaths ranged as high as 29, and injuries in the hundreds, with no estimate received from Woodward, Okla., the largest town in the storm's sweep. An Oklahoma highway patrolman advised that about one-half of the town of 5,426 was leveled.
Twenty persons were reported killed at Higgins, Tex., on the Oklahoma line and ambulance drivers said the business district there was burning. Ten bodies of unidentified victims from Higgins and other storm-struck communities were taken to a funeral home at Shattuck, Okla. The Shattuck hospital received 150 injured persons.
The village of Glazier, Tex., was razed by the storm, which swept northeastward along the Santa Fe railroad line from Amarillo to Woodward. Nine bodies of persons killed at Glazier were in a mortuary here. The Canadian hospital was filled to overflowing with injured. Emergency hospitals were set up in the Methodist church and a hotel.
At Shattuck, Okla., MRS. CARL MASON, Red Cross official, said that 150 persons injured at Higgins and vicinity crowded the 50-room Shattuck hospital. Six physicians were treating the injured.
Ten nurses and four doctors were on their way to Shattuck from Oklahoma City.
Townspeople at Shattuck ranged the countryside around Higgins in automobiles, seeking out injured and dead.
The department of public safety used its two-way shortwave radio to keep communications open.
Telephone lines to Higgins, northeast of Glazier, were knocked out by the storm. Wire connections to Woodward, Okla., were disrupted.
Pickup trucks, wheat trucks and automobiles were pressed into service to bring the injured to the hospital here. The hospital has a capacity of only 10 beds and supervisors said the storm victims were placed in halls, consultation rooms and any other available space. Attendants said some were seriously hurt, some only slightly.
Three persons were hurt at White Deer, Carson county, where the storm struck first. Several houses were flattened at White Deer and 21 freight cars blown from their track. A housewife and two trainmen were injured there. The twister proceeded northeastward, following the route of the Santa Fe railroad. It was sighted at Pampa, Gray county, and crossed a farm near Miami, Roberts county.

The Abilene Reporter-News Texas 1947-04-10

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Researched and Transcribed by Stu Beitler. Thank you, Stu!