President Bush declared parts of Kansas a disaster area yesterday after a tornado obliterated an entire town, killing ten people and injuring dozens.

Mr Bush said that the hearts of his compatriots were heavy for the loss of life in Greensburg. As he gave his speech, rescue workers resumed the task of searching through giant piles of rubble and vehicles scattered in the area where the town of 1,500 had stood, amid fears that the death toll would rise.

The storm that hit Greensburg on Friday night was 1½ miles wide and classified as an F-5 tornado, the strongest possible. At least eight more tornados hit a series of states across “tornado alley” in the Great Plains on Saturday night, including Oklahoma, South Dakota and Nebraska.

Eleven people were reported injured when another “twister” ripped the roof off a restaurant in the central Kansas town of Osborne.

Six others were injured in the early hours of yesterday when a tornado damaged about 25 homes by a lake in the Kansas town of Bennington.

As dawn broke in Greensburg yesterday the full extent of the damage became clear. All the churches were destroyed. Every business along Main Street was demolished. All that remained were steel girders, tattered insulation and splintered wood. The towns’ fire engines were crushed.

Dozens of cars and lorries were tossed into the mêlée. Historic buildings were reduced to jumbled piles of bricks. The high school, junior high school, hospital and city hall were gone.

For decades, meteorite enthusiasts from around the world have travelled to Greensburg to hunt for space rocks in the rich soil that surrounds the area. The town’s extensive meteorite collection, including its famed 1,000lb (450kg) pallasite meteorite, is also gone.

Steve Hewitt, the City Administrator, estimated that 95 per cent of the town had been destroyed. One of the few remaining structures is the only pub, the Bar H Tavern, which was converted into a temporary mortuary. The stone courthouse was also standing. “This is one of the most devastating tornadoes we have had in Kansas,” Congressman Jerry Moran said.

Cheryll Behm, at a shelter in the nearby town of Haviland, said that there was no town left. “I am concerned Greensburg never will be built,” she said. “There is no place to go back to work to. All of Main Street is gone.”

Mr Bush said: “We will help in any way we can. There’s a certain spirit in the Midwest of our country, a pioneer spirit that still exists, and I’m confident this community will be rebuilt.”

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