Benjamin Krain/Getty Images(MOORE, Okla.) -- As the terrified tornado-whipped students of Briarwood Elementary School in Moore, Okla., cowered on their hands and knees with backpacks over their heads, tearfully pleading for their parents, they asked their teacher, "Is this really happening?"

Sheri Bittle, a first-grade teacher at Briarwood, Tuesday recounted the horror of Monday's twister that she said sounded like a train that kept barreling by as it ravaged her school.

"You could just feel the pressure just building like you were in an airplane, just the pressurization of the cabin and your ears popping and the debris starts flying and the roof falling in," Bittle told ABC News. "And everything in your classroom falling in on you."

The tornado tore a 12-mile path of destruction that killed 24 people, including nine children, and destroyed Plaza Towers Elementary School and Briarwood Elementary School in Moore. For many families, Monday ended in tears of joy after families were reunited. Others were left to wait, hoping for good news while fearing the worst.

"I actually saw the tornado coming straight toward us," Briarwood first-grade teacher Cindy Lowe told ABC News. "I knew there was no turning back then. It was coming. It wasn't something that I was watching on TV. This was really going to happen."

Teachers followed procedure, Bittle said, moving students to interior walls and the innermost area of the school. The children got down on their hands and knees, putting their hands over their heads.

"They were covering their heads with their backpacks," Bittle said. "There was so much debris falling. A roof beam fell on me and another teacher."

Bittle, who escaped major injury, lay on top of her children as the building collapsed around them, and said all the teachers would have done the same. A teacher in the next room had a table leg impale her own leg.

"I was praying," Bittle said. "I yelled it over and over for the Lord to just cover us and save us and to keep us safe. And He did. My entire class was safe and well and got delivered to their parents. The teachers at Plaza Tower didn't have that blessing."

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Seven of the nine children killed in the tornado were students at Plaza Towers Elementary School, officials said.

"I can't imagine," Bittle said through tears, "not being able to give those kids back to their parents that brought them to me that morning."

Oklahoma County Commissioner Brian Maughan confirmed to ABC News affiliate KOCO-TV Tuesday that a number of children at Plaza Towers Elementary School remain unaccounted for.

"It's just a very graphic situation for even those of us who've come obviously well after the storm has passed," he said.

"I know there's a number of dead children from that school," Oklahoma City Police spokesman Sgt. Gary Knight said.

The walls of Plaza Towers Elementary School were "pancaked," Oklahoma Lt. Gov. Todd Lamb told ABC News.

The storm tore off Plaza Towers' roof, knocked down walls and turned the playground into a mass of twisted plastic and metal. Rescue workers passed the survivors down a human chain to the triage center in the parking lot after the tornado passed directly over the school. Briarwood Elementary School received a "direct hit" from the twister and was also destroyed, with its roof and walls blown off.

"Safety is our main priority and the decisions we make are always with safety in mind," Susan Pierce, superintendent of Moore Schools, said at a news conference Tuesday. "We are in the process of learning as much as we can about what has happened and we are reviewing our emergency procedures today."

The two schools were not funded for safe rooms, according to state Director of Emergency Management Albert Ashwood.

"You have a limited amount of funds that are based on disasters you've had in the past that are used for mitigation measures and when you have limited number of funds, you set priorities for what schools you do want to ask for," Ashwood said at the news conference.

He said Briarwood and Plaza Towers were not being left out, but, rather, had not been brought forward yet for safe rooms.

"We're going to be looking to try and up that number and try and get more safe rooms in schools across the state, the entire state," Ashwood said.

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PAUL J. RICHARDS/AFP/Getty Images(WASHINGTON) — The Army has suspended the one-star commanding general at Fort Jackson, S.C., for alleged misconduct involving adultery and an unspecified physical altercation.

An Army official tells ABC News that the case does not involve sexual assault.

Brig. Gen. Bryan T. Roberts was suspended Tuesday as Commanding General, U.S. Army Training Center and Fort Jackson, according to a  statement from Army Training and Doctrine Command. The post, located in Columbia, S.C., is the largest of the five facilities the Army uses for basic training of new soldiers.

Roberts was suspended by the Commander of U.S. Army Training and Doctrine Command Gen. Robert W. Cone, due to allegations of misconduct that "include adultery and a physical altercation,” which the statement said “are being thoroughly investigated.”  Adultery is a crime under the Uniform Code of Military Justice.

“The information at this time does not indicate this is a matter of sexual assault,” an Army official told ABC News.

No details were provided about the alleged physical altercation for which Roberts is being investigated.

Brig. Gen. Peggy C. Combs will serve as the interim commander pending the results of the investigation.  Coombs was previously the commandant of the Army Chemical, Biological, Radiological and Nuclear School, Fort Leonard Wood, Mo.

The Army’s Criminal Investigation Command is investigating the case and had gathered enough preliminary evidence for Cone to suspend Roberts from his command, Army Training and Doctrine Command spokesman Harvey Perritt said.

“[The] Army holds all soldiers regardless of rank or position accountable for their actions,” Perritt said.

Investigators are questioning witnesses and gathering evidence in the case, which could last several weeks or months, he said.

Roberts has been suspended from command pending the results of the investigation; he could be relieved of command of the post depending on what the investigation concludes.  Roberts has been in command of the post since April 2012.

Another Army one-star general is currently on trial for adultery at Fort Bragg, N.C.  Last year Brig. Gen. Jeffrey Sinclair was serving in Afghanistan as a deputy commanding general of the 82nd Airborne Division when he was accused of engaging in adultery and sexual assault.  Sinclair faces life in prison if convicted on the sexual assault charge.

Over the past two weeks, sexual assault in the military became a hot-button issue in Washington after two sexual assault prevention officers found themselves involved in incidents of sexual assault.

Two weeks ago the Air Force lieutenant colonel who ran the Air Force’s office of sexual assault and prevention was arrested for allegedly groping a woman, and last week an Army sergeant who served as a sexual assault prevention coordinator at Fort Hood, Texas, was removed from his post while he was investigated for alleged sexual assault.

The incidents led Defense Secretary Chuck Hagel to order the retraining and rescreening of the 45,000 sexual assault prevention officers and military recruiters.

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Lui Kit Wong-Pool/Getty Images(SALT LAKE CITY) -- Questions still surround the 2009 disappearance of Utah mother Susan Powell ever since the suicides of her husband, Josh Powell, and brother-in-law, Michael Powell, who authorities believe were "directly involved in her disappearance."

Although the brothers were considered persons of interest in her disappearance, there was never enough evidence to charge either one of them, said West Valley City Deputy Police Chief Mike Powell. The evidence against them was "circumstantial," he told ABC News.

Despite the scarcity of information to go on -- no crime scene, no body -- police said they were still working leads to find out what happened to Susan Powell.

"It's paramount that people understand that it's not a closed case," the deputy police chief told ABC News. "This is still an open investigation, and we will continue to pursue any information provided to us actively and with just as much vigor."

Some hope lies in Steven Powell, Susan Powell's father-in-law, who police believe might know something about her disappearance. Convicted on charges of voyeurism and child pornography, Steven Powell is currently in custody at Monroe Corrections Center in Monroe, Wash.

While Steven Powell was not directly involved in Susan's disappearance, the deputy police chief said, "we firmly believe that Steven knows something."

"Susan is still missing," he said. "If Steven Powell has any information or indication that he knows where or what may have happened, that would be important for us to have."

"Whether or not we're able to obtain that, therein lies the difficulty," he told ABC News.

Susan Powell, 28, was last seen in December 2009 at the Utah home she shared with her husband and their two young sons. Her husband told authorities that he had taken an impromptu midnight camping trip with the boys -- in the midst of a winter storm -- the night his wife vanished.

Josh Powell, 36, said that he returned home to find his wife gone and continued to state that his wife had left on her own.

Susan Powell's disappearance triggered a massive investigation that focused on her husband, who killed himself and his two sons in a fiery explosion at his home in Graham, Wash., in February 2012.

Authorities then turned their attention to her husband's brother, Michael Powell, 30, when they learned he had been made the heir to his brother's estate, which included the life insurance policies on Josh, his sons, and Susan that Josh had taken out.

Deputy Police Chief Powell said that while authorities looked at Michael Powell when Susan Powell was first reported missing, "there wasn't anything that jumped out initially" about him.

It wasn't until the summer of 2011, nearly two and a half years after Susan Powell had disappeared, that police learned that Michael Powell had a car in a salvage yard in Pendleton, Ore. He had allegedly driven from Utah to Oregon in July, but the car broke down outside the city, where it was towed and left in the yard.

"We began to look at Michael Powell much more closely at that point," the deputy police chief said.

Police brought cadaver dogs to the place where Michael Powell's car had been impounded. While the car had not been crushed, according to the deputy police chief, only the frame and the structure of the vehicle remained.

"The dogs did indicate the odor of human decomposition [in the car]," said Deputy Police Chief Powell. "We were able to extract a minimal amount of DNA from the trunk of that vehicle."

While investigators could not obtain "a full profile" from the sample, they concluded the DNA did not match the profile of Susan Powell. Still, it made authorities interested in her husband's brother.

As the investigation progressed, Powell said police found a significant amount of communication between Josh and Michael Powell that had been encrypted via the Internet.

In February, a year after his brother killed himself and his sons, Michael Powell committed suicide by jumping from a Minneapolis parking garage.

"We looked into him as completely and thoroughly as we possibly could," Deputy Police Chief Powell said. "I can tell you that he was involved in some capacity in the disappearance of Susan. There is a high probability that he had a direct involvement."

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iStockphoto/Thinkstock(MOORE, Okla.) -- First responders are in a race against time in the search for any survivors of a devastating tornado that ripped through Moore, Okla., while the medical examiner's office has revised the death toll from 51 to 24, including nine children.

Oklahoma medical examiner spokeswoman Amy Elliot said Tuesday morning that she believes some victims were counted twice in the early chaos of the storm. The original death toll included 20 children.

Two elementary schools were in the path of Monday's tornado, which the National Weather Service gave a preliminary rating of at least EF-4, meaning churning wind speeds of up to 200 mph.

Oklahoma City police spokesman Sgt. Gary Knight said seven of the young victims were from Plaza Towers Elementary School.

Moore Mayor Glenn Lewis and National Guard members told ABC News the search-and-rescue operation at the school is now a body-recovery effort.

"The walls were just pancaked, absolutely flattened and the students were just grouped together," Lt. Gov. Todd Lamb told ABC News.

Oklahoma Gov. Mary Fallin tweeted late Monday night that she visited with search crews at the elementary school. "Appreciate their hard work and tireless dedication," she tweeted.

Fallin has also deployed 80 National Guard members to help with search-and-rescue efforts throughout the city.

Authorities said Briarwood Elementary School in Moore received a "direct hit" from the storm and was also destroyed, with its roof and walls blown off.

A total of 242 patients, including 58 children, were treated at hospitals. Many patients have been treated and discharged while others have been transferred among hospitals.

Kelly Wells, spokeswoman for Norman Regional Health System, which oversees three hospitals in Oklahoma, said lacerations, broken bones, head and neck injuries were the most common.

Moore Medical Center, the only hospital in Moore, sustained major damage and was evacuating all its patients to other hospitals.

Betsy Randolph of the State Highway Patrol asked people not involved in search-and-rescue operations to stay off the roads so first responders can do their job.

President Obama signed a disaster declaration in Oklahoma and ordered federal aid to supplement state and local recovery efforts in the area affected by severe storms and tornadoes.

The first tornado warning went out around 2:40 p.m. local time and just 16 minutes later a tornado tore a 12-mile gash in Oklahoma from Newcastle to Oklahoma City. Frantic groups of rescuers could be seen digging through debris within minutes after the tornado blew by.

Moore, a community of 41,000 people about 10 miles south of Oklahoma City, saw homes wiped off their foundations and cars tossed like toys on top of nearby buildings. Block after block lay in ruins, reduced to smoking piles of wood and brick.

The weather service estimated that the tornado was at least a half-mile wide and says it could have been on the ground for as long as 40 minutes.

As Moore continues to sift through rubble for survivors, millions across the Midwest are once again under the threat of tornadoes. People in northeast Texas all the way to southwest Arkansas have a 10 percent chance of seeing a twister later Tuesday.

Millions of people from San Antonio, Texas, all the way to Michigan could see damaging hail and even a chance of isolated tornadoes.

More than 50 tornadoes ravaged the Midwest this weekend, killing a 79-year-old man in Shawnee, Okla.

Monday's devastation in Oklahoma came almost exactly two years after an enormous twister ripped through the city of Joplin, Mo., killing 158 people and injuring hundreds more.

Moore was the site of one of the most destructive tornadoes in U.S. history. An EF-5 tornado ripped through the Oklahoma City-area May 3, 1999, killing 42 people.

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TSA(NEW YORK) -- A New York man was arrested Tuesday at John F. Kennedy International Airport after a loaded gun was found in his luggage.

It's the second time in four days a passenger at JFK has been spotted with a loaded gun in his carry-on.

The passenger was flying to Hawaii when his .22 caliber handgun was confiscated.

It followed a San Francisco-bound passenger on Saturday caught with a .40 caliber gun and two magazines each loaded with three rounds of ammunition.

Firearms are only allowed in checked baggage and only if they're properly declared.

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iStockphoto/Thinkstock(NEW YORK) -- A veteran New York City detective was arrested Tuesday for alleged computer hacking.

Detective Edwin Vargas, who has been with the New York Police Department for 20 years, is alleged to have improperly used a federal database to snoop on an ex-girlfriend and fellow police officers.

Prosecutors say he also hired computer hackers to find information about them.

Between March 2011 and October 2012 court records say Vargas paid a hacking service thousands of dollars to obtain usernames and passwords for dozens of personal accounts of current and former NYPD staff.

It all may have stemmed from a dispute with the ex-girlfriend, who is also an officer.

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iStockphoto/Thinkstock(MOORE, Okla.) -- At least seven children killed in the devastating tornado that tore through Moore, Okla., were from Plaza Towers Elementary School, officials said.

The school was destroyed by Monday's tornado, which tore a 12-mile path of destruction that left at least 24 people dead.

The deadly twister touched down just as students were about to be released for their last week of school before summer vacation.  Many of the students hunkered down in closets, classrooms and bathrooms, clinging to their classmates and teachers.

Oklahoma County Commissioner Brian Maughan confirmed to ABC News affiliate KOCO-TV on Tuesday that a number of children at Plaza Towers Elementary School remain unaccounted for.

"It's just a very graphic situation for even those of us who've come obviously well after the storm has passed," he said.

The walls of Plaza Towers Elementary School were "pancaked," Oklahoma Lt. Gov. Todd Lamb told ABC News.

Moore officials and National Guard members told ABC News the search-and-rescue operation at the school is now a body-recovery effort.

"I know there's a number of dead children from that school," Oklahoma City Police spokesman Sgt. Gary Knight said.  "I know the number is around seven."

Briarwood Elementary School, also in Moore, received a "direct hit" from the twister and was also destroyed, with its roof and walls blown off.

One sixth-grade boy from Briarwood named Brady said he and other students took cover in a bathroom.

"I was in my classroom building and we were told to get in our tornado precaution system.  Then they moved us to the boys and girls bathroom," he said.  "Cinderblocks and everything collapsed on them but they were underneath so that kind of saved them a little bit, but I mean they were trapped in there."

Josiah Parker, 8, escaped Briarwood unharmed but couldn't find his parents in the immediate aftermath of the tornado.

"If our school is crushed, my house is like directly behind the pond and so I think it might be crushed, too.  If my mom and dad are still alive, they're probably going to take us to a hotel," Josiah said.

Josiah's parents survived and the family was able to reunite.

Students remained at Briarwood despite the tornado warnings because there were safe areas where they could be protected.

Moore resident Andrew Wheeler credits a Briarwood teacher with keeping his son safe as the tornado wrecked havoc on the building.

"The teacher held their heads, and bricks and everything were falling all over the kids," he said.  "She got her arm injured.  One of the other boys on her other side got a big gash in his head, but he's OK."

Wheeler's son, Gabriel, says his teacher stood with the class the entire time and told them to act as they did in practice drills.

"The roof came off and then I felt something and it was just raining clay on me and all that," Gabriel said.

Monday's twister was the latest in a group of violent storms that swept through the Midwest, starting on Sunday, leaving dozens of people dead.

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Hemera/Thinkstock(PHILADELPHIA) -- A former Philadelphia police officer once hailed as a hero and invited by the vice president to attend a presidential address to Congress now faces 16 charges, including rape, involuntary deviate sexual intercourse and making terroristic threats.

Bail for Richard DeCoatsworth, 27, has been set at $60 million after he allegedly sexually assaulted two women at gunpoint.

Authorities alleged DeCoatsworth, of Philadelphia, left a party with two women at approximately 2 a.m. Thursday and brought them to another location. He then, "produced a handgun and allegedly forced the two females to engage in the use of narcotics and sexual acts," Philadelphia Police Department spokeswoman Officer Tanya Little said.

The women contacted police once DeCoatsworth left the undisclosed site, Little said.

DeCoatsworth was arrested at his home Saturday morning and was booked at the Philadelphia County Jail. His preliminary arraignment was held on Saturday night, according to court documents.

Philadelphia Prisons System spokeswoman Sean Hawes told ABC News that DeCoatsworth was being represented by a public defender, but she did not know his attorney's name.

ABC News' calls to the Defender Association of Philadelphia were not immediately returned.

DeCoatsworth came into public view after he chased a gunman who shot him in the face in West Philadelphia in 2007, Philadelphia ABC News affiliate WPVI-TV reported. He caught his attacker, who later was sentenced to 36 to 72 years in prison.

According to WPVI, Vice President Joe Biden subsequently invited DeCoatsworth to attend President Obama's televised address to Congress in February 2009, and he sat beside first lady Michelle Obama.

DeCoatsworth retired from the police department on disability in December 2011, WPVI reported.

"I think that since he got shot, he's not the same person," one neighbor told WPVI.

Authorities declined to release the locations of DeCoatsworth's alleged assaults or the names of the alleged victims, citing a desire to protect the victims and the integrity of the investigation.

DeCoatsworth's next court date was scheduled for June 17, according to court documents.

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