Mangled highways, cut power and water supplies, the human toll is still rising tonight.
This is a special edition of NBC Nightly News with Tom Brokaw, reporting tonight from Southern California.
Good evening from the San Fernando Valley where night is beginning to settle in after what has been a very long day.
All of Southern California still is reeling from that major earthquake that struck at 430 Pacific time this morning in Northridge in the San Fernando Valley,
a heavily populated area just northwest of downtown Los Angeles.
The quake was severe at 6.6 on the Richter scale.
The damage extensive, including five major highways cuts, water supplies threatened, gas mains exploding, a half dozen communities in flames.
The death toll has been going up all day long.
We begin tonight with a big picture from NBC's Larry Carroll.
The quake struck an area where more than a million people live.
So far, at least 24 people are known dead. Hundreds have been injured.
Early estimates of property damage are in excess of half a billion dollars.
The force of the quake shut down power grids, plunging thousands of households into darkness.
The ceiling fell down. My kitchen is totally destroyed.
Gas lines ruptured and fires raced out of control in heavily populated residential communities.
Five homes were consumed instantly when this gas main exploded, sending flames 100 feet into the air.
The blast ruptured this water main, but dozens of others were shaken loose by the quake, sending torrents of water into valley streets.
The smog mixed with smoke for more than 50 fires, and the extent of the damage began to hit home.
Dead inside the rubble of the hillside home were two people, one of them this woman's daughter.
The quake was centered 10 miles beneath the campus of Cal State Northridge, 25 miles northwest of downtown Los Angeles.
At least one fire was reported on campus, and one dormitory, home to several hundred students, collapsed.
Most there were reported to have escaped unharmed.
But students housed in this apartment building adjacent to the campus were not so safe.
Fourteen people died when the second and third stories of the complex collapsed to ground level.
Also hard hit, the freeway system that serves as many as 13 million people.
Three major freeways, all recently reinforced for earthquakes, were damaged and are closed to traffic.
And then there's the property damage. Hundreds of homes and businesses are damaged, many beyond repair.
They don't have electricity, they don't have water, and they were doing, they were just moving.
And I'm just glad to be alive.
While not the most powerful on record in Southern California, the Northridge quake may well cause the most damage.
Larry Carroll, NBC News, Los Angeles.
Timing can be everything in life and in disasters.
It's very fortunate that this earthquake struck as early as it did this morning and on a holiday,
because in this densely populated part of California, there are so many people on the freeways and in the streets and in the buildings.
But still, there was a fight for survival. More on that tonight from NBC's Roger O'Neill.
That pile right there, the first pile you come to is where they're at.
It was a race against time all day long, a race to save lives.
I haven't heard anybody.
Hello, is anybody there?
This is all the first floor underneath here. This is the second floor right here.
Is he underneath us?
Yeah.
Is anybody in there?
Thirty-three people heard the cries of rescuers at this apartment complex in the valley.
But at least a dozen people were crushed to death as the three-story building collapsed.
She's an old lady. She's just a foot sticking out on her cheek.
For firemen, it was a day of heartbreak, but also triumph.
When you have somebody trapped in there, you just hope you can do the best to save them if they're alive.
Citizens responded to the cries of help, the cries of pain.
Marco Palaeus heard them after crawling out of his own apartment.
He then helped pull seven other people out of the rubble.
And they were screaming, you don't care about anything else. You just care about trying to get those people out of here.
At Granada Hills Community Hospital, the parking lot became a triage center.
Several hospitals had to refuse the injured. Their buildings were too severely damaged.
But how did you get the cut with the piano?
That's what it's been like for you this whole time.
Hell. Absolute hell.
Most of the injuries were not life-threatening, cuts and bruises, but still so many were in need of help, many had to wait their turn.
This two-week-old baby got immediate attention from nurse Jack Burns, who determined the bump on her head was not serious.
Nothing prepares me for a day like today.
The building's falling down over here, people are all over the place, the parking lot is faked out.
Nothing prepares me.
Few residents are prepared as they should be.
Food and water becomes precious commodities.
Electricity means gas lines.
And pay telephones become vital links to the outside world.
Just tell them, still is OK.
For the next several days, city parks will be home for thousands of people.
Not because their homes have been destroyed, but because this is perceived to be a safe place to be.
There is still a lot of fear in L.A. tonight.
But for hundreds of others who were trapped, then rescued, tonight is a night to celebrate life.
Oh, that sky looks beautiful.
Roger O'Neill, NBC News, Los Angeles.
The governor of California has been on almost permanent disaster duty in recent years.
His name is Pete Wilson, and earlier today I talked to him about what he does now.
What can you tell us now about the extent of the damage throughout the Southern California from property loss alone?
Tom, we can't estimate what the property loss will be.
It's premature to do that.
Our concern right now is safeguarding human life and restoration of service.
We are getting some good news.
On the other hand, it is going to be probably a long night for a number of people.
We will have the necessity, I think, even in areas where we expect to see a restoration of power,
it may be a rather fragile structure.
So we're urging everybody to have flashlights, candles.
We're urging them to boil water.
We've simply got to be prepared.
And, of course, there has been damage, structural damage, to the freeways.
So we have to assess how that can be repaired and what we can do by way of alternative routings.
Governor, you're beginning to preside over what is a permanent disaster area here in Southern California.
With the fires and the riots and now this major earthquake, your economy is already in trouble.
How do you begin to dig yourself out of this given the economic dislocation that is bound to occur?
This obviously doesn't help.
It will cost money. There will be disruption, particularly as it relates to some surface transportation.
But already the California Highway Patrol is figuring out alternative routings for truck traffic and passenger traffic.
Power will be restored.
If not everyone, they will have it, I think, within a matter of, for most Angelenos, they will have,
most of them will have power tonight.
Some will be without water overnight.
We'll get through it as we've gotten through the other problems.
But it sure seems like we're getting more than our share.
Truth be told, I'll be back in a moment with what the federal government is prepared to do for Southern California
and some of the day's heroes and survivors in a moment.
In business, there never seems to be a major effort, not only for the state of California at the local and state level,
but also for the federal government.
There is so much to be done here, not just in restoring the damage that has been done,
but providing an underpinning for the economy, which is already distressed.
Work is already underway on all of that.
We have that story tonight from NBC's Robert Hager.
As FEMA, the Federal Emergency Management Administration opened a 24-hour-a-day war room to supervise Washington's response.
FEMA Administrator James Lee Witt and Housing Secretary Cisneros left for Los Angeles to join
Transportation Secretary Peña already there.
...in 1971.
Well, yes, a portion of it behind me, the upper level, which you can't see, it's in the dark now,
but the upper level did collapse back in 71.
This is a different portion.
But this wasn't supposed to happen because after that earthquake, this one was inspected and it was checked out
and everyone thought that it would sustain, it would be able to make it through an earthquake like this one.
Thank you, Bill Whitaker in the San Fernando Valley.
Thanks, Bonnie.
It may be worth reminding ourselves that natural forces have been shaking Southern California for millions of years,
long before any humans showed up.
That's why Californians have been told rather constantly to expect that eventually those natural forces
will unleash the quake they call the Big One.
As correspondent Richard Threlke reports, just in case anyone forgets, history is a constant reminder.
San Francisco, in April of 1906, a monster earthquake, an estimated 8.3 on the Richter scale, kills at least 700 people.
The city's downtown burns to the ground.
Emergency officials estimate a quake like that in today's Los Angeles would kill as many as 14,000 people
and cause hundreds of billions of dollars damage.
In fact, they're preparing for the Big One, as they call it, 8.0 or more,
as scientists say it will surely come someday.
Before today, the quake that most Southern Californians remember was also in the San Fernando Valley almost 23 years ago.
It was bad enough, 6.5 on the Richter scale and 65 people died in it.
That was a learning experience for Californians, and so was this, the quake in Long Beach, just southeast of Los Angeles,
in March of 1933, 6.3 on the Richter scale.
San Francisco killed 115 people.
Ever since, California's cities have been trying to make themselves earthquake-safe.
There was another reminder of how much is left to do in October of 1989.
63 people were killed when San Francisco and the Bay Area were hit by a 7.1 earthquake.
Bridges and freeways collapsed and whole neighborhoods burned.
That was needed, that despite all the effort to make California earthquakes safe, there's no way to make it earthquake-proof.
One of the few things that Los Angeles can be grateful for is that today's quake, as awful as it was, was not the Big One.
Scientists say they have no way of knowing whether today's earthquake brought the Big One any closer
or postponed the inevitable day that it will come.
Richard Trowkel, CBS News, New York.
Straight ahead on tonight's CBS Evening News, more of our complete coverage of the Southern California earthquake,
including a live interview with the Governor of California.
[♪techno music playing on radio and radio playing in background.
A few minutes later, the earthquake is heard.
...earthquake. Join us tomorrow and see what a difference today makes.
Authorities investigating that attack on figure skater Nancy Kerrigan earlier this month say tonight
that they're about to make a key arrest in this case.
They say that there is a money trail that stretches all the way from Oregon to Arizona,
and it does implicate Jeff Gilhoolie, who is the ex-husband of Kanya Harding,
and she is the principal rival of Nancy Kerrigan.
More on this story tonight from NBC's David Blum.
Today, as Nancy Kerrigan skated publicly for the first time since the attack,
law enforcement sources in Portland told NBC News they are moving closer to arresting
Tanya Harding's ex-husband, Jeff Gilhoolie, and said he could be in custody as early as tomorrow.
NBC News has learned that authorities now have bank and wire transfer records
that they say could tie Gilhoolie to the three men already in custody
and could confirm bodyguard Sean Eckert's claim that Gilhoolie financed the January 6th attack.
NBC News also confirmed a report in today's Portland, Oregonian
that investigators suspect that Gilhoolie used some money donated by Harding's supporters
to finance her skating career to pay for the hit,
possibly including money from the U.S. Figure Skating Association and other benefactors,
such as New York Yankees owner George Steinbrenner.
Both Jeff Gilhoolie and Tanya Harding have vehemently denied any wrongdoing,
and neither have been charged with any crime.
Harding has agreed to answer prosecutors' questions about what role, if any,
she played in planning or covering up the attack.
Harding's lawyers said speculation and innuendo should not force her off the Olympic team.
Or does the United States stand for something greater than that?
Is it a place where the presumption of innocence means something
and accounts for something in this case?
Harding skated publicly for the first time today, as did Nancy Kerrigan,
who, according to her coach, took a spill for the cameras.
She even staged a fall for you people so that you would know she's human.
I'm a very determined person. I think if the Olympics was tonight,
I would be able to go out there and do my performance,
although they may have to sit down at the end and say, come get the stretcher.
Said Kerrigan, who had a light workout, I can't wait to start jumping.
David Blum, NBC News, Portland.
Now, in Germany today, two neo-Nazis were attacked,
were convicted for that attack on two members of the United States Olympic Luge team.
There have been more than 5,000...