all happened incredibly fast the majority of the workers took shelter in a primary designated location and a small group took shelter in another part of the building that was then directly impacted by the tornado according to amazon which said this is where most of the deaths occurred a heavily damaged amazon fulfillment center after it was hit by a tornado dec 11 2021 in edwardsville ill jeff robersonap amazon founder jeff bezos who stepped down as ceo of the ecommerce giant earlier this year reacted to the news on twitter late saturday bezos took some heat from critics on social media for a seemingly delayed response as his private spacetourism firm blue origin was launching a crew that included abc news michael strahan on a suborbital jaunt earlier saturday the news from edwardsville is tragic were heartbroken over the loss of our teammates there and our thoughts and prayers are with their families and loved ones bezos wrote all of edwardsville should know that the amazon team is committed to supporting them and will be by their side through this crisis we extend our fullest gratitude to all the incredible first responders who have worked so tirelessly at the site