in the hour it took them to get to springfield , ray flowers took calls from : a doctor who said people were dying like flies and who thought the government was lying through its teeth about a vaccine ; a hospital nurse who confirmed that bodies were being removed from kansas city hospitals by the truckload ; a delirious woman who claimed it was flying saucers from outer space ; a farmer who said that an army squad with two payloaders had just finished digging a hell of a long ditch in a field near route 71 south of kansas city ; half a dozen others with their own stories to tell .