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Airlines Find Ways To Keep Fares Low, Despite High Energy Costs; Concrete Slabs Could Help Coral Reefs Flourish; Cuba Remains Well Prepared For Hurricanes
Aired September 25, 2004 - 15:00 ET
THIS IS A RUSH TRANSCRIPT. THIS COPY MAY NOT BE IN ITS FINAL FORM AND MAY BE UPDATED.
FREDRICKA WHITFIELD, CNN ANCHOR, NEXT@CNN: Well the fate for Kenneth Bigley is still unknown. The Englishman and two American were kidnapped by militants more than a week ago in Iraq. A delegation from the Muslim council of Britain is now in Iraq to make a direct appeal for Bigley's release.
It's a familiar scene in Florida where residents are bracing for their fourth hurricane in six weeks. Hurricane Jeanne is on a path for the state's East Coast. Several million resident are under a mandatory evacuation order. State Governor Jeb Bush is also urging those not under the order to leave.
CNN's Jacqui Jeras is live from the Weather Center with the latest on Jeanne. Jacqui.
JACQUI JERAS, CNN METEOROLOGIST: Well Fredricka. We have some brand new information on the location and the strength of Jeanne. This just in from the National Hurricane Center still a category three with 115-mile-per-hour winds. The location getting closer to the Florida coast. 125 miles East-Southeast of Vero Beach, Florida. The present movement stays on the same, about 14 miles per hour. So that is kind of a quick pace and that means it could be making landfall late tonight or during the early morning hours for tomorrow.
It's moving just North of due west at this time. We do want to show you some of the main threats that you are going to be seeing here from Jeanne when it makes landfall. The flood threat should be extreme with 5 to 10 inches in the path of Jeanne with isolated higher amounts. The storm surge threat will be high with four to eight foot surge above normal tide and the wind threat will be moderate to high as the hurricane force winds extend out 70 miles per hour.
We're already seeing near tropical storm force wind across the East Central Florida Coast -- Fredricka.
WHITFIELD: All right Jacqui thanks so much for that update. I'm Fredricka Whitfield at the CNN Center in Atlanta. More news at the bottom of the hour. NEXT@CNN begins right now.
DANIEL SIEBERG, CNN ANCHOR, NEXT@CNN: Hi everybody. I'm Daniel Sieberg. Today on NEXT@CNN the hurricane hits just keep on coming. You can't help but wonder why this storm season seems to be so extreme. A look at the reasons and the reality.
With this fridge you can grab a cold one and get the latest news hot off the Web. We'll check out the smart refrigerator.
And these big lumps of concrete could help plants and animals thrive on the ocean floor. Find out why so reefs are having a ball. All that and more on NEXT.
No, it's not your imagination. Stormy weather is on the rise. And researchers at the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration say the last decade has seen the most hurricane activity ever recorded. Chad Myers has more.
(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)
CHAD MYERS, CNN CORRESPONDENT (voice over): They come in with whipping winds, severe storm surge, devastating floods and killer tornadoes. Wild weather defined the 2004 hurricane season. But why is this year so stormy? NOAA scientists say that an unusually warm Atlantic Ocean, below average wind sheer and other atmospheric conditions are creating the prime recipe to stir up a big batch of storms.
CHRIS LANDSEA, NOAA: It's turned out to be a very busy season.
MYERS: So far there have been 12 named storms. Names are given to tropical storms with at least 39-mile-per-hour winds. Seven have become hurricanes with winds of at least 74 miles per hour. And five major hurricanes, Category 3 or higher, and several of those made landfall. And the season isn't over yet.
LANDSEA: We're only about two-thirds of the way through the season. We may very well have one, two, maybe three more hurricanes before the season is done in November.
MYERS: But although Florida residents may be calling foul and despite the massive death and destruction throughout the Caribbean and the U.S. this year, the 2004 storm season has not broken many records. The most active year on record was 1933, 21 storms. The deadliest killed an estimated 8 to 12,000 in Galveston, Texas in 1900.
And the costly is Hurricane Andrew socked the U.S. with more than $26 billion dollars in damage. But that's little consolation for those hardest hit this year. Especially Florida. Mother nature slapped the sunshine state with three strong storms within a month. Charley sliced the state from the Southwest. Frances forced millions to flee from the East. Then Ivan struck the Panhandle. But the sunshine state is not alone. The Carolina coast breaks the record with some 30 hurricanes making landfall over the past 100 years.
And let's not neglect the Gulf. Last week Hurricane Ivan devastated the Mississippi and Alabama coastlines, too. But some of the worst destruction this year was felt in the Caribbean. In Haiti, the Dominican Republic, Grenada, Cuba, Jamaica and Grand Cayman. It will take months or years for the islands to recover from the multiple hurricanes that have swept in from the Atlantic. But some cities seem to wear a lucky charm.
New Orleans has not had a direct hit by a major hurricane since it was struck by Betsy in 1965. And Savannah on the coast of Georgia dodged every major hurricane in the 20th Century. But for those areas that have not been so lucky, names like Ivan, Frances, Charley, are all reminders of a devastating 2004 hurricane season. They've killed hundreds, cost billions, crippled communities and crushed spirits. Experts say coastal residents should brace themselves. Weather like this may be around for a while.
LANDSEA: We've been in a busy period since 1995, and it's part of a long-term cycle where we go back to busy conditions for about 25 to 40 years.
MYERS: He's referring to what is called a storm cycle. A climatic condition characterized by more active or less active hurricane season. And this one is packing a punch. Although experts don't have all the answers, they compare historic storm, sea surface temperatures and other records to current data and then try to predict how long that cycle will last and how severe a storm season will be.
They found that the 19 named storms that define the 1995 Atlantic hurricane season churned through the warmest regional ocean temperatures in recorded history. That hot event was the start of a very active phase in this storm's cycle. Marked by stronger and more frequent storms than in decades past.
And if the 2004 hurricane season is an indication of what this storm cycle has in store, it looks like the Caribbean and U.S. coastal residents should prepare to face more wet, wild weather.
(END VIDEOTAPE)
SIEBERG: Well while Haiti and other Caribbean islands have been devastated this hurricane season, Cuba has fared relatively well. Lucia Newman explains why.
(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)
LUCIA NEWMAN, CNN CORRESPONDENT (voice over): Cuba is the largest and most populated island in the Caribbean. Yet it consistently experienced the lowest death tolls during hurricane season. According to the United Nations, it's not because Cubans are lucky, but because they are prepared. We were prepared for a big one, and big it was, says this man of Hurricane Ivan. He and nearly 2 million others were evacuated from low-lying areas and fragile buildings ahead of the hurricane.
Nobody was killed. Preparations for a hurricane start well in advance. The same system that gives the communists a total, political and economic control is used efficiently to mobilize the nation to face natural disasters. State-run television and the civil defense authority bombard the population with information and instructions about what measures to take.
On every block there's a person assigned to take a census on who is being evacuated to which shelter with special attention paid to the elderly and pregnant women. We have a list and tell each person where they have to go. There they are taken care of says Lindsay Fittings (ph). In the fishing village of Lackalona (ph), which is vulnerable to hurricane flooding a massive evacuation, was mandatory.
The police and army responsible for guaranteeing there was no looting. Electricity is cut ahead of the hurricane to prevent electrocutions. After Hurricane Ivan, the seaside village of Lasagnas (ph) looked like a ghost town. Its residents evacuated days earlier. While many lost much of their belongings, at least no one had to cry over the lost of a loved one.
(END VIDEOTAPE)
SIEBERG: So as Caribbean nations and eastern U.S. states pray for the rain to stop, the drought-stricken western U.S is desperate for it to come. The first snows of the season did fall in the western mountains this week but will it be enough for the rivers or area residents to recover?
(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)
KEVIN ROBERTS, COLORADO FARMER: The plants are not thriving, as they should be. The main reason for that is because of the lack of ground water.
SIEBERG (voice over): Kevin Roberts has spent his life in the Colorado Rockies a third generation farmer. He's used to weathering whatever nature brought to bear. But finding solutions to the latest battle has residents and scientists fresh out of ideas from Colorado to California. And Oregon to Arizona. Western states are in a water crisis.
The regions main supply is showing signs of shrinking under the strain.
ROBERTS: I don't think I have ever seen it this low.
SIEBERG: The severe western drought has caused the once mighty Colorado River to become a shadow of its former glory. In it's hey day the river basin seemed inexhaustible now it just looks exhausted. After years of serving millions of people, irrigating farmland and nourishing nature, the latest bout of drought has begun to leave many in the region high and dry.
ELMER ROBERTS, COLORADO FARMER: The rain is spotty. Some places pretty good and other places it is just a hard dust bowl.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: We don't have enough water to irrigate. We are down 60 percent and have been for three years.
SIEBERG: When settlers came west, farmers were granted rights guaranteeing water for crop irrigation. But the population boom in places like Nevada, Arizona and other western states has water supplies going bust. Farmers like Roberts have resorted to using prime cropland to pasture their animals since most non-irrigated natural lands have gone dry.
With creeks and other tributaries running down to just a trickle, even irrigated fields are at risk. The condition has forced some farmers to stop planting crops. Others face more daunting decisions.
ROBERTS: A lot of people in this area that, for instance, across the river where they don't have storage products have had to sell off parts of their herds to stay in business. They can't afford to feed them. This is the lifeblood of the farming community.
SIEBERG: Communities that face the possibility of drying up as farmers wait for a transfusion of water this winter's snowfall season.
(END VIDEOTAPE)
UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: Up next Internet addiction and what one country is doing to fight it.
And later meet the man behind the x-prize for a private space flight who is also behind a new operation that lets average Joes play space cowboy.
(COMMERCIAL BREAK)
SIEBERG: Of course I don't need to teleprompter here. All right if you think the U.S. is a maybe we can just roll that back. If you think the U.S. is a wired nation you should go to South Korea. Nearly every home in that country has high-speed Internet access. South Korea is proud of its connectedness. But Eunice Yoon that success comes with a price.
(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)
EUNICE YOON, CNN CORRESPONDENT (voice over): For 13-year-old Lee Sequno-Woo an outing with friends is a rare occasion. He prefers to play games or chat online on his home computer for up to five hours a day. But recently his grades in school dropped. So he decided to take a psychological test at this gaming event to see if he had become addicted to the Internet.
LEE SEQUNO-WOO, STUDENT (translator): I find myself feeling nervous if I don't get to play my games.
YOON: Going through withdrawal is one symptom of Internet addiction, an illness waging war on South Korea's tech savvy set.
YOON (on camera): Kids and adults can spend up to 14 hours a day at Internet cafes such as this one. And in fact South Koreans love the Internet so much that online gaming has become a national pastime.
YOON (voice over): Online gamers are akin to rock stars here with cult following in the tens of thousands. With heroes like these and Internet cafes on every block, psychologists say it's easy to get hooked.
KWON JUNG-HYE, PROFESSOR LORIA UNIVERSITY (translator): The more they play online the more they lose their relationships in real life. Students skip class. Adults lose their jobs.
YOON: The government is funding clinics to reach out to potential addicts like Lee. Centers offers counseling services, consultation with parents and even therapy online saying it's a good way to connect with people too embarrassed to get help in person. But therapists say it's not enough.
LEE SUJIN, CTR. FOR INTERNET ADDICTION PREVENTION: If the students or if the person is seriously addicted, we don't do anything for them unfortunately.
YOON: Dome students think it's much ado about nothing.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE (translator): The Internet helps me with my studies. It isn't all bad.
YOON: Still, the new awareness is helping people like Lee. Hopefully before their love of the Internet gets to be a real problem.
(END VIDEOTAPE)
SIEBERG: Well technophiles may really love their computers, but they may some day feel the same about their refrigerators. Andy Serwer looks at a fridge that's definitely smarter than your average icebox.
(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)
ANDY SERWER, CNN CORRESPONDENT (voice over): That was then, this is now and then some. Hey kids, dad is really hungry tonight and I'm not coming home until later. I want you to take the chicken out of the refrigerator and stick it in the oven 350 for about an hour.
If the kitchen is the heart of the home the refrigerator might just become the brains.
VIK MURTY, SAMSUNG: You can get your e-mail here, you shop online right here. You can do anything you'd normally do with a PC and the World Wide Web.
SERWER: Vic Murty works for Samsung and its new refrigerator is part icebox, part TV and part PC. The home pad controls everything from temperature and the type of ice you want to an internal timer. The WI-FI panel also pops out so you can watch TV or surf the Web anywhere around the house.
MURTY: You naturally write on it like you would a PDA. It actually has a little keyboard that pops up.
SERWER: But all these bells and whistles carry a hefty price tag $5,000 in select markets. A similar fridge from LG goes for about $8,000, but you'll save on one thing. No need for refrigerator magnets.
MURTY: Look at that. We've got the crew.
SERWER: You can take digital pictures, keep a schedule, or leave very important messages.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: We're out of Mountain Dew. Pick up a couple of six packs.
SERWER: The next step, a smarter fridge. Some models in Korea can already identify what items you have in your fridge and tell you what recipes they'll fit and even contact the supermarket when you are running low and set up delivery.
(END VIDEOTAPE)
UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: Just ahead on NEXT@CNN the high-flying cost of fuel and what airlines are doing about it.
And later the tale of the meandering moose and what happened when it wandered into a cemetery.
(COMMERCIAL BREAK)
SIEBERG: The EPA says nearly one of every eight airliners had tested recently had drinking water that failed standards for caliform (ph) bacteria. EPA officials say the results are preliminary, but they say people with immune system problems may want to avoid drinking water from airplane galilees and lavatories and drinking tea and coffee not made with bottled water.
An industry spokesperson says the airlines are confident their water is safe. And that no one has gotten sick from airline water. Now to put this into perspective 90 percent of U.S. municipal drinking water systems meet EPA standards and this test shows airline water is slightly worse with 87.4 percent compliance.
All right if you have to take out a loan to fill your car's gas tank. Just think about the airlines. Richard Quest reports on how the major air carriers are dealing with the high price of crude.
(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)
RICHARD QUEST, CNN CORRESPONDENT (voice over): If you think you've got problems paying the rising prices at the pump, now imagine how much it costs to fill one of these. It takes 174 tons to top off the tanks on a Boeing 747. There are eight fuel tanks on this Boeing 747 jet. They are inside the wing and there's a big tank right in the middle. Forty tons, the size of my living room is all filled with fuel.
In total this jumble holds 175 tons of jet fuel. To fill her up and fly round trip from London to Singapore costs $150,000. And that's just for the fuel. For British Airways, rising oil prices mean an extra $400 million a year on the fuel bill. It's virtually wiped out the airline's profits.
DR. ANDREW SENTANCE, CHIEF ECONOMIST BRITISH AIRWAYS: One of the ways we can try to offset fuel cost is by being more fuel-efficient. And there are a number of ways we can go about that, one is through looking at the weight that we are carrying on the aircraft, making sure that we are not carrying unnecessary goods, food, water and so on. But also we're looking at getting more direct routings, working with the air traffic control so we can directly from A to B and burn less fuel.
QUEST: Passengers a playing their part all (INAUDIBLE) willing through fuel surcharges. Most of the world's top airlines, including Qantas, Singapore, and Lufthansa and of course B.A. Have imposed extra fees of around $20 a ticket.
SENTANCE: We've made it clear to the passenger that there is a surcharge because oil prices have gone up. We don't like it. It's not our fault but we have to pass it on to some degree. Obviously, if fuel prices come down very significantly, we can then review that.
QUEST: With just about every analyst expecting fuel prices to remain above $40 a barrel, such an airline review seems way off. So as long as the airlines continue to be squeezed by these higher fuel prices, fuel surcharges will be part of the traveler's life for some time to come. Unlike the plane itself, it seems what's gone up doesn't always come down.
(END VIDEOTAPE)
SIEBERG: And now from the, they don't make them like they used to department. In Texas the North Fort Worth Historical Society held a birthday party Tuesday for a light bulb. The lamp has burned continuously since September 21, 1908. It used to light a stage entrance at a local opera house. It's a 40-watt bulb made of thick glass with a carbon filament and has it own independent power supply. Granted 96 years is a long time but it's not a record, believe it or not. That honor goes to a four-watt bulb that has been burning at a California firehouse since 1901.
All right don't go away in our next half hour, we will tell you how to lose some weight or at least feel like you have.
And later how you can take your girlfriend with you wherever you go. That may or may not be a good thing.
(COMMERCIAL BREAK)
SIEBERG: Welcome back to NEXT@CNN. Well, a new satellite is orbiting the earth this weekend. India successfully launched its first satellite for educational services on Monday. The device will beam programs to school and colleges and support informal education in villages spread out across the country. It's hoped the satellite will increase distance learning among India's large rural population.
On Wednesday another launch is scheduled to take place. It's the first official launch the race for the X Prize. That's a $10 million award for private space flight. The man sponsoring the X Prize has just kicked off another venture, it's a float trip, and we mean literally. Miles O'Brien explains.
MILES O'BRIEN CNN CORRESPONDENT (voice-over): After years of hard work, Peter Diamandis is seeing some big dreams take flight. With newly minted blessings from the FAA, the company he heads, Zero-G Corporation, is now pedaling trips aboard a immediatified, well padded, 727. It flies a roller coaster pattern offering brief spurts of weightlessness for a couple of dozen hardy souls.
(on camera): Are you making money or are you just having fun?
PETER DIAMANDIS, ZERO-G CORPORATION: We're both.
O'BRIEN: Both. Both.
DIAMANDIS: We can do both. Get ready, straight forward.
O'BRIEN (voice-over): It's a right stop moment for the rest of us for about $3,000.
(on camera): When Diamandis did his business plan, he figured -- he figured there would be about two flights booked in the first month. So far he's got 20.
(voice-over): Diamandis believes there are tens of thousands of people who would pay for the chance to moonwalk, tumble, spin and, in some cases, lose their breakfast this way.
UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: I feel totally sick right now, but found it amazingly worth it, so far (PH).
O'BRIEN: But for Diamandis, these flights are just a small piece of a puzzle as big as the stars, a puzzle he spent most of his life trying to solve. How to open up the high frontier to entrepreneurs.
DIAMANDIS: My whole reason for being right now is to make the engine, not the government, but economics -- you know, profitable business.
O'BRIEN: And that is what led him to create the Ansari X Prize nearly 10 years ago. It's a $10 million privately funded purse for the first civilian team to fly a three-seat vehicle to pace and back twice in as many weeks.
Over the years, a few dozen teams joined the competition, with varying degrees of success.
DIAMANDIS: We need a new generation, and that's only going to come when there's enough profit being made that there is drive, there's cooperation. We need -- enough of the cooperation stuff, let's get some good old competition to drive us up there.
O'BRIEN: Aviation legend, Burt Rutan, took the bait. He is the designer of Spaceship One which became the first civilian craft to fly to space briefly in June. His team, funded by Microsoft billionaire Paul Allen, is the odds-on favorite to win the prize.
BURT RUTAN, SCALED COMPOSITES: Our hope is that this will be a benchmark that will lead to an opportunity for a lot more people to, not only have fun, but to reap the benefits that we believe might be there. We don't know what they are. Just like when the early airplanes were flying in 1910, we didn't know what the benefits were, but people were doing it because it was fun.
O'BRIEN: In fact, Diamandis was inspired by the cash prizes offered when aviation was young. Lindberg won $25,000 for flying the Atlantic alone. But, while the golden age of aviation spurred an industrtry and changed the world, space presents technical and financial hurdles that might have taken the spirit out of Saint Louis.
DENNIS TITO, FIRST SPACE TOURIST: It's going to take decades for this industry to develop.
O'BRIEN: Dennis Tito is the world's first space tourist. Three- and-a-half years ago he paid the Russians $20 million to visit the International Space Station. Since then only one other space tourist has floated in his wake. Tito is now focused on the earthly concerns of his investment company. Is he bullish on space as a business?
TITO: Well, it's a sector that I'd be bullish on 50 or 100 years from now. And it would be like -- you know, predicting that automobiles would be a great industry 120 years ago. You would not know what company to invest in.
O'BRIEN: But none of this dissuades Peter Diamandis. Since he was nine, he has dreamed of traveling to space and creating businesses that would build resorts on the moon or mine the asteroids.
DIAMANDIS: It's my calling in life. It's my passion. I don't know why it's so important, it's just -- it's, I consider myself lucky to have that passion. You know, I wake up every morning with the excitement to go out there and make this stuff happen. And it's what drives me.
O'BRIEN: It's a long way from weightless flights in suborbital hops to a Hilton on the moon, but Diamandis says his embryonic industry is headed in the right direction.
SIEBERG: Miles looked like he was having so much fun that I had to try this for myself. For more on this rather exhilarating experience, you can just go to our Web site, that's at CNN.com/next.
(END VIDEOTAPE)
(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)
ANNOUNCER: Just ahead, this place has been a spiritual refuge for Native Americans for centuries. Should a road run through it?
Also ahead, an animal park under investigation for what could be the world's largest case of ape smuggling.
(END VIDEOTAPE)
(COMMERCIAL BREAK)
SIEBERG: In Albuquerque, New Mexico, a fight is on to keep a road from being built through a place that's not only a national monument, but an area revere by Native American. Gary Strieker has the story.
(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)
GARY STRIEKER, CNN CORRESPONDENT (voice-over): They were chiseled out of volcanic rock, some of them thousands of years ago. In this place held sacred by Native Americans.
LORI WEAHKEE, SAGE COUNCIL: The Petroglyph National Monument is important to Native American people because it is our spiritual connection to this earth and to our ancestors and to the generations yet to come.
STRIEKER: Some 25,000 images like these are legally protected inside Petroglyph National Monument, stretching for miles along Albuquerque's west side and blocking road traffic to new housing developments. The monument is now emerging as a symbolic victim of urban sprawl, a critical problem affecting cities nationwide.
MICHAEL CADIBAN (PH), CITY COUNCIL MEMBER: The intent was always that this road would be part of the monument. This part...
STRIEKER: There's strong support here for extending a major roadway through the monument to relieve traffic congestion and provide more access to the city's growing west side.
CADIBAN: We're going to avoid petroglypms, if not all of them, as many as we can. So, there will be really minimal impact to this area.
STRIEKER: Others say the roads would be an insult to Native Americans.
ERIC GRiEGO, CITY COUNCIL MEMBER: This issue is about more than a road. It's about what we value fundamentally as a community.
MARTIN HENRICH, CITY COUNCIL MEMBER: Our mayor and some of my colleagues on the city council are willing to destroy what I believe to be a national treasure in order to save four minutes off of a commute time.
STRIEKER: The monument was created by Congress 14 years ago to protect the petroglyphs from vandalism and encroaching development.
(on camera): It was only a matter of time before the city's westward sprawl would push it right up against this monument and the sacred beliefs of Native Americans.
(voice-over): Opposition groups are threatening lawsuits to block construction of the road, but Congress has already approved a corridor through the monument to allow it to be built.
(END VIDEOTAPE)
SIEBERG: All right, scientists in Thailand have begun investigating what some believe to be the world's biggest case of ape smuggling. The Safari World Amusement Park in Bangkok has some 100 orangutans and conservationists say the park couldn't have gotten that many just from its breeding program. Researchers are conducting DNA tests that should determine whether the apes were smuggled from Indonesia. Now, if that's the case, they orangutans will be rehabilitated and returned to the wild and the owners of Safari World, prosecuted. Orangutans are an endangered species. Fewer than 30,000 of them are left in the jungles of Malaysia and Indonesia.
All right, couple of months ago we showed you home video of a rather strange looking creature that was roaming backyards in Baltimore County, Maryland. Some thought it was a hyena, some a coyote. Some even called it a "hyote" and Steve of Valley City, Ohio, told us in an e-mail: "The mammal in question bore a strong resemblance to the Tasmanian tiger, a marsupial thought to be extinct." Well, here's an update, the man who caught the animal on videotape set out a humane trap and caught what he believes is a baby of the original critter. Vets have identified it as a red fox with the skin disease, mange. Mystery apparently solved.
Well, here's another mystery: Why did the moose cross the cemetery? Well, we don't really know, but we can tell you what happened when he did. Samantha Hayes of CNN affiliate KSL has the details.
(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)
SAMANTHA HAYES, KSL REPORTER (voice-over): A funeral procession in the Salt Lake City Cemetery complicates efforts of Wildlife Resource officers, trying to relocate a moose that wandered in. The moose, however, did not seem concerned, yawning as officers zero in and playfully roaming about whenever they get close.
Finally there's a clear shot behind the stone wall. The drug works in a matter of minutes, the moose's legs stiffened at one point he trips over a headstone, knocking it over. He stumbles and stammers across the road until falling underneath a tree.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Grab my truck.
HAYES (on camera): Wildlife officials say they have seen a couple of moose come down from the mountains into the valley recently they say it's just that time of year, this bull moose in particular, was probably looking for a female companion
SGT. SCOTT WHITE, DEPARTMENT WILDLIFE RESOURCES: This time of year bull moose are generally fairly active. The mating season is coming up pretty quick, so they are out on the move.
HAYES (voice-over): The next step takes nearly a dozen men, including police officers and firemen to lift the moose up and into the trailer.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: One, two, three.
HAYES: The moose is released up in one of the canyons marked with blue paint to alert hunters that it has been drugged, a little taste of fresh September snow and the moose is on his way again. (END VIDEOTAPE)
(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)
ANNOUNCER: Next up: UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Well, that's quite extraordinary.
ANNOUNCER: Coral reefs get a new lease on life from special designed concrete balls.
(END VIDEOTAPE)
(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)
SIEBERG (voice-over): Here's a question: How do you use the Internet to get people together off the Internet? Well, that's a question that Meetup CEO, Scott Heiferman, was determined to answer.
SCOTT HEIFERMAN, CEO, MEETUP.COM: Just because we have all these great, wonderful new ways to communicate, instant messaging and e-mail and -- you know we still have a -- we're still a species that -- you know, evolved to get something out of face-to-face communication.
SIEBERG: Heiferman took this idea and ran with it creating a Web site called Meetup.com where Internet users can log on, type in a hobby or interest along with a zip code and get instant access to others in their area with those same interests. The site then sets up face-to-face meetings for those individuals to get together.
HEIFERMAN: The nature of Meetup is to give people power to organize themselves when they really feel passionate about something, even if that passion is just about -- you know, knitting or Chihuahuas.
SIEBERG: Just this month, Meetup launched a new phase of the Web site, giving members of local Meetup groups more power and control.
(END VIDEOTAPE)
(COMMERCIAL BREAK)
SIEBERG: Many of the world's natural coral reefs are in trouble. Artificial reef can fill the gap and even help the coral grow back. Michael Holmes reports from Kuwait on a group that's taking concrete action to restore reefs.
(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)
MICHAEL HOLMES, CNN CORRESPONDENT (voice-over): Off the coast of Kuwait, a rather odd looking object is about to be tossed into the Persian Gulf, one of the final steps in a process that begins like this:
Concrete, a mold, and what so far appears to be a terrific idea.
They're called reef balls, here high and dry after manufacture, a variety of sizes and designs. But their final resting place is under the waves, where they are being used to create artificial reefs, marine habitats, breakwaters, erosion preventers, and some very cool diving destinations.
(on camera): Once the mold comes off a reef ball, you're left with, well, a lump of concrete, but this is not just any lump and this is not just any type of concrete. This is a very complex lump of concrete.
MIKE SYMNS, KUWAIT REEF BALL CO.: There's a lot of complexity. There's the thing about the habitat, the micro-surfacing, the macro- surface there to provide the protection and shape. There's the design of the holes in it, which are convex, which actually create small vortexes which disperse the nutrients.
HOLMES (voice-over): Oh, yes, the concrete, a finally chewed recipe that makes the reef ball enviro-friendly and actually attracts both flora and fauna, and with a pH level close to that of seawater. End result: a fish and plant magnet.
SYMNS: It amazes one. It's a wonder of life, really, when you see these -- within the hour of putting them in there, you will see fish quite happily swimming in them, using them as habitat immediately.
HOLMES: Mike Symns runs a company called EcoSeas in Kuwait, but he's also a contractor for the Reef Ball parent company, which is based in the U.S. You see, reef balls aren't just in Kuwait, far from it. Nearly 4,000 projects over the past 10 years, half a million reef balls deployed off New Zealand, parts of Africa, the Middle East, and here a spectacular project in Antigua.
TODD BARBER, REEF BALL FOUNDATION: Reef balls are important for a lot of reasons. They're an important educational tool for people to understand how important natural coral reefs are. They're also an important tool for us to be able to restore coral reefs by transplanting corals on top of them, as well as to replace the habitat that corals create.
HOLMES: Coral transplantation has become a highly successful benefit of the reef ball. When they're made, small indentations are carefully created during the concrete pour. Coral is then placed in a special mixture and essentially just planted on the reef ball. The results have, for the most part, been spectacular. Endangered reefs have been given some new life and new reefs created where once there was just sand.
Today we're the guests of the very active and very enthusiastic Kuwait Dive Club. For years they've been building artificial reefs to dive on, but these days they are reef ball converts.
This from the clubs biggest deployment, dozens of reef balls shipped out via barge and lowered into place by crane, a massive endeavor, but this is one bunch of keen Kuwaitis.
We suit up as the preparations to launch the latest reef ball continue. Down below, a forest of reef balls and schools of fish, a new ecosystem where, not so long ago, there was an underwater desert.
BARBER: Well, reef balls are designed with no metal rebar inside of them, nothing that would make them degrade, so in essence, a reef ball is designed to last a minimum of 500 years.
HOLMES (on camera): Well, that's quite extraordinary. Those reef balls have been down there for only three months, and there's already plenty growing on them. Some coral will grow 15 centimeters, up to 15 centimeters, in a year, so before long that's going to be a real reef.
Another aspect of this program is encouraging corporate or individual sponsorship of balls. You get the GPS coordinates so you can find it, your on plaque, and you can visit any time.
(END VIDEOTAPE)
(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)
ANNOUNCER: Still to come: As if your cell phone didn't have enough accessories, how about adding your girlfriend? We'll explain when NEXT@CNN returns.
(COMMERCIAL BREAK)
SIEBERG: You know, they say love is a game. Well, now it's a game you can play on your cell. A Hong Kong company has developed a virtual girlfriend designed to be downloaded to your phone. She has artificial intelligence and will respond to any request. Well, almost any request, more from Andrew Brown.
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"VIVIAN": Hello.
ANDREW BROWN, CNN CORRESPONDENT (voice-over): She's called Vivian, a 20-year-old designer, fun loving, single and seeking companionship.
"VIVIAN": OK. Let's go, handsome.
BROWN: Best of all, she's right under your thumb.
EBERHARD SCHONEBURG, ARTIFICIAL LIFE: You can send her messages and see what she's doing, you can flirt with her.
BROWN: Vivian a virtual girlfriend, programmed to hook up with males between the ages of 15 and 35. The only catch is, she lives inside a cell phone.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: She has sort of like a robotic kind of deal.
BROWN: Vivian uses up a lot of bandwidth, flirting, dining, going to bars, the gym. To track her movements you need a high-tech handset that can process moving images. You also need to push all the right buttons.
SCHONEBURG: If you're not nice to her, she'll be mean to you, maybe.
"VIVIAN": Fine. I'm not talking to you.
BROWN: The virtual girlfriend is the brainchild of a Hong Kong- based software company called Artificial Life. The firm will roll out the service in Asia and Europe this fall and expects hundreds of thousands of men will sign up. Could get scary.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Once you get used to sort of a relationship virtually, then the danger is not being able to relate to real people.
BROWN: Some women are celebrating the end of conventional romance.
UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: It's safer to have that girlfriend, then...
BROWN (on camera): Than a real girlfriend?
UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: Yeah.
BROWN: Why? Because you can't trust women?
UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: No, not women, men!
BROWN (voice-over): You can definitely trust the men playing this game.
SCHONEBURG: See, we thought about this, but you won't get any sex.
BROWN: Or much love.
(on camera): Dear, I bought you a membership to my gym.
"VIVIAN": Why? Do you think I'm fat.
SCHONEBURG: She would have certain secrets and behaviors that you will not realize in the beginning.
"VIVIAN": You make me feel like a giant hippo. I need a new boyfriend.
BROWN: Ah, you know you're right, babe.
"VIVIAN": Ah!
(END VIDEOTAPE)
SIEBERG: Hmm, well, I guess it's a step up from those big plastic blow-up dolls -- or maybe not.
Well, that's all the time we have for now. But here's a look at what's coming up next week.
A race for the X Prize for private space flight gets underway in earnest. Burt Rutan is scheduled to launch his Spaceship One on the first of two flights needed to win $10 million.
That's coming up on NEXT. Until then, let's hear from you. You can send us an e-mail at next@cnn.com and don't forget to check out our website at cnn.com/next.
Thanks so much for joining us, for all of us, I'm Daniel Sieberg. We'll see you next time.
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