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American Morning

Countdown: Discovery; "90 Second Pop"

Aired July 13, 2005 - 09:30   ET

THIS IS A RUSH TRANSCRIPT. THIS COPY MAY NOT BE IN ITS FINAL FORM AND MAY BE UPDATED.

SOLEDAD O'BRIEN, CNN ANCHOR: A beautiful picture of the Space Shuttle Discovery to show you this morning, to open our 9:30 half hour here, from New York, at least. Welcome back, everybody. I'm Soledad O'Brien, reporting from New York. Good morning, Miles.
MILES O'BRIEN, CNN ANCHOR: Good morning, Soledad. I'm Miles O'Brien, live at the Kennedy Space Center about three-and-a-half miles from that beautiful Discovery on the launchpad. Special coverage this morning of the launch. We hope there will a launch today of the Shuttle Discovery. First mission since the Columbia disaster two-and- a-half years ago, as you know. Second time Discovery has been in this position. Discovery did the return to space after Challenger, after that disaster back in 1998. Sort of the comeback kid for NASA.

I'll have more for you about what the crew is going through at this moment, having their breakfast, the weather briefing, the suit- up. I spoke with the Mission Commander Eileen Collins, and we'll hear a little bit about that. Right now, though, let's go back to New York and Soledad.

S. O'BRIEN: All right, Miles, thanks. And in fact, let's take another look at the headlines this morning and get right to Fredricka Whitfield. She's at the CNN Center in Atlanta. Good morning, again, Fred.

FREDRICKA WHITFIELD, CNN ANCHOR: Hello again.

British police are hunting for a mastermind behind the bombing attacks in London. Officers are searching homes outside London this hour. New video, just in this morning, shows crews in the Leeds neighborhood, where three of the suspected four attackers lived. Prime Minister Tony Blair is urging tolerance amid fears of a backlash to Britain's Muslim populations.

A suicide bomber in Baghdad has killed at least seven Iraqi children. Officials say a vehicle filled with explosives drove up to a U.S. Army humvee just as the troops were handing out treats to the children. The explosion killed at least 27 people, including at least one American soldier.

Thousands of people in southern Colorado are waiting to hear when they can head back home. Firefighters made headway Tuesday against a 12,000 acre wildfire burning about 150 miles south of Denver. Some 5,000 people have been evacuated since the blaze started a week ago. National Guard helicopters are on standby after Colorado's governor declared a state of emergency. And Tropical Storm Emily is heading toward the Windward Islands on the Eastern edge of the Caribbean, and it could be a hurricane by this evening.

(WEATHER REPORT)

M. O'BRIEN: Let's talk about that countdown clock, because it does require a little bit of running math to go through all of this. This is rocket science. So let's -- the clock says T-minus three hours and holding. And we are 38 minutes into this planned three-hour hold. There's a lot of history on these holds. It goes back, actually, to the Gemini (ph) days when this were trying to launch two rockets to rendezvous in space, and they want to kind of -- wanted to keep the work kind of sinked up on both countdowns. And so they built these holds in.

They've kept that tradition. It allows them benchmarks of time to know when to do certain things and gives them sort of slop in their schedule, so to speak, some buffer time. During this period of time, they finish fueling up half million gallons of hydrogen and oxygen. And, by the way what you do is you add, as you can see here, about three hours and 15 minutes to that right now. The launch is about six hours and 15 minutes away. The hold at three hours now, 39 minutes old. Now, that should be enough to confuse anybody.

All right, anyway, the fueling continues. And then what happens, after it's filled with that super-cold hydrogen and oxygen, there's a very careful inspection that will occur, probably underway right about now. Looking for ice build-up on that external fuel tank. That, obviously, a big concern. You don't want ice falling off on the orbiter, taking us back, hearkening back to Columbia.

The disintegration of Columbia brought huge changes for NASA, of course. Nearly everything from NASA's organizational structure, down to many design features of the shuttle, was brought into question. Here's a look at some of those changes, as well as what the crew members are thinking, as they trained and prepared for liftoff.

(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)

M. O'BRIEN (voice over): Being the first is never easy, and so it goes for the Discovery astronauts, the first shuttle crew to fly after the loss of Columbia. Good thing they're led by a commander well-accustomed to the vanguard.

Eileen Collins, among the first women to fly in the Air Force, the first female shuttle pilot, and then commander, she is at home in the hot seat.

EILEEN COLLINS, DISCOVERY COMMANDER: And I personally like being stressed out. I think it's good training for us. And on the real flight, if you only get one thing goes wrong, it's going to be much easier to handle it, because you're trained to handle a lot more.

M. O'BRIEN: The real flight they are training for began as a typical shuttle run to re-supply the Space Station. They were set to launch not long after Columbia was due back in February of 2003. But Columbia did not make it home. The crew of seven perished over Texas 16 minutes before they were due to arrive in Florida.

COLLINS: When the accident happened, I had an opportunity to just take myself off the mission and say, I want to spend more time with my family.

M. O'BRIEN: Eileen Collins is not only an astronaut, she's a working mom with two young children.

COLLINS: I have never had any pressure from my family to not fly this mission. My parents, my husband, my children, my friends -- you know, I would think that I would have, but I haven't. Having said that, I have asked myself, do I really want to fly this mission, many times. And the answer always came back yes.

M. O'BRIEN: No surprise to anyone who knows her, not the least of them, husband Pat Youngs, who met her 22 years ago when they were both in the Air Force. He marvels at his overachieving spouse, who earned a Masters at Stanford in 11 months.

PAT YOUNGS, EILEEN COLLINS' HUSBAND: I recall helping with some of her homework, and it was pretty difficult looking at it. And I remember she would just sit there and grind it out and sort it out when I was thinking, if I was doing this, I think I'd go play nine holes and come back and look at it later. But that's how she always is, and just, you know, figured it out.

M. O'BRIEN: And for this mission, finishing safe and sound is the primary goal. Over the past two-and-half years, NASA has spent more than $1.5 billion looking for answers for what brought Columbia down.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Booster ignition and liftoff...

M. O'BRIEN: The crew's fate was sealed about a minute after launch, when a two-pound piece of insulating foam careened off the external fuel tank, piercing a lethal hole in the heat shield on the left wing. The orbiter disintegrated 16 days later in the blast furnace of re-entry. NASA has redesigned the fuel tank, changed the way it applies the foam, and removed it from some places to reduce the risk of a big piece breaking loose.

ANDREW THOMAS, DISCOVERY MISSION SPECIALIST: I don't think our vehicle is going to be plagued by problems with foam coming off the tape, no. There will be some small pieces of foam that come off. That always happens. We know from the flight history that happens. I don't think they're going to be serious, though.

M. O'BRIEN: They will launch during daylight hours, under the gaze of a more sophisticated network of tracking cameras to spot trouble. Heat shields on the wings will be rigged with sensors to detect a debris strike. And then, once in space, the crew will conduct a painstaking survey of the orbiter with cameras mounted on the end of a newly-designed boom. And they will approach the space station belly first, giving the station crew a chance to shoot yet another ream of photos. There is good reason for all this checking and re-checking of the orbiter's wing protection.

CHARLES CAMAROA, DISCOVERY MISSION SPECIALIST: We thought we could survive a quarter-inch hole in some cases, and an inch hole on the upper surface. Right now, we believe that we cannot survive if we see like a thumbnail-size piece of coating loss from the outside surface in a critical region on the leading edge.

M. O'BRIEN: The astronauts will try some new ideas for patching holes in the heat shield in space, but right now NASA does not have a lot of confidence in the techniques. So, as a last resort, if the orbiter is damaged, the crew will simply stay on the space station, a safe harbor, waiting for rescue. But all this attention on avoiding what happened to Columbia's crew leaves a nagging concern, that other lurking problems might be overlooked.

STEVE ROBINSON, DISCOVERY MISSION SPECIALIST: It's the thing that we haven't thought of yet that will be the next thing that will surprise us. And -- but there are a whole bunch who are out there worrying about that. It's just not as visible to the rest of us.

UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: And liftoff of Discovery...

M. O'BRIEN: For the astronauts of Discovery and their families this will be a long, hard mission. Before Columbia, shuttle crews and their families all breathed a sigh of relief once the rocket engine stopped and the orbiter was in space.

JIM KELLY, DISCOVERY PILOT: Well, this time, they're going to be sitting on the ground for two week, watching the clock tick and going, well, I'm still waiting for the event that killed the last crew. Psychologically, for the families, for NASA, for all the managers, for everybody, it's psychologically going to be a completely different thing.

(END VIDEOTAPE)

M. O'BRIEN: Now about six hours and ten minutes to launch, and we invite you to join us for a special coverage of the launch of Discovery, weather permitting today. It begins at 3:00 p.m. Eastern. The launch, as you know, 3:51 Eastern Time. Stay with CNN all day long and you'll know about the shuttle's return to flight -- Soledad.

S. O'BRIEN: All right, Miles, thanks.

Well, for months, "Time" magazine reporter Matthew Cooper refused to divulge who leaked the identity of a CIA operative to him. Today, though, Cooper is testifying before a federal grand jury.

Kathleen Koch is outside the U.S. District Court in Washington D.C.

Kathleen, good morning to you.

What exactly is going on behind closed doors? Can you essentially guess? KATHLEEN KOCH, CNN CORRESPONDENT: Well, basically, Matt Cooper is, we can assume, answering the questions before the grand jury that he has refused to, as you mentioned, for months. This after, of course, "Time" magazine eventually consented to turn over his e-mails and notes to federal prosecutor, and also after both of their appeals that went all the way to the Supreme Court failed, both "Time" magazine and Matthew Cooper's. And then also in a very dramatic turn of events, it was last week when Matthew Cooper was about to go to jail, facing potentially four months in jail, that he got what he called personal consent from his source.

Now, he has not yet publicly divulged that source, but of course there was an article that came out over the weekend, "Newsweek" magazine, citing an e-mail from Matt Cooper that did name Karl -- was between he and Karl Rove, deputy White House chief of staff, on this very subject.

So in that case, that's what we believe he's discussing right now. He did not talk to cameras as he went in, said he would upon completing testimony. But of course, grand jury testimony is secret. So he will be limited in what he can share with us -- Soledad.

S. O'BRIEN: All right, Kathleen Koch for us, thanks for update.

Well, there's the another reporter involved in the CIA leak controversy, and that was Judith Miller of "The New York Times." Miller chose not to reseal her sources. She was carted off to jail last week, and she could be there as long as four months.

National correspondent Kelly Wallace has been following her story, joining us this morning.

Good morning.

KELLY WALLACE, CNN NATL. CORRESPONDENT: Good morning to you.

S. O'BRIEN: First of all, let's start with where she is. I mean, I was surprised to read maximum-security prison for Judith Miller.

WALLACE: Maximum security. This is not sort of a white collar, kind of minimum-security facility. It is a maximum-security jail. It is Alexandria Detention Facility in Northern Virginia. This a place, we understand, anyone from who commits crimes in Alexandria, from shoplifting to murder, ends up. There are federal prisoners there as well.

We were told as of yesterday, 425 men, 33 women there. According to sources familiar with conditions at the jail there, we understand that Miller is with a group of about 22 women in total. No violent offenders in that population, in for things like petty crime, petty theft and fraud.

S. O'BRIEN: So give me a sense of what her day is like.

WALLACE: It is tough. Her new home now, a 70-square foot cell, which she shares with another woman. We understand there are no bars on that cell. There is a mattress on the floor. That's where she is sleeping. In that cell, you'll also find a toilet, a sink, night light and window. No clocks, so no opportunity to know what time it is.

Pretty much she's in that cell from 11 p.m. to 7:00 a.m., and during any lockdowns throughout the day. Beyond that, she can sort of be in a lounge where she shares meals with her fellow inmates. We understand, there is no choice, you get what the prison is serving, access to television, access to phone calls, microwave. She doesn't have to work, so she's not required to work. She has access, we understand, also to a library and to newspapers.

Interestingly, also, she must always wear a jumpsuit with prison or inmate on it. The facility is billing itself as sort of a new- generation jail, trying to reduce tension and violence. And part of that, they say, they have a sheriff's deputy living with all the inmates 24 hours a day.

S. O'BRIEN: You know, when you talked to her before the decision was made that she would go to jail, she spoke a lot about her husband and really how concerned she was for him. Does he come to visit her? Does he get to come to visit her?

WALLACE: Well, we understand he is going to visit her. And that she can have, we understand from a spokesman with the jail, visits of up to one hour a day, except for Friday. But there are restriction on the times.

Also, we were surprised to learn this, no physical contact with the visitors. There's a glass window. She can talk on the phone with her husband, with her family and friends. And this is different. People will recall Martha Stewart, she was in a federal prison camp in West Virginia. She could actually have physical contact with her visitors. We understand she was playing Scrabble at times with her mother, so a big difference here.

S. O'BRIEN: She has some interesting company, if you can call it company, in this jail, in this prison.

WALLACE: People will be surprised to hear this, I think, Zacarias Moussaoui, and people will know him as man the man who pleaded guilty not too long ago in connection with the September 11th attacks. He is also at this facility. The reason is this facility houses some federal prisoners as part of a contract with the U.S. Marshal's Service. Chances of the two of them, though, Soledad, running into each other, not likely, because women are kept pretty much separately from the men.

S. O'BRIEN: And I'm sure a host of other reasons, too. How is she doing? Has any of her spoken about...

WALLACE: That's, of course, our big question, too. I have been talking to one of her lawyers who is seeing her regularly. And he says this, Soledad, that this is a big adjustment. This is a real prison, he said. He said she appears a bit paler and thinner than when she went in, but says she's adjusting.

S. O'BRIEN: All right, Kelly, thanks a lot for the update.

Still to come this morning, an angry Bernie Ebbers arrives in court. The former Worldcom exec is being sentenced today. We'll take a look at that.

Also, will former friends Paris and Nicole duke it out in another season of "The Simple Life?" They might have to. "90-Second Pop's" up next.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)

S. O'BRIEN: I love that song. Welcome back, everybody. It's time for another all-new episode of "90-Second Pop." Starring today B.J. Sigesmund, the newly-minted senior editor at "Us Weekly." Yea! Congratulations.

ANDY BOROWITZ, BOROWITZREPORT.COM: Wow!

S. O'BRIEN: Karyn Bryant, she's the co-host of "SHOWBIZ TONIGHT." And Andy Borowitz, the new president of borowitzreport.com, and CEO and CFO as well.

Welcome, you guys. Let's get right to it. We're going to start with DreamWorks. And kind of a bad week. First, you've got that pesky SEC investigation. Those are never fun. And then also "Shrek 2," a popular movie, but the DVD sales. Why?

B.J. SIGESMUND, STAFF EDITOR, "US WEEKLY": Right. Well, this is the most popular animated film of all time. But surprising to everyone, the DVD sales have not been that strong, nor were they very strong for "Shark Tale," DreamWorks' other big animated movie from last year.

And, in fact, all of this news sent DreamWorks stocks falling on Monday. In fact, it closed 13 percent lower than it had been at $23, which is down from a high of $42 back in December. I sound like Andy Serwer.

S. O'BRIEN: Look at you, Andy Serwer.

KARYN BRYANT, CNN CO-HOST, "SHOWBIZ TONIGHT": My goodness.

BOROWITZ: But he is a senior editor now.

S. O'BRIEN: Oh, sorry.

BOROWITZ: He needs to know these things.

SIGESMUND: But the more important...

BOROWITZ: Junior editors don't need to know this. SIGESMUND: The more important news is it's not just DreamWorks that's happening -- their DVDs don't do well. Also, "The Incredibles" has not done that well on DVD. And it's causing people to wonder what's causing this slump.

BOROWITZ: There's a bright side of this, which is that if no one wants these DVDs, that's really going to cut down on piracy, which is bad. In Hong Kong, the street vendors won't be able to move this stuff.

BRYANT: Well, isn't it partly because the shelves are overflowing?

BOROWITZ: Right.

BRYANT: The DVD window is so short now from when a movie is in the theater to when it's on the shelves, it's just flooded.

SIGESMUND: Sure.

BRYANT: Now they don't give you as much time.

SIGESMUND: Plus, when you go there, it's not just new releases. It's also vintage TV shows now coming out on DVD. For instance, "Dukes of Hazzard" is upon us, right? So, you can get...

BOROWITZ: The first season of "90-Second Pop" just came out, which is great. I recommend it to everyone.

S. O'BRIEN: We are all going to be billionaires, you guys.

BOROWITZ: Exactly.

SIGESMUND: So, you can now get the -- just to finish the "Dukes of Hazzard" thing, you can now get the first season of "Dukes of Hazzard" on DVD. Studios are using any excuse to put stuff out there. And, as Karyn said, it's causing confusion among consumers.

S. O'BRIEN: The crowded-field problem. Well, that's interesting.

BOROWITZ: Right.

S. O'BRIEN: Let's talk about something that "People" magazine is reporting. Paris and Nicole -- for my mom, that's Paris Hilton and Nicole Richie. OK, the two of them hate each other, big split, in fact, to the point where she issued a statement saying, like, we're broken up as friends.

BRYANT: Right, yes. Well, they do "The Simple Life," and Fox has picked up their option for a fourth season even though these two are no longer friends. And the press statement was, Nicole knows what she did.

BOROWITZ: Wow!

(CROSSTALK)

BRYANT: Right, exactly. And...

BOROWITZ: It's like middle school, like "Mean Girls."

BRYANT: Very much so. And so, she passed a note and said, do you like me anymore? Check yes or no.

S. O'BRIEN: And that would be no.

BRYANT: That would be a big no.

S. O'BRIEN: And so, they have to do the show, because they've signed a deal.

BRYANT: Exactly. And so the idea is they're both engaged. So maybe the show would follow their respective preparations for their weddings. Or if there were a reconciliation, the show could follow that. But the option has been picked up, so...

SIGESMUND: I vote for the former option. I think this show, which is so popular among women, and most women love weddings, I think it would be very fun to watch the two of them get ready for their insane weddings. You've seen the bling. You know, like you've seen the fiances. Let's see the bridal gowns, et cetera, et cetera.

S. O'BRIEN: Also, the thread of these two people, former friends who now hate each other, I mean, I would so watch that.

BOROWITZ: Right.

S. O'BRIEN: I have to tell you.

B.J. and Andy and Karyn, thank you very much. Thanks for playing with us. Don't forget, Karyn's "SHOWBIZ TONIGHT," on headline prime tonight, They're taking a look at how futuristic space travel, as portrayed in movies and TV shows like "Lost in Space" matches reality. Not very much. That's tonight, every weeknight, 7:00 p.m. Eastern time.

A short break. We're back in a moment.

(END VIDEOTAPE)

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

S. O'BRIEN: Bernie Ebbers in court for his sentencing hearing. With a look at that, plus a check of Wall Street, Andy Serwer's "Minding Your Business" this morning. Good morning.

ANDY SERWER, "FORTUNE" COLUMNIST: Good morning, Soledad. We have some pictures in of Bernie Ebbers coming into court just about an hour. He's a little punchy, I think it's fair to say. We have that tape here? Here we go. There's Mr. Ebbers. Ooh, is that a bump or a push?

S. O'BRIEN: A push and...

SERWER: That's a bump. That was Dan Acker (ph), Bloomberg photographer, who -- I think it's fair to say -- got in the way of Bernie...

S. O'BRIEN: Grabs him, pulls him down...

SERWER: And there's the look, Soledad, the look.

S. O'BRIEN: Well, he's going to be -- he potentially could be sentenced to like 85 years in prison, right?

SERWER: Yes, 85 years, that's right. Let's talk about the markets. Stock trading up at this hour on Wall Street. S&P and Nasdaq going for five days in a row. Now, the Dow coming back as well, up 29 points. We've been talking about the damage Hurricane Dennis did in Florida.

But here's some pictures from the Coast Guard. Amazing footage. It takes a while for us to get around to it. That is a billion-dollar oil platform owned by British Petroleum and Exxon, 145 miles southeast of New Orleans. 16 anchors attach it to the bottom of the ocean floor, 6,000 feet down. Badly listing. It's 170,000 square feet, as big as a Wal-Mart supercenter. And that is going to take a lot of money to fix.

S. O'BRIEN: Oh yes, a tons. And they're insured?

SERWER: No, they're not insured, apparently.

S. O'BRIEN: Ugly.

SERWER: It could be a lot money.

S. O'BRIEN: Andy, thanks.

SERWER: You're welcome.

S. O'BRIEN: "CNN LIVE TODAY" coming up next. Hey, Daryn, good morning.

DARYN KAGAN, CNN ANCHOR: Hi, Soledad. We have a busy morning ahead on "CNN LIVE TODAY."

Convicted in the collapse of WorldCom. We're going to have more on Bernie Ebbers. We have the tape for you. Once again, not a boxing match, just him as he walks into his sentencing. When he -- the sentence is announced, we'll have that for you live here on CNN.

Also, a rubbish rescue. There was a curious kid, a trash compactor, not a good combination. We're going to hear from the very alert garbage collector. He saved the day. That story's just ahead.

S. O'BRIEN: Good.

KAGAN: Back to you. S. O'BRIEN: It has a happy ending, then.

KAGAN: It does, I'll tell you that.

S. O'BRIEN: For a minute, I was getting a little worried.

KAGAN: No, no, no. No squished kids.

S. O'BRIEN: All right, Daryn. We'll watch for that story, thanks.

A short break and we're back in a moment.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

S. O'BRIEN: That's it for AMERICAN MORNING this morning. Miles, we'll be watching your coverage, starting at 3:00 p.m.

M. O'BRIEN: Well, thank you very much, and we hope all of you will join us as well, as we look forward to the shuttle launch, weather permitting. Once again, 3:51 p.m. Eastern time. Join us for a special at 3:00 Eastern.

For now, let's send it over to Daryn Kagan at the CNN Center Atlanta.

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