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North Korea Threat; Fight Over Federalism; Update on High-Rise Crash

Aired October 12, 2006 - 11:00   ET

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

HEIDI COLLINS, CNN ANCHOR: Good morning, everybody. I'm Heidi Collins.
TONY HARRIS, CNN ANCHOR: And I'm Tony Harris.

Spend a second hour in the NEWSROOM this morning and stay informed.

Here's what's on the rundown this hour.

The United Nations fine-tuning a plan to punish North Korea for its reported nuclear test. Diplomats headed for a vote perhaps Friday.

COLLINS: New questions this morning about aviation security after a small plane hits a high-rise. For the New York Yankees it is a day for mourning.

HARRIS: A casual morning for this man. The potential for a stressful afternoon. The former Capitol staffer testifies about Mark Foley's e-mails on this Wednesday, October 12th.

You are in the NEWSROOM.

The Bush team at the U.N. carefully choosing its words today, hoping to nail down sanctions against North Korea for its reported nuclear test. The U.S. wants a resolution passed tomorrow. The sanctions reportedly toned down to keep China and Russia on board. Both have veto power.

Among other things, the plan demands North Korea return to six party talks. But China thinks direct talks between the U.S. and North Korea may be in order. That is something the Bush administration opposes.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

LIU JIANCHAO, CHINESE FOREIGN MINISTRY (through translator): Since the very beginning of the nuclear issue on the Korean Peninsula, we believe that the U.S. and North Korea are principal parties in this issue. If the two parties can strengthen their dialogue and consultation on certain occasions, this will strengthen their understanding and mutual trust, and they will be able to narrow down their differences. This would play a positive role.

(END VIDEO CLIP) HARRIS: And Japan pursuing its own sanctions against North Korea this morning. The ruling party approves a plan today. The Japanese cabinet expected to go along tomorrow.

The sanctions would include a ban on North Korean imports. North Korean ships wouldn't be allowed in Japanese ports and most North Korean nationals would be barred from Japan. A senior North Korean diplomat threatening strong countermeasures if Japan goes ahead.

COLLINS: A river runs through it. One side lit up in neon, the other mostly dark.

CNN's Jaime FlorCruz with a tale of two cities there along the line dividing North Korea and China.

(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)

JAIME FLORCRUZ, CNN BEIJING BUREAU CHIEF (voice over): A glimpse into North Korea from across the water in China. Men fish along the riverbanks of Sinuju, a North Korean border town of some 350,000 people. Not far away, school children gingerly learn to roller skate. And over here, North Koreans are celebrating the marriage of two of their own.

Two days after North Korea announced it had conducted its first nuclear test, it seems life in Sinuju is carrying on as normal.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE (through translator): Everything is normal for ordinary North Koreans. There isn't any tension.

FLORCRUZ: The contrast was the Chinese side couldn't be greater. Dandong is a city of 800,000 people, bustling with energy and entrepreneurship. Here, high-rise hotels and modern apartment houses tower overhead. And on the streets, Chinese eager to turn a profit.

Chinese tourists find time to look across the river and make the inevitable comparisons.

UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE (through translator): It's just like China in 1970s.

UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE (through translator): This side looks like Hong Kong. That side looks like China in the '70s.

FLORCRUZ: Others take a short boat ride.

(on camera): This is the Yalu River which divides China and North Korea. For less than three U.S. dollars, tourists can take a motorized tour and get a closer look at North Korea.

(voice over): And they see a very different place. Slogans like this wishing North Korea leader Kim Jong-il longevity keep up the remorseless beat of state propaganda. Sinuju's decrepit looks betray a sense of stagnation and isolation.

Smoke stacks tower over factories but only one or two spew smoke. A sign perhaps of the north's acute energy shortage. A ferris wheel sits along the bank, idle for years.

Panning across the Yalu River, the skylines of Sinuju and Dandong show just how much North Korea has lagged behind its close neighbor and ally. Despite talk of sanctions and North Korea's isolation, trains and trucks continue to ply both sides.

As night falls, Chinese border guards wade through convoys of vehicles, ferrying goods across the so-called China-Korea Friendship Bridge. The traffic continues into the night. The Chinese side of the bridge ablaze in neon and lasers. And on the other side, only a tiny flicker of light.

Jaime FlorCruz, CNN, Dandong, China.

(END VIDEOTAPE)

COLLINS: A TV station under attack. Police say gunmen stormed the offices of a Sunni satellite channel this morning, killing nine people. Eight people were killed in blasts in central Baghdad.

And in other violence, Iraqi police reported finding 40 bullet- riddled bodies in neighborhoods across the capital. They say all the bodies show signs of torture.

More than 400 corpses have been found in similar condition in the Iraqi capital this month alone. Authorities blame violence between Shiites and Sunnis.

Dividing Iraq. The country's lawmakers approve a measure to form federal regions in a nation already split along ethnic lines.

CNN's Cal Perry reports now from Baghdad.

(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)

CAL PERRY, CNN CORRESPONDENT (voice over): It may look like a dull routine, parliamentary procedure, but this vote may change the map of the Middle East. Iraq's Shiite-dominated parliament pushed through a law allowing for the creation of federal regions. Eighteen months from now, Iraqi provinces will be able to form alliances. Sunni MPs and two small Shia parties boycotted the session, but the measure still passed.

Three major groups live in Iraq: Kurds in the North, Shias in the south, bordered by the majority Shia Iran, and the Sunni Arab minority in the middle. The Kurdish North, rich in oil, has always been the most independent. It had autonomy even during the last decade of Saddam Hussein's rule.

The Kurds have always wanted this decentralized arrangement. Neighbor Turkey, with its own Kurdish minority, does not. The Iraqi foreign minister is trying to allay Turkish anxiety.

HOSHYAR ZEBARI, IRAQI FOREIGN MINISTER (through translator): The prime minister will visit Turkey. Issues discussed will include the worries Turkey has about the Kurdish legal party. Talks also include bilateral talks about the commission that serves Turkish-Iraqi relations.

PERRY: Most Shia also favor a federal arrangement. They, too, dominate oil-rich provinces in the south. One of the most influential Shia leaders says this isn't a prelude to the breakup of Iraq.

ABDUL AZIZ HAKIM, HEAD OF THE SHIITE BLOC IN IRAQ (through translator): What is happening now is that Iraq is being divided into three countries. We want god, the world and history to witness that we have nothing to do with it.

PERRY: But Sunnis think it is a cause for division.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE (through translator): So we do not believe wherever there is federalism there are divisions. Federalism is a unity for Iraq and not a cause for division for Iraq.

PERRY: Despite being a minority in Iraq, the Sunni have long dominated its political life. Now they face the prospect of being isolated in the middle of the country, an area without proven oil reserves and mired in sectarian violence.

(END VIDEOTAPE)

COLLINS: Cal Perry joining us now live.

Cal, how exactly then does this affect the three major groups that we're talking about? Of course, the Kurds, the Sunni and the Shia. You talk about the Sunnis being in the middle of the country if this were to really happen, sort of being isolated.

PERRY: Absolutely. And they have concerns of their own.

What it really does is it puts already stressful relations under even more stress. We're talking both regionally and domestically.

For example, how do the Turks feel about suddenly sharing a border with what could be a Kurdish autonomous region? And how do the Sunnis, as you say, very isolated under much of the violence from this war, how are they going to feel about Shias sharing a border with Iran already with a lot of Iranian backing?

So, really what we're talking about is stressful relations, perhaps coming under even more stress. And I say this, Heidi, trying not to be tongue in cheek, but in Iraq, a year and a half is an awfully long time. A lot can change on the ground between now and this referendum -- Heidi.

COLLINS: Boy, that's what history will show, certainly.

So do you think then that the Shias could actually -- I mean, with reference to the militias, they could actually become more powerful or less powerful? I just -- I don't see how it all would work.

PERRY: Well, I think this is a big concern for Sunnis that live in the central section of the country. Again, we're talking about cities like Falluja and Ramadi, where they have seen heavy, heavy fighting.

These Shia militias here in Iraq are very, very powerful. Many of them have strong backing from Tehran.

The concern here is, of course, that these militias in many parts of the country are running unchecked. They're running without the security forces checking them.

Many Sunnis blame these militias as being sectarian death squads. So the concern is that If Basra and places like this down in the south come together as their own autonomous region bordering Iran, there will be even less to check these militias.

COLLINS: Yes. It seems like borders would become a very big issue as well.

Cal, we will continue to watch this story. Thanks so much.

HARRIS: A tragic accident, now a search for answers. What caused the plane crash that killed New York Yankees' pitcher Cory Lidle and his flight instructor? Here's what we know right now about the accident.

Investigators are going over radar data trying to figure out what went wrong. Lidle's plane slammed into a high-rise condo on New York's Upper East Side.

Family, friends and teammates are mourning Lidle's death. The Yankees called the crash a terrible and shocking tragedy. The accident briefly raised fears of another terrorist attack, and this morning is raising questions about air space restrictions and the potential threat from small planes.

Let's get an update on the investigation now. For that, we go live to the crash site in New York.

CNN's Allan Chernoff is there for us this morning.

Allan, good morning.

ALLAN CHERNOFF, CNN SR. CORRESPONDENT: Good morning to you, Tony.

And as we look up at the crash site, the Belaire Condominiums, every once in a while we see somebody walking around in the apartments. You see several apartments were burned by the crash itself. Those people inside, well, investigators from the NTSB, as well as the FBI's evidence response team, and the police department's crime scene unit.

They're going through the debris both inside of the building and on the sidewalk below, where much of the debris from the airplane actually did fall, including one body that was still strapped in. So a very grim task, of course. The body has been removed, but the debris is still there. This hopefully will help investigators figure out what exactly did cause that crash. It is not an easy task because, first of all, there had been no contact with air traffic control. This was a visual flight rule area, so essentially the pilots were just using their eyes to guide themselves and to make sure that they didn't crash into anybody else. So, certainly it's going to take a little while to try to figure out.

Our colleague, Miles O'Brien, who, as you know, owns and flies a similar plane, speculated to us this morning that this may have been a problem when the pilot was trying to make a turn above the East River. This condominium is just a few hundred yards away from the East River on the east side of Manhattan, and the plane had to remain above the East River.

The planes are not actually permitted above Manhattan Island. So that may have been what triggered the real problem over here.

For New Yorkers looking up at that condominium this morning, well, it was a reminder that yesterday they were reliving, at least briefly, their worst fears.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

MARLA KAUFMAN, PLANE CRASH WITNESS: I saw smoke. You heard this loud noise first. It was a very loud noise. And I saw smoke, and then I saw this huge ball of flames shoot out from the building and go to the ground.

CHERNOFF: Right.

KAUFMAN: And I immediately said, "Was that a body?" I didn't know what it was. And I was trying to clear the chairs where I was to look down and look down at the ground and see what was there. And then I immediately thought of terrorism.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

CHERNOFF: But, of course, we quickly learned that it was not a case of terrorism, fortunately. There were two fatalities, as you mentioned, the Yankees pitcher, Cory Lidle, and his flight instructor. Five civilians were injured -- Tony.

HARRIS: CNN's Allan Chernoff for us in New York City.

Allan, appreciate it. Thank you.

COLLINS: Cory Lidle got his pilot's license in February. He was flying with an instructor at the time of the crash yesterday. But it still raises quite a few questions.

And for some answers, we turn now to Richard Mulliner. He is a flight instructor at the Academy of Aviation on New York's Long Island. He's 23 years old but has been flying since he was 15.

Thanks for being with us, Richard. You know this area very, very well. You are a general aviation private pilot. Explain to us in layman's terms, if you would, about how difficult it is to fly in the space that's available, specifically in Manhattan.

RICHARD MULLINER, FLIGHT INSTRUCTOR: Sure, Heidi.

What it's known as is VFR corridor. Many pilots do it throughout the year. It's basically our way of kind of getting a nice view of the city.

Unfortunately, as you get towards the lower east end, it does get very thin. And with the weather conditions that prevailed that day, we did only have about -- oh, I'd say about 500 feet of space between the clouds and where we needed to be. It was from about 700 feet to 1,100 feet. So you are dealing with a very tight space as you are crossing -- crossing the New York City area over the East River at that time.

COLLINS: All right. So pretty challenging conditions, certainly for a person with 88 hours of -- in the cockpit. And a lot of that, we're trying to figure out how much he was pilot in command, PIC time, as we talk about -- which is important, because he did have the flight instructor with him.

Any indications at this point as to whether or not he was checked out and certified in this particular aircraft?

MULLINER: As of the releases that I've read and heard of on the news so far from the NTSB and the FAA, they have not released any information as to whether or not Cory himself was checked out in the aircraft.

As far as I know, the instructor had to have a minimum of at least five hours in the aircraft to teach him. I'm sure that working out of the flight school in Teterboro he did have more than that as an instructor. But the minimum as an instructor you need to have in an aircraft to instruct in it is five hours, which I'm sure the instructor did have. As far as Cory, I'm not sure whether or not he had been checked out yet or if he was in the process of doing it that day.

COLLINS: And maybe that's something we should explain to people. Just because you have a pilot's license does not give you the license to just fly any plane out there. It's not like a car. I mean, you have to be checked out and certified on all types of different equipment.

MULLINER: That is correct. The aircraft that they were flying, which was the Cirrus SR-20, is a complex aircraft. It has a horsepower engine over 180 horsepower. Therefore, you need a specific certification to fly that aircraft.

That certification is given to you by an instructor. You get signed off after a certain amount of ground training, as well as flight training. As to whether or not Cory had that signoff or not yet I do not know. The NTSB has not released that at this time.

COLLINS: How long does it take to get a pilot's license?

MULLINER: The average right now for the United States is about 70 hours of flight time, of which usually about 20 hours is solo time. There's a lot of other requirements that go into it.

As far as night training, you have to have a certain ability to navigate. And the FAA obviously does the check ride with you, which is the final authority as to whether or not you'll get your license. But 70 hours is the average right now for the U.S. as far as getting your private license.

COLLINS: I know that you specifically have time in this aircraft as well. So that's interesting to this discussion. But I think as we talked earlier about the difference between general aviation and commercial aviation, specifically for the Manhattan area, your personal thoughts on whether or not it should be reviewed, that private aircraft can fly in this very tight corridor?

MULLINER: I think one of the things about aviation that gets people involved is the fact that you get to actually fly. It's not something that a lot of people do, but there are enough.

And one of the interests for me when I first got into it was the ability to actually go up and sightsee and tour. I've been able to fly right across Atlanta's air space, across the Atlanta skyline, across the Dallas skyline, across New York's skyline. And that to me is one of the reasons that I love my job so much, is I get to do those things.

Whether or not there should be restrictions, perhaps maybe based on weather. But as far as restricting -- allowing a general aviation aircraft to fly in and around the major metropolitan cities, I don't think that's necessary. Perhaps we need to look at weather conditions that must be prevailing in order to be within a certain distance from -- from -- from the -- from metropolitan cities. But as far as the air space that they were flying in, which is Bravo (ph), that is the most restricted air space.

COLLINS: Right.

MULLINER: If you want to go in there, you have to have certain weather conditions which were met at the time.

COLLINS: Richard, is it worth it to you? Is it worth the risk?

MULLINER: I think -- I think if you look overall, there's always risks no matter what you do. There's risks when I get in my car driving to the studio this morning. You have to weigh the risks.

Whether or not the risk is enough -- for me, yes, I will continue to fly. If I get the chance to do the VFR corridor in New York City, it's a beautiful view, especially at night with friends and family.

Do I think they should take that right away from us? I don't. I don't believe they need to do that.

COLLINS: Well, we certainly appreciate your thoughts here today.

Richard Mulliner, he is a flight instructor out of New York.

Thanks again, Richard.

MULLINER: Thank you, Heidi.

COLLINS: Well, he played baseball, but he was certainly passionate about flying. Cory Lidle in the cockpit. You won't want to miss this.

HARRIS: And the Mark Foley page scandal and potentially pivotal testimony.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

KIRK FORDHAM, FMR. CHIEF OF STAFF, REP. FOLEY: Again, I'm going to wait and talk to the Ethics Committee today. They've asked me to keep my testimony confidential for now.

DANA BASH, CNN CONGRESSIONAL CORRESPONDENT: Do you plan on talking to press after you meet with the committee?

FORDHAM: We'll see how it unfolds here. OK?

(END VIDEO CLIP)

HARRIS: Foley's former chief of staff ready to talk to Congress. A live report from Capitol Hill coming up.

You're in the NEWSROOM.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

HARRIS: And a story we're following for you. A British man has entered a guilty plea this morning to charges of conspiring to bomb high-profile targets in the United States, including the International Monetary Fund building in Washington, the New York Stock Exchange, the World Bank headquarters in Washington, and the Citigroup building in New York. Also the Prudential building in Newark, New Jersey back in 2004.

Thirty-two-year-old Dhiran Barot entered that guilty plea this morning. And according to prosecutors, the plan was to carry out explosions by using gas cylinders that would have been packed into limousines and set off in underground garages.

Again, 32-year-old Dhiran Barot entering that guilty plea this morning. CNN's Paula Newton is following that story and will have more details for us shortly.

COLLINS: This also just into us now. That apparently that man there, former Virginia -- former governor Mark Warner not going to be running for president. Democratic sources are telling us this. We apparently will hear from him officially a little bit later on today. He's planning a news conference. Not sure of the exact reason, but you may remember that he left the governor's office back in January and has been touring all over the place, including key states of New Hampshire and Iowa, which usually gives an indication that he's going to be running for president.

But he is saying now that he won't. So we'll hear what he says officially a little later on today.

HARRIS: So, who knew what? When did they know it? Questions at the heart of the Mark Foley e-mail scandal. Today lawmakers are looking for answers from former congressional staffer Kirk Fordham.

Our congressional correspondent, Dana Bash, has more.

(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)

BASH (voice over): Kirk Fordham, Mark Foley's former chief of staff, plans to testify under oath that he warned more than one GOP congressional official several times about Foley's inappropriate behavior with pages much earlier than Republican leaders have stated. A source familiar with Fordham's account of events tells CNN Fordham will take investigators back to a report he got about one alleged Foley incident some three or four years ago, something that made him so alarmed he asked House Speaker Dennis Hastert's top aide to intervene and confront Foley.

That alleged incident, his boss, Mark Foley, had shown up at the pages' dorm drunk. In the last week, two senior Republican lawmakers said they, too, heard about that incident and wrote letters to the House clerk asking for an investigation.

Another GOP congresswoman, Ginny Brown-Waite, says she conducted her own "investigation" two weeks ago and learned "Congressman Foley showed up at the page dorm one night inebriated." Brown-Waite will not release any details.

The Capitol Police are looking through files for any record of the incident, a spokeswoman says. CNN is told Fordham arranged a meeting between the speaker's chief of staff and Foley about the alleged page dorm incident and other troubling Foley behavior towards pages. That, according to two sources familiar with Fordham's account and a third intends to tell all of this to the House Ethics Committee.

(END VIDEOTAPE)

HARRIS: Dana Bash joins us now.

Dana, good to see you.

First of all, a couple of questions, actually. Aside from Fordham's testimony today, what else is happening at the Ethics Committee?

BASH: Something very interesting is actually happening as we speak, Tony. The first lawmaker that we know of is testifying before this panel, which we should -- I keep pointing out, operates in secret. So we're not 100 percent sure, but Republican Congresswoman Shelley Moore Capito, who is important because she is not only a Republican lawmaker, she's a Republican lawmaker who sits on the page board. And she released a statement as soon as all of this broke saying she was very upset.

Why? Because she wasn't brought into this at all. She -- there was a confrontation, apparently, with some Republicans and Mark Foley at the end of last year. And she wasn't brought into it.

So not only were the Democrats not brought in, but not all of the Republicans were either. And that is interesting and certainly significant potentially because what they're trying to do behind closed doors at this committee is try to figure out exactly what went on.

They don't have jurisdiction over Mark Foley in particular. What they have jurisdiction over is essentially the system and the people who still work in Congress -- the lawmakers and top aides. So they're trying to figure out, did the system break down, or, as some Republicans are even alleging, did congressional leaders actually try to hide Mark Foley's behavior for political gain?

So those are answers that the committee is trying to find out. And of course what we have seen and was heard over the past several weeks, there's a lot of conflicting testimony and stories on that.

HARRIS: Congressional Correspondent Dana Bash for us.

Dana, thank you.

COLLINS: A team's loss and a family's grief. We'll hear from the twin brother of Yankees' pitcher Cory Lidle just ahead.

HARRIS: And erased from the landscape. A site of a school massacre turned to rubble now.

Details in the NEWSROOM.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

HARRIS: Welcome back, everyone. Here's what we know right now about the plane crash in New York City yesterday. It was an accident, not terrorism. It killed Yankees pitcher Cory Lidle, and a flight instructor. No one inside the condos was killed. Twenty-one people, mostly firefighters, were treated at the hospital. Lidle's plane was equipped with an emergency parachute. It did not deploy. Witnesses say the plane may have been flying erratically just before the crash. Investigators are trying to figure out exactly what went wrong.

COLLINS: Cory Lidle at home on the mound, at home in his plane. Here now, Cory Lidle at the controls last April.

(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)

CORY LIDLE, DECEASED NEW YORK YANKEE: Make sure the fuel is full in each tank.

Jump in.

Clear.

As you can see, we're second in line.

On the takeoff, we're going to get up to about 55, 60 knots and then start pulling back. Nice and slow.

We're not going to get too high today. We're going to try stay under 1,500 so when we go over towards the city, we won't be in Philadelphia's air space.

Right now, we're heading right towards Pine Valley.

Here's Pine Valley. World's best golf course right there. That's sweet. I played that course about two weeks ago.

It's a good feeling no matter what's going on, on the ground in your life, you can go up in the air and everything's gone. You don't think about baseball, you don't think about anything, it's just -- you know, something that takes you away from everyday life.

I love being in plane and looking down at the seeing the traffic on the freeway.

I found out that I love it. One thing I'm not going to do is beg anyone to go with me. If they don't want to go, if they're scared or they don't trust me, that's fine. It's not going to hurt my feelings. But I love it. I'm going to continue to do it.

I wish we could go over by the field. That would be cool. I don't want to get my license taken away, though.

This is the first time that I have actually flown over the city. It can put things into perspective. It's hard to, unless it's stadium, it's really hard pick out landmarks from the air.

It's almost like you're 16 getting your license, you can go to mall whenever you wanted. This is pretty much that same feeling. Maybe, times 100 because you go just about anywhere you want. And just, you know, to be up in the air, looking down at everything on the ground is a pretty cool feeling.

There's the airport right there. Crosby (ph) Cessna Six Charlie Alpha. On final. And we're down.

Stick the landing, walk away and it's a good day.

(END VIDEOTAPE)

COLLINS: Boy, I have seen that video so many times. And still, every time I see, it just breaks my heart. I-Reporters certainly jumped into action, sending us photos and video from every angle of this incident. The first picture was sent by Dean Collins, showing debris on the ground in front of the building. Dean who lives across the street from the building says he heard the explosion and then started taking pictures.

Sourabh Banerjee also heard the explosion from his apartment on Roosevelt Island. He shot the first I-Report video -- wow -- of the flames shooting out of the building.

And another angle shot by David Rose. He snapped this street- level picture.

And David says at first, of course, people feared it was a terrorist attack. Some were saying this was 10/11. That certainly not the case as we know now. Emergency responders filled the street outside Stephanie Garbarino's apartment. She sent us this photo, because it was unlike others she was seeing on TV.

And police boats patrolling the East River. Retired police officer Steven Malecki says he always carries a camera and took this picture after driving close to the accident scene.

So if you have photos or videos like these, you can always go to CNN.com/iReport, send us what you've got, sometimes it helps us to understand the situation even better. Join the world's most powerful newsteam in bringing the news to the world. Thanks to all of the I- Reporters, of ours, who contributed to our coverage.

HARRIS: And stay with me for just a moment, because we just learned the name of the flight instructor who was onboard that plane with Cory Lidle. His name is Tyler Stanger -- Tyler Stanger, the flight attendant -- I'm sorry, the flight instructor who was working with Cory Lidle. I don't know his age, don't know how he came to know Cory and work with him. We're working on all of those details. But once again, the flight instructor working with Cory Lidle, who died in that crash yesterday, his name is Tyler Stanger. We'll continue to get more information certainly on his background, his age and his relationship with Cory Lidle when it began, and their relationship together.

Family and friends are trying to come to grips with the death of Yankee pitcher Cory Lidle. His twin brother, Kevin, spoke with our Larry King. He was asked about how he learned about the plane crash that killed Lidle.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

KEVIN LIDLE, COREY LIDLE'S TWIN BROTHER: I was actually at work. And what do I do, I teach baseball. And I was in between lessons with some kids, and a buddy of mine called, and he kind of started yelling in the phone, it was Cory's plane, it was Cory's plane. And I had absolutely no idea what he was talking about. And he finally -- he finally spit it out and said, the plane registered to your brother's name crashed into a building in New York. And I was like -- I couldn't even believe it.

(END VIDEO CLIP) HARRIS: Once again, we're just learning the name of the flight instructor who went down in that crash with Cory Lidle. Once again, his name is Tyler Stanger. We're working to get more information about him. As soon as we do, we'll pass that along to you.

COLLINS: A British man has pleaded guilty to conspiring to bomb high-profile targets in the United States, and that is to include the International Monetary Fund headquarters in Washington and the New York Stock Exchange. You may remember this. It happened quite a while ago. We want to go directly to Paula Newton. She is standing by live in Scotland Yard.

Paula, what can you tell us?

PAULA NEWTON, CNN CORRESPONDENT: Interesting developments here in London today. It was in fact, Daryn, thirty-four years old, who pled guilty to conspiracy to murder. As you mentioned, some high- profile targets in the United States and Britain. Most significantly, it was back in 2004 when the United States did, after arresting this man here in Britain, they did elevate the terror threat. It seemed what he had were reconnaissance maps of these places, of these targets on his computer here in London. He was arrested.

So interesting here, too, that two other plots were uncovered. They seemed to have been in the planning stages. One was called the "dirty bomb project," and that includes putting together a radioactive device, that instead of actually killing many people would have instead really spread a lot of fear here in the U.K., and also the gas limos project. He was going to stuff limousines and underground car parts with gas cylinders.

What is very interesting is that this man, under another name, Isa Al Brutani (ph), was in fact mentioned in the 9/11 Commission Reports, in so that he did have contact, apparently with the 9/11 hijackers, according to the commission report, and that he was willing and did look at certain high-value targets for al Qaeda in the United States, including what were described in these court documents as Jewish targets and targets that were of economic interests.

What this man really did was begin the forefront of what we've come to know now are these freelance operations by al Qaeda. This is someone who definitely has spent time with al Qaeda and was described as a fairly senior al Qaeda operative.

After 9/11, though, decided to do freelancing, in the sense that perhaps al Qaeda then at that point had to really change its structure. And this is the beginnings of those kind of homegrown terror plots that we've been reporting on, unfortunately, so much from here.

COLLINS: Boy that, is certainly the scariest scenario, someone on their own, I would agree there.

Paula Newton, thanks so much, live from Scotland Yard.

HARRIS: And still to come, boy, you raise this topic, and you sort of stand back and watch the sparks fly. Who's smarter, men or women?

COLLINS: Duh!

HARRIS: New research has an answer. Don't be influenced by Miss Heidi. That story next in the NEWSROOM.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

COLLINS: It's a brain game, the battle of the sexes.

HARRIS: So who's smarter?

COLLINS: Remember, before we show this, Dr. Sanjay Gupta is a man.

HARRIS: What kind of caveat is that? What kind of disclaimer is that?

COLLINS: Well, he's reporting on it. I think it's an important thing to know?

HARRIS: Unbiased medical -- chief medical..

COLLINS: I know...

HARRIS: So let's do it. Dr. Sanjay Gupta checks out the latest research -- Heidi.

(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)

DR. SANJAY GUPTA, CNN SR. MEDICAL CORRESPONDENT (voice-over): Kathryn Monkman (ph) and Gaurav Puri are a good match. Both had near- perfect undergraduate GPAs, and both are second year med students at the Schulich School of Medicine in Western Ontario.

GAURAV PURI, MEDICAL STUDENT: We're both pretty much equally intelligent. I would say that Kathryn is a little more intelligent than I am.

UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: I would say he's a flatterer.

GUPTA: So confident they are equal, they agreed to take a little test for us, graded by Professor Phil Rushton. He is the psychologist who ignited a new round in the who's smarter, men or women debate.

J. PHILIPPE RUSHTON, UNIV. OF WEST. ONTARIO PSYCHOLOGIST: When you extract the general factor of intelligence, males on average score 3.64 I.Q. points higher than women.

GUPTA: Rushton's bold conclusion that men have higher I.Q.s is based on his study of the SAT scores of 100,000 17- and 18-year-olds, 50,000 male, 50,000 female. Now, if you think one sex would naturally do better on math or verbal, Rushton says forget it, that he factored out the bias, finding men on average outscored women by nearly four I.Q. points. RUSHTON: Once you start getting out to I.Q. levels of 115 or 130, what you need for the highest job, you're going to get proportions of 60/40, 70/30, 80/20 of men over women.

GUPTA: Rushton's critics charge his conclusions are skewed, and he has an agenda.

REBECCA COULTER, GENDER STUDIES EXPERT: We have a very long history of science being used for political purposes, and I think this is just another example of that.

GUPTA: Are there really any innate sex differences? This is a human brain on display at the Mental Illness and Neurodiscovery or Mind Institute. One of the country's top brain researchers tells me that as far as I.Q. goes, men and women are equal.

DR. RICHARD HAIER, U.C. IRVINE BRAIN RESEARCHER: The areas of the brain related to intelligence in women tend to be more in the front. In men, they tend to be more in these side areas. Intelligence in general is normally distributed and equally distributed in men and women.

GUPTA: Now, back to our highly unscientific quiz. Gaurav scored a perfect 10 out of 10. Kathryn missed just one question. But does she think Gaurav or any of her male colleagues are smarter because they're men?

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: I would have to say no.

GUPTA: Scientists at the Mind Institute say someday brainscans may replace I.Q. tests altogether. It may be worth revisiting the issue then.

Dr. Sanjay Gupta, CNN, New York.

(END VIDEOTAPE)

COLLINS: Reported by a man, scored by a man. And then even Sanjay admits, highly unscientific test. Right?

HARRIS: So what's your point?

COLLINS: Shut up! All right, I had fun.

HARRIS: If you'd like to take the I.Q. test with Heidi or a friend...

COLLINS: No, we're taking it in a minute?

HARRIS: We're going to take it?

COLLINS: Oh yes.

HARRIS: All right, check out our website, CNN.com/paula. Click on "Mysteries of the Mind."

COLLINS: It is a mystery, isn't it?

HARRIS: Yes.

COLLINS: Hey, the markets are looking good. We're going to get a check of the markets right after this. You might be surprised. Stick around, everybody.

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HARRIS: YOUR WORLD TODAY coming up. Hi. At the top of the hour. Ralitsa Vassileva is here with a preview. Ralitsa, good morning.

RALITSA VASSILEVA: Good morning, good morning. What's coming up on international news, on YOUR WORLD TODAY. We will tell you about the article a Russian journalist was writing as she was killed over the weekend. Some of her colleagues think it was precisely the abuses she witnessed there from Chechnya that got her killed.

Also, no more smoking in France as of the beginning of next year. Are French smokers fuming? We will check in with them. They're a quarter of the population.

And he's at it again. This time, though, it's a winery, believe it or not. A new curvy structure from the same architect who shocked with a curvy titanium Guggenheim building in Bilboas (ph), Spain in the '90s. Very interesting.

HARRIS: That's nice.

VASSILEVA: Frothy glass of wine.

COLLINS: I'll go to the curvy winery, I think, first, versus the other place.

VASSILEVA: To get in the mood, Heidi.

COLLINS: Right, that's what it's about.

All right, Ralitsa, thank you so much.

VASSILEVA: Thank you.

COLLINS: Hey, we have some exciting news here, don't we?

HARRIS: Well, yes, we're going to an extra hour, pick up another hour of our show.

COLLINS: We're going to get up a little earlier. We're going to come and say hello to you at 9:00 a.m. Eastern Time, starting on Monday.

HARRIS: Oh, geez.

COLLINS: So I'll call you, so can you get up a little earlier and we can be prepared for it. So we'll go from 9:00 to noon, right here, CNN NEWSROOM on Monday, starting on Monday. Exciting, isn't it?

HARRIS: Monday, 9:00 a.m.

COLLINS: Yes, if you could be there, that would be terrific.

Meanwhile, high winds on a rampage. Storms blow through the Midwest. We're going to look at some of the damage. It doesn't look good. That's coming up here in just a few minute, right here on the CNN NEWSROOM.

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(MARKET REPORT))

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HARRIS: Much more ahead in the NEWSROOM. When we come back, we'll get a preview of what's coming up this afternoon with Kyra Phillips and Don Lemon. But first a break.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

COLLINS: More information on the flight instructor, we were learning his name, Tyler Stanger, and you guys...

LEMON: You guys broke that during your newscast.

We'll more information on him and who he was, about the hours of flying that Cory Lidle had. Plus, the investigation moves forward in this thing. We've been talking to people who are wondering why planes are still being allowed to fly through Manhattan after 9/11. That's what people are asking. We'll talk to some neighbors who are wondering about that now, and talk to one very famous, or at least a best-selling author. Her name is Carol Higgins Clark, as you remember, Mary Higgins Clark. So we'll talk to her coming up in NEWSROOM at 1:00 when you join Kyra Phillips and me.

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