Return to Transcripts main page
American Morning
Airline Delays; Ravine Rescue; Hurricane Lorenzo; New Home Sales
Aired September 28, 2007 - 06:00 ET
THIS IS A RUSH TRANSCRIPT. THIS COPY MAY NOT BE IN ITS FINAL FORM AND MAY BE UPDATED.
JOHN ROBERTS, CNN ANCHOR: Breaking news. Instant hurricane. Lorenzo suddenly grows right before landfall overnight.
Nick of time.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
TOM RIDER, CRASH VICTIM'S HUSBAND: It's been seven days. She's alive. It's a miracle.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
ROBERTS: A dramatic turn of events for a driver trapped in her wrecked car.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: One more day, she would have been dead.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
ROBERTS: And solutions in the sky. The White House weighs in on record flight delays. Why what happens in New York could change your travel plans no matter where you are, on this AMERICAN MORNING.
And good morning on this Friday, the 28th of September. Lots to tell you about this morning. Thanks very much for joining us. I'm John Roberts.
KIRAN CHETRY, CNN ANCHOR: And I'm Kiran Chetry.
And we begin with an incredible survivor story to tell you about this morning. A woman who was in critical condition but survived eight days after falling down into a ravine. Police found Tanya Rider's car on its side in a total wreck down a steep ravine off a highway. It was south of Seattle. Police say that her car plunged 20 feet and then was buried in deep brush, making it very difficult for rescuers or for anyone, really, to know she was there. Well, rescues ended up having to cut the roof off of her car to get her out. They found her after tracing her cell phone signal. And it was just in the nick of time for her and, it turns out, for her husband as well.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
TOM RIDER, CRASH VICTIM'S HUSBAND: I was sitting down to take a polygraph test in Seattle or Kent Regional Justice Center for the sheriff because I wanted to make sure that they weren't focusing on me, they were looking for Tanya. And just before they were to strapped me into the machine, the detective in charge of the case walked in with a piece of paper, a map of the cell phone tower signal origination and they tracked her that way and found the wreck.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
CHETRY: Unbelievable. So, again, eight days she was there before being rescued. Tom says that his wife is suffering from dehydration, from kidney failure and also from sores from being stuck in the same position for more than a week. We're actually going to talk to him in just a moment about how she's doing and how the family is doing this morning.
John.
ROBERTS: A new push this morning to fix the problems causing airport delays. Crowded runways making this one of the worst years for airlines getting their flights to arrive and depart on time. The Bush administration addressing the problem and focusing on the three busy New York City airports, where congestion is the worst in the country and has a ripple effect across the nation. Our Alina Cho is live at LaGuardia Airport with more this morning.
Good morning, Alina.
ALINA CHO, CNN CORRESPONDENT: Good morning to you, John.
You know, as you mentioned, this is the heart of the problem. One third of the nation's air traffic comes through the New York region. New York is cited as being the worst for travel delays. And that does have a ripple effect, causing delays in two-thirds of all flights across the country.
So what's being done about it? The president met with transportation officials yesterday. All agreed that something needs to be done about it. Among the proposals, charging airlines fees for landing during peak hours, possibly restricting the number of planes in the air at any one time, and passengers will like this, possibly increasing the compensation for stranded passengers from $200 to $600.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
GEORGE W. BUSH, PRESIDENT OF THE UNITED STATES: We've been having a discussion about the fact that a lot of our air travelers are not only inconvenienced, they're -- some cases they're just not being treated fairly. And there's a lot of anger amongst our citizens about the fact that, you know, they're just not being treated right. And the secretary and I have been talking about what to do about it.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
SIMONE ENGLANDER: Well, this White House doesn't seem to be able to a lot about anything. So I'm not surprised that they can't (INAUDIBLE). And it is an annoying feature, for sure to have (INAUDIBLE). It seems like you have a small, little rain storm and you're delayed two hours or the flights are canceled.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
CHO: Now the airlines say all of this sounds really good. But the bottom line is, if they're charged landing fees, for example, that would only be ultimately passed along to the consumer in the form of higher fares. They say the problem is with the FAA. That they need to update, to modernize their antiquated system from radar to GPS. They say that will help them manage the air traffic better.
But keep in mind, John, this is a real problem. By 2015, we could see 1 billion air travelers a year. The goal for the White House is to have some of those changes in place by next summer, not the holidays. But all agree, John, that the real changes, especially the ones dealing with updating computer systems, could be years away.
ROBERTS: And, Alina, this seems to be aimed only at relieving congestion when, you know, the weather is perfect for flying. What about when the weather goes downhill?
CHO: Well, listen, I mean, one of the big problems is that we talked about the air flow, the air traffic. One person said, it's not a problem of concrete, meaning runways, it's a problem with air space and the routes that airplanes travel. There could be fine weather at your departure spot and at your destination, but perhaps somewhere along the route -- and it might not be a direct route -- there will be bad weather. That will cause delays.
There's really nothing that can be done about that. What they're trying to do is put some quick fixes in place. But, unfortunately, John, those fixes won't be in place by the holidays, the busy holiday season. The goal is for next summer. But again, it could be years before we see any sort of real changes.
ROBERTS: And everybody pointing fingers at everybody else for who's the root cause of this problem.
Alina Cho for us this morning at LaGuardia.
Thanks very much, Alina.
Kiran.
Oh, sorry.
Just as the president was announcing plans to fix air travel, forbes.com was compiling a list of some of the worst airlines in the U.S. For 12 months ending in July, they analyzed flight delays, cancellations and mishandled bags. Atlantic Southeast Airlines took the number one spot, ranking at the bottom or next to the bottom in all three categories. Right behind it was Comair, followed by American Eagle Airlines, Espressjet Airlines and U.S. Air. Major carriers, Delta, United and American also fell into the top 10 worst. And coming up at 7:15 Eastern, we'll speak with a woman who's leading the effort to get an airline passengers bill of rights. I'll ask her for her take on all of this.
Now to Kiran.
CHETRY: Yes, there's some new reports this morning of more violent crackdowns on protesters in the Asian nation of Myanmar. Witnesses reporting hearing shooting today in the streets of Yangon. That's the country's largest city. And at least 10,000 protesters are said to be marching today. Myanmar's governed by one of the most secretive regimes in the world and it's been hard for foreign journalist to enter the country and even cover this. Bloggers and citizen journalists have been a big link to the outside world, posting news and pictures on the web.
Right now the country's access to the Internet, though, has been cut. And then there is new, disturbing video showing a man getting shot by troops. They say that the man is a Japanese journalist. The government says that nine people were killed in the crackdown on protesters this week.
Turning to politics now. They were invited to discuss issues of importance to minorities in the country, but some of the top Republican candidates were not there. Some of them, though, did debate the issues last night at Morgan State University in Baltimore. Ron Paul, one of five candidates who shared the stage with four empty lecterns.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
RON PAUL, (R) PRESIDENTIAL CANDIDATE: We don't have to have more courts and more prisons, we need to repeal the whole war on drugs. It isn't working! We have already spent over $400 billion since the early '70s and it's wasted money.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
CHETRY: Well, the candidates who were there also took some shots at the four top Republicans who decided to take a pass.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
GOV. MIKE HUCKABEE, (R) PRESIDENTIAL CANDIDATE: Frankly, I'm embarrassed. I'm embarrassed for our party and I'm embarrassed for those who did not come, because there's long been a divide in this country and it doesn't get better when we don't show up.
SEN. SAM BROWNBACK, (R) PRESIDENTIAL CANDIDATE: I apologize for the candidates that aren't here. I think this is a disgrace that they're not here. I think it's a disgrace for our country. I think it's bad for our party. And I don't think it's good for our future.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
CHETRY: Governor of Arkansas, Mike Huckabee, and then Sam Brownback there.
Rudy Giuliani, Mitt Romney, John McCain and Fred Thompson all said that they couldn't make it because of scheduling conflicts.
John.
ROBERTS: A showdown is heating up in Washington over expanding health care for children. Eighteen Republicans joined Democrats in the Senate to pass the bill, despite President Bush's threat to veto it. He says that the new State Children's Health Insurance Program is too expensive. An additional $35 billion over five years. The president wants to hold it to an increase of $5 billion over five years.
The Senate has the votes to override the veto, but there are not enough votes yet in the House. They're still trying to put pressure on the president, though, House members, to try to get him to back off on his veto threat.
Attorneys for Mychal Bell are preparing today to take his case to juvenile court. The last of the so-called Jena 6 is out of jail after the local prosecutor dropped his challenge to move the matter out of the adults courts. It happened one week after 15,000 protesters showed up in the small town of Jena, Louisiana, in a civil rights march centered on his cause.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
REV. AL SHARPTON, CIVIL RIGHTS ACTIVIST: Now is not the time for high-fiving. It's a time for contemplation and saying that we must have a nation that has one law for everybody. There should not be different laws for Mychal Bell and anyone his age of a different color. And that's why we came to Jena. And let Jena represent equal protection under the law.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
ROBERTS: The teenager was tried as an adult and found guilty for attacking a white classmate, but an appeals court threw out that conviction.
An Arizona teenager is the sixth person to die this year from a rare infection linked to an organism found in freshwater lakes, rivers and hot springs. Fourteen-year-old Aaron Evans died earlier this month. Doctors say he likely picked up the organism while swimming in Lake Havasu. A very popular spot.
The CDC, Centers for Disease Control, says infections related to this heat-loving amoeba are rare, but cases have spiked this year. Two were reported in Texas, three in central Florida, in addition to the Arizona case. The amoeba attacks the body by going in through the nasal cavity and then destroys tissue as it spreads to the brain. Literally every infection is fatal.
Kiran. CHETRY: Well, we have more now on an incredible story of survival. A Washington state woman rescued from a ravine after a car crash. She survived there eight days before being rescued. Her husband, Tom Rider, joins us now from Seattle.
Tom, thanks for being with us.
TOM RIDER, CRASH VICTIM'S HUSBAND: No problem.
CHETRY: I can't imagine how relieved you must be this morning. How is your wife, Tanya, doing?
RIDER: She's still in critical condition. They're afraid they're going to have to take one of her legs. She's fighting for her life. And the scariest part is that she didn't want me to put her under my insurance because she just started a job and she was going to get her own. So I don't know what's going to happen from here. All I know is that she's here and she's alive and that in itself is a miracle.
CHETRY: It really is. Tell our viewers just a little bit about how she got in that crash and then how long it took her to be rescued.
RIDER: Well, I don't know exactly when the crash happened. All I know is she was on her way home from work and didn't get there. And I reported her missing to Bellevue police. They took the report right away, but found evidence, video of her leaving work, getting into her own car. So they told me I'd have to file in King County because she was leaving their jurisdiction. So King County, I called up, and the first operator I talked to on the first day I tried to report it flat denied to start a missing person's report because she didn't meet the criteria.
CHETRY: Wow. So you think there was delays in finding her because of just red tape?
RIDER: I know there was delays because of red tape. They didn't start . . .
CHETRY: Now eventually it was her cell phone, right? The cell phone signal. How did you get them to look into that?
RIDER: I basically hounded them until they started the case. And then, of course, I was the first focal point, so I tried to get myself out of the way as quickly as possible. I let them search the house. I told them they didn't have to have a warrant for anything, just ask. This morning they called and asked for me to come sign for phone records so they could try that. And I came, I signed, and they asked me to take a polygraph test. And I, of course, immediately agreed.
And by the time he was done explaining the polygraph test to me, the detective burst into the room with a cell tower map and a big circle on it and he started explaining for about 30 to 45 seconds about this blip they were picking up on the cell tower. And then finally announced that they had found her vehicle, at which point he told me they were going to valleys and . . .
CHETRY: Well, what was that like? What was that like when he came in and you had that little bit of hope after knowing nothing about where your wife -- her whereabouts for an entire week?
RIDER: It was a mixture of feelings. I don't know exactly how to explain it. I was, you know, I knew she was missing. I knew something happened and no one would believe me except operator number 65. He's the one that started the case. No one would believe me. They all thought that she's an adult, she can go where she wants.
CHETRY: And did you think she had been in an accident or did you think that maybe somebody had taken her?
RIDER: I didn't -- I thought somebody had taken her, she was in an accident. I thought all kinds of things. And the only way that I was able to not crumple up in a little corner was to think, you know, the least damaging to anything was that maybe she just didn't want to be around me for a while, but I still wanted her found.
CHETRY: Right.
RIDER: And that was the only thing -- I mean, if I'd have known she was in that car for eight days or even for the first day -- I mean, I drove down that road six times because it was one of the routes she knew how to get home.
CHETRY: Wow.
Well, Tom, boy, what a roll . . .
RIDER: I didn't see any -- I didn't see any evidence of . . .
CHETRY: What a roller coaster of emotions.
RIDER: I didn't see any evidence . . .
CHETRY: So, as you said, she's still in critical condition this morning, Tom, and, you know, you still have a lot of questions as to whether -- how she's going to recover. But you're -- are you pretty sure that she's going to be OK in the long-run?
RIDER: She's alive after eight days. If God was going to take her, he would have taken her before that.
CHETRY: Oh, Tom, well, you know, what a relief for you this morning. And thanks for sharing your story.
RIDER: No problem, Kiran.
ROBERTS: Coming up now to 15 minutes after the hour.
The inquest into Princess Diana's death tops your "Quick Hits" now. Jury selection is underway in London. The case is scheduled to begin next week, expected to last about six months. The inquest was delayed until French legal proceedings were complete. Princess Diana, you'll remember, and her companion, Dodi Fayed, died in a high-speed car crash just over 10 years ago in Paris. Their driver was also killed.
And colleges across the country are using high technology to get the word out fast in a crisis in response to the Virginia Tech massacre. Earlier this week, the University of Wisconsin sent out mass e-mails and also took out an ad on the social networking site FaceBook to alert students that a gunman was reported to be on the loose on campus. More and more college campuses doing that these days.
It's a filthy rich list. How filthy? Donald Trump is number five. The highest paid people on your television. Who made the cut, coming up.
And tropical trouble out of nowhere. Where a hurricane made landfall this morning and whether the U.S. is out of danger. Yesterday it wasn't even a tropical storm. That's coming up on AMERICAN MORNING.
(COMMERCIAL BREAK)
CHETRY: Welcome back to AMERICAN MORNING. Eighteen past the hour now and it's time to check in with our AMERICAN MORNING team of correspondents for other stories new this morning.
And our Rob Marciano is at the CNN weather desk. You warned about this, how quickly these tropical systems can form into something and we're talking about Lorenzo today.
ROB MARCIANO, CNN METEOROLOGIST: Yes, Lorenzo today. It was Humberto just a few weeks ago. That one made landfall in Texas as a hurricane, strengthening quickly from a tropical depression. This one was festering in the southwestern Gulf of Mexico for days as a tropical depression and yesterday it blew up as a storm and then last night as a hurricane.
Here it is on the satellite imagery. It has made landfall, so that's the good news. The center of which is right about there and continues to move off to the west. Right now the winds are 65 miles an hour and continuing to head towards the west. So it will weaken as it does so. It is going to be heading into the mountains of Mexico, and you know what that means, extensive rainfall will be triggered from this storm and landslides, mudslides will become a greater issue.
Give you a little history on this storm. The yellow line is the track that it has taken. And then the symbol here, the tropical storm symbol, that is where it is right now and there are your coordinates, its movement and how strong the winds are.
It did reach hurricane strength yesterday afternoon at 5:00. It made landfall anywhere from a 75-mile-an-hour to 80-mile-an-hour hurricane last night. That's around midnight local time. So a Category One storm making landfall in Mexico and strengthening fairly rapidly. It had 35-mile-an-hour winds yesterday at 11:00 a.m.. And by 8:00 p.m. it had 75-mile-an-hour winds. So nine hours it strengthened from a tropical depression to a hurricane and made landfall around midnight last night.
No threat to the U.S. with this one. We're still watching Tropical Storm Karen. Changes in that forecast overnight. We'll bring them to you in about half an hour.
CHETRY: That's amazing how fast it was able to form like that and it hit an area of Mexico that didn't need the rain. They were already rain-soaked there.
MARCIANO: Yes, that's for sure. So, again, flooding and some landslides a possibility over the next 12 hours. We'll watch for that.
CHETRY: All right, Rob, thank you.
Also, sales of new homes dropped to a new low as well. Ali Velshi is here with more on continuing bad news on the housing front.
Hi there, Ali.
ALI VELSHI, CNN CORRESPONDENT: Good morning, Kiran.
Yes, it's more of what we expected. New homes in August, the sales were down 8 percent over the previous month, over July. But when you compare it to last August, down 21 percent.
Now the reason we consider new homes is, they're much smaller proportion of the homes sold. Existing homes are most of the market. But new homes are the ones that you require construction on, so they employ a lot more people.
Nobody's really employed in your existing home market, other than real estate agents. The interesting thing here is the median price, which is now $225,000 for the median price of a new home. That's the price at which half the homes sell for higher and half the homes sell for lower. That is a drop of 7.4 percent over last year.
Now remember, we've gone through many years where there's been no drop in real estate prices. To actually see a 7.4 percent drop one year over the next is a big deal.
The bright -- the silver cloud -- the silver lining around the cloud, Kiran, if there is one, is that most people say that September is going to be the height of those mortgage resets from people who had low-rate, adjustable-rate mortgages to higher-rates. But most people don't think this housing slump is over for at least another year, if not a year and a half.
Kiran.
CHETRY: Not good news. All right, Ali, thank you.
John.
ROBERTS: Twenty-two minutes now after the hour. Honda vehicles get the best fuel mileage according to the EPA. Toyota came in second. Daimler-Chrysler finished last. The results were taken by averaging all 2007 model vehicles by each manufacturer. The average fuel economy for all of the car makers combined is about 20 miles per gallon. Of course, a lot of people are calling for enormous increases on top of that.
Your baby's crib has been recalled. The company sent the repair kit, but chances are it's no quick fix. Our Greg Hunter is looking out for you this morning.
And how much money do the best-paid television stars earn? Donald Trump makes a lot, but he doesn't top the list. We'll tell you who does, ahead on AMERICAN MORNING.
(COMMERCIAL BREAK)
ROBERTS: Twenty-seven minutes now after the hour.
Who is the richest celebrity on television? She's pointing at me.
CHETRY: You wish!
ROBERTS: Oprah, you say? Absolutely right. She again tops the list of "Forbes" magazine's highest paid television celebrities. Oprah earned, cha ching, $260 million from June 2006 through June of this year, way ahead of Jerry Seinfeld, who's not even on TV, but earned $60 million.
CHETRY: Syndication, maybe.
ROBERTS: Oh, I'll tell you.
Simon Cowell of "American Idol" fame came in number three with $45 million. David Letterman not far behind in the number four spot. Donald Trump relegated to fifth on this list because it only includes the money that he made from television, not his other businesses. So he makes $32 million off of television. How much do you think he made total last year?
CHETRY: I don't know. Don't ask Rosie O'Donnell. She's the one who claimed he was bankrupt and he went crazy.
ROBERTS: There you go.
CHETRY: Well, here's another story coming up that you just cannot miss.
ROBERTS: You get all choked up about -- look, it's OK. One of these days you'll make $100 a week (ph) and it will be fine.
CHETRY: We'll move the dust (ph) and we'll point over a little bit.
Check this video out. This came from Lake Tahoe, from an affiliate out in Sacramento. That is a bear dangling from an overpass. How the heck did he get there? One thing's for sure, he knows he doesn't want to fall.
ROBERTS: He knows he is up high and does not want to let go. How did it turn out? We'll tell you. He hung on for 24 hours. That story coming up on AMERICAN MORNING. Stay with us.
(COMMERCIAL BREAK)
KIRAN CHETRY, CNN NEWS ANCHOR: Beautiful shot this morning coming to us from WPVI of the Ben Franklin Bridge in Philadelphia. 70 degrees there, 76 for a high today with some morning showers, but I'm sure they're happy just as well. They tied the Mets right now for -- for what? What is it? For the race to win, to be first place, right? There we go, in baseball. Are you laughing at me this morning? Front page of the "New York Post" today said "all tied up," so I know that's something good for the Phillies.
JOHN ROBERTS, CNN NEWS ANCHOR: There you go. Welcome back. It's Friday, September 28th. I'm John Roberts.
CHETRY: And I'm Kiran Chetry.
We start out with breaking news in Asia.
ROBERTS: Yeah. Shots ringing out in the streets of Yangon and Myanmar, its largest city there. It's the capital city, otherwise known as Rangoon before the military took over there. As the government cracks down on protesters for a third day now, we're seeing more and more of this. A disturbing video coming out of Myanmar shows a man being shot. The source of the video says the victim is a Japanese journalist. Other videos closer up confirm that.
Dan Rivers is live in Bangkok this morning.
Dan, are things threatening to spiral completely out of control there?
DAN RIVERS, CNN NEWS CORRESPONDENT: Things are looking very dangerous indeed at the moment. More shooting as we speak on the streets of Yangon and then this terrible video you just mentioned, of what appears to show one of the protesters or somebody in amongst the crowds being shot dead, apparently, and falling to the ground as people run and the camera man holding the camera dives for cover. We don't know how many people have been shot and killed today, but we are certainly speaking to people in Yangon who say they have seen people being shot dead, a number of people being shot dead. We don't know how many or in which part exactly of the city, but it appears this crackdown by the government, which is desperate to stop these pro- democracy demonstrators is continuing today.
ROBERTS: Is there any pressure, Dan, from surrounding governments to put a stop to this?
RIVERS: Well, there has been condemnation from the United States and from Europe. China has urged calm and restraint, but it has stopped short of saying anything about democracy or the Democratic leader and Thailand has also, along with the other Asian nations here, urged restraint. But there hasn't been much of criticism from China, and China really is the key to all this because they have massive influence and huge amounts of trade with them.
ROBERTS: Dan Rivers this morning from Bangkok, thank you very much. We'll check back with you later on.
CHETRY: Incredible survival story. A woman from Washington State was missing for eight days. Her husband said he was starting to come under suspicion by police, even agreed to take a polygraph test when troopers finally found Tanya Rider's car. It had crashed down a steep ravine. It was on its side, a total wreck there. You see it. They actually had to cut away part of it to get her out.
This is off a highway south of Seattle. She was not able to call for help on her cell phone, but it was on, and it was the signal that finally led police to her. They were even about to give her husband -- he said he was actually sitting down to take the polygraph to rule himself out as a suspect. Well, he spoke to us about this roller coaster ride of emotions a couple minutes ago on "AMERICAN MORNING."
TOM RIDER, CRASH VICTIM'S HUSBAND: I basically hounded them until they started the case. And then, of course, I was the first focal point, so I tried to get myself out of the way as quickly as possible. I let them search the house. I told them they didn't have to have a warrant for anything, just ask. This morning they called and asked for me to come sign for phone records so they could try that, and I came, I signed, and they asked me to take a polygraph test, and I, of course, immediately agreed, and by the time he was done explaining the polygraph test to me, the detective burst into the room with the cell tower map and a big circle on it, and they started explaining for about 30 to 45 seconds about the blip they were picking up on the cell tower.
CHETRY: Well, Tom says that his wife is still in critical condition. She's dehydrated. He says she may lose a leg from her injuries.
ROBERTS: She is so lucky that that cell phone battery lasted so long.
Other headlines new this morning -- a stunning report on a British web site that claims Saddam Hussein offered to go into exile a month before the Iraq invasion. The report says Hussein was willing to do it in return for $1 billion and all the information he wanted about weapons of mass destruction. The offer was revealed in a transcript of talks between President Bush and Spain's prime minister at the president's Texas ranch back in 2003. The White House not commenting on the report, but Spanish officials say it could possibly be true.
The Supreme Court stopped the execution of a death row inmate in Texas late last night. Carlton Turner Jr., was scheduled to be put to death for the 1998 killing of his parents. Earlier this week the Supreme Court said it would consider whether lethal injection violates a constitutional ban on cruel and unusual punishment.
Several cities along the gulf coast want to get rid of the FEMA trailers that were set up after Hurricane Katrina. About 65,000 families are living in those trailers. The government says they were only supposed to be temporary housing. The mayor of Pascagoula, Mississippi calls it an act of tough love, saying it's been two years since Katrina and the best way to move forward is to close down these trailer parks.
Starting Monday, U.S. Airline passengers will once again need a passport to go to Canada, Mexico, the Caribbean, and Bermuda. The new passport requirements were temporarily waved because too many passport requests had swamped the State Department, but the State Department says there is extra staff on board, the summer travel crunch is over, cutting passport processing time to six weeks now for a routine application. It was around three months in some cases.
An update on a story we told you about yesterday. A 17-year-old man has been arrested in connection with a pepper spray attack on a McDonald's drive-through worker. Investigators say three people in the car with females, the other two were men dressed in drag.
CHETRY: Because they originally thought it was five women in the car.
ROBERTS: They did. Three McDonald's workers suffered minor injuries. That is a big can of pepper spray.
CHETRY: We were remarking on that yesterday. How do you get that?
An amazing animal rescue. When we saw these still pictures, we couldn't believe it. It's a bear literally hanging on for dear life off a bridge, an overpass outside of Lake Tahoe after a brush with becoming road-kill. Let's look at the picture because it's more interesting than my mug. There it is.
Rescuers say they saved the bear after he avoided traffic -- the poor guy. Then he nearly plunges off the side. Animal rescue -- and there is a big bear league in Tahoe that does their best to try to help these guys, they were able to get there. Witnesses say that two cars crossed the bridge at the same time when he was walking, so the bear panicked and jumped over the safety wall and caught onto the ledge and was able to hang on. Are you sure this isn't a guy in a costume? He hung onto the support.
As you can see, rescuers hung this net under the bridge, made sure that was in place properly, then tranquilized the bear and pushed him gently onto it. Well, he was okay it worked. Then after the tranquilize r wore off, he woke up and walked away.
ROBERTS: Better than a trampoline.
CHETRY: That doesn't always work. So he hung on for 24 hours?
ROBERTS: Look at the poor guy. You wonder, how did he grab onto the arch there? Because you can see the arch is recessed under the railing. He left over the railing, must have grabbed onto the railing and swung himself under, almost like a "Spiderman" type move.
CHETRY: Hats off to the rescuers, too, because it doesn't look easy to make sure the netting stayed in the right place. All of that, we said, over a big body of water. That was probably why it was hard to see. You could see why you would miss that, even driving by the area, not notice what the heck that was.
ROBERTS: How would you ever know?
Well, there is not much you can do when you're snowed in by a blizzard. We'll tell you what the people in Denver were up to. Hint, hint, hint, the storm was nine months ago.
And it's becoming harder to become an American citizen. A new citizenship test is out. Do you know who wrote "the federalist papers"? Let's see if you can pass this. Can you name one of the founding fathers who wrote the federalist papers? We'll have the answer when we come back on "AMERICAN MORNING." Stay with us.
(COMMERCIAL BREAK)
CHETRY: Welcome back to "AMERICAN MORNING." The U.S. citizenship test is getting a $7 million overhaul, and some of the questions may make you thankful that you're already here legally or born a citizen. Starting in October of next year, applicants will have to correctly answer six out of ten questions on the quiz to pass. The U.S. Citizenship and Immigration Services says that it genuinely captures what it is to be an American.
So here are some of the samples for you to take a look at. Test your knowledge. Would you know them? What territory did the United States buy from France in 1803? Guys know this one? That's right, the Louisiana Purchase, Louisiana territory. There it is. How about this one? Can you name one of the founding fathers who wrote "the federalist papers"? And we admit here that we did use the help of Google, although John did know all three, so I'm very proud of him. James Madison, Alexander Hamilton and John Jay. Any one of those three and congratulations, you passed.
John?
ROBERTS: And later on today we'll have some more of those questions as well.
CHETRY: Sounds good.
ROBERTS: Test people's knowledge of America.
Hope you have your tool box ready. Do you know what to do if you have one of the thousands of recalled cribs and playpens? The companies send the repair kits, make parents figure out how to fix them. How easy are they to repair?
Greg Hunter is live in Hanover Park, Illinois. Good morning to you, Greg.
GREG HUNTER: John, good morning to you. No doubt, I know you knew that answer. I didn't know the answer, but I'm proud of you, John. You're the smartest guy on television, buddy. Listen, this is one of the 1 million simplicity cribs that was recalled, just a little more than a week ago, and they've recalled it because of this hardwood that failed or could be put on upside down. It could be put on the wrong way.
With me is Cora Smith with the attorney generals office here in the state of Illinois.
And Cora, your boss has been particularly hard on this recall, saying that it really isn't a very good recall at all. Explain that.
CORA SMITH, ILLINOIS STATE ATTORNEY GENERAL'S OFFICE: This recall is terrible for consumers. We know of three children that have died, seven who have become entrapped when the side rail fell away from the crib. 55 other incidents. These will just at the CPSC was notified of. And the consumer products safety commission was telling parents last Friday when the recall was announced, we don't want kids sleeping in these beds tonight was their statement. And we have the company complacently saying to parents, we will get you a repair kit in three to four weeks.
HUNTER: We are in the home of a family that has one of these cribs. This crib has been moved out, into a special place in the middle of the room, but they told me they called the company and they said it was going to be like four weeks. And also, they said it was supposed to come with a disc, the repair kit was supposed to come with a disc. You have one of the repair kits. Let's see it.
What did it come with?
SMITH: It came with nothing. It came with eight pieces of plastic...
HUNTER: So these are the new parts for the drop rail.
SMITH: Correct.
HUNTER: It's obviously screwed in with wooden screws, so there is a top and there is a bottom part right here and you're supposed to replace these with caps and no instructions?
SMITH: I assume that's what they want us to do, correct.
HUNTER: Why would they send this out with little or no instructions? There's no instructions at all.
SMITH: It's baffling. I have no idea why they would do this. Again, they're providing hardware to families who have experienced problems with these cribs in the first place. It's across the board the wrong response for consumers. Simplicity --
HUNTER: You think they should just recall them, bring them back?
SMITH: They need to refund or replace the cribs, bottom line. They need to refund consumers the cost of the crib or replace the cribs entirely, absolutely.
HUNTER: The company will surely say that this is a good fix and we know this will work and we don't want to have any more expense to the company, it costs jobs. What did you say to that?
SMITH: I think when it comes to the safety and lives of young, innocent children who are put in these cribs at night away from their parents, money, the cost of their repair, the cost of replacing these cribs is absolutely relevant.
HUNTER: Cora Smith, thank you for being with us.
SMITH: My pleasure.
HUNTER: The Illinois state attorney general's office.
Back to you to you guys in New York.
ROBERTS: At least when they recall a car, they tell you to go to the dealership, not do it yourself. Greg, thank you. We'll check with you later on.
For a list of the playpens affected, go to cnn.com/am.
CHETRY: A new report criticized the FDA. A report is due out today that says the FDA doesn't do enough to oversee the patients who test drugs in what are known as clinical trials. That according to an article coming out in the "New York Times" today. The FDA says that it does lack resources to oversee all of the drug trials properly.
Have you ever heard of the see-food diet? You see food and then you eat it. You know people like that. The author of "Mindless Eating" says that having a jaw of candy, let's say on your desk, makes you a lot more likely to eat it, as opposed to if you kept it in a drawer. He says every time you see the candy you have to yet again make another decision to resist eating, whether or not you're hungry. And you know, we have someone on our show who has a big, fat -- Kristen, at her desk -- of Twizzlers and Laffy Taffy. I don't need it but it's there and it's bright.
ROBERTS: It took a scientist to figure that out?
CHETRY: And an author.
There is not much to do when you're snowed in by a blizzard, especially if TV's knocked out and you're stuck in your house. Well, we'll tell you what people were up to in Denver. The storm, by the way, nine months ago.
(COMMERCIAL BREAK)
ROBERTS: Welcome back to "AMERICAN MORNING." A look at some extreme weather in your "Quick Hits" now. Trees and power lines knocked down in Far East Texas after heavy wind and rain tore through the area. A few houses also damaged. Take a look at that tree that came down. One injury was reported there. Strong wind storms slammed New Hampshire. Several trees and power lines knocked down, roads had to be shut down. And in Alton, a lightning strike started a fire that destroyed a summer home.
Kiran?
CHETRY: Well, Denver area hospitals are starting to see the impact of a series of blizzards that hit the area back in December. It was about nine months ago. And now, they say, it appears there was a bit of a baby boom in the area.
UNIDENTIFIED MEDICAL WORKER: We've been seeing a regular, daily increase in the number of deliveries, and when we talk to our families, they've pretty much all confirmed that it occurred around blizzard time. Just couldn't keep up with keeping the streets clear. So people were kind of stuck at home, and as a result, we're seeing lots of new babies from nine months ago.
CHETRY: How cute. Well, at least one hospital in Denver says they're expecting deliveries for October to increase by about 20 percent as a result of all the people that were snowed in with nothing else to do.
ROBERTS: There's nothing on TV?
CHETRY: Well, I guess not. Either that or maybe the electricity was out, too.
ROBERTS: There you go.
Search is on for a boat crew. It was called off. The Coast Guard has stopped looking for the crew of the fishing boat Joe Cool. The two men that were rescued at sea as part of that were in court today. Police are suspicious of their story that hijackers boarded the boat and killed the crew one by one.
Jurors are deliberating today in the sexual harassment case against New York Knicks coach Isiah Thomas. A former employee is suing him and Madison Square Garden, owners of the team, for $10 million.
What airlines are best or worst when it comes to on-time performance? That's coming up next on "AMERICAN MORNING."
(COMMERCIAL BREAK)
CHETRY: Well, President Bush is wrapping up a two-day meeting on climate change today and our Miles O'Brien is keeping an eye on this one, seeing what happens when science and politics collide. Miles is at the State Department ready with a fact check for us. Hi, miles, good to see you.
MILES O'BRIEN, CNN NEWS CORRESPONDENT: Good morning, Kiran. The president will be here in just a few hours to address this two-day meeting on climate change. The question many of the nations here are asking is will the president announce a change in policy?
(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)
O'BRIEN (voice-over): The science is solid, a warming earth could mean dangerous changes in the years ahead. But when science collides with politics, the chemistry isn't always pretty. And White House pronouncements on a warming earth have been all over the map. Head to head with Al Gore in a 2000 presidential debate, candidate Bush wasn't so sure about global warming.
GEORGE W. BUSH, PRESIDENT OF THE UNITED STATES: Global warming needs to be season very seriously, and I take it seriously. But science, there's a lot -- there's differing opinions, and before we react, I think it's best to have the full accounting, full understanding of what's taking place.
O'BRIEN: Then, before the election, Bush promised to force limits on greenhouse gas emissions. But in an interview a year later with CNN's John King, Vice President Cheney asked for a do-over on that promise.
DICK CHENEY, VICE PRESIDENT OF THE UNITED STATES: It was a mistake, because we aren't in a position today to be able to do that, in terms of sort of capping CO2 emissions.
O'BRIEN: This year global warming was back on the front burner, making the A-list for the State of the Union Address.
BUSH: These technologies will help us be better stewards of the environment and they will help us to confront the serious challenge of global climate change.
O'BRIEN: No one expects a breakthrough from this meeting, but the president's supporters say it couldn't hurt.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: I don't see how it could be anything other than a positive, and I believe Prime Minister Blair will agree, to get the major economies of the world, to get the nations that are responsible for 80 percent of the carbon emissions.
O'BRIEN: But even Bush's first EPA administrator says the U.S. has left the impression that it won't lift a finger to help.
EPA ADMINISTRATOR: He said we're out of here, gone, and we're not going to regulate climate. And the rest of the world interpreted that as flipping them the bird, frankly, on an issue which they cared a great deal.
(END VIDEOTAPE)
O'BRIEN: So the U.S. is rejecting mandatory restrictions. So is China and so is India. Those are the three big greenhouse gas emitters, and a lot of climate scientists, Kiran, would say unless there are mandatory caps and unless those three big greenhouse gas emitters agree to them, the climate could face a situation where it reaches a tipping point and could go out of control -- Kiran?
CHETRY: All right, we'll see if anything comes of that, if any promises are kept. Miles O'Brien for us at the State Department, thank you.
ROBERTS: A minute to the top of the hour. Ali Velshi "Minding Your Business".
We're talking about airline flight delays and how much time you spend on the ground and the worst and best airlines. Seems like there are no best airlines.
ALI VELSHI, CNN SENIOR BUSINESS ANALYST: A new study out by Forbes talking about airlines. Unlike the airlines, I'm going to get you to the top of the hour on time. I'm not going to have a delay because the biggest criteria are delays, mishandled baggage and canceled flights. Just delays now.
Take a look at this list. No surprises on there. U.S. Airways has an on-time, performance rate of 68 percent, American 70 percent, United 72 percent, Delta 75 percent.
The irony here, of course, is that if you book tickets, and you look at the flight times that are allowed for these flights, they are strangely long, a two-hour flight sometimes has three hours allowed for it, even allowing for those airlines to have delays in terms of boarding and deplaning and sitting on the runway. So these are perhaps not as clear as they should be. We'll continue to get on this story and there are hearings in Congress about it.
Right now, the next hour of "AMERICAN MORNING" begins.
ROBERTS: Breaking news, miracle ending.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
RIDER: She's here and she's alive, and that in itself is a miracle.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
TO ORDER A VIDEO OF THIS TRANSCRIPT, PLEASE CALL 800-CNN-NEWS OR USE OUR SECURE ONLINE ORDER FORM LOCATED AT www.voxant.com
