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Massive Power Outage Strikes Florida; Jury Will Decide if Bobby Cutts is Sentenced to Death
Aired February 26, 2008 - 15:00 ET
THIS IS A RUSH TRANSCRIPT. THIS COPY MAY NOT BE IN ITS FINAL FORM AND MAY BE UPDATED.
BETTY NGUYEN, CNN ANCHOR: Well, it is lights out, not to mention TVs, computers, traffic signals, anything else that is electric in a big part of Florida today.
DON LEMON, CNN ANCHOR: And, Betty, eight, get this, eight Florida power plants are offline, as are more than four million homes and businesses.
It's breaking news, and you're in the CNN NEWSROOM today.
Hello, everyone. I'm Don Lemon, live at the CNN World Headquarters here in Atlanta.
NGUYEN: Hi, there. I'm Betty Nguyen. Kyra Phillips is on assignment in Iraq.
LEMON: Our Susan Candiotti has been out on top of this story in Florida. She joins us now by phone to give us an update on it.
What do you have for us, Susan?
SUSAN CANDIOTTI, CNN NATIONAL CORRESPONDENT: Well, what we just heard was that update from Florida Power and Light saying that at its height about 800,000 customers were affected. This power outage as it were struck at about 1:00 in the afternoon Eastern time, affecting customers of Florida Power and Light up and down the state of Florida basically from north to south.
FP&L serves over four million people in all. Now, you know the number of customers actually affected, how many of those customers now have had power restored, they're not exactly sure. Now, on top of that, there are some smaller power systems, power companies, that also provide electricity to customers in Florida, for example, in the Tampa area and some other parts of the state. We're still getting numbers there, but, for example, in the Tampa area, an additional 50,000 customers were without power. All but 2,000 of them have had their power restored as well.
Now, we are -- there is no clear reason for the outage as yet, obviously, some sort of problem with the power grid. But (AUDIO GAP) says that the way they have the system set up is that, in an emergency, their automated system tries to contain the power outage as best as is possible, and they do say that that happened in this case.
Meantime, of course, as power is going out, people have to deal with it. For example, there were a few delays at Miami International Airport. Those delays have been corrected. But, currently, for example, a number of traffic lights are out in large metropolitan areas.
LEMON: Hey, Susan?
CANDIOTTI: Yes?
LEMON: I was going to ask you about that, because I understand the last time we spoke to you, you were in the car. Have you been trying to get around in this mess? What are you seeing real quickly? We have to get on to another person. But explain to us real quick what you have.
CANDIOTTI: You got it. Right. I don't have it, only from we have heard about these traffic backups at major intersections. I'm on the turnpike and not experiencing any problems at all.
LEMON: OK. Susan Candiotti joining us from Florida -- thank you, Susan.
CANDIOTTI: You're welcome.
NGUYEN: Well, that is good to hear.
We want to check in now with Andy Newman. He's a spokesperson for the Florida Keys.
And I'm told by my producer, Andy, that you have some good news for us today.
Andy, are you there?
ANDY NEWMAN, SPOKESPERSON, FLORIDA KEYS: I'm here.
NGUYEN: All right, great. I understand that you have some good news out of Florida Keys. What's the information on the ground there? Andy, can you hear me?
All right. Obviously, we're having some audio difficulties.
And, you know, this is kind of indicative of the situation there. We heard from a reporter for WSVN, our affiliate in Miami, where you are seeing this picture come in from, talk about that there are just so many people on the cell phones right now. And that's causing a little bit of a backup.
LEMON: You're talking about WSVN. I don't mean to cut you off. But there's a press conference going on. We want to listen in.
(JOINED IN PROGRESS)
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: ... they didn't know the reason.
Pretty much. They just told me before I came here that within the next couple of hours we should have power in Dade County, most of it. Yes. QUESTION: Did FP&L give you any indication of power -- if is coming back on? (OFF-MIKE) Is it a cascade effect?
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: That's exactly how it's coming up. And I don't know -- we don't -- we wish we had somebody here from FP&L, so that they could guide you through this. I'm not an expert and I don't pretend to be. They have explained it, and it's a matter of just a cascading effect.
QUESTION: Can you tell us anybody the source of this? We know -- you aid it was something -- a mechanical the within FP&L, not a (OFF-MIKE) problem, but we heard that it actually started near or at Turkey Point nuclear plant.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: I can't answer that. I mean, but what I can assure people is that this was something technical. It wasn't anything criminal related. I know there was some concerns in some municipalities as to what had occurred in Turkey Point or, you know, what was the reason for it. It's just within their system, something that occurred that triggered this power outage.
QUESTION: Is there any chance that this procedural problem at Turkey Point might -- might be a cause of a larger, more dangerous problem at the nuclear facility?
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: There's no indication of that whatsoever. And we haven't been told that. As a matter of fact, they're very optimistic that within the next couple hours we will have power back.
QUESTION: Were you briefed by the folks at Turkey Point?
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: I was briefed by the folks at FP&L, so, yes.
UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: All right, there you heard from Mayor Alvarez, says that this was not an emergency, that it was actually a procedural problem. Hard for a lot of people, though, in the state of Florida, the four million people without power, to understand that.
He said that FP&L says it was some sort of cascading effect, that it was not criminal related. It was a technical problem. FP&L admits that it did shut down a nuclear reactor at Turkey Point there for safety reasons. Still not explaining why.
UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: And that's the big -- the big question, but the mayor did mention that so far in terms of the traffic, really no big problems there. I mean, there are a lot of traffic lights out all over the county, but no big problems. He's calling it more of a -- quote -- major -- or "massive," I should say, inconvenience, a massive inconvenience.
As we all know, you know, if you live in Miami-Dade County, as the mayor put it, we have traffic problems to begin with. So, throw in tons of lights out, and that would, indeed, cause a massive inconvenience. But the good news is that the mayor did say that an FP&L -- the FP&L folks are telling him that here in Miami-Dade County, in Miami-Dade County... LEMON: OK, you're listening, again, to our coverage from affiliate WSVN down in Miami.
And also there was a press conference just going on. Now, the reports that they are -- that has not been confirmed by CNN, what they are saying there. That's according to the "Associated Press," that it was some sort of procedural problems that occurred when this Turkey Point was trying to shut down one system to conserve, and then another system became overloaded by that.
And perhaps the person who can best answer this is Ken Clark. He's with the Nuclear Regulatory Commission. He joins us now by telephone to tell us about this.
Is this a viable cause for this type of power outage, Mr. Clark?
KEN CLARK, NUCLEAR REGULATORY COMMISSION: Well, the Turkey Point units shut down automatically -- we call that a scram -- at nine minutes after 1:00 this afternoon. There was some sort of a disturbance on the grid.
At this point, we have not established or FP&L has not reported to us that they have established precisely what caused the grid disturbance. We have resident inspectors at the Saint Lucie plant up at Stuart on the Atlantic Ocean and we have resident inspectors at Crystal River over on the Gulf Coast, about 90 miles north of Tampa.
And they reported to us that both of those plants in their control rooms saw -- excuse me -- saw the disturbance on the grid, but it did not cause them to scram or to shut down. There have been some reports that Florida Power and Light shut the plants down for safety reasons. Actually, the plants shut themselves down automatically when this disturbance occurred on the grid.
Now, whether one or more of the plants caused that or whether or not the disturbance caused the plants to shut down -- well, the disturbance did cause the plants to shut down. But we haven't pinpointed yet what the precise cause is.
LEMON: And, Mr. Clark, I'm glad you said that, because during that press conference and also the coverage of our affiliate there, they were saying that it was some sort of shutdown, that the plant had possibly shut down something, a reactor, and then that had caused the problem. So, I'm glad you cleared that up. But usually, you say if there's a disturbance this plant or these mechanisms will kick in and they will shut down themselves.
CLARK: That's right. They're automatic.
LEMON: Right. And so we still don't know at this point; is that what you're telling me?
CLARK: Well, and the information we have is preliminary, but that's from our resident inspectors at Turkey Point and up at Saint Lucie and over at Crystal River. LEMON: If you're with the Nuclear Regulatory Commission, obviously, you know, we have blackouts all the time. And I don't want you to speculate here about, but tell us, what do you think would cause this type of a problem? We have been hearing about, you know, the infrastructure and, you know, one system being overloaded and the other one being overloaded. We need to update that. Then what could cause that? What could cause this grid disturbance that you're speaking of?
CLARK: Oh, at this point, we just don't know. Our resident inspector at Crystal River told us that there have been some heavy storms down in South Florida, and they were expecting them to move I guess in a northward direction. So whether or not something happened at one of the nuclear plants or at some fossil plant, we just haven't established yet what precisely caused it.
LEMON: A lot of people without power, and, of course, it's inconvenient. We don't want -- we wish everyone -- hope everyone is safe. And we don't want to risk anyone's safety. But just real quickly, this is a good thing that these things shut down, right, sir?
CLARK: Yes. And I might add that both of the Turkey Point plants, which are shut down, do have what we call off-site power. In other words, they are drawing power from the grid. And that, of course, is good, because it enables them to maintain the plants in a safe shutdown condition without having to rely on emergency diesel generators.
LEMON: All right, Mr. Clark, Ken Clark, from the Nuclear Regulatory Commission, we appreciate that. At least you have given us some -- a different perspective on what might have caused it, maybe a grid disturbance and then automatically that these plants will shut down to sort of circumvent having a bigger disturbance and a full blackout, a full-on blackout.
Thank you very much.
Back in a moment here in the CNN NEWSROOM with details on our breaking news, a power outage in Florida.
(COMMERCIAL BREAK)
NGUYEN: All right, we have been talking a lot about power outages in Florida, specifically in the Miami and Southern Florida areas.
Let's talk now with Stan Johnson. He is a manager for situation awareness with the North American Electric Reliability Corporation.
And, Stan, a little bit earlier today, you had mentioned that eight power plants were offline across the region. Specifically, Turkey Point has a nuclear station in South Miami. What is the situation with Turkey Point?
STAN JOHNSON, NORTH AMERICAN ELECTRIC RELIABILITY CORPORATION: As far as we know, Turkey Point is going through the normal procedures for a safe and controlled shutdown. That's what always happens with nuclear plants when they go offline unexpectedly. So, the operators there are doing everything they can to helping that plant down safely.
NGUYEN: And any idea at this point as to what caused these power outages, what caused the transmissions to go down?
S. JOHNSON: The information we have was that there was a short- circuit in a substation in South Florida, and the protected systems that are designed to contain the problem to that substation did not work correctly, so the problems spread very rapidly, and that's why it became a widespread outage.
(CROSSTALK)
NGUYEN: So what is supposed to happen when something like that goes down?
S. JOHNSON: Well, what's supposed to happen is the protective equipment are supposed to limit it to that problem. Just like in your home, if you have a short-circuit in your wall, only that circuit breaker should trip and not your whole house go without power. In this case, the circuit breaker apparently did not work and that's why it spread to a much larger area.
NGUYEN: And we're talking, especially when it comes to Florida Power and Light, between 600,000 and 800,000 people affected.
And Don was talking a little bit earlier, and it does make sense, that even though this may not have worked exactly how it was supposed to, the fact that these power plant shut down is a good thing.
S. JOHNSON: Absolutely. That's what they're designed to do. Whether it's a nuclear plant, a coal plant or a gas-fired plant, they are all are supposed to shut down in order to protect themselves so they are not damaged and that they can be started back up again and continue to supply power.
NGUYEN: So, what happens now? Do they go back to the source of the problem and you have to fix it at that point before you can bring all the other plants online?
S. JOHNSON: Usually, you can bypass the initial cause of the problem and get everybody back online. And the companies in Florida, Tampa Electric, Florida Power and Light, and Progress, are all in the process of doing that now, getting their customers back on.
NGUYEN: And, Stan, from what you're hearing, this was just simply a technical glitch. We spoke with our homeland security correspondent, Jeanne Meserve, and she said at this point she has not heard of anything dealing with terrorism. So, I have to ask you, have you heard anything to that extent on your end?
S. JOHNSON: No, we have not. All the information that we have is consistent with what Jeanne has. This appears to be a technical problem, no indication whatsoever of any kind of terrorist activity.
NGUYEN: Well, that is good news.
And quickly, as we wait for this come back online, we have got a number of different estimates, somewhere between 10 hours, and then others are saying between two and four. What do you expect?
S. JOHNSON: It depends where you're talking about in the state of Florida. Areas like Tampa and on the east coast, the central east coast, that will be coming back on much more quickly. The areas in Southern Florida will take a bit longer. So, it's going to depend a bit on location.
NGUYEN: All right, Stan Johnson with the North American Electric Reliability Corporation -- Stan, thanks for your information.
S. JOHNSON: You're very welcome.
LEMON: OK, Andy Newman is a spokesperson for the Florida Keys. The power company in the Florida Keys. Am I correct, Andy?
NEWMAN: ... power company, but the Florida Keys.
LEMON: Yes, go ahead.
Listen, tell me what's going on there. Do you have the power back?
NEWMAN: Well, we have very good news to report in the Florida Keys. Both utilities in the Keys, the Florida Keys Energy Services and the Florida Keys Electric Co-op, are reporting a full restoration of service throughout the island chain.
LEMON: It was dicey for you for a while, though.
NEWMAN: It wasn't too long, actually. In talking to officials at both companies, they're indicating that most of the folks were without power for about 30 minutes and some up to just under an hour. So, we're actually fully back online and in good shape.
LEMON: How many people?
NEWMAN: Well, there's about 75,000 residents in the Keys, and probably about 35,000 visitors to the island chain.
LEMON: I know it's a serious story, but lucky people who get to live in the Keys, and you probably don't even use that much air- conditioning.
NEWMAN: Well, and I think the important thing probably for a lot of folks is that the margarita machines are back on again.
(LAUGHTER)
NGUYEN: He's putting it all in perspective, isn't he?
LEMON: He put it into perspective for us, yes.
So, Andy Newman, appreciate it. And we're glad, obviously, no reports there of anyone hurt in the Florida Keys.
NEWMAN: We haven't heard of any serious impact yet.
LEMON: Yes. You said for about 30 minutes. So, it's good to see that folks back, at least in the Florida Keys, have their power back, and, as he said, the margarita machines.
NGUYEN: Well, the folks around Miami and other parts are looking at the Keys, going, can you just bring that my way? They need their lights back on.
LEMON: Or can we drive down, right, for the weekend?
NGUYEN: Yes, exactly, that, too, although traffic is probably going to be a mess there, headed towards rush hour.
It's 3:18 on the East Coast here. And obviously we're getting toward that time period. So, hopefully, some of this electricity can be back online by the time a lot of people are headed on to those freeways.
LEMON: We still haven't found out exactly, though, what happened. We have heard theories about what could have happened.
(CROSSTALK)
LEMON: We are going to try to break that down for you, get some information, here in the CNN NEWSROOM.
(COMMERCIAL BREAK)
LEMON: All right, Florida facing a major power outage this afternoon.
Joining us on the phone now is Joshua Johnson. He's from the Miami Herald Radio.
I understand you might have some information about when the power may come back up.
JOSHUA JOHNSON, MIAMI HERALD RADIO: Yes, Don, the latest word from FPL, according to a statement that they just put out, is that they expect to restore service to most of the customers that were affected by this outage within approximately two hours. And there have been other reports that say that it may take through the rest of the night. But FPL's word right now within the next few hours.
LEMON: Yes, we're hearing up to 10 hours. That was like maybe an hour ago, we heard that, Joshua.
J. JOHNSON: Yes. It will probably depend based on what part of the state that you are in. FPL affects practically the entire state of Florida.
LEMON: Yes. Joshua, are you inside or have you been out and about today? J. JOHNSON: I'm inside the "Miami Herald" building. We had a power blink. Fortunately, most of our systems, including the radio studios, were on a backup. So, we only saw the power blink. But some of our reporters who were out said everything shut off. The power went off and came back on. It kind of varied depending on where you were in South Florida.
LEMON: Any idea? Give me some instances of what people are saying, some of your reporters, what they are seeing and hearing...
(CROSSTALK)
J. JOHNSON: Well, it's very sporadic. There's one guy who works in sports who came in, said the power in southwest Broward went off for about 20 minutes; then it came back on.
There are some people who were closer to the University of Miami who say the power went off and stayed off. There are people over on Miami Beach who were looking for a place to eat. And then right before they walked in the restaurant, the power shut off.
And so they had to go from storefront to storefront trying to find someone who had power that could serve them a meal. So, kind of depending where you are, whether you're at a port or a hospital or any of the major centers here, either it was a tough day or it was a minor inconvenience.
LEMON: Yes, well very put, a minor inconvenience if you can't find a restaurant that has food.
J. JOHNSON: Exactly.
LEMON: Eventually, you will find something. But for people who were -- who knows -- we heard, Joshua, from the police officer people who were stuck on trains and stuck on elevators. That's very serious.
J. JOHNSON: It is.
And Miami and Miami P.D., Miami-Dade County Police Department have been responding to that throughout. So far, they have been working very hard to reassure people that this is not like a terrorist attack or anything like that. The county mayor, Carlos Alvarez, just had a news conference not too long ago in which he reassured residents that, as far as we know, this is a procedural issue -- his word was procedural -- and not related to some kind of evil deeds by some outside force, just to keep people calm.
LEMON: Joshua Johnson from the Miami Herald Radio, we appreciate it, sir.
J. JOHNSON: Any time.
LEMON: All right.
NGUYEN: Well, it's 24 minutes past the hour right now, and here are three of the stories that we're working on right here in the CNN NEWSROOM.
Admitted al Qaeda member Zacarias Moussaoui wants a federal appeals court to toss out his guilty plea. He claims his lawyers were prohibited from discussing crucial evidence in his case with him. Moussaoui, who is serving a life sentence, described himself as the so-called 20th hijacker who was supposed to have flown an airliner into the White House on 9/11.
Let's take you to Ohio now. A jury is deliberating whether the death penalty is an appropriate punishment for Bobby Cutts. The former police officer was convicted of killing his pregnant girlfriend and their unborn child. Prosecutors are pushing for the death penalty. Cutts, though, has appealed to the jury to spare his life.
And a really frightening morning in parts of the Southeastern U.S. Several storms and severe storms at that pounded parts of Alabama and Georgia. Near Birmingham, an elderly woman was killed when a tree fell on a mobile home. The storms have left thousands of people in both states without power.
Well, do you remember these pictures? Alaska 1989. The Exxon Valdez runs aground and spills 11 million gallons of crude oil into Prince William Sound. It was the worst U.S. oil spill on record. Now the case has spilled into the Supreme Court. And Exxon says it shouldn't have to pay more than $2 billion in punitive damages. For some of the people who still live and work in the area, there is no argument.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
JENNIFER GIBBINS, PRINCE WILLIAM SOUNDKEEPER: Tomorrow, Exxon will argue that it has suffered enough. And we're here to say that this argument is simply offensive. And it's offensive to us as Alaskans, but it's also offensive to all Americans. And it's an argument that Exxon could not even have conceived of themselves in 1989.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
NGUYEN: Well, Exxon claims it can't be held responsible for what the Valdez captain did. The company has already paid more than $3 billion in cleanup costs and fines.
Sea birds, seals and other marine life coated in that thick, black crude oil were the victims of one of the nation's largest environmental disasters. Want to take a look back now at the Exxon Valdez oil spill.
(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)
NGUYEN (voice-over): A paradise of seawater and marine life, that's the way it was for centuries in Alaska's Prince William Sound. The sound also was generous, providing a good life for commercial fishermen, Alaskan natives and businesses. All of that changed on March 24, 1989. The supertanker Exxon Valdez struck a reef in the sound, spilling 11 million gallons of oil -- 1,200 miles of shoreline were soiled. Hundreds of thousands of birds and other marine animals were killed. Evidence during an 83-day trial during in 1994 revealed that the Valdez captain, Joseph Hazelwood, had left the ship's bridge just before the giant ship had to make a difficult turn.
The jury found Hazelwood and Exxon reckless, and awarded $287 million in actual damages and $5 billion in punitive damages. A federal appeals court later cut that assessment in half. According to a federal study released last year, an estimated 85 tons of crude linger in the sound. Environmentalists say numerous species have not recovered to pre-spill health in abundance.
Exxon has paid $3.5 billion in environmental cleanup costs, fines, and settlements of private claims. The company says claims that the spill continues to damage Prince William Sound are simply untrue.
(END VIDEOTAPE)
LEMON: Well, they're getting some of the power back up in Florida, but it could be a long time before things are back to normal.
A major power outage in Florida, that's our breaking news today in the CNN NEWSROOM.
(COMMERCIAL BREAK)
LEMON: All right, breaking news this afternoon in the CNN NEWSROOM -- a major power outage in Florida. Let's get you some pictures now so you can take a look at what's happening.
It's almost rush hour and people are going to pick up their kids from school. That's what's happening on the right, from our affiliate WSVN. And then on the left, you see there traffic -- not much really by way of traffic, at least not at 3:30 in the evening in Miami.
But, of course, those streets are going to get much more crowded in the coming hours -- actually, in the coming minutes. As we heard officials there in Florida joining us by telephone explain that. So what exactly what happened? What's going on in Florida now from a ground perspective?
We want to get to our John Zarrella, who is in Tallahassee. He's been monitoring much of this situation for us -- John what do you know?
JOHN ZARRELLA, CNN CORRESPONDENT: Hey, Don, that's right. I'm actually up at the state capital here and at the emergency operations center now -- the state emergency operations center.
And what the folks here have been telling us is that the outage appears to have been some system failure or perhaps a mechanical failure. They believe that it is confined primarily to -- Miami-Dade and Broward Counties were the two biggest places hit. And they say -- they estimated two to three million people were affected statewide overall, although the numbers are varying.
We've heard up to 4.4 million. The state is saying two to three million. They believe that a lot of the power is coming back on. And, in fact, a little while ago, I talked with Wayne Sallade, who is the emergency manager over in Charlotte County, on the West Coast of Florida. And at one point this afternoon, they had lost about 7,000 homes without power. They were out for about 45 minutes.
In fact, he told me they had a communications tower -- an emergency operations communications tower that lost power, as well. But all the power is restored there in Charlotte County on the West Coast. The Tampa Bay Area and Hillsborough County had about 40,000 out, we're told; another 19,000 a little north of there in Pasco County.
But power coming back on. Slowly but surely in all of these places it's being restored. So, again, the state is saying they believe it's confined, it's under control and that power is beginning to come back on. But as you mentioned, you know, rush hour -- rush hour in Miami getting started pretty quickly, Don. And there's probably going to be quite a bit of traffic snarls on those streets down south -- Don.
LEMON: Yes. And we were looking at streets. And you know, in different neighborhoods you may not get that much traffic. But definitely in business areas and areas that are leading to the interstates and expressways, John, it's going to be quite a mess if they don't have those power lights.
ZARRELLA: Yes, no question about it. And you know, I talked to some people in the Broward County area who say well, they never lost power. It didn't even blink in Broward County. So while it's a widespread massive blackout, there were many portions of -- certainly of Broward County that weren't affected at all with power outages, you know, so that it wasn't a problem in every area of Miami-Dade and Broward, that's for sure.
LEMON: All right. CNN's John Zarrella. John, appreciate it.
NGUYEN: Well, we want to try to get a better understanding of exactly what happened. And we've heard a number of different reports. But a little bit earlier, I spoke with Stan Johnson. He is with the North American Electric Reliability Corporation. And here's what he had to say.
(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)
STAN JOHNSON, NORTH AMERICAN ELECTRIC RELIABILITY CORPORATION: As far as we know, Turkey Point is going through the normal procedures for a safe and controlled shutdown. That's what always happens with nuclear plants when they go offline unexpectedly. So the operators there are doing everything they can to shutting that plant down safely.
NGUYEN: And any idea at this point as to what caused these power outages -- what caused the transmissions to go down? S. JOHNSON: The information we have was that there was a short circuit in a substation in South Florida and the protected systems that are designed to contain the problem to that substation did not work correctly, so the problem spread very rapidly. And that's why it became a widespread outage. But the initial --
NGUYEN: So what's supposed to happen when something like that goes down?
S. JOHNSON: Well, I -- what's supposed to happen is the protective equipment are supposed to limit it to that problem. Just like in your home, if you have a short circuit in your wall, only that circuit breaker should trip and not your whole house go without power. In this case, the circuit breaker apparently didn't work and that's why it spread to a much larger area.
NGUYEN: And we're talking, especially when it comes to Florida Power & Light, between 600,000 and 800,000 people affected. And Don was talking a little bit earlier and it does make sense that even though this may not have worked exactly how it was supposed to, the fact that these power plants did shut down is a good thing.
S. JOHNSON: Absolutely. That's what they're designed to do. Whether it's a nuclear plant, a coal plant or a gas fired plant, they all are supposed to shut down in order to protect themselves, so they're not damaged and that they can be started back up and continue to supply power.
NGUYEN: So what happens now? Do they go back to the source of the problem and you have to fix it at that point before you can bring all the other plants online?
S. JOHNSON: Usually you can bypass the initial cause of the problem and get everybody back online. And the companies in Florida -- Tampa Electric, Florida Power & Light and Progress -- are all in process of doing that now, getting their customers back on.
NGUYEN: And, Stan, from what you're hearing, this was just simply a technical glitch? We spoke with our homeland security correspondent, Jeanne Meserve. And she said at this point, she has not heard of anything dealing with terrorism. So I have to ask you, have you heard anything to that extent on your end?
S. JOHNSON: No, we have not. All the information that we have is consistent with what Jeanne has. This appears to be a technical problem. No indication whatsoever of any kind of terrorist activity.
NGUYEN: Well, that is good news.
And, quickly, as we wait for this to come back online, we've got a number of different estimates -- somewhere between 10 hours and then others are saying between two and four. What do you expect?
S. JOHNSON: It depends where you're talking about in the State of Florida. Areas like Tampa on the East Coast -- the Central East Coast -- that will be coming back on much more quickly. The areas in Southern Florida will take a little bit longer. So it's going to depend a bit on location.
(END VIDEOTAPE)
NGUYEN: Let's go right to Florida Power & Light now. Karen Vissepo is on the line with us.
And, Karen, we're hearing now, according to one of our reporters down there, two hours before you have everyone back up?
KAREN VISSEPO, FLORIDA POWER & LIGHT: Excuse me, can you repeat again? I'm sorry, I couldn't hear you.
LEMON: A couple of hours before you have everyone back up?
VISSEPO: A couple of hours, yes.
LEMON: What do you -- two, three, one?
VISSEPO: Hopefully, within two hours we should have most of our customers, those affected by the outage, back on.
LEMON: OK.
VISSEPO: And what we -- what we -- I just received the latest information, is that approximately between 1:00 and 1:30 Eastern time today, both Turkey Point nuclear plants shut down after an offsite grid disturbance. This means that there was a loss of power at an offsite area. And the plant responded as designed, as you were discussing.
It shut itself down to avoid the situation from escalating to a bigger event. And the plants are right now in a stable condition. We're getting those plants back on and restoring power. And every customer, hopefully, should be getting power back as soon as possible -- as I said, within the next couple of hours.
LEMON: All right. Karen Vissepo with Florida Power & Light. We appreciate you joining us again here in the CNN NEWSROOM.
That's the latest information. They're saying a couple of hours before they get everyone back up and running as far as electricity goes in Florida. We're back in a moment.
(COMMERCIAL BREAK)
NGUYEN: All right, we're talking about the situation in South Florida today. For a couple of hours now, they've been dealing with a power outage. And that is really causing some major problems when it comes to delays and traffic and folks getting in and out of work, because a lot of the electricity, again, is just not on. Let's get the situation from the ground with Susan Candiotti.
I understand, Susan, you are near downtown. Are you seeing any major snarls with traffic or any other problems because of this power outage? CANDIOTTI: Not major, from what I can tell so far. I'm going southbound on I-95. I'm just about a mile or two away from downtown Miami, so I'm able to observe right now. We're in the middle of -- the start, actually, of rush hour traffic.
So, a lot of cars heading northbound at this time. Of course, there are no traffic lights on the interstate. But as you move from side to side, I see a smattering of traffic lights that are out, but a lot of them are on. And so that's what we've been seeing occasionally, you see some police officers out helping to direct traffic.
And then, on the other hand, you see traffic moving normally -- or at normally as is possible for this hour. But I definitely suspect that as we get really into the heart of the rush hour, there probably will be more backups than usual as a result of this.
Other than that, schools were said be working normally. The Miami International Airport, when all this happened at about 1:00 this afternoon Eastern time, only had a few flight delays. It lasted just a few minutes and then they were back online.
So it really depends on where you are in the Miami/Fort Lauderdale area. Some people didn't even see the lights blink. Others had power out for just a few minutes and some didn't notice anything wrong.
NGUYEN: And we also understand from Florida Power & Light that the electricity is coming on. It's coming on in certain sections at a time. And we do want to tell our viewers that it's a little bit difficult to hear you at times, Susan. And we were hearing a little bit earlier that that's simply because so many people are coming out of the buildings, they're getting on their cell phones and they're trying to figure out what is going on with the electricity.
CANDIOTTI: That may very well be the case. Obviously, as more and more people are trying to make phone calls -- it even took me a couple of times to get out, on occasion, because so many people are on the phone and trying to check, obviously, with each other what the situation is right now.
I just got off the interstate and I see a whole line of traffic lights working normally. On the other hand, we see some flashing lights. We're going to check that out to see what we see up ahead here, too.
NGUYEN: Are you seeing a lot of police officers just on standby, patrolling the areas, making sure that there's no unrest because of the power outage?
CANDIOTTI: No, not really. I don't think we're at that stage at all. They're monitoring this from an emergency operations center to see whether they need to send anybody out. But I see no more patrol cars out than one normally would at this hour.
NGUYEN: Well, it's good to hear that you're in the downtown area and you are seeing traffic lights back up. Because we're looking at video right now of officers directing traffic at some major intersections just to make sure that people know when to get through that intersection so that some minor fender benders and other accidents aren't occurring because of this. Susan Candiotti joining us from downtown Miami.
And at this point, she is seeing, Don, a number of traffic lights up and running. So that's good news. It just shows us -- Florida Power & Light was telling us a little bit earlier that the electricity is coming on in several parts of Miami. And that's something that's going to continue until all the power is restored.
LEMON: Well, as we say here, there's still a bunch of folks who don't have power and that's a concern for them.
NGUYEN: Oh, yes, thousands.
LEMON: And our affiliate, WSVN, just had a press conference, just a short time ago. And they have some new numbers for us, I believe.
Let's take a listen to see what they're reporting.
UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: A little bit behind in their dismissal. But the buses are running in public schools and dismissal did go on, but a little bit later than usual. But in terms of private schools within the Archdiocese of Miami, the private school buses did not run. So right now it appears that perhaps if your child goes to a school within the Archdiocese, maybe you're trying to find transportation for them, to try and get them home.
But it appears that slowly but surely we are up and running, little by little. We're seeing more and more traffic lights. We went to Nicole Linsalata near Jackson Memorial a while ago. And in the middle of her report -- boom, the traffic light came up in a very busy intersection. So, as the afternoon progresses, we are getting back to normalcy, if you will, hopefully.
CRAIG STEVENS, NEWS 7 ANCHOR: All right. We are getting good news as it relates to the number of customers coming back online throughout the region, not just in Miami-Dade County.
Perhaps we can get an update directly from the utility. Seven's Reed Cowan is over at Florida Power & Light headquarters and he can join us now with the latest from there -- Reed, what have you got?
All right, perhaps we (AUDIO GAP) for just for a second.
We'll try to get back with him. We know he's in position at Florida Power & Light. And, hopefully, he will have some good news in terms of getting folks back online.
We've got Rene Marsh, who is with us from Morningside Elementary School -- joined us a short while ago to let us know how the dismissal was going there. It seemed to be going fairly well, based on the you were sending back.
Rene, what do you have?
RENE MARSH, WRVN CORRESPONDENT: Yes, Craig, you're exactly right. I just spoke with the principal just minutes ago. And she says things are back to normal. They did lose power for about an hour and a half today, but the power has been restored. And the principal says that the dismissal will go on as usual. Parents can pick their kids up. But she says that the buses will be here. It is, again, a normal dismissal.
Earlier, today, though, it was lights out. Teachers were put on alert and students were kept inside of the classrooms until the lights did come back on and they decided that things were safe.
Again, that's about the latest going on here. But, again, the principal is telling me that things are back to normal here at Morningside Elementary. They did have a brief blackout. Lights are back on. Parents don't have to worry. She says all the kids are safe. Buses will pick these kids up. And that's the latest from here. Back to you -- Craig.
STEVENS: Rene, I'm curious just because of the dismissal, which seemed to go fairly much on schedule. But the numbers of parents who chose to go to the school to pick up their kids versus the number of kids who went home on the buses as they would any other day, were the buses full or were there a lot of parents there just because of the situation and they wanted to get their kids themselves?
MARSH: Well, I know that a few parents did come here to pick up their kids because they did see the reports and they weren't sure what the situation was. So those parents did come. As far as how many kids did get on the bus, we don't know at this point. I do know that there will be another dismissal.
I guess they have dismissal in rounds here at this school. The next one isn't until 4:00. So at 4:00, we'll have a better idea as to whether or not many kids will be on these buses or whether or not their parents came to pick them up.
STEVENS: All right, Rene. And that's about 12 minutes away so we'll be getting back with you. From Morningside Elementary in the City of Miami, thank you for that live update on the school dismissal there.
UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: A lot of worried parents out there. Perhaps a lot of people worried if they have loved ones in hospitals and whatnot. We've been telling you that at Jacksonville Memorial Hospital they never lost power. Things at Miami's Children's Hospital also looking OK.
But now we have an opportunity to check in to see what the situation is over at Baptist. Christine Rodder (ph) is on the phone with us to let us know how things are looking there.
Good afternoon. I'm sorry, I mispronounced your name. Christine Lauder (ph)?
CHRISTINE KODLER, BAPTIST HEALTH HOSPITAL: Kodler. It's Christine Kodler...
UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: I'm so sorry...
KODLER: ... and I'm here with Baptist Health Hospital.
UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: ... someone with very bad handwriting gave me your name, Christine.
LEMON: All right, you're listening to our affiliate there in Miami, Florida. WSVN, of course, is there reporting the story happening in their town, so it's good to get their coverage on our air to see how it's going down in their town.
You're looking at now -- which I believe is this Turkey Point facility, which is near Homestead, Florida -- believed to be the source of this problem today. We're still not getting confirmed word on exactly what happened, why so many people lost power. We've heard some theories, but then again, we're not exactly sure.
CNN's going to continue to stay on top of this. Hopefully, we can bring you some answers. But the good news, according to the Florida Power & Light Company there, two hours before everything is back up and running.
You're watching CNN, the most trusted name in news.
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NGUYEN: Let's take you back down to South Florida now, where many of the folks there have lost power this afternoon. It happened just after 1:00 Eastern. And you're looking at a live picture from our affiliate WPLG in Miami. This is the Turkey Point nuclear station. It's one of the reactors that went down in this power outage. We don't know exactly what caused the outage, but we understand it was a technical problem.
And a news conference is underway right now. Let's take a listen and then hopefully we can gain some new information.
(JOINED IN PROGRESS)
ALETHA PLAYER, FLORIDA POWER & LIGHT: I assure you that this failure is no way a safety issue for our customers or the residents within each of the jurisdictions. And, in fact, the electrical system performed as it should have in a failure event such as this.
We sincerely hope that this information is helpful in providing you as much information that we have at this (AUDIO GAP) are continuing to do our investigation. But our first effort is to restore the power.
QUESTION: Mrs. Player, can you detail exactly what that significant failure was?
PLAYER: We don't have the details in terms of what caused the equipment failure. What we do know is at the highest peak, about 700,000 customers were without power, at the highest. (AUDIO GAP) no throughout FP&L service territory. Remember, I said that the customers that were impacted were primarily Dade-Broward and some (AUDIO GAP). As of 2:30 today, the number of customers that are without power is at 200,000. (AUDIO GAP) it's at 2:30 so...
QUESTION: At this substation, what part of the equipment failed? What mechanism failed? For people who are not into electrical engineering, can you bring it down and explain what happened?
PLAYER: Well, it's difficult and we don't want to speculate. You know, there is equipment within the substations and at this point in time, I really don't want to speculate.
As soon as we have that information available, we will bring it to you. But, again, (AUDIO GAP). I don't have that information at this point. Again, we have completed the investigation. Turkey Point -- I don't have that information that Turkey Point shut down.
QUESTION: What can you tell us about Turkey Point and its involvement in this power outage?
PLAYER: Well, if, in fact, Turkey Point was involved, that will come out as part of our investigation. That information is not available at this point in time.
QUESTION: Does it...
(CROSSTALK)
QUESTION: Was this situation (INAUDIBLE) that 600,000 people essentially all went out at the same time or did it start small and roll largely?
PLAYER: As I understand it, when the equipment failed and sometime between 1:09 p.m. (AUDIO GAP) after, 700,000 customers did not (INAUDIBLE) at one time. But at its highest peak, we reached 700,000.
QUESTION: So how did it build? How did it -- if it was one substation where it started, how did that mushroom?
PLAYER: Well, as the system shut down because of the safety procedures that (AUDIO GAP) had in place, once the system started to shut down, (AUDIO GAP) to lose customers. Customers began to experience outages. But I can't tell you that it was this number at this time. We don't have those statistics.
QUESTION: What can customers expect in the various places around the geographical area to get back online? Is it the same kind of cascading repair?
PLAYER: Yes. As we bring more (AUDIO GAP) back online. As I said, at 1:09, at the highest peak, we were at 700,000. At (AUDIO GAP), which is, what, two-and-a-half hours later, we had already restored (AUDIO GAP) a million. So as we began to work our circuits in a methodical manner large blocks of customers, you know, will get power.
QUESTION: Was there any warning that something was wrong, previously -- I mean, after this was discovered?
PLAYER: I don't have that information and I don't want to speculate. But, again, our system is designed to protect the system. Anytime these kinds of events occur, the system will trip in order to protect the system. So it worked as designed.
QUESTION: The equipment -- how big is (INAUDIBLE). Is it as large as this room? Is it as big as the microphone?
PLAYER: Yes. Well, as I said earlier, we have not completed our investigation and I don't have that information available. Trust me, when the information -- when the investigation is complete and we (AUDIO GAP) to speculate, we'll have that information available.
QUESTION: Is it a complete (INAUDIBLE) in your mind to let you know that before nightfall the power will be back on?
PLAYER: By 5:30 today if a customer is without power, they need to let us know. All indications that we have is everybody will be back in service by no later than 5:30 today.
NGUYEN: All right, there you've heard it. Aletha Player with Florida Power & Light saying that by 5:30, about an hour-and-a-half from now, that everyone will have power restored, according to Florida Power & Light.
Now we cannot forget that there were other power companies at play here and they will also have to restore electricity to the areas in Southern Florida where they have just been without power for a few hours today. It's a technical glitch. And, as you heard there, we still don't know exactly what caused it.
LEMON: Yes. We might not know.
NGUYEN: Yes.
LEMON: We may not find out, just judging from this. Hopefully we will...
NGUYEN: The investigation is still underway, as they say.
LEMON: Yes. Hopefully, we will find out to keep it from happening again. But the good news is that the system, they said, worked as it should. And -- because it could have been a much bigger problem.
NGUYEN: And no major problems, no major injuries or anything like that associated with it.
You know, the closing bell is about to ring on Wall Street.
LEMON: And Susan Lisovicz is standing by with a final look at this trading day. I only got to talk to you once -- Susan. And it was great.
SUSAN LISOVICZ, CNN CORRESPONDENT: Well, you know, I've got some...
LEMON: And now it's the p.m. --
LISOVICZ: I've got some good news.
LEMON: Oh, good.
(STOCK MARKET REPORT)
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