Return to Transcripts main page
American Morning
Hurricane Earl Brushes Outer Banks; Miami Airport Security Scare; Bracing For Earl; Unemployment Stays Steady for August; Brewer's Awkward Moment of Silence; Earl Brushes Outer Banks
Aired September 03, 2010 - 07:59 ET
THIS IS A RUSH TRANSCRIPT. THIS COPY MAY NOT BE IN ITS FINAL FORM AND MAY BE UPDATED.
ALI VELSHI, CNN ANCHOR: Good morning. It is Friday, September 3rd. I'm Ali Velshi.
KIRAN CHETRY, CNN ANCHOR: I'm Kiran Chetry. We've got a lot to talk about this last hour of AMERICAN MORNING. We're following Hurricane Earl. It's working its way up the East Coast right now. Already bringing near hurricane-force winds to North Carolina's outer banks.
But it's interesting when you -- when you hear from the governor, and we talked to the governor of North Carolina, she feels that the state really dodged a bullet. But where is the storm heading now? And what can we expect next?
Well, we have full team coverage up and down the Atlantic seaboard this morning.
VELSHI: Let's go down, though, to start with the security scare at Miami International Airport.
Concourses were evacuated. The bomb squad was brought in. A passenger was taken into custody. After all that, a suspicious item was found in baggage. We now know that that item -- what that item was.
John Zarrella is joining us live coming up to tell us what it was.
CHETRY: And it's just 30 minutes from now that we're going to hear the new employment numbers out there. We expect the release of the employment report for August.
It is expected to show that at least 100,000 people lost jobs last month. Of course that's certainly the wrong direction as we look a near double-digit unemployment.
VELSHI: Right.
CHETRY: We're going to break down these numbers for you as soon as they're released.
VELSHI: And of course the "AM FIX" blog is up and running. Join the live conversation right now. Just go to CNN.com/amfix. CHETRY: We begin this hour tracking Hurricane Earl, where he's been, the damage left behind, and also what's next as the storm works its way up the East Coast.
VELSHI: Working its way up north-northeast at about 18 miles an hour. Overnight Earl brushed North Carolina's outer banks whipping the coastal islands with near hurricane force winds.
Our team is tracking everything for you this morning. Reynolds Wolf is in the Extreme Weather Center. Brianna Keilar in Ocean City, Maryland, where things are starting to whip up.
Let's first go to Kill Devil Hills, North Carolina. That's where we find Rob Marciano.
Rob, how are things looking there?
ROB MARCIANO, AMS METEOROLOGIST: Getting hairy, again, to use that term, Ali. We are getting now bands of rain. Now that the storm itself is beginning to peel away a little bit from the North Carolina coastline, what we're going to see over the next several hours are raining sideways conditions and gusty conditions in spots. When the rain bands come through, that will pull down the gustier winds, obviously, the rainfall as well.
And we've seen a ton of rain since 10:00, 11:00 last night. That's when things began to deteriorate. And then, 2:00, 3:00, 4:00 in the morning, that's when the storm was at its peak. And then we went on the air, it was raining pretty good and blowing sideways as well.
One thing that hasn't stopped is the ocean. And that continues to batter coastline with tremendous, tremendous surf and huge, huge waves. You see them rolling in there 15, 20 footers easily. Even further out, I see higher ones. We have buoy reports of 37, 38-foot waves. So, this is going to continue to do damage to this coastline on the ocean side.
Now the sound side, the problem with the outer banks is that you got two sides to the land. And on sound side, once we got the winds switch around a little bit, we're going to see a little bit of a storm surge there and we'll see some flooding conditions likely. South of here, Highway 12, on the way to Cape Hatteras, that has cut of south of Oregon inlet because of over-washing conditions from this heavy surf coming on board.
For the most part, power is on -- although, there are spotty power outages across parts of Dare County. But winds, as you mentioned, gusting to hurricane strength in spots. And we had a hurricane gust here, just 70 miles an hour. So, even though those storms didn't make landfall here, certainly feeling the effects of heavy, heavy tropical winds -- guys.
CHETRY: All right.
VELSHI: Rob, thanks very much. And we saw Rob two hours ago, when he was really getting buffeted by that. Just to give you a sense that was 70 miles an hour. You know, those are heavy, heavy winds that can cause damage and send out those power lines, that can flood.
CNN is your hurricane headquarters. We've got a team of correspondents up and down the East Coast to cover every angle this morning.
CHETRY: We'll turn to our Brianna Keilar, who is in Ocean City, Maryland.
At 6:00, a little calm. At 7:00, we saw the wind whipping up. And now, an hour later, we're checking in with you as well. What's it like, Brianna?
BRIANNA KEILAR, CNN CORRESPONDENT: More wind and actually a little less rain than we saw an hour ago. But, guys, I think it's safe to say you better be pulling out the board games if you are in and around Ocean City, Maryland, today. As you can see behind me, some pretty serious surf here and some really serious currents.
Keep in mind, there are no evacuations going on in Ocean City, Maryland. The beach where I'm standing is open. In fact, if you look down the beach, I know it's difficult to see, but there are some people walking on the beach, checking things out.
Of course, you cannot go in the water. Swimmers not allowed inside the water. But the message here from Ocean City officials is Ocean City is open for business. We are expecting winds really to get -- to grow here, get a little stronger here in the coming hours, maybe up to 30 miles per hour. But it's not going to be what you saw there on the outer banks.
And this is a big weekend. This is the last hurrah for the summer vacation season. City officials telling us they are expecting the area to swell from about 100,000 people all the way up to a quarter million.
And I have been talking to some people, Ali and Kiran, who were either making plans to come from the D.C. area out to Ocean City for the weekend or maybe they're already here and they're staying through this long weekend. People who are already here that I spoken with are just, sort of, hanging out for the day and just, you know, hunkering down.
People are still planning on coming once the winds pass in the afternoon. And here's why: tomorrow, about 80 degrees and sunny. It's expected to be a nice beach day.
CHETRY: Eighty degrees and sunny after a day like today in parts of the Atlantic seaboard. But, you know, just hang in there.
VELSHI: It should be clear for people who don't know, if you are -- I mean, look, all of these places that we talk about, Kill Devil Hills, Cape Hatteras,
CHETRY: Waves --
VELSHI: -- waves where you are in Montauk, in Long Island, where Allan Chernoff is, in Cape Cod, these are places that people live, but they are definitely places people go and they go on Labor Day, they go on Labor Day weekend. So, these communities, if they can avoid losing the traffic that was coming there this weekend, if they can get two days out of it or one day out of it, they want to try to get as many people there.
Ocean City, Maryland, it is a big magnet destination for people.
CHETRY: Yes. Ocean City, Maryland, and the surrounding communities. A lot of people actually have the -- I mean, there is a -- great deal hotels people go up there, Brianna. There are a lot of people that are there for the summer. They rent places.
It's an extremely popular place. I mean, you know, I grew up outside the area. We don't get summer jobs. (INAUDIBLE) live in Ocean City.
So, they're going to be OK. But it is interesting just how quickly things are going to be turned around as soon as this storm pulls out.
KEILAR: Yes. And that is certainly what city officials want people to know. There's a huge boardwalk here that really caters to families and it can be a very busy. We were here on the beach yesterday and there were umbrellas really as far as the eye can see. And so, certainly, today is a wash. It's obviously not a good beach day.
But we spoke with a lot of people who said, you know, the weather is nice. We want to get the last weekend in before summer and we're not going to be giving it up. And it looks like because what we're getting is certainly milder than we saw in the outer banks that people will be able to do that.
VELSHI: Brianna, thanks very much. We'll check in with you again.
I'm going to say, I feel sorry for Reynolds. You know why? Because if this thing stays where it is and it weakens and it doesn't end up being damaging, then Rob Marciano, David Mattingly, Brianna Keilar, Allan Chernoff and Susan Candiotti are going to have all expenses paid vacations in the hottest spots on the East Coast for Labor Day weekend. And Reynolds Wolf is still at work.
CHETRY: Right. Reynolds, in fact, the last time you were out in a hurricane, you were getting whipped around like no one's biz (ph).
REYNOLDS WOLF, AMS METEOROLOGIST: Yes, that was -- that would be Hurricane Alex, down in South Padre Island.
But I'm hoping that that plays out. That scenery that you're referring to, it would be great the see this thing pull away from the coast and end up being a better time this weekend for everyone on the Eastern Board. There are millions of people that call the Eastern Seaboard home. Certainly, the last thing they want is damaging storm.
And the way it looks now, it looks it is beginning to weaken, which is certainly good news. But still, it is a category 2 storm at this time. Keep in mind, winds of 105 miles per hour, gusts up to 125.
Now, from Rob's location, he happens to be right on the outer banks and he's got really some of the strongest winds that we have at this time. In fact, some of these winds that we have, again, up to hurricane-force.
But where Brianna happens to be going live near Ocean City, Maryland, conditions not as stock there because she's farther away from the center of circulation. But still, with this kind of a storm, what you are going to be dealing with will be very, very strong winds that will be spinning around the center of circulation. So, even though she may not be getting strongest winds, we're talking about Brianna, along parts of the Eastern Seaboard, but still, there's going to be enough of that wind at the surface, pushing some monstrous waves along much of the Eastern Seaboard.
In fact, I'm going to draw out the border right here along the coast, past the outer banks, down into the Carolinas, you're going to have, again, those rough surf conditions all the way up through Maine as the storm moves north. And that is the direction that we anticipate it's going to continue, that northerly jog, again veering off to the Northeast. It's still a category 2 as we get to the afternoon.
We follow the forecast of the National Hurricane Center through Saturday at 2:00. It's going to be crossing just to the east of Long Island. Heavy surf conditions can be expected in places like, say, Long Island, back over as we get all but closer towards Boston, the storm is expected to come very, very close to Cape Cod and still that possibility -- Cape Cod is still in that cone of uncertainty where the storm could jog a bit more to the east out harm's way or perhaps a little bit more to the west.
And if that happens, that means that this storm could make its way across parts of Cape Cod. And that would be very heavy surf conditions. We are talking category 1 storm with winds in excess, again, of 74 miles an hour. Possibly winds as high as, say, 90 miles per hour. Heavy surf for Martha's Vineyard, places like Newport back over to, say, even Boston.
And then you have that storm actually lifting its way to parts of the Northeast where you can have is kind of surge of that wind spinning counterclockwise, creating heavy surf back into Cape Cod itself. So, you can see the water begin to pile up.
The timetable on this looks favorable, though, as we make our way -- as we fast forward into, say, Sunday afternoon and then into evening into Monday, the storm lifting far to the north and then well north of the U.S. and, of course, Nova Scotia. So, as we get deep near the weekend, conditions will be better for the holiday. But even then, you're going to be dealing with very rough surf conditions. Not just from the storm but also Fiona throughout the holiday weekend.
So, just keep that in mind. Rip currents, a very real possibility and a true danger, especially in spots like Ocean City where -- I believe they pulled back 250 people out of the water just this past weekend. So --
VELSHI: Yes.
CHETRY: Yes. Dealing with 35-foot waves in North Carolina.
And the other thing to keep in mind and to mention is we try to give people perspective. And that's what we're trying to do with this, Reynolds, is that -- you know, we are obviously trying to find the track as exact as we can, you know, so that people know what's going on. But this thing stretches 166,000 mills out. It's bigger than the state of California, square mileage-wise.
(CROSSTALK)
WOLF: Oh, it's a monstrous storm. Absolutely.
CHETRY: Regardless of where it goes, I mean, people are going to feel the effects very far away from this center of the storm.
WOLF: Absolutely. You come back and you take a look at the shot we have, this Google Earth image. There it is for you. Take a look at this.
And not just center of the storm but you check out the outflow. The outflow actually stands just to the east of the Great Lakes. It's a tremendous thing. If you could pick this up and carry it over, it would actually cover the state of Texas.
So, I mean, yes, this is an absolute monster. The only thing it's also really going to be in our saving grace is going to prevent us from making a direct hit on a place like, say, Long Island, is actually what you are seeing out here towards the west.
There is a bit of frontal boundary that's extending down from the Great Lakes. And that is going to be kind of like a plow -- an atmospheric plow that's going to help drive this deeper and farther to the north and to the Atlantic. And once it gets caught up in the jet stream, it's actually going to increase its forward progress, its forward speed, and move up and out and deep near the Atlantic which is certainly can happen soon enough for many of us, no question.
VELSHI: Reynolds, thank you very much for that. We will continue to check in with you. This thing is far from over. Reynolds Wolf.
WOLF: You bet.
CHETRY: When you are away from your TV, CNN.com is also a place you can get the latest on the hurricane, the online hurricane headquarters. Head to CNN.com/weather. Also, if you have pictures, you have videos, you want to upload and sent to us. It's iReport.com. We want to get them on TV.
(MUSIC PLAYING)
VELSHI: Just in to CNN. Take a look these pictures of Fidel Castro. The former Cuban leader is giving a speech right now to students at the University of Havana. He's been raising his profile recently.
You don't see Fidel Castro very often. He left spotlight obviously, he was unwell. He turned his power over to his brother, Raul Castro, in 2006 because of his poor health. Cuba's state-run Web site reports that this speech comes during, quote, "the danger of a new war in the Middle East with unpredictable consequences for the world," end quote. We are watching this and we are tracking it live for you. We find out anything new comes of it, we'll turn it around and report it to you immediately.
CHETRY: A lot of people turning out to hear him.
VELSHI: Yes.
CHETRY: He had been very ill. He had -- actually, he gave an interview and said that he -- at one point, thought, you know, I should just give up and die.
VELSHI: Right.
CHETRY: That he's now better and we'll be seeing more of him.
VELSHI: And from time to time, we would hear reports that he had died. And that's one of the reasons why Fidel Castro would all of a sudden show up or put out a video that he's live. Looks somewhat robust there.
CHETRY: Much better than he did months back.
VELSHI: Yes.
All right. Another story that we are following right now is there has been a bomb scare at the Miami airport. A suspicious item prompted a mass evacuation and a shutdown of almost all of the airport. John Zarrella will have that story for us up next.
CHETRY: And, of course, live coverage of Hurricane Early continues as well. We're going to be checking in with Allan Chernoff. He is on the very, very tip of Long Island, New York. They are expected to get the brunt of this as it moves north and east rather quickly. We're going to have a live report from there as well.
Twelve minutes past the hour.
(COMMERCIAL BREAK)
CHETRY: It's an evolving story now, 16 minutes past the hour. Wondering what was going on yesterday at the Miami airport. A big scare that meant the concourse was all but one evacuated overnight. A bomb squad called in and here's what they discovered.
VELSHI: They detained a passenger after they discovered canisters in the -- or a canister in the baggage claim area. John Zarrella is live in Miami. The airport is open again. Tracking this morning's security watch, John, what details do you have about what this canister was?
ZARRELLA: Yes, no question about it. It was a very big scare at the Miami International Airport. The airport shut down for about eight hours. Fortunately a light air travel time. Last night into the early hours this morning. What happen was about 9:00 -- 9:30, last night, T.S.A. screeners in the customs area found a bag, noticed in that bag a canister that looked apparently according to a source close to the investigation, like a pipe bomb. They immediately evacuated the airport. The bomb squad was called in.
And this device was taken from the airport. Before it was taken from the airport, according to sources close to the investigation, it was determined it was -- there was nothing explosive about it but it has been taken for further testing. The source also tells CNN that the person who was the -- passenger was detained was a 70-year-old scientist.
Now, authorities tell us here that the FBI during a press conference that that man who was detained has fully cooperated and has not been arrested. He is talking with the FBI and with the Metro Dade police -- Miami-Dade police.
So, at this point the all-clear has been given at the airport. They are just waiting now for the final tests to be conducted at the laboratory to determine what, if anything, was in this device. And as the FBI agent here told us earlier today, he said there may not have been a crime committed at all, Ali, Kiran.
CHETRY: Just -- the question is, why are they still holding them? Do we know?
ZARRELLA: Well, he is cooperating and they are questioning him. Technically they are saying they are not holding him. He has not been arrested and was never arrested. And he is telling them, you know, whatever they are asking him at this particular point in time. For all we know, he may, by now have been released. Ali, Kiran.
VELSHI: All right John, thanks very much. Well as soon as you know more about what that was --
CHETRY: Distinction, detained versus arrested. He was detained in the wake of this.
VELSHI: Right, right, I know -- I guess they are trying to get better at knowing when a camera is not a pipe bomb. All right Kiran.
CHETRY: Eighteen minutes past the hour. Some "Breaking News." We are talking about Massachusetts. Under a state of emergency now, officially. Hurricane Earl is threatening to darken the doorstep on Cape Cod. Unleash powerful winds and waves later tonight. The government of Massachusetts says the emergency declaration will pave the way if and when they need quick disaster and financial aid.
VELSHI: Long Island's east end, the eastern tip of Long Island bracing for the impact of Hurricane Earl. If the storm strengthens that area could see hurricane-force winds later today or tonight. CNN's Allan Chernoff joins us live from the very tip of Long Island, Montauk. How is it looking out there?
ALLAN CHERNOFF, CNN SENIOR CORRESPONDENT: Ali, we have been looking at the waves here and earlier this morning they were very, very intense. They eased off over the past half hour or so. I've seen waves probably about two to three feet high. But earlier I could say that they were easily well above six feet, major waves at high tide isn't until about 3:00 in the afternoon.
The storm itself, well, no wind whatsoever right now. The storm forecasters are saying it is still a good 12 hours away. When it does pass, they expect it will pass about 100 miles off of the coast and be a Category 1 at that point. Downgraded somewhat.
Nonetheless, property owners here have been preparing. Some of the hotels around here, some of the property owners, have boarded up their windows. Many have not. They have been telling us that they are not terribly concerned. What we have been seeing along the beach, though, earlier today, some fishermen and the fishing has been quite good. One fisherman told us he caught five striped bass. We saw one of those bass he caught.
Ali, Kiran.
VELSHI: Allan, thanks very much. We will continue to check in with you. Wow, that's --
CHETRY: People are still out there fishing, surf fishing this morning.
VELSHI: Well, look, fishing you can get away from. And if something goes wrong, you can get away. But then, yes, he is committed. Allan, we will check in with you a little bit later on.
We are going to -- obviously covering those areas that are bracing for impact from Hurricane Earl. Even if the hurricane itself doesn't hit you, there are winds that extend hurricane force winds extend -- some 90 miles from the eye and very heavy winds, almost 200 miles from the eye.
Sean O'Brien is in Massachusetts. He is the coordinator of emergency planning, and he is in Barnstable, Massachusetts. Also, we are going to talk to the supervisor in East Hampton, Long Island, next to find out what emergency preparations are under way for people who are there if this gets bad.
(COMMERCIAL BREAK)
CHETRY: Look at the size of that thing. Hurricane Earl, 166,000 square miles. You can take it, as Reynolds said, and cover Texas.
VELSHI: How do you know that?
CHETRY: I read it.
VELSHI: Do we not get that information? Because I didn't get any 166,000 You know what I got? The size of the state of California.
CHETRY: Which is 160,000 square miles, so there you go.
VELSHI: Oh OK.
CHETRY: They did tell you. They want you to do some figuring out. International space station. Isn't that just breathtaking?
VELSHI: Wow. OK, that's a big storm. Lot of people say it has been downgraded. It was a four, a three, now it's a two. It is still a very big storm with very high winds. As the storm moves north- northeast, as we call it, nature (INAUDIBLE) and tourists along Long Island and Cape Cod could find themselves in the path of dangerous hurricane force winds.
CHETRY: Yes, and to see how they are preparing we will check in now with Sean O'Brien. He is in South Yarmouth, Massachusetts. He's been coordinating emergency planning in the area also from Long Island. The supervisor of East Hampton, New York, out there as well, Bill Wilkinson.
Welcome to both of you, thanks for being with us this you -- with us this morning. Sean, let me start with you quickly, because I know that the way that it looks right now, you guys could be bracing for perhaps the worst of it. What plans are in effect right now? What are you telling people out there?
SEAN O'BRIEN, BARNSTABLE COUNTY REGIONAL EMERGENCY PLANNING CMTE.: Right now we are telling people, especially on our outer Cape to expect tropical storm force winds, maybe hurricane force winds and some gusts. Additionally what we have done is we've made sure we have shelters open. We have -- we will be open five of our regional shelters.
VELSHI: Yes go ahead.
O'BRIEN: We are opening up five of our regional shelters in East Hamn (ph), Yahrmith (ph), the town of Sandwich, and the town of Barnstable. And we are just getting ready to open up our multiagency coordination center, too. To try to -- if we need resources, get them down to the Cape.
VELSHI: You haven't had a big problem hurricane for some time. Obviously the folks out there are used to weather. How do you -- in a place -- I'm going to ask the same thing of Bill in a minute. In places like this, Cape Cod or Long Island, where you don't know what is going to happen and what may happen, may happen before nightfall today. How are you asking people to prepare? You have got these shelters open. Are you people planning on coming to them as far as you know?
O'BRIEN: We are not sure yet to be quite honest with you. We wanted to make sure they are opening in case people had to leave. From the sounds of it so far, we are maybe not expecting that much storm surge. So we wanted to make sure that they were open and if there were any power outages. There is a potential we may have some power outages on the outer Cape.
What we are also trying to make sure is the people prepare themselves. We want -- we want to make sure people have proper safety and evacuation plans for their own home. So we have been trying to get the information out to them through Web sites, through public service announcements just to try to make sure that people know there is a storm coming. We have not seen anything like this since Bob. We are use to weather in the winter like this but we really -- it has been a while since we had a hurricane. And to be vigilant and constantly be aware.
CHETRY: You know one of the things that's different then of course, you worry about the foliage, you worry about the trees blowing over and power outages because as you are saying this is at the end of summer. How are you preparing for that? And also, you have such a huge influx of tourists around this time of year. People love to be in the water. It's nice, it's beautiful this time of the year. Are you concerned about the surf as well?
O'BRIEN: We think we will see large surf especially on the outer Cape. And so people definitely need to be very careful and you will probably see -- don't go in the water orders depending upon the community. What will also occur is because we have so much foliage on the tress, we will see power outages. As I said, we haven't had anything like this since Hurricane Bob. But if Hurricane Bob is a barometer which happened in August, we could have some extended periods of time should the winds be strong enough. Where we do not have power.
VELSHI: Let's go to Bill Wilkinson. He is the supervisors of the town of East Hampton, Montauk, where Allan Chernoff is right now. What are you doing to prepare for this, Bill?
WILLIAM WILKINSON, SUPERVISOR, TOWN OF EAST HAMPTON: Welcome to Montauk. And we started to open up the emergency operation center this morning from the town of East Hampton. Montauk being part of the town of East Hampton. About 11:00 o'clock this morning, we will open up an emergency shelter. Just in case people need to get to some safety.
We will also provide an animal facility there for caged pets which is the first time for the town of East Hampton because you know, we respect our pets out here. Especially our Labradors. So between that and the Coast Guard -- not the Coast Guard but the lifeguards closing down the beaches, I just would ask everybody out here that is within ear and eye shot of CNN to respect what's going on out here because the conditions can get pretty treacherous over in next 12 to 24 hours. VELSHI: Bill thanks very much for joining us. We will keep an eye on what you folks are doing out there. Sean O'Brien is the coordinator for Barnstable County regional emergency planning. Thanks to you and good luck to both of you today. We hope that the worst does not come to pass but that you are well prepared. All right we are going to take a quick break. When we come back, the economy, it continues to be number -- issue number one. Jobs are issue number one and we are almost at the new report for unemployment for August. I will bring that to you as soon as we come back.
(COMMERCIAL BREAK)
CHETRY: Welcome back. We are just poring over the jobs numbers. We got the report in for August. It is one of those things you say it is good news but it is not good news. The bottom line is 54,000 jobs were lost that we found out for the prior month.
But we were expecting a lot of government jobs to be lost, more than 100 thousand because of census jobs, the temporary census jobs ending. Bright spot perhaps is that private sector added 67,000 jobs. but again, the net total is 54,000 jobs lost for the month, yet unemployment rate is 9.6 percent.
VELSHI: You may call this a glass one-quarter full, or something like that.
We have some people here to tell us what their thoughts are on this. Leigh Gallagher, senior editor at "Fortune" magazine, Shawn Tully, editor-at-large at "Fortune" magazine.
But before we get to you guys, let me go over to the wall and give our viewers a sense of perspective of the job losses. I want to go back to January of 2008 when the job losses began. It was very small back then, very small losses. See how this went.
This thing developed. By the time January of 2009, we were losing 700,000 jobs, I think that month. We went through the spring of 2009 and like that. Then throughout the end of 2009, you could really see this economy improving. Look at the job losses. They really got better. Before the end of 2009, see the green, we actually gained jobs. Then we slipped down again.
But 2010 shows up and we are on a tear. It is very clear that this economy is getting better until a couple of months ago. We started losing jobs. Then we lost 131,000 last month in June -- in July, and now we have August number where we lost 54,000.
So here's the good news. The good news is we have private sector jobs coming back. The good news is that the trend of losing seems to have broken a little bit. Shawn Tully, I bet you will tell me that glass is not one-quarter full.
SHAWN TULLY, EDITOR-AT-LARGE, "FORTUNE" MAGAZINE: This is actually not such bad news because we are looking at unemployment rates in the U.S. really haven't seen since early 1980s. And in the early 1980s, the comeback was extremely strong and unemployment dropped very, very sharply.
In the U.S. we never had 10 percent unemployment rates for long periods. In late 2008 through 2009, as you just showed with that very helpful chart, companies cut as if we are going into a great depression. They need to hire people back. Unless we move to European unemployment rates, which is extremely unlikely, we are going to see much better numbers going forward.
We began to see them this month because the growth in private jobs more than offset the decline in government jobs because of the census losses. That's things go in big cycles. We are in the up- cycle.
CHETRY: Leigh, just to have you offer perspective when we see those big numbers in green, earlier part of the year a lot of it was because of the stimulus. We added jobs, government jobs, because of the stimulus, many of them temporary in this case.
VELSHI: Census jobs.
CHETRY: Now we are seeing the private sector and as Shawn said this hasn't been the case adding 67,000, almost feeling that there may be a light at the end of the tunnel.
LEIGH GALLAGHER, SENIOR EDITOR, "FORTUNE" MAGAZINE: That's true. That private sector number was estimated to be 41,000. So we are beating expectation which is something we haven't done in a while with the jobs market.
Those earlier months up until May, the economy was going -- not gangbusters, but it was growing pretty heavily, a lot earlier this year. In May everything stalled. Since then we have seen negative disappointment after disappointment in the job market and everywhere.
And this number today, 100,000 was the expected number for total and came in as you said a lot lower than that.
VELSHI: The unemployment rate actually went up from 9.5 percent to 9.6 percent. We were just talking in the break, we were breaking down in some of the industries where we have seen gains. There are real gains in the private sector. We have all acknowledged this.
But this cloud hanging over us, or the elephant in the room, Shawn, are we headed for a double dip recession n we had evidence that perhaps not entirely so.
TULLY: I don't think we will go into a double dip. There's always some probability that could happen, but it is low. We had one in U.S. history, and that was in 1937. Again, these things go in big cycles. When you have the kind of monetary stimulus that we've had, all those zero interest rates, that lowers the bar for businesses. A lot of things to invest in become profitable with when you can borrow that cheaply.
Eventually you will see that pushing the economy forward and growth rates rising from where we are now. So I think the chances of a double dip are very much overestimated. And I do think that growth rates will increase.
The problem we will face a couple years down the road is we have to pay the price for all this monetary growth and we may be in 1970s situation with much higher inflation.
CHETRY: But the other problem still seems to be if you are sitting at home you can look through the numbers. If you still don't have a job, feel like you applied everywhere and cap get a job, we know the health care field is growing. What if you are somebody that works in manufacturing and you are an unskilled laborer and trying to get something in this market.
UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: A lot of the jobs are going away. Auto sector is adjusting from making 17 million cars a year to eight million to 10 million cars a year. The rest of the manufacturing sector, these jobs are going away. This is why the recession hurt men more than the rest of the population.
CHETRY: Are we doing things to retrain and help put --
GALLAGHER: We are trying.
CHETRY: -- where they can get other jobs.
GALLAGHER: We are trying. We are a long way from seeing where those jobs will be. Everyone is talking about health care and technology and education, but we haven't structurally changed the education policies yet to help out.
VELSHI: To that point, by the way, unemployment rate, break it down between men and women, for men, 9.8 percent, higher than national average, and for women, it is 8 percent, because women are in the jobs that are growing, health care and manufacturing, and men are in construction and manufacturing, which have been substantially weaker.
Great to see you both. Thanks very much, Leigh.
TULLY: Great to see you, Ali, thank you.
CHETRY: When the president appears the rose garden at 10:00 this morning, he will be talking about the latest job numbers. CNN will bring you live coverage. You can watch it, even if you are away from your TV, by heading to CNN.com/live or hit your live button on your CNN iPhone app.
VELSHI: And of course I'm going to break all of this down for you, the business news of the week and tell what you need to know about your bottom line, how to capitalize on some of this. That's on "Your Money," 1:00 on Saturdays and 3:00 eastern on Sundays on CNN.
CHETRY: Jan Brewer, she's Arizona's governor, had a terribly awkward moment at the debate that she had with her Democratic challenger. Here is a little snippet of what went on.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
GOV. JAN BREWER, (R) ARIZONA: We have done everything that we could possibly do. We have --
(END VIDEO CLIP)
VELSHI: What's that going to cost her campaign? Let's be clear. She is somewhere around 20 points ahead of her closest opponent. She has been the face of this Arizona law. We are going to talk about the immigration law when we get back.
(COMMERCIAL BREAK)
VELSHI: We are tracking the path of hurricane Earl as it heads up the east coast after taking a swipe at the North Carolina coastline. Wind-driven rain pounded the outer banks often sideways as Earl passed off shore this morning. There's coastal flooding but not the storm surge that many had feared.
North Carolina governor Bev Purdue said her state dodged a bullet. Virginia and Maryland now feeling the effects of Earl. New York's eastern Long Esland and Massachusetts Cape Cod also in its sights.
Earl remains a powerful category two hurricane with sustained winds of 105 miles an hour. Kiran?
CHETRY: Turning to politics now, Arizona governor Jan Brewer calls it the longest 16 seconds of her life. If you haven't seen it, when you do you will understand what she is talking about. It was a televised debate that happened earlier in the woke. The governor delivered her opening statement.
She was suddenly at an uncomfortable loss for words. Here is a look.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
BREWER: I have done so much, and I just cannot believe that we have changed everything since I have become your governor in the last 600 days. Arizona has been brought back from its abyss. We have cut the budget. We have balanced the budget. And we are moving forward.
We have done everything that we could possibly do. We have -- did what was right for Arizona.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
CHETRY: There was a lot more to the story than just the awkward silence there. KNXV reporter Christina Boomer covered the debate and she also pressed the governor later on some of the claims she made about beheadings in the Arizona desert. That was something her opponent called her on during the debate as well.
Christina, thanks so much for being with us. First of all, let me just say, I'm sure anybody who's ever had a fear of public speaking or been in one of those circumstances can sort of feel for the governor regardless of their politics here. But what was going on? I know that you guys were all watching this debate in the press room. What -- what was the room like when you saw that happen?
CHRISTINA BOOMER, ABC15-TV CORRESPONDENT: I have to say as soon as that moment hit, and I tweeted about it -- because I was tweeting the debate live, I literally wrote what happened. A collective gasp, it's almost like as if everyone held their breath for that second.
Because you know, any reporter has had that moment, at least once in their career, where they lose their train of thought. And so there was a lot of empathy for her. You can kind of feel it in the room. Everyone has their laptop set up, you know one of those media rooms. And people are tweeting and writing.
And for that second when she stops and is not speaking, there's no clutter on the keyboards, no one is talking. Everyone is just waiting. Saying and thinking to themselves, say something, say anything. Just start speaking.
So I think at that moment there was just a lot of empathy for her. You felt badly because a lot of us have been in that position. We know what it feels like to be there. But that's a lot of time, as you know, 15, 16 seconds --
CHETRY: Yes.
BOOMER: -- and TV. I mean --
CHETRY: She called it the longest act --
BOOMER: That's an eternity.
CHETRY: Right, well, she called it, quote, "the longest 16 seconds of my life". But how much will this hurt her? I mean, as we said she has been far ahead in the polls. She certainly got a lot of national -- national attention by this controversial state law where, you know, people's immigration status can be questioned and she's taken a lot of heat but also gotten a lot of praise for it by -- by some.
Is this going to hurt her?
BOOMER: That's something we have been trying to explore on our own. I have been speaking to some political analysts. And they're telling me the good news is that it happened early September. It's a long way until November. And, you know, when you cover these -- these contests, you know a lot can happen in this stretch of time.
So they think not only does it give her a nice stretch to hopefully in the eyes of her campaign staffers maybe people forget about it, maybe they just don't even remember -- remember it happened, but it also gives her some time to recover.
So as one political analyst said what she did on a local radio show at KTR yesterday by making light of the situation, by calling it the longest 16 seconds of her life -- that that's the kind of thing she should be doing. Is just laughing it off and moving forward.
CHETRY: Right.
BOOMER: So this political analysts say if she continues to do that and make some strong speeches on the topic she feels comfortable with, like immigration or SB 1070, maybe she can still charge forward.
CHETRY: But that wasn't the only controversial and questionable shaky moment for her during this. What -- just to give people a little bit of background, she's -- her Democratic challenger is the attorney general, Terry Goddard and he pressed her during the debate about what she said be about beheadings in the desert. She said that law enforcement had found bodies that had been beheaded. And during the debate -- after the debate she was hammered by you guys trying to get an answer as to whether or not she was exaggerating or fear mongering.
Let's listen.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: Governor why wouldn't you recant the comment you've made earlier about the beheadings in the desert?
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Seriously, that's a serious question, Governor.
GOV. JAN BREWER (R), ARIZONA: Well, this was an interesting evening tonight.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Governor, please answer the question about the headless bodies? Why won't you recant that?
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Do you still believe that? Come on, Governor.
BREWER: OK, thank you all.
UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: Governor, what do you make --
(END VIDEO CLIP)
CHETRY: And you hear all the collective groans from you guys as well. Did you get an answer? And what is the deal with those comments?
BOOMER: Well, let me give you the update. On that program, when the KTR -- when she did -- she did the interview with them, she did clarify which is the first time we've heard her clarify her statement saying that there are beheadings in Mexico.
On a local level, we have been trying to get the answer to this question for months. So, keep that in mind, for the entire summer, she made the comment saying that there were beheadings in the desert.
I spoke to medical examiners offices at several counties in Arizona including all of the counties along the border. And they are telling me that they have never seen any beheadings in the desert and in fact, Pima County telling me that in the last ten years, 1,700 border deaths and not a single beheading. So, there was some speculation, right? The medical examiner's offices are telling me maybe it's a matter of semantics.
They do find in the desert bodies where the head is detached from the body. Now they say some times that can be because animals in the area will use those carcasses as a food source. So they -- you know eat away at the tissue connecting the head to the body. So, it's what they called disarticulated but not beheaded.
Other people start saying well maybe she's talking about the beheadings happening in Mexico. But the point was, is that we never heard from her herself. What did she mean? What was she talking about?
So during the debate, when Terry Goddard literally squares his shoulders to her and says to her and gives her a challenge, and offers her really the opportunity at that moment, will you recant this statement? I think it was the moment in the debate.
And when she doesn't answer the question, when it comes up again and she's still not addressing it, a question that's been lingering in our community for so many months, as soon as she walked out of the studios, that's the first question I had on my mind.
CHETRY: And you asked it and she didn't give you an answer. And there you go. And now, of course, all of this is playing on the national stage as well. We'll see how it affects the polling. As we've said, she's still very far ahead of her challenger.
Christine Boomer, a reporter with KNXV in Arizona, great job. Thanks for joining us.
BOOMER: Thank you for having me.
CHETRY: Ali.
VELSHI: What a story, Kiran.
All right, Hurricane Earl, that is the big story today. It stayed offshore of North Carolina's Outer Banks. Boy that was good luck. But that huge storm is still slamming that state with winds and rains. And it is -- it is headed north. Virginia, Maryland, New York, Connecticut, Massachusetts, we'll see what it's doing right after this break.
(COMMERCIAL BREAK)
CHETRY: Well, there you see the waves. This is Kill Devil Hills, North Carolina. Actually looks a lot better than it did when we checked this with Rob earlier. As we know hurricane Earl passing through. They are still looking at rain, wind, and more rain later today going up to a high of 91.
VELSHI: And you're so into this thing. You're even out of breath talking about it.
CHETRY: Yes it's just -- it just takes your breath away.
VELSHI: It's been a -- it's been a busy morning with us. Reynolds Wolf is at the CNN Hurricane Headquarters. You know what, Reynolds, we can thankfully be -- just a little light about this because it has not -- it's not hit anything yet. But there's just some bad winds all over the place.
REYNOLDS WOLF, AMS METEOROLOGIST: Absolutely. This is very different from what we happen to see a lot of times in the Gulf Coast. And when you have one of these storms that forms in the Gulf and it makes landfall, basically what you have -- you have this that's almost like a head-on collision. And you have a direct punch, so to speak, when you have one of these storms that makes its way onshore say in -- if it were to make its way in to say, I don't know, Texas coastline and perhaps even into a spot like Louisiana.
But in this situation, it really has been a glancing blow along parts of the Eastern Seaboard. Right now the storm still relatively strong; it's a Category 2 storm with winds of 105-miles-per-hour. But take a look at the last couple of frames. We see some of the reds. Some of the more enhanced areas of the satellite imagery just begin to kind of fade out just a little bit.
We've got some dry air that's intruding in the western half of the storm so it is really beginning to weaken because it's encountering cooler water and also strong upper-level winds which we refer to as shear.
The storm is expected to still though continue its march to the north eventually shifting more northeast. It's doing it at the rate of about 18-miles-per-hour. But it's a front that develops out towards the west.
As the storm interacts with the jet stream, it is expected to increase its speed northward. And as we get to later this afternoon, just off the Maryland coast, off the Jersey shore line, by, say, later this afternoon, into the evening hours. And then by Boston at 2:00 a.m., Saturday morning, possibly going very close to Cape Cod and then going back up in towards the Bay of Fundy into the weekend.
That is a quick wrap on your forecast for the storm. We're going to keep a sharp eye on Earl -- back to you.
VELSHI: All right. Reynolds thanks very much. We will -- you're going to be working hard today. We're going to keep on following all of this.
Let's check in with Rob Marciano. He is in that shot we showed you at Kill Devil Hills. That's it right there. There's Rob. He has had a busy several hours. What is the situation where you are now? Those waves look pretty good.
ROB MARCIANO, AMS METEOROLOGIST: Yes, they do but they look a lot better or smaller now than they did just 15, 20 minutes ago. That's a stage of the storm that we are in now that it's the pulling away somewhat. We're just going to get the back half of the bands. And any time you get a band in some squally weather it's going to bring down the higher winds that are at the upper levels of the storm.
For a while there we were off the air. It was nasty, nasty, nasty coming down sideways and blowing. Right now, I mean, we even started to see a few breaks in the clouds. That's light up the surf -- that's amazing, amazing ocean right there. The surf is going to continue to pound this coastline right on through the rest of today.
And it has done some damage. South of here, Highway 12 has been overwashed. No word of a breach or a cut much like Hurricane Isabel did back in 2003. We certainly hope that's not the case.
But as we go through time, some overwash of highway 12 or some water on the roadway, I should say, Highway 12 just north of here. Sporadic power outages; much more so down across the islands of Ocracoke and Cape Hatteras where there has been reports of one and two feet of actual standing water in Hatteras Island. But that will be coming to an end relatively soon.
Hurricane Earl scraping the coastline of North Carolina; another few hours it looks like of dicey weather. And then well, probably bringing us some sunshine before the day is done -- guys.
VELSHI: All right Rob. Good work out there. Thanks very much. We will continue to check on this with you. Rob Marciano in Kill Devil Hills, North Carolina -- Kiran.
CHETRY: Yes, we are going to take a quick break. We will be right back. It's 57 minutes past the hour.
(COMMERCIAL BREAK)
VELSHI: All right.
CHETRY: Still seeing it, it is huge. Hurricane Earl, 166,000 square miles. But at least hearing it from the governor of North Carolina, they dodged a bullet.
VELSHI: Dodged a bullet, yes.
So now we still have to see what happens to Long Island. We have to see what happens to Ocean City and Cape Cod. Unfortunately it is going to be an economic thing for a lot of people. It's going to hurt a lot of businesses that stood to make a lot of money this weekend, the last summer --
CHETRY: Yes, the last hurrah, Labor Day weekend.
VELSHI: Speaking of last hurrah.
CHETRY: This is it for us as well.
VELSHI: And for me. It is so sad. This has been so much fun.
CHETRY: You are welcome to come up any time.
VELSHI: Oh, stop.
CHETRY: Just a quick hop on a plane and you are here.
VELSHI: All right. Thank you. I like working with you.
CHETRY: And it was nice working with you as well.
Of course, the news continues. So don't go anywhere. We have our T.J. Holmes -- the very talented T.J. Holmes --
VELSHI: Oh, wow. Oh, wow.
CHETRY: -- who's going to be taking over for us now.
I got that in because I can hear you today.
T.J. HOLMES, CNN GUEST ANCHOR, "CNN NEWSROOM": Oh, that's great. That's an improvement over yesterday. Apparently the audio people were -- took off on their vacation a little early.
But Ali, I'm looking forward to having you back, buddy, down here in Atlanta. Kiran, you enjoy your weekend. Talk to you guys soon. All right.
VELSHI: Thanks, T.J. Have a good one.
HOLMES: All right.
