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American Morning
Thousands Still Stranded After Weekend Blizzard; Passenger Bill of Rights?; Any Given Tuesday; Snow and Anger Piling Up, Politicians Seeing Red; Hard Hits, Dangerous Games
Aired December 29, 2010 - 07:00 ET
THIS IS A RUSH TRANSCRIPT. THIS COPY MAY NOT BE IN ITS FINAL FORM AND MAY BE UPDATED.
JOE JOHNS, CNN GUEST ANCHOR: Good morning. It's Wednesday, December 29th. I'm Joe Johns.
KIRAN CHETRY, CNN ANCHOR: Good to have you with us this morning, Joe.
JOHNS: Really glad to be here, in fact.
CHETRY: I'm Kiran Chetry. We have a lot to talk about this morning.
If you're in New York, you're wondering why the heck 48 hours after the storm, these streets still look like this. Thousands of passengers are also stranded this morning after the weekend's powerful East Coast blizzard. A lot of them have been forced to sit on tarmacs for hours, especially coming off long, overseas flights.
The fallout causing a ripple effect across the country, it's triggered delays and cancellations at airports from San Francisco to Atlanta to North Carolina and Philly. We're live at New York's JFK Airport where they've been having a lot of problems.
JOHNS: So, whatever happened to the passenger's bill of rights you want to know, if you're on an international flight, you're probably out of luck. But is there anything in it for the people who spent the past few nights sleeping on a luggage carousel? We'll talk about keeping the airlines in line ahead.
CHETRY: Also, on the East Coast, the snow is piling up and so is the anger at politicians in charge. New Jersey residents seeing red after Governor Chris Christie left town for a family vacation and so did the lieutenant governor. While across the Hudson in New York, Mayor Mike Bloomberg is getting flak for city streets still buried in snow. We're taking a look at the politics of the storm.
JOHNS: 10,000 and counting, that's how many flights have been canceled. Do you believe that? Since Sunday. The blizzard of 2010 stranding thousands of holiday travelers. Many of them forced to spend hours sitting on the tarmac or standing in terminals desperately trying to find a way home this morning.
CHETRY: It's been a nightmare for a lot of passengers. Some of them stuck on the tarmac at JFK for up to 11 hours, and that is after a long overseas flight. Some travelers say they've spent close to 20 hours on planes before they were finally allowed off. We talked to one dad who went through it with his kids, and we're also hearing from a passengers right advocate who said that what happens is inexcusable.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
MAX ASCUI, STRANDED ON JFK TARMAC FOR 11 HOURS: We were told we'd have to wait for an hour. Then the hour passed, and the pilot came on saying, sorry, looks like might be another two hours. Two hours would pass, and then, he's saying, you know what, bad news, I'm sorry to keep giving you bad news, this time it looks like it might be six hours to eight hours. Yes, it ended up being full 11 hours.
KATE HANNI, EXEC. DIR., FLYERSRIGHTS.ORG: Terminal 4 at JFK has 14 passenger mover buses. They have 14 sets of portable stairs, and anywhere an emergency vehicle can go. Those buses can go, and they could have de-planed them. The problem is the Port Authority did not appear to be motivated to make that happen.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
CHETRY: A lot of passengers in tears as the hours dragged on, stranded with little or no food or water.
JOHNS: New Yorkers are a tough breed, but 2010 has pushed them to the brinks. Streets are still choked with snow, and some people can't get to work.
CHETRY: Mary Snow is live on the streets of Manhattan this morning to talk about this. Out of the boroughs Manhattan seems to have got the most attention. Some of the people are certainly upset in some of the outer boroughs. They are saying why are all the Manhattan streets drivable and walkable, and here we are stuck in what looks like an avalanche.
MARY SNOW, CNN CORRESPONDENT: Absolutely, Kiran. And you see behind me the streets are clear here in Manhattan, but as you said, people outside of Manhattan saying look, we were left out in the cold and they're furious and they're very angry with city officials starting with Mayor Michael Bloomberg.
(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)
SNOW: In the boroughs outside Manhattan, streets are still blanketed with snow, leaving New Yorkers like Lance Owen on edge.
LANCE OWEN, BROOKLYN RESIDENT: Years and years and years I've lived here and never have I seen it like this.
SNOW: Emergency crews like this fire truck in Manhattan face challenging conditions. Hundreds of buses were still stuck and stranded by Tuesday morning. And there was this videotape of cars damaged by a plow.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Oh, my god.
SNOW: The department of sanitation says the incident is now under investigation. City Councilwoman Latisha James, a democrat of Brooklyn and chairwoman of the Sanitation Committee has scheduled the hearing into what happened. She gives the city's response a failing grade, starting with Mayor Michael Bloomberg.
LETITIA JAMES, NYC COUNCILWOMAN: New Yorkers are angry, New Yorkers are angry there's a disconnect between those in the outer boroughs and the mayor of the city and his administration. And to me it's another reflection of a mayor who is basically out of touch.
SNOW: Asked about the response of angry New Yorkers, the mayor says he's angry too, adding the city is doing the best it can.
MAYOR MICHAEL BLOOMBERG, : We won't get to everybody every time. We will make mistakes. But we have to continue plugging ahead. Yelling about it and complaining doesn't help.
SNOW: But Bloomberg wasn't the only politician under fire. In neighboring New Jersey, Governor Chris Christy, a rising star in the Republican Party, gained attention for the fact that he's on vacation while a state was hit with the blizzard, and his lieutenant governor was vacationing, as well, leaving the state in the hands of the state Senate president.
UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: They're both gone. Shouldn't they be taking care of the state?
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: It's hard for me to talk bad about the governor because he's one of the greatest governors we've ever had, but I'm sure he's been in communication and the state's getting cleaned up.
SNOW: The governor's office answered criticism, saying the response to the storm has been the same as it would be in other circumstances, adding, "We are a northeastern state and we get plenty of snow, including heavy hits like this, and we'll get through this just as we always have."
(END VIDEOTAPE)
SNOW: Now, there's one other politician gaining a lot of attention for a different reason, and that's the mayor of Newark, New Jersey Corey Booker, because he's been responding to Twitter messages from people who need plows. And as we've been seeing in some cases he's been out himself digging out people in the snow.
CHETRY: Yes, he has. And I bet you a lot of politicians this morning are saying why didn't I think of that?
(LAUGHTER)
SNOW: Very sharp contrast.
CHETRY: Yes, it sure is. Mary Snow, thank you.
JOHNS: Mary, I know you've been getting a lot of people playing with your name, but it's just so much fun in this weather -- Mary Snow.
Thousands of passengers still stranded after this weekend's powerful east coast blizzard and many of them forced to sit on tarmacs for hours after long overseas flights. CHETRY: Our Susan Candiotti is joining us from JFK this morning and trying to get some more answers. We know this happened, you know, the day after the storm, but now two days out, why are these planes still being left to sit on the tarmac at JFK?
CANDIOTTI: Boy, wouldn't we all like to know? Wouldn't you hate to be a passenger on one of those planes, and a crew member, as well. Good morning, we're still trying to get to the bottom of why this is apparently still going on.
According to various websites for a number of airlines as well as listening to traffic from air traffic controllers, it would appear that a number of airlines overnight after landing at JFK airport, in fact, have been stranded for several hours. Six hours, seven hours, in the case of a Korean airlines flight, nine hours before being able to pull up to the gate.
In some cases, we believe, some of the planes have not yet pulled up to the gate. We know that at least three of them have been able to. But the question, again, gets -- boils down to this. Why is this still going on?
We know that agreements were made a couple of years ago to try to prevent this from happening to domestic airlines. But it would appear overnight that these planes are landing at JFK with no gate to pull up to. So the question becomes, is JFK airport, is the Port Authority of New York and other entities that are involved here trying to work out something?
As you recall what we were hearing yesterday in part because we were hearing a number of different stories as finger pointing was going on was that the airlines are to blame because they're not supposed to take off before they know that a gate will be available for them.
Well, evidently that has happened yet again as we've been telling you about all morning long. So we're trying to -- we have a producer who is inside at baggage claim right now. We're not allowed to be indoors here at JFK airport, so that's why I'm reporting to you from outside. So we're trying to find some passengers who may have deplaned by now so we can try to get some more answers for you. Back to you Kiran and Joe.
JOHNS: Susan Candiotti, that is just an incredible notion of sitting on a plane for hours and hours with nowhere to go.
CHETRY: Yes, especially, you heard Kate Hanni, the passenger advocate saying that they have these portable stairs and buses where even if there's not necessarily a gate to go to, in an emergency they can get passengers off a plane.
JOHNS: There's got to be a better way.
CHETRY: We're going to continue to follow that this morning. We do, by the way, have calls into the Port Authority as we do all yesterday and they have yet to get back to us in terms of doing an interview and explaining this. (WEATHER BREAK)
JOHNS: A terrifying ride for skiers. Several ski lift riders plummet 30 feet to the ground after a chair lift fails at a ski resort in Maine.
CHETRY: One of our employees was there describing what it was like.
Also ahead -- any given Tuesday -- the Eagles and Vikings playing the first Tuesday night NFL game since 1946 last night. Up next, we'll be joined by former NFL running back and friend of the show Jamal Anderson, the game breakdown.
(COMMERCIAL BREAK)
CHETRY: It's 12 minutes past the hour right now. Safety officials in Maine are trying to figure out what caused a chair lift to derail at a Sugar Lift Mountain ski resort sending five chairs crashing about 30 feet to the ground yesterday. Eight people, three of them children, were taken to a hospital.
JOHNS: And another 150 people were stranded on the lift, some for as long as two hours dealing with 25-mile-an-hour wind gusts. Earlier on "AMERICAN MORNING" we heard from one of those stranded skiers, CNN employee Robb Atkinson.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
ROBB ATKINSON, STRANDED ON CHAIRLIFT: When the derailment happened, all of a sudden there was that gust of wind and it was a bump. We felt a little bump, a strange bump you don't feel on chair lifts.
And we looked up and we saw the five chair lifts fall to the ground in a big puff of white powder snow came up. And people then started screaming in horror that, you know, they couldn't believe what they saw. And of course, we were worried that we were five chairs behind the tower. Everything after the tower collapsed. So we weren't sure if our section was going to hold or not.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
CHETRY: They say that chair lift was 35 years old, but it passed a recent maintenance inspection. Sugar Lift officials say it was scheduled for upgrades or a possible replacement. And 22 inches of fresh snow fell on Monday, fresh powder, and rescuers say that actually cushioned the blow and saved the skiers from getting seriously hurt. We hear this morning they are all out of the hospital.
JOHNS: Which is great news.
Time to play Wednesday morning quarterback. I haven't ever said that before. Some major headlines coming from the first Tuesday night NFL game in over 60 years. Eagles quarterback Mike Vick went down on the first play grabbing his leg, but he stayed in the game even though he struggled. CHETRY: The Vikings ended up upsetting the eagles 24-14. He was also named the Pro bowl starter for the NFC topping off a sensational comeback year. Joining us now is former NFL star Jamal Anderson who led the Falcons to a Super bowl appearance. Good to see you this morning.
JAMAL ANDERSON, CNN SPORTS CONTRIBUTOR: Good morning.
CHETRY: So Jamal, this is interesting, because a lot of people were really excited about this game. It was a Tuesday night game for the first time because of the snow, everybody was watching. What was your take on what went down?
ANDERSON: Oh, Kiran, you know you were excited. You're an Eagles fan.
CHETRY: By marriage, unfortunately, yes.
(LAUGHTER)
ANDERSON: Well, the reality is, the Philadelphia Eagles are supposed to take care of this game. Brett Favre was deactivated in this game and you expected the eagles to come in and handle business. It was a Tuesday night game. The game got moved from Sunday night. Another national TV appearance for Michael Vick and the Eagles, a chance to actually have a bye in the first round of the playoffs if they go in and do what they're supposed to do.
Six sacks, a fumble, an interception, Adrian Peterson, 120 yards, Joe Webb, the rookie starting for Brett Favre from the University of Alabama Birmingham almost 200 yards passing. He also ran one in for a touchdown, kind of giving the Eagles a dose of their own medicine with a running quarterback.
It was a tough game for the Eagles, it was a tough game all night. The Vikings were physically ready and defensively they played great.
JOHNS: So, Jamal, one thing that seems true, though, is that the narrative on this NFL season is already written. And my question for you is, number one: is Mike Vick's comeback one of the greatest comebacks in sports? And two, do you think America has really forgiven him for his transgressions?
ANDERSON: Well, you know, me and Don Lemon talked about this a little bit yesterday. I think there are people in America -- let me answer number one -- this has been a fantastic comeback for Michael Vick. Obviously, you talk about what he did, federal penitentiary, being imprisoned for 18 months, you know, a lot of teams didn't necessarily want to sign him. When the Philadelphia Eagles did sign him, it was a controversial move. There were a lot of people who are angry about it. Michael Vick wasn't even a starter coming into this year, Joe.
JOHNS: I know, he's my -- I picked him up as a Facebook quarterback.
CHETRY: He's on his fantasy team, OK
ANDERSON: Yes. You know, and he's probably done very well for you nearly 700 yards rushing.
JOHNS: Oh, man. Yes, top of the league.
ANDERSON: He's never had 3,000 yards passing in the season. He missed games this year. The consistency and the stability and the coaching staff and how he has prepared as a player on-field and off- field and how he's handled everything this year has really been exceptional. I mean, you watch what he's doing on the football field with the exception of last night, obviously.
But it's been a great season for the Philadelphia Eagles and Michael Vick. Again, he was hurt for a couple of games, but he's still 3,000 yards passing, he's never done that. Nearly 700 yards rushing, 21 TDs, over 100 passer rating, seven or eight rushing touchdowns, as well. Excuse me, nine rushing touchdowns. So he's accounted for 30 touchdowns. It's been really a remarkable turnaround.
CHETRY: You know, this is interesting, though, because there are -- there's still a large segment of the U.S. that is not willing to forgive him. That said, you knows, deliberately killing animals and all of that is -- we all have amnesia because he's a fantastic football player.
ANDERSON: Well, more than that, Kiran, I think -- here's the reality. The guy went to federal penitentiary. He went in early. He did everything he was supposed to do.
He's continued to work with the Humane Society. He's continued to speak out against and about dog fighting and kids. On Tuesdays on his day off, he's done everything that was asked of him.
There are going to be people who are never going to be happy with Michael Vick because they love dogs and what he was convicted of and the crimes, they were heinous and reprehensible. There are going to be people who, regardless of what he does, how fantastic he plays on a football field, as he goes to the Super Bowl and wins, they're not going to like this guy, regardless.
But it has been a tremendous turn around and he's done everything he was supposed to do. Now, we just don't want him to get six sacks like he did last night. That was tough.
CHETRY: Yes, and so, he was hurt, right, and kept playing. Why did they keep him in? They wanted to keep him in because of -- what, field advantage?
ANDERSON: Yes, well, the reality is -- the Eagles win that game last night, Kiran. They get a bye for the first week of the playoffs. They get to rest their guys and come back and host the game. They don't get that bye anymore. They go -- they have to go to next week's game and go straight in and play right away.
So, that would have been huge --
CHETRY: Right. ANDERSON: -- particularly with the hits that Michael Vick has been taking the past couple of weeks and then the six sacks last night. That was tough.
JOHNS: Well, thanks so much for coming in and talking to us this morning. And I'm sure we'll be checking back in with you.
ANDERSON: Always a pleasure.
JOHNS: Regardless of what happens with Mike Vick.
ANDERSON: Exactly. And, hey, listen, bring up the Falcons, man.
JOHNS: Yes, I know. But, you know, I wonder, though, whether if in Atlanta, people really have a problem with Mike Vick much more so than say some other cities.
(CROSSTALK)
ANDERSON: I'll tell you right now, John -- Joe, excuse me. Everybody's talking about the fact that the Eagles are in the playoffs, the possibility that Michael Vick could end up playing the Falcons in Atlanta. The Falcons handle business next week against the Carolina Panthers. They're the number one seed home field advantage throughout the playoffs.
If Michael Vick happens to come here to Atlanta for a playoff game, it is going to be huge. A huge story.
CHETRY: It will.
ANDERSON: I mean, it is going to rock the house. It's going to be very polarizing. There are going to be people in the stands who will root for Michael Vick in Atlanta. Trust me. It happened before.
CHETRY: All right.
JOHNS: Right across from the CNN Center.
ANDERSON: Exactly. And, Joe, look, you're friends with the --
(CROSSTALK)
CHETRY: I'm going to the game with you two.
JOHNS: I'm looking for you.
ANDERSON: Let's go. The whole AMERICAN MORNING crew, we will be on the sidelines.
CHETRY: Absolutely. Good to see you this morning.
ANDERSON: A pleasure. Thank you, guys.
CHETRY: Well, she's been dubbed America's sweetheart, as we know. Guess which Hollywood A-lister is now getting ready to walk down the aisle again.
JOHNS: Plus, another dark turn for "Spider-Man." One of the leading actresses is now leaving the troubled musical. Why is she out? "Morning Talkers" coming up next.
(COMMERCIAL BREAK)
JOHNS: All right. Sorry.
CHETRY: You should be doing this.
JOHNS: I know. Yes, exactly. That's coming up in a second.
"Morning Talker" now. President Obama back on the links. He played golf with some friends at the Mid-Pacific Country Club during his vacation in Hawaii. Oh, missed it. I've been trying to see what his swing looks like.
He was overheard telling a friend his putting was on fire on the ninth green. As for the president, reports his swing is better than it was last year.
CHETRY: But how is Ed Henry's swing? You know, he is also in Hawaii. He's covering the president's vacation and he decided when in Rome, you know the rest. He decided to take a hula lesson and his hips don't lie. Take a look.
JOHNS: Oh, my God. That's really sad.
All right. Let's go, Ed.
(VIDEO CLIP)
JOHNS: Yes, I don't know. All right.
CHETRY: That looked more like tai chi.
JOHNS: Right. Yes. He gets a B-minus.
He doesn't know what to do with that one.
CHETRY: Poor Ed. Maybe he doesn't feel he has sassy eyes. Maybe he doesn't know what to do with that one.
JOHNS: Yes, I don't know. And the shirt doesn't help.
CHETRY: Oh, I like the shirt. He's looked --
JOHNS: Yes. OK. I'm not -- I'm not going to make fun of him because, you know, he can talk on TV, too.
CHETRY: Yes, he has nice form. Oh, that's not him.
(LAUGHTER)
JOHNS: No way. He didn't just change. All right. More problems for the biggest Broadway production of all time. Natalie Mendoza, the lead actress in "Spider-Man: Turn Off the Dark" is leaving the show before it even officially started. She suffered a concussion during the musical's first preview performance last month. She hasn't been back to the show since "Spider-Man" stunt double Christopher Tierney fell 30 feet off a platform and suffered a broken vertebrae last week.
CHETRY: So, lots of troubles for that show.
JOHNS: I know.
CHETRY: Well, from legally blond to legally wed, "People" magazine says that actress Reese Witherspoon got engaged to Hollywood agent Jim Toth. Witherspoon has two children from a previous marriage to actor Ryan Philippe. So, congratulations.
JOHNS: That's awesome.
Still ahead: hundreds of travelers stranded in cramped planes stuck on the tarmac for hours. Why aren't they allowed to deplane? What happened to the Travelers' Bill of Rights? We're getting answers this morning.
(COMMERCIAL BREAK)
CHETRY: Twenty-seven minutes past the hour right now. We've been talking this morning about the nightmare for people that came in on an international flight, and then get stuck for hours -- in some cases, 11 hours on the tarmac. And a lot of people are wondering, what happen to the Bill of Rights?
JOHNS: And it's unbelievable.
Alison Kosik is here to try to give us some answers.
ALISON KOSIK, CNN CORRESPONDENT: Hi.
JOHNS: That's the big question. And there was a Bill of Rights. But it doesn't apply to international travelers or what?
KOSIK: Exactly. And there is a Bill of Rights. It still exists, but it doesn't exist for those international passengers. And, you know, it makes you think, gone were the days of sitting on the tarmac for hours and hours, stuck on that plane.
CHETRY: Right.
KOSIK: It can still happen, especially if you're an international passenger.
And this all came out of that Passenger Bill of Rights that came out last April. And what this does is it fines an airline $27,000 per passenger for allowing a plane to go ahead and sit on the tarmac for more than three hours. So, obviously, it gets expensive. And this incentivizes the airline to not go ahead and do that. Also, the airline has to provide food and water after two hours of being delayed. It also has to give bathrooms. They have to be made available.
But, once again, these rules just don't apply to these international flights. The rules only apply to domestic flights. The Department of Transportation says that when they went ahead and came up with these rules, they thought that because international flights operate with less frequency than domestic flights, there's less of a chance of disruption. So, the DOT does says that they proposed extending the Passenger Bill of Rights to international flights back in June.
That part of it is currently being reviewed. They anticipate being able to extend the Bill of Rights to international flights this spring. But this doesn't help everybody today.
So, you know, what can be done now? Not much if you're stranded on that plane for hours and hours, and that's really the reality of it. You know, U.S. carriers also flying internationally are required to have self-imposed limits on how long a plane can sit on a tarmac.
And while the Department of Transportation has no say in how long these self-imposed limits can be, the airlines are required to make them public on their Web site, let's say. So, if a carrier violates their self-imposed rules, the DOT can go ahead and take action against them and fine them. But that really is up for discussion.
And the DOT says, you know, they're looking into these recent incidents that have happened over the past few days to see if any violations occurred. But, you know, bottom line here, until the Passenger Bill of Rights is extended to these international flights, there really is no recourse. You know, just going to have to -- I hate to say it, suck it up and take it, you know?
(CROSSTALK)
CHETRY: I mean, it's a PR nightmare for the airlines and for the airports. I mean, the last thing they want is, you know, for these people to be calling in with these stories of overflowing bathrooms and babies screaming and being stuck for 11 hours. People already so skittish to fly because -- you think they'd want to do everything in their power not to have people stuck like this.
KOSIK: You have to remember the PR nightmare sure out lasts for the next maybe month or two, but people have short-term memories. You know, these airlines sure -- they'll probably do all they can -- maybe -- but that PR nightmare will kind of fade away after a little while and people will get back on their flights. They still need to go where they need to go, right?
JOHNS: What's so bizarre about it is the plane in our instance here in New York is sitting on the ground in the United States so you would think that American law would apply, but no.
KOSIK: It doesn't because it's an international carrier and well, hopefully by the spring, a passenger bill of rights will be extended to these international flights and there will be recourse. We'll see if it's the three-hour limit. It could be more.
CHETRY: Hopefully by the spring, the snow will have melted in JFK.
KOSIK: We can only hope.
JOHNS: It is now 30 minutes after the hour. Time for this morning's top stories.
Video just in this morning from Brooklyn, New York. Three days after the blizzard of 2010, streets remain unplowed and thousands remain stranded unable to get to work or get home. The mayor of New York taking a beating telling everyone to quit complaining.
CHETRY: Meantime, in Southern California, they're still digging out after last week's flooding. Five homes were destroyed, 75 damaged in San Bernardino County Community of Highland. Total damage expected to be more than $17 million and the worst part may not be over. The National Weather Service is expecting more rain. They're forecasting it for the area this morning.
JOHNS: And signs of a double-dip slump to end the year. The latest housing report shows home prices fell by 1.3 percent in October, six cities hit their lowest levels in four years.
CHETRY: You know, there are a lot of people unhappy this morning in Brooklyn, 2-1/2 million New Yorkers live in the borough that's not far from Manhattan, but it's a very different story. A lot of them are still looking for the snow plows.
JOHNS: Thousands are still stranded, unable to dig their cars out of snow drifts. Meteorologist Chris Knowles is live in Brooklyn this morning. Chris, are they making any headway at all where you are?
CHRIS KNOWLES: Barely, Joe. Let me show you the headway they are making. Earlier just a few minutes ago, a compact car, the driver dug himself out, just enough to get his car through. Believe it or not, he made it, scraped a little paint.
Now, as we walk through the street here. This is what the side street looked like. Take a look, there's the only bear street, I think you're going to find around here and that was not dug out by the city, that was dug out by the driver so desperate to get to work this morning.
As we make our way down the street, most of the streets look like this, there are just mounds and mounds of hard snow. Now when this snow fell, it fell in powder form, 2 feet of it. But now, look at this, this is going to be as hard as ice with the refreezing taking place.
The afternoon high temperatures will be into the 30s. The problem is the morning lows in the 20s. So we're refreezing this entire glacier it looks like right in Brooklyn, an affluent section of the city's largest borough. Some call it the fourth largest city if it was a city on its own in the United States.
And this is what they're dealing with. A mountain of ice that is not going anywhere fast. The cost of this storm is going to be tremendous. When you think about it, we're looking at aerial video, I understand. If you figure on the city's usual amount of $1 million plus an inch times that by 24 and this unique clean-up where now the snow is frozen.
So your normal plows are not going to get through the streets now. We're talking about bulldozers, front-end loaders, heavy construction equipment to get this city back on its feet. And by the way, the street we're standing, unfortunately, no stranger to natural disasters.
In July, this street was hit by a tornado, tearing down trees and doing significant damage to the homes. I can't say they're used to this, but another unfortunately story here in Brooklyn.
CHETRY: Did they wish Cory Booker was their mayor. He's on the streets of the Newark try to help dig people out himself.
JOHNS: That looked like Alaska, some of those aerial pictures. That's unbelievable. Chris, thanks so much.
CHETRY: Well, in Alaska, speaking of, the Senate race is finally over. Brooklyn, you're right, does this not look like a city.
JOHNS: It's Brooklyn.
CHETRY: Well, federal judges now dismissed the lawsuit that was challenging Republican senator Lisa Murkowski's write-in victory. Murkowski as we know launched this after losing the Republican candidate in the primary, Joe Miller. Miller claimed a lot of those write-in ballots can't stand because Murkowski's name was spelled wrong. Well, her election will now be certified tomorrow.
JOHNS: Congressman Charlie Rangel says he started raising funds for a trust to pay his legal expenses. Rangel who formerly censured by the House this month for rules violations is saddled with legal fees. The New York Democrat says a House committee has authorized his fund- raising plan.
CHETRY: And here's for the next governor of Kansas. He now has a beer that bears his name. Brown Back Wheat, in honor of Governor- elect Sam Brownback. It'll be served at the inaugural ball next month.
JOHNS: I didn't even know he drank, but look, that Sam Brownback drinking a beer. Unbelievable.
CHETRY: Brownback got to taste the brew and he called it excellent.
JOHNS: All right.
Fallout from the snowfall falls in the northeast facing a storm of anger over the response to this week's blizzard. Is all the heat deserved or should everyone just cool out and be patient? Can't get any cooler coming up next.
(COMMERCIAL BREAK)
CHETRY: Live aerials over Brooklyn this morning, Brooklyn, New York. As we take a look at some of these pictures and you can tell literally there has been no plows on a lot of those side streets since this blizzard hit Sunday night.
JOHNS: It looks like there haven't been any reindeer, either.
CHETRY: No, nothing.
Well, politicians are certainly feeling the heat after the blizzard in the northeast. Both New Jersey Governor Chris Christy and his lieutenant governor under fire because they left on family vacations right before the storm hit.
JOHNS: And angry New Yorkers have Mayor Mike Bloomberg on the hot seat demanding to know why so many of their streets are still buried under mounts of snow. CNN contributor John Avlon joins us to discuss the politics of the storm.
JOHN AVLON, CNN CONTRIBUTOR: Good morning.
JOHNS: Good morning. I guess we all know that city mayors are judged, at least in the east and north by how well they get rid of the snow. There's nothing more important.
AVLON: Absolutely. This is basic and the ghost of John Lindsay hovers over all mayors. In February 1969, John Lindsay, took him a week to get Queens plowed out and he lost his party's nomination as a result.
In more recent history mayors in Denver and even Washington Adrian Fenty and Chicago have been deeply affected by the failure to plow city streets. So here we are 48 hours out still a lot of angry people. And the question is, why this mayor who has been very effective in clearing major snowfalls in the past, this time there have been some stumbles.
CHETRY: Yes, and he held a press conference, and he's not one to mince words, New York Mayor Michael Bloomberg. He'll say it like it is and he seemed a little bit defiant earlier in the week saying this happens.
I mean, this is snow. You had 2 to 3 inches falling an hour. This is what we can expect. Seemed to change his tune yesterday at the press conference saying, OK, there were some mistakes made. But why -- are we looking at a city like Brooklyn that has 2-1/2 million people and they don't have their main arteries cleared. Why is that?
AVLON: Well, what folks will tell you is that a big part of the problem with people driving during the snowstorm and then abandoning their vehicles. At one point over 100 buses were abandoned and that was really clogging the efforts to clear the snow. CHETRY: In all, they say 1,000 city buses ended up being unable to drive. They said they didn't put chains on the buses before letting them out of the depot.
AVLON: That's right and so do you have this problem. Abandoned vehicles, buses, it's getting cleared out. I think it's a reasonable expectation by the end of today that all the streets should be cleared.
But you do have this potential problem of double freezing. Bottom line is folks are angry. They've grown accustomed to expecting a city that works even in the snow and that's the real question here.
You know, Mike Bloomberg's been to this rodeo before. New York City hasn't had a real problem since '69. We've had major snowfalls, this will get cleared out, but folks are angry because they've come to expect better service and Mayor Cory Booker in Newark is setting a great example. He's on it and that's something that's inspiring a lot of confidence.
JOHNS: Right, so that's the question. Crisis response here for a politician in this situation. What are some dos and don'ts that you can see? You know, what is it that Mayor Bloomberg should be doing more of?
CHETRY: There's Cory Booker, by the way, shoveling. Obviously this makes for great pictures. Newark's a smaller city than New York --
AVLON: It is, but still a major American city, but look politics is perception. And the mayor needs to be on the front lines, that's why folks hire him to be on the job. That's why Chris Christie and his lieutenant governor both being on vacation at the same time is so politically difficult for them.
At the end of the day, won't make a major difference two or three years down the line, but you don't go on vacation when a major snowstorm's coming. You're on the job. You're on the frontline. You're telling folks not only do I feel your pain, but I'm solving the problem.
CHETRY: And how much does it hurt that you have so many calling out Michael Bloomberg saying he's out of touch. He doesn't get it. I mean, how about when people in your own party sort of start to turn on you in some of these other areas. Is that hard to recover from?
AVLON: It is a problem. Mike Bloomberg is in his third term and third term mayors of New York City traditionally have a tough time. But some folks are trying to make political hay for their own reasons.
They're saying the snowfall becomes a metaphor for a mayor that's Manhattan centric. Same accusations that were lobbied to John Lindsay back in 1969. I think people are trying to make political hay out of this snowfall ultimately missed the mark. It's about getting the job done. They have a responsibility to make their constituents anger heard and felt. That's good political representation. JOHNS: And as you said people don't forget -- Adrian Fenty, for example. I remember in Washington, D.C. years and years ago, Marion Barry was at the Super Bowl during a blizzard and people never forgave him for that. It doesn't leave your legacy.
AVLON: No, it doesn't and Marion Barry has lots of problems.
JOHNS: Yes, he does.
AVLON: That's right, but don't go to the Super Bowl.
CHETRY: During a snowstorm.
AVLON: That's right. There's no sleeping on the job. Your job is you're manning the ship and you don't leave town when a crisis is there. You need to make sure your presence is felt and folks know you're on the job 100 percent of the time.
CHETRY: Well, the pictures don't lie. When you take a look at those Brooklyn streets, somebody dropped the ball. John Avlon, great to see you as always.
Well, Jacqui Jeras is coming up. She's going to have this morning's travel forecast for us right after the break. She's taking a look at some rain moving through the south. It's 43 minutes past the hour.
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JOHNS: There we go, 45 minutes after the hour, 33 degrees right now. Columbus Circle, New York City; lots of snow out there. We have a long way to go.
CHETRY: Yes, until they can get it out. I saw some of them loading up that snow into these big trucks and taking it away, hauling it away.
JOHNS: I wonder where they take it. Dump it in the river? Couldn't be good.
CHETRY: Oh, yes. They're nodding. They do dump it in the river?
JOHNS: Yes. There you go. All right.
CHETRY: (INAUDIBLE) clean.
(LAUGHTER)
CHETRY: Forty-six minutes after the hour. Let's get a check of this morning's weather headlines.
(WEATHER REPORT)
JOHNS: Coming up, we're going to have a story about a guy who suffered countless hits and was determined to play through them all. But now Super Bowl champion Kurt Warner is hoping today's players get smarter about concussions. An AM original, "Hard Hits, Dangerous Games," coming up.
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CHETRY: Well, for the next three days we are tackling a topic you probably heard us talk a lot about on AMERICAN MORNING, what many are calling a "concussion crisis" in football. And today, we kick off a three-part series we're calling, "Hard Hits, Dangerous Games."
JOHNS: Now, if you've ever seen one game you know that a big part of football is hitting and hitting hard. As a consequence, there are more than 100 diagnosed concussions each season in the NFL. It's a statistic that got our chief medical correspondent Dr. Sanjay Gupta investigating.
(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)
DR. SANJAY GUPTA, CNN CHIEF MEDICAL CORRESPONDENT (voice-over): It's a chilling moment in football.
ANNOUNCER: And Kurt Warner is hurt. Warner is down.
GUPTA: A player is hit and does not get up.
ANNOUNCER: Kurt Warner, he's on his back.
GUPTA: January 16th, 2010. Former NFL quarterback Kurt Warner was that player.
ANNOUNCER: And the trainers race out from the Cardinals --
GUPTA: He got up and later he returned to the game.
(on camera): Do you feel like now in retrospect, you ever stayed in the game or were sort of pushed to stay in the game when you shouldn't have?
KURT WARNER, FORMER NFL QUARTERBACK: Yes. There's no question that's happened. A lot of guys when they get those hits or concussions they think, OK, I'm going to play through it here for the short term and it's going to get better.
ANNOUNCER: He was just lifted up and deposited.
GUPTA (voice-over): Playing through it is part of football, says Warner. A big part.
WARNER: Probably 100 percent of the guys that played my sport in the NFL have been there. I think for a long time, it was felt like, well, if you didn't get up dizzy or with no memory, then you really didn't suffer a concussion.
GUPTA (on camera): What does a concussion feel like?
WARNER: It's like a mental fogginess where you almost seem like you're separated from a situation. You're in it, but you're kind of looking at it from the outside looking in.
GUPTA (voice-over): According to the NFL, there are more than 100 documented concussions every season. After a big hit, doctors on the sidelines test players for signs of concussion. Memory problems, confusion, dizziness. But there's no definitive answer to the most important question: who should continue playing and who should come out of the game?
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: How many of you have by show of hands had a concussion?
GUPTA: Kevin (INAUDIBLE), formerly a Pittsburgh Steelers' trainer studies concussion's impact on the brain in high school players.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: This is showing moderate levels of atrophy --
GUPTA: -- and retired NFL athletes. In his study, players who've had three or more concussions get MRIs.
UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: I'm going to say three words.
GUPTA: And memory tests.
UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: Apple, penny, table. Now you say those.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Apple, penny, table.
UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: Good. What were those three words I asked you to remember earlier.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: I don't remember. Penny.
That's all I remember.
UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: OK.
GUPTA: Memory problems are not the only thing they're finding.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: The brain has shrunk.
GUPTA: Concussions may be shrinking memory and learning centers in the brain, thwarting its ability to transmit signals.
(on camera): Did you retire because of concussion?
WARNER: No, not because of concussions. But there's no question, you know, as I contemplated the big picture and, you know, thought about life after football, do I want to put myself at risk for another concussion or for a worse concussion?
GUPTA (voice-over): Many players, of course, decide to play through it.
ANNOUNCER: Oh, dropped. Great defense play by --
GUPTA (on camera): Now, we asked the NFL about Kurt Warner's statement about players staying in the game even if they're hurt.
They responded by saying this, quote, "If anything, we're going in the other direction where people sit out until they're totally symptom free. There are so many protocols now, if a guy gets pulled out of a game, he cannot go back until he's cleared by the team doctor."
(voice-over): Dr. Sanjay Gupta, CNN, Phoenix.
(END VIDEOTAPE)
JOHNS: I've had a concussion. I was just talking. It's so interesting to hear the guy talk --
CHETRY: Describe it?
JOHNS: Right. About the mental fogginess and the sort of disconnectedness. I remember someone had to convince me that I had a concussion. But, I was sort of, almost felt like I was outside of myself, looking in.
CHETRY: Scary. And the pressure to keep playing, you know, and just taking that whole decision out of the hands and just saying, no, if we think it, you're sitting down and making that just a league policy.
JOHNS: Right, right. But, you've got to do something because it's very dangerous.
CHETRY: It is.
JOHNS: In the long run.
All right. Take a look at this. Somehow, this poor German Shepherd managed to squeeze his head through a hole in the wall. Look at that.
CHETRY: He's OK. Don't worry.
JOHNS: Yes, I know. He whimpered and cried until the owner's friend saw and called the police. Officers tucked his ears back, pushed from one side, then pulled from the other and there he is -- there we go -- happy pooch again. You just wonder, why on earth he would put his head in there. He must have been chasing food, that's what I think.
CHETRY: Yes, yes. Or, he was just interested to see what was going on, on the other side of the wall. Found out it's not so interesting after all.
JOHNS: So sad.
CHETRY: Well, he's all better. I heard his name's Rebel, by the way.
All right. We're going to take a quick break. Your top stories coming up in just a couple of minutes, including the latest on these tarmac delays., people trapped for 11 hours on the plane at JFK. We're looking for answers about why.
(COMMERCIAL BREAK)
