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New Day

Britain's Royal Baby Born; Plane Crash Lands at LaGuardia Airport; George Zimmerman Saves Family from Overturned SUV

Aired July 23, 2013 - 07:00   ET

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

(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Great. Fabulous news. Everyone here is so happy.

KATE BOLDUAN, CNN ANCHOR: This morning, waiting for the prince. We are live in London as the entire world waits to see the royal arrival. It could happen any moment.

CHRIS CUOMO, CNN ANCHOR: The moment of impact. New video of a hard landing at a New York airport sparks flying. What happened to the front landing gear? Do authorities know?

MICHAELA PEREIRA, CNN ANCHOR: George Zimmerman the hero? New details on a bizarre twist in a Zimmerman saga. He rescued a family from a car crash after his acquittal. We talk to his lawyer.

CUOMO: Your NEW DAY starts right now.

ANNOUNCER: What you need to know.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: There's no really perfect solution. A freak accident like this could still happen.

ANNOUNCER: What you just have to see.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Holy (EXPLETIVE DELETED).

ANNOUNCER: This is NEW DAY with Chris Cuomo, Kate Bolduan, and Michaela Pereira.

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CUOMO: Welcome back to NEW DAY everybody. It is Tuesday, July 23, 7:00 in the east. I'm Chris Cuomo. And as you can see Kate Bolduan is not with me. She's across the pond in London at its best today, which means it's raining. How are you doing there, Kate?

BOLDUAN: I had to get away from you. And where do you come? You come to London. And what happens when you're in London? It rains. Good morning, guys. I'm live right in front of Buckingham Palace, the place to be today. This entire country celebrating the birth of Prince William's and Catherine's new son, his royal highness, the prince of Cambridge. He already has a very big name for such a little boy. The new family at a special first night together at St. Mary's hospital, as we've been told by our good friend Katie Nicholl.

Get this, they ordered take-off pizza for dinner. That sounds pretty normal to me. This morning we're hoping to get a glimpse of the newest royal at any moment. Chris?

CUOMO: Kate, back here, news anchor Michaela Pereira and I are following several stories for you, including this massive manhunt for hundreds who escaped from Iraq's Abu Ghraib prison. Dozens of guards were killed by insurgents in this bloody attack late last night. We have that. It's a developing situation. We'll give you all the details.

MICHAELA PEREIRA, CNN ANCHOR: And the Texas giant rollercoaster shut down. Officials at six flags over Texas trying to determine just how that woman was thrown to her death while riding the park's signature rollercoaster last week. The family wants questions answered, to be sure.

CUOMO: I'm sure it's going to be happening soon, and not soon enough for them. Kate, back to you in London.

BOLDUAN: Thanks, guys. First up this hour, the entire world waiting anxiously for the first public appearance of England's future king. Duchess Catherine and her unnamed eight pound, six ounce prince are both doing well this morning. The palace tells us they are expected to leave St. Mary's hospital sometime, any time. It could be today. We're watching it closely.

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BOLDUAN: London's landmarks lighting up the night sky in red, white, and blue in honor of Prince William and Kate's first baby, many celebrating into the night.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Her royal highness, the duchess of Cambridge, was safely delivered of a son.

BOLDUAN: After more than 10 hours of labor at St. Mary's hospital, Kate delivered the third in line to the British throne. Prince William spent the night at his wife and baby's side. For days the media camped outside the very hospital where Princess Diana gave birth to William and Harry some three decades before.

The yet to be named prince of Cambridge was born at 4:24 p.m. local time, weighing in at eight ponds, six ounces. Crowds following the car that drove the formal birth announcement to Buckingham Palace to see it placed on a gilded easel, a tradition since the 18th century.

UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: There we have the queen's press secretary. She has just placed the birth announcement on the gilded easel.

BOLDUAN: Breaking with tradition, the palace released a detailed statement before the formal bulletin, revealing the royals have been informed and are delighted with the news. Prince William issued a brief statement, saying "We could not be happier." Prince Charles adding "Grandparenthood is a unique moment in anyone's life as countless kind people have told me in recent months. So I am enormously proud and happy to be a grandfather for the first time."

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BOLDUAN: So what happens next for the new prince? That's where Max Foster comes in, live outside St. Mary's hospital here in London. What's the latest, Max, other than I'm sure you are a little wet now after that downpour?

MAX FOSTER, CNN INTERNATIONAL CORRESPONDENT: Yes, it was quite something, want it? The world didn't share in the little moment but I can tell you that it's not totally imminent. It might be today but not before 6:00 p.m. our time. So we've got another six hours to wait at least and it could possibly be tomorrow morning. That's what a royal source is saying. No updates on names.

A Kensington palace spokesman has been given an update on their condition. Mother, son, and father are all doing well this morning. And a quote from the duke and duchess as well, "We'd like to thank the staff for the Lindo wing and the whole hospital for the tremendous care the three of us have received. We know it has been a very busy period for the hospital and we would like to thank everyone for this understanding at this time." They don't like bringing this whole kerfuffle everywhere they go. They're thanking the hospital for that.

So the update really, Kate, is everything is going well and they'll leave this evening for tomorrow morning, not in the next six hours.

BOLDUAN: We'll be watching and waiting, but it's good to hear that all is still going well this morning. Max, we'll be back with you in just a little while.

Let's talk more about all of this and what's next for this new family with CNN royal commentator Katie Nicholl as well as CNN royal historian Kate Williams. I'm deeming this the Kate segment.

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BOLDUAN: Kate, first things first, we are waiting and hoping and expecting to see the new family sometime soon, but then the queen needs to see the third in line at some point as well. So what traditionally will happen?

KATE WILLIAMS, CNN ROYAL HISTORIAN: The queen is number one of course. Yesterday the queen was the first to be told. William called and said, granny, it's a boy, it's eight-pound, six. And today the queen will see her grandchild. She's not going to go to the hospital. What's going to happen is they will come home. They'll be taken to their cottage in Kensington palace, and then from there bring the baby in a car to Buckingham Palace, perhaps now not until maybe Thursday morning possibly. That's when the queen will meet her grand grandchild, the future king, we don't know his name yet, the future king of the United Kingdom of the commonwealth.

BOLDUAN: And quite a moment that will be for everyone. WILLIAMS: They're not sure what kind of bowing he's going to do at this point.

BOLDUAN: He still needs to work on the stability of his head at this point. I think the queens will allow a little deference.

So, Katie, there's another family involved in all of this.

KATIE NICHOLL, CNN ROYAL CORRESPONDENT: Yes, the Middletons.

BOLDUAN: Where are they?

NICHOLL: I'm quite surprised that we haven't actually seen them yet.

BOLDUAN: She is so close with her family.

NICHOLL: Very much so. Do you remember there were reports that Carole might even have been in the delivery room. And Pippa, who is usually very high profile, we haven't seen her. So given Max's recent update, one wonders if there might be a visit from the Middletons. Kate is quite right, the queen won't go to the hospital unless someone is terribly ill. She'd rather receive guests and visitors here at the palace.

WILLIAMS: And also Prince Harry as well. That's the thing about the Middletons, because after William's maternity leave has elapsed, he's going back to Wales and it looks like Kate will go back to her parents' house in Bucklebury. Kensington palace, it's a little too small and it's not ready.

BOLDUAN: Unusual, continuing to kind of do it their own way and breaking from royal tradition, the Middletons, Carole Middleton is going to play do you think a significant role in the early days --

NICHOLL: Yes, she's the grandmother. She's always been part of a couple's life. Can I tell when you William and Kate were dithering about getting married, Carole wanted to know what was going on, and William did give Carole his word that they would get married and also that they would be involved in the family.

BOLDUAN: We're listening to the drums, the changing of the guard continues as they're marching off. It's wonderful to see. What's next? We're waiting for queen to meet her great-grandson. What's next after that for the family?

WILLIAMS: The queen will then go on holiday to Balmoral. She said last week, she hoped the baby would hurry up because she wants to go on holiday. William and Kate are going to go back to Kensington with the baby to enjoy William's paternity leave. After that he's going back to Anglesey back to work, end of the fun time with the baby.

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BOLDUAN: And we'll be waiting to see the few moments we'll get to see, pictures maybe. We'll see. Kate, Katie, we'll be back for another Kate segment shortly. Much more from here coming up, including a look at what it's like to grow up royal. First, back to you, Chris.

CUOMO: All right, looking forward to that. Back here, Kate, this morning, investigators are trying to figure out what caused the landing gear on a packed southwest passenger plane to fail during a terrifies landing at New York's LaGuardia airport. You can see sparks and really a fireball breaks out as a plane skids down the runway in this video on attend by CNN. Let's go to our Poppy Harlow live at LaGuardia. Good morning, Poppy.

POPPY HARLOW, CNN CORRESPONDENT: Good morning, Chris. Update for you and any travelers, runway four where that incident happened just reopened as of 6:59 A.M. Again, that runway open, LaGuardia now fully functional, still a lot of delays ahead. But it was a shocking and scary landing for the passengers of Southwest flight 345 coming here from Nashville last night after they had that landing, this coming just weeks after that Asiana flight 214 crash landing in San Francisco.

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HARLOW: You can see sparks flying as Southwest Airlines flight 345 out of Nashville lands hard on its nose.

THOMAS BOSCO, GENERAL MANAGER, LAGUARDIA AIRPORT: The nose wheel specifically collapsed. The aircraft skidded down the runway on its nose and then veered off and came to rest in a grass area.

HARLOW: And 150 people aboard evacuated on emergency slides.

ROLANDO OCHO, PASSENGER: I thought it was just a terrible job by the pilot, but I didn't realize what happened until I left the plane.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: It was like getting smashed in a car wreck.

UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: Very chaotic, no one knew what was going on, flight attendants crying.

HARLOW: These photos obtained exclusive by CNN show the scene inside the airport lounge where passengers waited hours for luggage from the stranded plane. According to the FAA, the plane came safely to a stop at the edge of the runway. No injuries were immediately reported to air traffic control. The FAA is investigating.

The scare comes on the heels of the crash landing of Asiana flight 214 that left three dead at San Francisco International Airport earlier this month. Now images of that plane's interior show charred seats, a scary reminder of what can happen. The incident at LaGuardia closed the airport to incoming flights for just over an hour but caused a ripple of flight delays the rest of the night.

Southwest said in a statement it's cooperating with local authorities and the NTSB has been notified.

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HARLOW: And, Chris, we do know that the NTSB is on the ground here. The plane has been taken from that runway. It's been taken to a hangar at LaGuardia airport so they can investigate, try to find out what may have caused this. I spoke last night, Chris, with a woman who was at the hospital after getting off the plane. She was there for smoke inhalation. And she told me overall it was pretty orderly get off the plane. She said they were not on the plane for more than ten minutes before they evacuated on those slides. But she did tell me sitting in the third row when she landed, the front door popped open. She said I could definitely see outside.

Just imagine being in there a few weeks after that Asiana crash, which was deadly for some, and seeing this happen, very scary. We're lucky there were no more injuries.

CUOMO: That's very true, Poppy. We keep calling it a hard landing, but really is just seems like a crash. So let's see if we can figure out what the investigators will see when they take a look at the plane. Let's bring in Mary Schiavo. She's a former inspector general of the department of transportation, an aviation attorney for the law firm Motley Rice. Very good to have you again.

So let's take a look at this, OK. This video is not great but it's going to come through here. Here's the plane. As it comes through, we're going to see this fire ball. You see the smoke. This is the landing gear. When you see that grainy video, what does it tell you?

MARY SCHIAVO, AVIATION ATTORNEY, MOTLEY RICE LAW FIRM: It tells me a couple of things. It tells me that the pilots probably did not know their landing gear had a problem. There are warning lights in the cockpit if your gear is not down and locked. I was out at the airport, there was a very busy time, traffic, planes everywhere. So they probably didn't know to expect this collapse or any problem with the landing gear. It's clear the gear completely collapsed, it wasn't just a situation where the wheels were turned sideways.

CUOMO: They don't seem to be making any adjustments for the landing gear, which leads you to believe they weren't getting any warning lights. Did they do the right thing once they hit that? Is there a protocol in place like, oh, I've lost my front landing gear, here is how I now stop the plane?

SCHIAVO: Yes. They were proceeding as only they could once they lose that front landing gear. If they know they're going to have a problem like the one that I was on they come in very, very slowly, try to burn off all the fuel they possibly can, let it settle. Here they just had to get it stopped.

CUOMO: What can fail?

SCHIAVO: A lot of things can fail. There are various switches that alert the plane, whether they've landed. And then sometimes you can actually have a metal failure. There were a number of planes a few years back that had failure of the struts. You can also have failure of the locking gear that holds it into place. Since the whole thing collapsed up I think the NTSB will be looking for actual failure of the gear itself.

CUOMO: Could it just be the tires. We heard earlier on there was a flat. Would that be enough to collapse the entire gear?

SCHIAVO: Probably not. If it was just the tire and a flat what you often see is this part literally just gets ground down and you have fire down here. But there you can see from the angle of the plane that it had collapsed. It was riding on the nose and engines.

CUOMO: We've been saying sparks but they weren't sparks. That was a flame plume that came out of that. I mean that was real fire they had there for second, and you heard there was smoke filling up the cabin. Now, so they wind up being pitched down and yet they exit out the back. Why?

SCHIAVO: Because the smoke and flames were coming from the front. They didn't want to have people coming out here. Although they did deploy the slide on the other side. But they didn't want people anywhere near the fire, and that's what you do. You have to assess where the fire and damage and debris are and get the passengers out the other end.

CUOMO: And the amount of time they were on there, the way the crew worked, you believe that that was according to standard procedure?

SCHIAVO: Well, ten minutes is a long time. You know federal aviation regulations say you got to get everybody off the plane. You have to be able to get them off the plane in 90 seconds. The pilot assessed the situation obviously before ordering an evacuation. But as you see the fire was out, so it was the sparks and the burning landing gear and nothing else. They got them off.

CUOMO: All right, and of course there's also the issue with Southwest Airlines of utilization of the planes. The 737s get used a lot. So we'll have to figure out how that plays in. All right, Mary Schiavo, thank you very much. Appreciate the insight as always.

A lot of other news to tell you about. We're going to get to Michaela with that. Michaela, I believe you're starting off with what is going on in Syria and the U.S. disposition there?

PERIERA: Yes we are, Chris. The Obama administration ready to move forward with plans to arm rebel sources in Syria. Congressional leaders who feared weapons could wind up in the hands of extremists say those concerns have been eased by the White House. Rebel supporters are hoping U.S. arms deliveries begin to arrive in August.

Bail set at $6 million for Michael Madison, the east Cleveland, Ohio man suspected in the murders of three women. Madison, a registered sex offender, did not enter a plea at Monday's hearing. He could face life in prison if convicted of kidnapping and murder charges. East Cleveland police fear there may be more victims.

A Boston police sergeant may find out today the repercussions for leaking gritty pictures of accused Boston bomber Dzhokhar Tsarnaev. Sergeant John (ph) Murphy said he said he did it in response to this August "Rolling Stone" cover. Which he believed glamorized Tsarnaev. A panel of three officers will decide if Murphy will face suspension or could remain on duty as an investigation continues. Close to 57,000 people have shown their support for Sergeant Murphy on a Facabook page set up in his honot.

Hundreds of thousands of Catholics in Rio De Janeiro celebrating the pope's visit, and the official start of World Youth Day. When Pope Francis arrived Monday, tens of thousands lined the streets to welcome him. He was quickly surrounded by a huge crowd when the driver took a wrong turn. Brazil's military police say they discovered and destroyed a small explosive device. It was near a sanctuary Pope Francis was scheduled to visit later this week.

All right, talk about getting a little too close for comfort. Some scuba divers off the coast of central California. Wow! That it a little too much for me. When two humpback whales surfaced right next to them. These whales can weight up to 80,000 pounds each. Were coming to the surface to grab some fish. You can see them swarming on the surface there. For dinner. These divers are really lucky they didn't end up being dessert. They wouldn't have meant it. They just would have got caught up --

CUOMO: Whatever!

PERIERA: -- in the gaping mouths.

CUOMO: We bleep out what the guy says, which is

(CROSSTALK)

PERIERA: You would be Jonah in that situation, in the belly of the great fish.

CUOMO: No good.

PERIERA: No good. Honey, let me tell you what happened when I was on the water today.

CUOMO: Never again. I would never do it again. That's why they're better than I am. Let's go to Indra Petersons in the weather center.

INDRA PETERSONS, AMS METEOROLOGIST: We're talking about definitely rain. More rain. Everything that's coming out of the gulf. We're talking about a lot of moisture. Some monsoonal thunderstorms still in the forecast, plus the threat of severe weather. Today is right along the cold front. So, pretty much anywhere from Kansas all the way over to Kentucky.

And for the rest of us, we're just talking about that southerly moisture. Again, still streaming out of the Gulf. With that the typical threat of thunderstorms, especially in the afternoon when you get that daytime heating, 1 to 2 inches from the northeast all the way to the southeast. The biggest concern of course will be the threat of flooding. Any time you get rain just kind of training for a long period of time we have the threat of flood watches. And today it looks like that is actually in the northeast. So, we'll be watching out for that here.

PERIERA: Not only did forget umbrella but rain boots.

CUOMO: I have both for you.

(CROSSTALK)

CUOMO: You assume I don't have nice boots.

PERIERA: No, gigantic is what I'm saying.

(CROSSTALK)

CUOMO: Coming up on NEW DAY, just days after his acquittal I the Trayvon Martin case, police say George Zimmerman was a hero, helping rescue a family after their vehicle overturned into Florida. We'll tell you the story.

PERIERA: And of course we're going to go back to London. Much more from London as we await out first glimpse of the royals' newest member. Could it happen today, or will we have to wait tomorrow?

CUOMO: Have your friend Kate bring you some boots. Won't happen in time, though.

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CUOMO: Welcome back to NEW DAY, everybody. Just four days after being acquitted of murder, police say George Zimmerman played the hero, helping a family of four escape their overturned SUV. This good deed comes as many Americans are calling for federal charges against Zimmerman. CNN's Victor Blackwell is live in Sanford, Florida. A bizarre twist in this saga, Victor.

VICTOR BLACKWELL, CNN CORRESPONDENT: It is indeed. After his acquittal two Saturdays ago, George Zimmerman slipped back into hiding. No one knew where he was or if he was still in Florida. Wednesday he was not only in Florida but in Sanford. Deputies say this time he was in the right place and definitely at the right time.

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UNIDENTIFIED MALE: I just witnessed an accident on the offramp, coming off the 417 getting on to i-4 over in Sanford.

BLACKWELL: 5:45 Wednesday evening, a blue SUV is driving on to the highway but the driver loses control and rolls into this field.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: It looks like an explorer. There are people at the car now. The vehicle is on its side.

BLACKWELL: There's class, a mirror, a floormat, still here on the scene.

By the time first responders arrived, the parents and their two children were outside of the SUV safely because two people stopped to help them. One of them was George Zimmerman. And all this happened less than a mile from where he shot Trayvon Martin.

Monday night in Sanford the story of Zimmerman the rescuer was met with skepticism at an NAACP town hall meeting.

PASTOR LOWMAN OLIVER: That's one of the most ludicrous, silliest stuff I've ever seen in my life, to do anything to validate a murderer is wrong.

BLACKWELL: Organizers announced plans to put a repeal of stand your ground on the ballot in 2014.

UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: If we lose what Trayvon has brought us together to do , we would lose out. We cannot wait until February for a legislators and our governor to possibly veto this. We need to do this ourselves.

BLACKWELL: After days of protests and rallies across the country calling for federal civil rights charges against Zimmerman, the Sanford Police Department has now handed its evidence and files over to the Department of Justice. As for Zimmerman, this was a brief moment in the public spotlight. Presumably he's now back in hiding.

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BLACKWELL: Good news after that rollover crash. Mom, dad, two kids, the entire family is safe. No injuries as a result. One other note from last night's meeting. After the acquittal, George Zimmerman gets his gun back once the FBI is done with it as part of their investigation. But there's a initiative here in Florida to get the state to revoke his concealed carry permit. They do not want him to have that gun back. There's an online petition with more than 21,000 signatures. Chris.

CUOMO: Thank you for the update on the family in that crash. Important to note that. Last night while guest hosting "PIERS MORGAN LIVE," I had the opportunity to talk to Mark O'Mara, George Zimmerman's attorney. I asked him about the 911 call, and his client and this is what he had to say.

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MARK O'MARA, DEFENSE ATTORNEY: This is quintessential George. This is the person I knew him to be when I found out about his past before February 12. Just a guy who always involved in the community, always lend a helping hand. And here we go, four days after the event, something that I could not have planned but turned out to be just pure George.

CUOMO: Is it true that you saw George soon after this incident and he did not mention it to you? Is that true?

O'MARA: Yes, he came by but did not mention it at all.

CUOMO: Do you believe he is safe in Sanford?

O'MARA: He was sort of surprised at the blowback from the verdict.

CUOMO: I'm not trying to be provocative, I mean you've said and we've heard through the family there have been meaningful threats against his safety, yes?

O'MARA: Yes, there have been. Actually there was an increase in them since the verdict came back.

CUOMO: What is your take on the outrage that's there, specifically, not outrage but reaction, President Obama and his comments? What have you thought about all those?

O'MARA: If you look at just a sound bite, I think it was inappropriate to suggest that 35 years ago Trayvon could have been him or whatever. But if you look at the complete context of what the president said, I think what he was acknowledging was that we still do have some issues of race and the way there is a divide between the country still, and it's a conversation that we need to have.

CUOMO: Do you think that this case is a legitimate starting off point for discussions about concealed weapon laws and stand your ground?

O'MARA: This is not a stand your ground case, never was. I don't know that the facts of this could apply to stand your ground. But now that we're talking about stand your ground and weapons laws and the way the system may be skewed, I think it's great to have those conversations.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

CUOMO: Well, they're certainly going to be ongoing. Our thanks to Mr. O'Mara for that interview. We're going to take a break here now on NEW DAY. When we come back, amusement park safety under scrutiny. Investigators trying to figure out what caused a woman's fatal fall from a Six Flags roller coaster. Now, another popular roller coaster has been shut down. We'll tell you all about it. But let's head across the pond. Look at Kate with her beautiful flowered blouse there and Buckingham palace, a big smile. You're loving it.

BOLDUAN: You never compliment my clothes. This is a huge moment, America. I hope you're listening to this. Anyway, to focus on the real issue at hand, coming up from London are we'll tell but the life of luxury that awaits the new royal baby. What it's like growing up royal just ahead.

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