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Homeland Security Prepares for Rita; Key Largo Flooded From Hurricane; Hurricane Rita Category Four Storm; Buses Ready In New Orleans for Evacuation; Minding Your Business

Aired September 21, 2005 - 07:30   ET

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

SOLEDAD O'BRIEN, CNN ANCHOR: In fact, we are tracking Hurricane Rita today.
MILES O'BRIEN, CNN ANCHOR: Yes, cold comfort in the Gulf hearing about good news here in New York. We're going to look at the federal government's emergency planning for Hurricane Rita. The Homeland Security secretary, Michael Chertoff, will be with us in just a few moments and we'll ask him what lessons he has learned from Katrina and what will be different this time around.

Let's get the latest on Rita right now. Chad Myers is in our weather center once again. I think he was there all night practically.

CHAD MYERS, METEOROLOGIST: I was.

MILES O'BRIEN: Chad, you were on late, you're up early.

MYERS: That's OK.

MILES O'BRIEN: When do you rest?

MYERS: When it finally makes landfall somewhere and moves on and finally dies, that's when I'll probably rest.

This is going to be another major hurricane here. Already category three. That is quote/unquote from the Hurricane Center what will be and is considered a major hurricane. But at 125 knots, almost 145 miles per hour as it pulls into some very warm water here in a day or day and a half, this is going to turn into a much larger storm. Yes, the wind speeds are going to be very high in the center of the eye, but the storm itself is going to be so large that even if the eye hits a hundred miles to your west, you are still going to be in the path of significant damage. The larger it gets in size, in width, the more damage you get.

Katrina was so large, it did damage all the way from New Orleans, all the way over to Mobile. So and that's the same kind of area that we're talking about because we're literally talking about the same type of storm. The same type of storm track.

Here are the potential lines so far. The computer is in a lot better agreement today than yesterday. Everybody taking it into Texas so far today. We'll have to see what the new computer model runs. They're going to start here in about 25 minutes. There's the radar pulling away from the Florida coast right now.

Back to you, Soledad.

SOLEDAD O'BRIEN: All right, Chad, thanks.

Many questions still to be answered about FEMA's slow response to Hurricane Katrina. Is the agency now ready for Hurricane Rita? The Department of Homeland Security oversees FEMA. Secretary Michael Chertoff joins us this morning from the White House.

Nice to see you, Secretary Chertoff. Thank you for talking with us this morning.

SECY. MICHAEL CHERTOFF, DEPT. OF HOMELAND SECURITY: Good morning.

SOLEDAD O'BRIEN: Do you feel that FEMA is better prepared this time around, better prepared for Hurricane Rita as it approaches than it was for Katrina?

CHERTOFF: Well, we've obviously poured a lot of effort and a lot of resources and people into what we're doing in Katrina. Still doing in Katrina. But one of the things we did at the same time was start to backfill with respect to supplies and people and resources because we anticipated at least the possibility of a second storm coming. And so we've been working to that possibility really for the past couple of weeks.

We've now pre-positioned or are in the process of pre-positioning a lot of supplies. We've got helicopters on standby. We're working very closely with the governor and the other state officials to make sure that we are completely connected in terms of their needs and what capabilities they're asking us to bring to the table. And so we are taking it very seriously and we are leaning as far forward as we can in preparation.

SOLEDAD O'BRIEN: What about communication fixes? Obviously the communication, or lack of, it was such a disaster in the wake of Hurricane Katrina. What's been done to repair that? CHERTOFF: Well, we are making sure that our communication systems with our state and local first responders are as go as they can be. We're recognizing, of course, that a hurricane is a killer storm and it's going to knock out cell towers and knock out other kinds of communication equipment. I think one of key things we're seeing is, trying to get people out of the path of this storm as early as possible and that means also making provisions for people in nursing homes or hospitals to get them out a couple of days in advance so that they're out of harm's way and they don't need to be rescued.

SOLEDAD O'BRIEN: As was clear in Katrina, bickering over who's in control and who's a control was a big problem. So after Rita makes landfall, or as Rita makes landfall, who is in charge?

CHERTOFF: Well, of course, the first responders on the ground are typically the emergency personnel, the National Guard folks who are actually deployed in the area to come in as quickly as possible. And I know Governor Perry has called up 5,000 National Guard. We're going to be ready with the capabilities we can add. If that's military capabilities, if it's supplies, if it's helicopters.

The Coast Guard, of course, stands by to do the same kind of superb job that it did in the wake of Katrina. And Katrina, we also uses customs and border protection folks. We're going to have them ready to go. We've got them deployed. It's really all hands on deck to deal with this storm.

SOLEDAD O'BRIEN: And you've named a person to be responsible for the on the ground efforts in Texas. Isn't that role essentially redundant to what the director of FEMA is supposed to be doing?

CHERTOFF: Well, one of the things we want to do, because we recognize that FEMA is still very much involved in the challenge of helping people rebuild in Mississippi and Louisiana, is to make sure that we have somebody who is going to be focused exclusively on Texas. And so I've designated a coast guard admiral as my principle federal officer on the ground, again, to make sure we have the maximum ability to have somebody who is has full responsibility for this particular storm.

SOLEDAD O'BRIEN: Lots of officials have told us that they're looking forward in the wake of Hurricane Katrina. And I understand that. But I'm curious to know what you see as your responsibility in the big problems in responding to that storm. We heard from the mayor who said he'll take his fair share of the blame. The governor who said the state response buck stops with her. The president said the federal response issues are his fault. Do you take blame for some of the problems?

CHERTOFF: You know, Soledad, six months before Katrina, I took the oath of office as secretary of Homeland Security. And when I did that I assumed the responsibility for the department, things that worked well, things that didn't work well. And so that is all my responsibility. My responsibility is to fix the things that don't work well and that's what we are in the process of doing right now. And as Rita points out, it's the kind of job we have to undertake immediately because storms or other catastrophes don't wait for us to take a long leisurely look backward. And so we are repairing things even as we move forward to meet new challenges.

SOLEDAD O'BRIEN: But do you see failures in your role and failures in your office in the response to Hurricane Katrina?

CHERTOFF: You know, as I say, I mean my office and I personally have responsibility for this department. I had it when I took the oath in February and I have it now. And that responsibility puts on me the obligation to fix what I need to fix, which is what I'm in the process of doing.

SOLEDAD O'BRIEN: So you'll take responsibility for the fixes but not any of the problems that happened?

CHERTOFF: You know, I think, Soledad, I've been as clear as I possibly can about how I see the way going forward.

SOLEDAD O'BRIEN: OK, sir, but I'm not sure that that's a clear answer for me, but I will take it as your answer.

I thank you very much for joining us this morning. Secretary of Homeland Security Chertoff with us.

CHERTOFF: You're welcome.

SOLEDAD O'BRIEN: Miles.

MILES O'BRIEN: Thousands of residents in the Florida Keys expected to return home this morning. The islands largely spared by Hurricane Rita. But as Dan Lothian reports, some people who evacuated were glad they got out when they did.

(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)

DAN LOTHIAN, CNN CORRESPONDENT, (voice over): When you mix a powerful storm surge and a high tide, this is what can happen.

GARY MANNING (ph): Once it came over the sea wall, I'd say in 15 minutes it started waken (ph), had 1, 2-foot chop.

LOTHIAN: An oceanside mobile home park in Islamorada, just off Highway 1 near Key Largo, pounded by Hurricane Rita.

MANNING: Yes, everything's flooded.

LOTHIAN: Is swamped by the rising waters. John and Jackie (ph) Hanna return to their home to survey the damage after evacuating on Monday.

JOHN HANNA, KEY LARGO RESIDENT: We were staying up at a condo up the road. We got out to get some place a little bit higher.

JACKIE HANNA, KEY LARGO RESIDENT: About 10:30, I guess, our friends called us and said it was . . .

JOHN HANNA: And said it really came on fast.

LOTHIAN: Firefighters waded through the park, going door-to-door searching for anyone who might be stranded. Most here had apparently heed the mandatory evacuation order. But not Gary Manning. He had decide to do ride out the storm. When the water started rising, Manning attached his boat, started up his RV, and did what the owners of these fixed mobile homes could not do, he drove to higher ground.

MANNING: And I brought everything out front.

LOTHIAN: Further south on Highway 1, more water flows into a motel and nearby cottages. Hurricane Rita intensifying, leaving plenty of water damage in its wake.

Dan Lothian, CNN, Key Largo, Florida.

(END VIDEOTAPE)

MILES O'BRIEN: Let's take a look at some live pictures now coming to us from our affiliate WPLG as they take an early morning helicopter tour of the Keys, setting out from I think the Key Largo region heading pretty much due west toward Key West now but I can't identify which Key we're looking at right now. Thus far no visible signs of any significant damage.

And, by the way, that's from we just switched over to our other affiliate, WSVN and we thank them both for those pictures. We'll be watching those closely. We'll bring them back to you as it gets a little bit closer down toward Key West.

Let's bring in Chad Myers now.

Chad, you know, I heard the expression this morning, Key West dodged a bullet and that immediately made me think about what happened post-Katrina in New Orleans. In the meantime, apparently you've got some breaking news for us. Why don't you tell us what's going on.

MYERS: Yes. Rita is now a category four hurricane. The 8:00 advisory just in, 20 minutes early. Sometimes they'll do that if they have really big news.

And the storm is still moving to the west at 14. But they've looked at the satellite. The satellite presentation (ph) now is so perfect, the eye is so symmetric now that they have this storm now up to 135 miles per hour with a minimum central pressure at 28.00.

I want you to go to the barometer on the wall that you never look at and see how far over 28.00 is. This storm has really become very intense in the overnight hours. Literally, since I went to bed at midnight and now it's, what, 7:00. It went from 110 to 135. Now a category four and, obviously, still increasing at this hour.

MILES O'BRIEN: Chad, what's your best take on this? Is it likely to go to category five?

MYERS: I think, sure, absolutely. I think maybe briefly it could. At some point in time, we're going to get what's called an eye wall replacement cycle. Big long term. All it means is that it gets so strong the eye gets so small, it gets so spinning so fast that it can't hold itself together anymore and it literally blows itself apart. Then you go from 160 to 170, 175, like Katrina. It blew itself apart. Then it gets back down to 125 and it has to rebuild the eye wall again.

So it's just one of those things. It just goes so fast that it kills itself and then it has to start all over. So, yes, certainly I think it could briefly be five. Four's and five's from the rest of the time here.

MILES O'BRIEN: All the way to landfall then?

MYERS: Pretty much.

MILES O'BRIEN: OK. We'll be watching this one very closely, of course. Chad, thank you very much.

Let's check some other headlines now. Kelly Wallace in with that.

Good morning, Kelly.

KELLY WALLACE, CNN CORRESPONDENT: Good morning to you and hello, everyone.

These stories "Now in the News."

The mayor of Galveston, Texas, declaring a state of emergency as Hurricane Rita gains strength. It is now, as Chad was talking about, a category four storm. Residents are filling up sandbags and boarding up windows. Mandatory evacuations are underway at this hour. Some 80 buses are set to leave from Galveston. This is all part of a phased evacuation plan.

The Army Corps of Engineers says New Orleans is essentially dry. An estimated three-quarters of a trillion gallons of water have been pumped out of the city in the past two and a half weeks. The commander in charge of draining New Orleans tells CNN all of the surface water is gone and travel is now possible throughout nearly the entire city.

American Airlines resuming flights in and out of New Orleans today. The nation's number one carrier will make three daily round trips from its Dallas-Ft. Worth hub. The airline plans to add flights from Chicago and Miami later this year. American now joining Northwest and Delta. Both returned to New Orleans last week. Continental and Southwest have limited services.

And you may have heard about those dolphins. Those dolphins displaced by Katrina. We have some good news for you. All eight of them are now safe. Trainers and biologists were able to recapture them after they were swept out to sea. The oceanarium they were living in was destroyed by the hurricane but they have now been placed in a U.S. Naval facility in Gulfport in a special pool used for Navy dolphins.

A lot of attention, Soledad, on that story. People very happy to see those dolphins are all OK.

SOLEDAD O'BRIEN: Yes, and a happy ending.

WALLACE: Yes.

SOLEDAD O'BRIEN: That's good news.

MILES O'BRIEN: I wonder if they wanted to join the Navy, though. They're in the Navy now, right? They're Navy dolphins now.

WALLACE: Easy recruiting.

MILES O'BRIEN: Yes, I guess that's one way to recruit.

SOLEDAD O'BRIEN: All right, between the two of you, enough!

MILES O'BRIEN: All right.

SOLEDAD O'BRIEN: Still ahead thanks, Kelly.

Still ahead this morning, the return to New Orleans is painful, even for some of its toughest residents. Two firefighters survey the destruction at home. We'll have their story up next on AMERICAN MORNING.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

SOLEDAD O'BRIEN: Welcome back, everybody.

You're taking a look at the latest radar loop of Hurricane Rita which is now a category four storm as it churns toward Texas and the Gulf Coast there. People there, of course, already reeling from Hurricane Katrina and knee-deep in the cleanup now.

Let's get right back to Carol Costello. She's in New Orleans this morning at the convention center.

Carol, good morning to you again.

I know that there are buses at the convention center. They're not actually bringing evacuees into the convention center, but who are the people who are getting on these buses? Haven't most of the people who have come into town driven in on their own steam?

CAROL COSTELLO, CNN CORRESPONDENT: Well, we'll ask General Myles Deering, because he's in charge of this whole evacuation process. The convention center's in front of me. The evacuation site is behind me and the buses are parked way back there where you can't see them but General Myles Deering is here to help us understand how this process works.

So I see that there's a little setup right behind us and there's some MP's standing there. So if someone wanted to evacuate the city, what's the process?

BRIG. GEN. MYLES DEERING, U.S. ARMY NATIONAL GUARD: Well, the process is they come down to this evacuation point that's just coincidentally located across the street from the convention center. We bring the displaced civilians into this area. Of course, we have to provide service for the safety of everybody. If they are in need of medical care, we provide the medical care and so they're taken care of and then we let them on.

COSTELLO: Where do they taken for that, the Iwo Jima? Or is there another medical facility set up?

DEERING: No, we have doctors back here at the evacuation point to check the civilians out. Now if they need to be evacuated, we call in medical evacuation resources, even helicopters to get them out of here and to where they can receive their care.

COSTELLO: How many buses are parked back there?

DEERING: I think there's at any one time there's generally about two buses. And so we rotate them through here. But right now the activity hasn't been that severe because most of the people have already evacuated the city and so these may be some stragglers. There maybe people we've evacuated before that are coming back when they hear about Hurricane Rita.

COSTELLO: Yes, Soledad just asked the question, who are these people. I know 23 people left on two buses yesterday, which is not many. So you're not waiting for the buses to fill up, right?

DEERING: That's right. No, we're not waiting for the buses to fill up. As we gather a group in a reasonable amount of time, we evacuate them so we can get them to comfort and safety.

COSTELLO: And who are the people exactly? Because a guy just stopped us out there and he was looking for the Greyhound bus station to get out of town. He didn't speak English. So he, obviously, was a worker brought in here to sweep the streets or do something else to help the city of New Orleans recover. But would you take him if he came and approached you guys? Would he be able to get on a bus and out of town?

DEERING: Oh, absolutely. I mean anybody who has a desire to leave the city and seek safety, we'll get them to the evacuation points where they can go to shelters.

COSTELLO: Obviously the convention center brings up a whole host of bad memories for a lot of people. Lieutenant General Honore said, don't talk stupid, reporters, get over it. This is a staging area. But there is a certain aura connected with this place. And are people mentioning it? And why was this place chosen?

DEERING: I haven't really heard anybody and, I mean, I hear the convention center mentioned all the time. But in terms of the evacuees the those people that we're taking care of here, it's merely a point on the ground. It's an easily identifiable point that we can pull people to consolidate them and move them to safety. And I don't think that the citizenry is that focused, even though there's a lot of bad memories here, just like there was with the Murrah bombing in that building in Oklahoma. It's just simply a point on the ground easily identifiable where everybody knows to go to and so we can evacuate them.

COSTELLO: OK. And I must say this, and I told you this before, the people I run into on the streets are loving the military. Everyone has been so kind to them and I just wanted you to know that so you could share it with your people.

DEERING: Well, I appreciate that because that makes what we do worthwhile. And I know the soldiers here that from the people they talk to on the streets, and we talk to them every day, and it's just inspiring, their feelings about what we've done since we've been here and because a lot of these kids have been through some rough seen things they've never seen before in their life and they're doing a marvelous job, just an outstanding job and we appreciate that.

COSTELLO: And let's give credit where credit's due. Members of the Oklahoma National Guard manning the post over there.

DEERING: Yes, ma'am.

COSTELLO: All right. Thank you, General Deering.

DEERING: Thank you. Thanks.

COSTELLO: Thanks for coming up.

Back to you.

SOLEDAD O'BRIEN: All right, Carol, Thanks. Still to come this morning, business news. Andy Serwer's "Minding Your Business." One of the most famous names in retail disappearing. We'll tell you who it is just ahead on AMERICAN MORNING.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

MILES O'BRIEN: The sounds of Bourbon Street filled Manhattan last night. The city hosted two simultaneous concerts to benefit hurricane relief efforts for Katrina. The shows featured Louisiana natives, the Neville Brothers, as well as Tom Waits and Dave Matthews. It was called The Big Apple to The Big Easy. Some other big names included Elton John, Lenny Kravitz and Jimmy Buffett. In addition to underwriting the show, Madison Square Garden pledged to donate a million bucks to Katrina related charities. A good cause, definitely.

Soledad.

SOLEDAD O'BRIEN: Great cause. And I think it's just been amazing, all the people who have kind of stepped up to the plate and either, you know, done things for these charity concerts or just given cold, hard cash. I mean, I think that's just terrific.

Miles, thanks.

Let's talk more about business news. One of the nation's largest retailers cutting thousands of jobs, dropping a well-known brand name in the Midwest. Andy Serwer's "Minding Your Business" this morning. This is sad news today.

ANDY SERWER, CNN CORRESPONDENT: I think it is and I think it's kind of unnecessary really. I mean, I know corporate America is obviously focused on the bottom line but did they have to do this?

Chicago is losing a landmark starting next year. Marshall Field's, the name will be taken away from these stores. Been there for 153 years in the windy city, Soledad. Going to be replaced by a venerable oh, and this really is rubbing salt in the wounds, New York name, Macy's. So they're going to stick Macy's on all the Marshall Field's stores.

The decision made by Federated Department Stores, which is the parent company of Macy's and Bloomingdale's after it purchased May, which owns Marshall Field's. A lot of anger, disappointment and hurt in the Chicago papers this morning and I don't blame them.

SOLEDAD O'BRIEN: Why would they I mean, I can't imagine that. I get outside of Chicago why people may not have such an emotional attachment to Marshall Field's name. But in Chicago, that just seems like a really bad business move.

SERWER: I think it is, too. I mean, obviously, you want to centralize operations when you put two companies together, all of the back office stuff, accounting, et cetera. Maybe even have the same brands in the stores. But what are you going to do, save $5,000 on a bunch of signs and tick off everyone in the city? I just think it doesn't make sense.

Oh, and did I tell you about layoffs. Federated is going to be laying off over 6,000 people nationwide. Not necessarily in Chicago, so much as in Boston, Houston, Virginia, and St. Louis. You know, this is just a part of business today, I guess. The signs, the names of the stores, I just don't understand that part.

SOLEDAD O'BRIEN: People have a big, emotional connection in that city to that store and that store's name.

SERWER: They do.

SOLEDAD O'BRIEN: I think they're going to really regret that decision. But I'm not minding your business, you are.

SERWER: Yes.

SOLEDAD O'BRIEN: All right, Andy, thanks.

Miles.

MILES O'BRIEN: Our complete coverage of Hurricane Rita continues in just a moment. Folks along the Gulf Coast are gearing up for another monster storm. The latest on Rita's path ahead on AMERICAN MORNING. Stay with us.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

SOLEDAD O'BRIEN: Still to come this morning, if Rita hits Louisiana, will state, local, and federal officials get along better than they did in Katrina's aftermath? Louisiana Senator Mary Landrieu joins us live ahead on AMERICAN MORNING.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

SOLEDAD O'BRIEN: Breaking news. In just the last half hour, Hurricane Rita surging in strength again. Now an extremely dangerous category four storm and getting stronger. We are tracking Rita's path just ahead this morning.

And getting ready for Rita in Texas. Mandatory evacuations are now underway in Galveston. That's just the beginning.

Plus, we're live in New Orleans where almost all the flood water from Katrina is now out of that city but heavy rains from Hurricane Rita could change all of that. A dangerous scenario for the city and its fragile levees on this AMERICAN MORNING.

ANNOUNCER: From the CNN Broadcast Center in New York, this is AMERICAN MORNING with Soledad O'Brien and Miles O'Brien.

MILES O'BRIEN: Good morning to you. We're glad you're with us.

SOLEDAD O'BRIEN: And we are tracking Hurricane Rita. Getting stronger and stronger by the hour. We got our last update just a few minutes ago.

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