Return to Transcripts main page

Anderson Cooper 360 Degrees

Rescuers Search for Survivors of Avalanche Near Park City, Utah; Red Carpet Battle

Aired January 14, 2005 - 19:00   ET

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

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


HEIDI COLLINS, HOST: An avalanche near Park City, Utah, and fears of a dam breaking in California.
360 starts right now.

A huge avalanche hits just outside a major ski resort in Utah. Rescuers searching for survivors trapped beneath the snow. We'll take you live to the scene of the slide.

Mother Nature's fury unleashed. Overflowing rivers and streams wreaking havoc as thousands of residents are forced to flee from a dam ready to burst.

Mourning the loss of lives from the California mudslide. Tonight, meet one lucky family counting their blessings, who escaped the deadly mountain of mud.

The commander in chief opens up. Tonight, the words President Bush says he wishes he hadn't said.

And the awards show battle of the red carpet. It's Star Jones versus the Rivers girls. Tonight, how the two teams plan on going toe to toe at the Golden Globes.

ANNOUNCER: Live from the CNN Broadcast Center in New York, this is ANDERSON COOPER 360.

COLLINS: Good evening again. Anderson is off tonight. I'm Heidi Collins.

We begin this evening with late-breaking news of an avalanche near Park City, Utah. Search and rescue operations under way right now on U.S. Forest Service property near a ski resort called the Canyons there in Utah. Officials say more than two people are missing.

Summit County Sheriff David Edmunds is at the scene of the avalanche. He joins me now by phone from there.

Sheriff, good evening to you.

What is the very latest? How many people are trapped at this point?

SHERIFF DAVID EDMUNDS, SUMMIT COUNTY, UTAH: That's a real good question. We don't have definitive information that would tell us how many folks are up there. What we are willing to release at this point is, we believe that there are multiple victims.

COLLINS: We are looking at some live pictures here of the area, once again, known as the Canyons Ski Resort. About 20 miles away is Salt Lake City. Sheriff, what kind of search and rescue methods are being used right now? I understand there are dogs?

EDMUNDS: That's correct. We have several dog teams on scene. We have several ground-pounders that are actually using probes. We're using peeps (ph) and shovels, we're using airships. Every piece of technology and equipment that we have, we're throwing at this particular problem.

COLLINS: Some people who might be listening tonight may not be familiar with that terminology, peeps, beacons. Talk to us a little bit about how skiers who go to these out-of-bounds areas, lots of times try to carry avalanche beacons with them.

EDMUNDS: Well, the smart ones do. There's a couple of things about back-country rescue that everybody needs to be aware of when they go to the back country, is number one, that you're wearing the appropriate equipment, which includes the peeps or beacons. And also the equipment to dig your buddy out. And typically, in avalanche situations, if you can't self-rescue, or your buddy can't rescue you, your chances of survival are very slim.

COLLINS: Talk to me also, if you would, about shooting down these avalanches. I mean, I realize that there has been quite a bit of snow to fall in this area at this resort. Usually, the officials on scene there keep a very good track of how much snow is falling in order to control it with shooting avalanches down with small dynamite charges.

EDMUNDS: Absolutely. We use explosives to do that. And, you know, it's important to note that this particular avalanche was triggered outside of the resort property. So there was no avalanche -- there was no avalanche explosions that were being conducted in this area. There was no avalanche treatment.

These folks were in an area where they were skiing at their own peril. They had gone over -- under the ropes, so to speak, and they'd actually passed numerous signs indicating that they were leaving resort property and going into an area where there was no avalanche control.

COLLINS: I'm sorry, you say that they had left signs that they left the out-of-bounds, or they went into the out-of-bounds area. They told several people...

EDMUNDS: No, no, no...

COLLINS: ... that they were going there?

EDMUNDS: No. Sorry, I think you misunderstood. What I said was is that they had passed signs, and they had disregarded those signs... COLLINS: I see.

EDMUNDS: ... and gone underneath the ropes and gone into those areas on their own.

COLLINS: Well, you bring up a good point. We know that in the ski season of 2004 to 2005, there were 13 deaths across this country due to avalanches, six of them in your state alone. At this point, you know, what do you have to say to people who disregard those signs?

EDMUNDS: Well, what I would say to anyone that ventures into the back country, you know, you're doing it at a very perilous time. We haven't had avalanche conditions like this out here in the state of Utah for a number of years. And where we're at is, we're at a situation where it's just extreme. And if you decide to go into the back country, you are literally taking your life into your own hands. You are risking everything by doing that.

So the message that I have for anyone that would come and recreate here in Summit County, Utah, which is a huge tourist destination, is, if you stay inside the boundaries of the resort centers, you're going to be fine, because they conduct proper avalanche control. But anytime you decide to go outside of those boundaries, there's a good chance that you're not going to make it out of it with your life.

COLLINS: All right. Well, Sheriff David Edmunds of the Summit County Sheriff's Department, we appreciate your time here. We'll let you get back to what will probably be a very busy night ahead. Thank you, sir

EDMUNDS: Thank you very much.

COLLINS: And here now is just a little of what Salt Lake City's TV station KSL had to tell its viewers a bit earlier about the conditions that combined to lead to the avalanche.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

ARLEN RANDOLPH, KSL METEOROLOGIST: I want to take you back to Viper, and we'll go back over how much snow has fallen just, really, just in the last couple of weeks. Recent storms, everybody. Yes, let's talk about it. We know they've pounded the mountains. They've dropped anywhere from 30 to 60 inches of snow. But that was really heavy snow.

The flow, the atmospheric winds delivering all that moisture, came off the Pacific, off of Southern California. So the snow density was very, very high. We're talking about eight to 10 inches of snow to one inch of water.

Along with that, we had winds recently between 50 and 90-plus miles per hour. Oh, my goodness. They created snow cornices, they rearranged the snow that had fallen. Huge mountains of heavy, wet, drifting snow piled up all over our mountains of not only northern Utah but the central and south as well. And that snow, Keith and Carol, let me talk about this. Fifth -- over -- between 15 and 20 feet of snow have fallen this season alone for the Canyons. Canyons' total is 243 inches of snow. Continuing the snow, nine feet of snow, just since December 28 at the Canyons Resort.

The impact of the weather, I think, has been quite large in that the way the snow was delivered, with early fluffy snow laid down, and then this layer of what sometimes we refer to as Sierra cement, this heavy, wet, high-density snow on top of a very, very difficult and rotten snowpack for the most part. So that's the situation.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

COLLINS: And you were just listening to KSL meteorologist Arlen Randolph a little bit earlier in the night.

Right now, we want to take you directly to the area live. The same affiliate is listening to their helicopter pilot give an update on the situation. Two hours earlier there now, so still a little bit of daylight to work with. Let's listen in.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: ... at this altitude whether they really specifically found something. But we certainly have spotted a number of different areas of interest. Jay is going to back out again a little bit and try to find one of those areas. One of the tricky aspects of trying to work the camera from up here is that sometimes you get in a little bit too close and a little bit of movement will take us off the area. So we're going to try to find another one of those areas for you.

But we have spotted a number of different areas where it appears that rescue dogs and rescue workers have focused on an area. They're working with probes, even at times digging feverishly, trying to get into the snow. But it's really hard to tell up here without having any kind of direct communication with those workers, whether they have found anything specific, or whether they just think that it could be something.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: We saw medical helicopters sitting on the snow earlier. Are they still there, from what you can see?

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: We saw one of the medical helicopters took off a little while ago. Whether it's still there right now, I don't know. They may still have one on the ground. We did see, and we have seen in the last five or 10 minutes, a lot of those rescue workers, ski patrol people, heading down. So it could be that a number of their folks are starting to come down off the mountain.

I haven't had any contact with the sheriff's department down on the ground. So I'm not exactly familiar with when they're going to cut off the search, or whether they're going to search for a number of hours.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Yes, they're going to run out of light here pretty soon, so that may be a factor. OK, Jed Bull (ph), live in Chopper 5 over the avalanche in Summit County this afternoon, thanks.

UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: Thanks, Jed.

Joining us now is Adam Moffat (ph), who's a KSL photographer, and is here to show us video he shot of that same area, how long ago?

ADAM MOFFAT, KSL PHOTOGRAPHER: It was about last year I decided to take my helmetcam and go up there and kind of ski. And as you can see there, there are the gates...

UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: There it is.

MOFFAT: ... that you have to go through. It's pretty obvious, and you have to go through those gates. There is no if, ands, or buts. You have to see that sign. And...

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: That's the boundary of the ski area, right?

MOFFAT: Yes.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Not just -- OK.

UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: All right. Now, Adam, isn't that terribly scary?

MOFFAT: Yes, it is. But it's one of those -- it's part of the thrill. And, you know, as a skier and snowboarder all my life, it's what we do it for.

UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: All right, so you, there you are.

MOFFAT: Yes, this is me going down. And I believe that is right about dead center where that avalanche happened. And as you can see, there's been people that have gone down at the time I went down it. And it's just -- it's so scary to me, to see what can happen. And I was right there. This could have been me in this avalanche.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: How long is that run?

MOFFAT: I don't know. Once you get going, it's only about a minute and a half.

(CROSSTALK)

MOFFAT: You know, it's an hour hike for a minute and a half. But...

UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: Wow.

MOFFAT: ... it's untracked powder. And it's what, you know, as a skier and snowboarder, what we kind of live for.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: So you're just going in between the trees, and... MOFFAT: Yes.

UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: Yes. And you're snowboarding at this point.

MOFFAT: Yes, I'm snowboarding at this time. But you can see how many people go down and up, up and down that.

UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: You can. That is absolutely amazing.

MOFFAT: Yes.

UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: And that's the exact area. This must give you chills today.

MOFFAT: Yes, it makes me real nervous. Because (UNINTELLIGIBLE)...

COLLINS: We were just listening to our affiliate KSL and their live broadcast tonight, trying to get everybody up to speed on the avalanche that has occurred at the Canyons Ski Resort, that's about 20 miles from Salt Lake City, Utah.

Also spoke with the sheriff there in the area of Summit County. He said he didn't want to talk about numbers, but he knows at least two people are missing at this point. So they are really working with a deadline of daylight, as you see. It is about 5:10 or so in that time zone. So they're working furiously to try to get ahold of those people using all kinds of probes, shovels, beacons. They're looking for the light to flash underneath the snow. Sometimes those who ski out of bounds wear those beacons with them.

So we will, of course, will keep you up to date on this story, and have much more on it as we get it throughout the show.

Meanwhile, to California now. After weeks of rain, it was a hillside that gave way some days ago, taking 10 lives with it.

Now there are fears that a dam may give way. This is the Prado Dam near Corona, about an hour south and east of Los Angeles. Eight hundred of so people, nearby -- 800 or so nearby homes, that is, have been evacuated. There are conflicting reports, though, over whether the dam has sprung a leak, or, as the Army Corps of Engineers says, water is deliberately being released to ease the pressure on the structure.

CNN's Eric Philips joins us now from Corona with the very latest.

Eric, what can you tell us?

ERIC PHILIPS, CNN CORRESPONDENT: Well, Heidi, good evening.

I'll clear up that confusion in just a moment.

But first, what the most important information is of the hour, and that is that residents are being allowed to go back to their homes. About 800 homes, as you just said, were evacuated this morning because of that seepage situation at the dam. That was a mandatory evacuation.

Just a little while ago, the mayor here, Mayor Darrell Talbert (ph), said that that mandatory evacuation is now a voluntary evacuation. He's urging residents to stay out until Monday, but he is saying that if they insist, they can go back to their homes.

But this is the situation at the Prado Dam. Early yesterday morning, U.S. Army Corps of Engineer workers recognized that there was a seepage situation happening at a container surrounding a construction area at the dam. They kept their eye on it all day long, and as it got worse and worse, as the seepage increased exponentially, they notified local authorities, who decided to go ahead and evacuate residents for their own safety.

Now they're saying that seepage situation is under control. It continues to leak, but it has substantially decreased, and they're saying it's not a threat at all. And that's why the mandatory evacuation has gone to a voluntary evacuation.

They're saying that they are deliberately releasing millions of gallons of water at this point, and that by Monday at 12:00 noon, that seepage should stop altogether. So again, the leak continues to happen, but they're saying it's not a threat at this point, and residents can, if they insist, go back to their homes. But officials here are asking that they not do so, Heidi.

COLLINS: A little bit better news, anyway, for the weekend. All right, Eric Philips live from Corona, California, thanks, Eric.

Lots of golf courses have water hazards, as you know, but not like the ones at Pebble Beach, California now, where the torrential rains we've been covering have caused massive sinkholes and other kinds of erosion on some of the most famous fairways in the country. This is the 18th hole. And whatever it used to be, it's got to be a par 12 now at the very least.

And 360 next now, abuse, torture, and pictures seen around the world. Was it orders from above, or soldiers acting on their own? A jury has decided.

Also tonight, one of Saturn's moons up close. A first step for mankind with pictures that are out of this world.

Plus, President Bush unplugged. Find out what he's calling a confession and a regret.

But first, your picks, the most popular stories on CNN.com right now.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

COLLINS: We want to update you on the latest involving that avalanche near Park City, Utah. Right now, more than two people are still missing after this afternoon's avalanche near a ski resort. Still working to clarify that number for you.

But Jill Atwood is a former reporter who was there when it all happened. And earlier today, she told CNN in chilling detail what she saw.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

JILL ATWOOD, FORMER REPORTER (on phone): It looked like someone took a knife and cut through the side of the mountain, just a huge slab has fallen off. And you can see where it came to rest down in a valley. And right now, I can tell you, search and rescue are down there with their dogs. I have a life flight helicopter hovering overhead as we speak.

They're using dynamite to blow away some of the extra snow, the loose snow that still could threaten some of the ski patrol that are down there right now, trying to help. Just -- it was a huge slide.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

COLLINS: Once again, more than two people are still missing after the avalanche. We're going to stay on top of this one for you and bring you the very latest developments just as soon as they come in to CNN.

There are some images, though, that are hard to forget, like this one, a photograph of a group of prisoners naked at Iraq's Abu Ghraib prison. In a humiliating human pyramid, U.S. troops nearby, smiling, abusing the prisoners for laughs.

Pictures like that one sparked international outrage toward the U.S. military when they became public last year.

And just a short time ago, we got a verdict in the court-martial of the Army reservist accused of being the ringleader of the abuse at Abu Ghraib. Specialist Charles Graner, guilty tonight.

Let's go right to (UNINTELLIGIBLE) CNN's Susan Candiotti at Fort Hood, Texas, now. Susan, good evening.

SUSAN CANDIOTTI, CNN CORRESPONDENT: Hello, Heidi.

You know, at the beginning of this trial, Specialist Charles Graner said, "We'll find out what kind of monster I am."

Perhaps the jury has spoken. After deliberating about five hours, the jury found him guilty of nine of the 10 main counts. He now faces a maximum of 15 years behind bars in a military prison, almost twice as much time as the four others who so far have pleaded guilty before trial.

(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)

CANDIOTTI (voice-over): The signs inside Abu Ghraib prison said, No photographs in a high-security cell block. Yet Specialist Charles Graner, his sergeant, and other guards, brought cameras to Iraq. And it was their disregard for this very first rule, taking photos like this, that documented the prison abuse scandal.

Taking the witness stand, the sergeant and two other guards who already have pleaded guilty. They testified it was Graner who put the leash around this prisoner's neck and took this photo. It was Graner who arranged these naked Iraqis in a human pyramid. It was Graner who punched a detainee moments after this photo was taken.

The defense blamed the atmosphere of abuse on military intelligence agents assigned to the prison. An example, this guard, Megan Abyooal (ph), testified intelligence staffers told her to go watch naked Iraqi detainees in the shower, and to mock them. Abyooal's testimony was undercut by her admission she had an affair with Graner, about the same time Graner had been sleeping with another reservist, PFC Lynndie England, seen in some of the most notorious photos.

In closing arguments, the defense called Graner a scapegoat for the Army and military intelligence. The prosecution said Graner was acting on his own. At the end, it showed the jury the pyramid photo and said, This cannot become a recruitment poster for the United States Army.

(on camera): When the verdict was read, Graner stood stiffly at attention, showing no visible reaction. Deliberations are now under way for the sentencing, and those deliberations could go well into the night, Heidi.

COLLINS: All right, Susan Candiotti in Fort Hood, Texas, tonight. Susan, thank you.

Shortly after the September 11 attacks, President Bush said Osama bin Laden was wanted, dead or alive. Those were tough words, but words Mr. Bush now says had unintended consequences.

In interviews this week, he expressed misgivings over the vocabulary he used while trying to make a point.

CNN's Elaine Quijano reports on some rare candid moments with the president.

(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

GEORGE W. BUSH, PRESIDENT OF THE UNITED STATES: ... got to follow the path...

(END VIDEO CLIP)

ELAINE QUIJANO, CNN CORRESPONDENT (voice-over): He's joked about his plainspokenness many times, and even made it a part of his stump speech.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

BUSH: Sometimes I am a little too blunt. I get that from my mother.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

QUIJANO: Now, President Bush, who last year struggled to name a mistake he'd made...

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

BUSH: I just haven't -- just put me under the spot here.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

QUIJANO: ... says he can think of two times he wished he would have chosen his words more carefully. Once, when he discussed insurgents in Iraq, just months after the U.S.-led invasion of that country.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

BUSH: There are some who feel like that, you know, the conditions are such that they can attack us there. My answer is, bring 'em on.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

QUIJANO: In an interview airing tonight on ABC's "20/20," Mr. Bush expressed second thoughts about that statement.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP, "20/20, ABC)

BUSH: When I, I said some things in the first term that probably a little blunt. "Bring it on" was a little blunt. And I was really speaking to the -- to our troops. But it came out, and it had a different connotation, a different meaning for others. And so I've got to -- I'll be, I'll be more disciplined in how I say things.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

QUIJANO: Another time happened in the days after September 11 at the Pentagon, when Mr. Bush said this of Osama bin Laden.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

BUSH: I want justice. And there's an old poster out West, as I recall, that said, Wanted, dead or alive.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

QUIJANO: The president candidly admitted that phrase raised the ire of the first lady.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP, "20/20," ABC)

BUSH: I guess it's not the most diplomatic of language. Laura, as a matter of fact, chewed me out right after that. So I, I, I, I, I do have to be cautious about, you know, conveying thoughts is, in, in, in a way, maybe, that doesn't send wrong impressions about our country.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

QUIJANO (on camera): Now, the president said he didn't know if his acknowledgement of poor word choice should be called a regret, a confession, or simply a lesson. And while he expressed misgivings about the language he used, he also made clear he had no regrets about the actions he took, Heidi.

COLLINS: Elaine Quijano tonight. Elaine, thanks.

360 next, an avalanche near Park City, Utah. Rescue operations under way right now. We're bringing you the latest as it unfolds.

Sex, bombs, and angry rats. The Pentagon dreams up some creative ways of incapacitating enemy troops. Wait till you hear the details.

Also tonight, Bush unplugged. The president shares a confession and a regret.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP, "HISTORY OF THE WORLD, PART 1")

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: They'll be here any minute!

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Not to worry, not to worry. We are now armed with mighty joints.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Mighty joints?

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: (UNINTELLIGIBLE), let's go, (UNINTELLIGIBLE).

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Quickly, after them!

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: We've got to -- we've got to...

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Get moving. We've got to stay loose, you know? Let it cool. Let the coolness get into our vertebrae.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Go, men! Go northward. You go southward. I'm going to walk here around in a circle.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

COLLINS: I don't know how you can't laugh. Mel Brooks, incapacitating opposing armies in his movie "History of the World, Part 1."

As far out as that weapon was, it seems to fall right in step with some proposals for the military. According to one magazine, researchers were tinkering with some bizarre weapons ideas. Now, we want to be clear, these ideas were rejected long ago. So think of this as an entertaining diversion of what ended up in the trash bin.

(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE) COLLINS (voice-over): Consider modern combat. Could an enemy love itself to death? According to the Sunshine Project, a group which tracks research on chem- and bioweapons, the Pentagon has reviewed plans to develop various nonlethal weapons, including a so- called gay bomb, an aphrodisiac weapon to make enemy soldiers so irresistible to each other, morale would plummet.

Other weapons ideas dating from 1994 at the U.S. Air Force Research Lab, unleashing wasps or rats on the enemy. And a chemical to cause such severe halitosis, it would gross out the enemy.

The U.S. Marines, issuing a statement today, saying ideas are submitted from many sources. Quote, "None of the systems described in that proposal have been developed."

JOHN PIKE, DIRECTOR, GLOBALSECURITY.ORG: It's no surprise that they would be looking at all kinds of ideas to how to incapacitate enemies on the battlefield. Some of them might actually work. And the problem is that in developing any of these weapons systems, you know in advance that half of them are bad ideas. You just don't know in advance which half are the bad ones.

COLLINS: One of the bad ones predates the psychedelic '60s, the era of make love, not war. In the '50s, according to globalsecurity.org, the Army's Chemical Corps launched a project called Psychochemical Agents and tested the hippie drug LSD. The idea was to release it from airplanes and make the enemy hallucinate. It didn't work, and LSD was dropped.

Can you picture the U.S. striking back with bats? Project X-Ray was launched during World War II. The military's idea was to attack using bats wearing tiny explosives.

PIKE: Under the theory that when the bats went home to roost inside Japanese houses, that the firebombs would go off, and be able to burn down Japanese housing. By the time the atomic bombs were dropped, they still hadn't figured out how to make it work, and then the war ended.

COLLINS: Pike says it's impossible to know what the military is actually testing right now. But he says hope springs eternal the military will come up with ways to incapacitate the enemy without having to kill them.

(END VIDEOTAPE)

COLLINS: Amazing newly released images of last month's tsunami as it rips apart a construction site. That tops our look at global stories in the uplink.

Take a look at this. The video taken by an Australian tourist during his visit to Phuket, Thailand. As you can see, the tsunami just destroyed the area, even left one man stranded on a mound in the middle of the wave.

Darmstadt, Germany, more astounding images beamed to earth this afternoon from Saturn's moon Titan. They're the first we've seen from the moon's surface, which scientists believe closely resembles earth in its early stages. The images, taken by the European space probe Huygens, show what appears to be drainage channels and a shoreline, which will likely made a liquid, made by a liquid, but not water. Hmm.

London, England. Prince Harry will not go to Auschwitz. Some British newspapers said a visit to the concentration camp site would be his punishment for wearing this Nazi costume at a party. But the office of Prince Charles denies that, saying instead it's negotiating to have Prince Harry work with local Jewish charities. The prince has apologized for the incident.

And across the U.K., the king still rules. Elvis Presley's "Jail House Rock" will likely return to the top of the U.K. charts this weekend. Sony music is rereleasing Elvis Presley's No. 1 hits in the U.K. to mark would have been his 70th birthday. And that's tonight's "Uplink."

A huge avalanche hits just outside a major ski resort in Utah. Rescuers searching for survivors trapped beneath the snow. We'll take you live to the scene of the slide.

And the award show battle of the red carpet. It's Star Jones versus the Rivers girls. Tonight, how the 2 teams plan on going toe to toe at the Golden Globes. 360 continues.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

COLLINS: The latest now on our developing story, an avalanche in Park City, Utah. About 30 search and rescue workers are on the scene right now outside the Canyons Resort. Officials say more than 2 people are missing.

I want to talk more about it now. From Salt Lake City is Bruce Tremper, who is the manager of the Forest Services Avalanche Center in Utah. Mr. Tremper a life long mountain man, a long time ski racer, also the author of the book "Staying Alive in Avalanche Terrain."

Thanks so much for being with us, Mr. Tremper. Appreciate your time here.

So over the past 2 weeks, this area has seen about 7 feet of wet, heavy snow. These are prime avalanche conditions.

BRUCE TREMPER, FOREST SERVICES AVALANCHE CENTER, UTAH: Yes, we've had a huge storm that's come over the last two and a half weeks, starting just around Christmas and going almost nonstop for two and a half weeks. And it ended with a flourish with a huge amount of water weight coming down, because the storm was unusually large and unusually windy and unusually warm. So it made a very dense, hard, stiff slab over the top of these buried weak layers.

And that's the problem. Kind of like trying to park a Cadillac on top of a pile of potato chips. It just doesn't work. So, it's overloading these weak layers and things are sliding out. It was much worse a few days ago when we had extreme avalanche danger ratings and avalanche warnings going on.

Things have kind of settled down a little bit recently. So there's less avalanches. As you can see, there still are avalanches occurring.

COLLINS: Yeah. We're looking at the video now, trying to conduct this rescue operation. We also want to take a look at an avalanche in action. How fast do these things move? Some people I know try to outrun them or outski them. Not a smart idea?

TREMPER: Avalanches can go very fast. Just within a few seconds, they're going 60, 80, sometimes even 100 miles an hour. So they're very difficult to outrun. Most of the time they're triggered by the victim or somebody in the victim's party. Which is actually good, because it means we can avoid avalanches most of the time if we want to. It's not like getting struck by lightning or something like that.

COLLINS: I don't know if you can see our video but it is amazing how fast these slides happen. I know you've been caught in one. Tell us what that was like.

TREMPER: Well, it's like somebody pulls a rug out from underneath you. A lot of people think avalanches are just a bunch of loose snow. But they're actually a slab of snow, a plate of snow that slides off the mountain like a magazine sliding off the table. And it's like somebody pulls a rug out from underneath you, like I say. And you fall down. And suddenly you're tumbling. And snow is just going everywhere. It's going under your eyelids, down your underwear. Every time you take a breath it just forms this plug of snow in your mouth.

COLLINS: Yeah. And you can't breathe. I mean, you're suffocating.

TREMPER: Yeah. Then when you get buried, you can't move. It's like being frozen in concrete. And you die from asphyxiation. Carbon dioxide builds up in the snow around your mouth. And you only have about 15 minutes to live underneath the snow, so you've got to get people out from under very quickly.

COLLINS: Yeah. And that's what they're doing right now.

Bruce Tremper, we are very glad that you made it out of your experience alive. Thank you so much for your expertise tonight.

TREMPER: Thank you.

COLLINS: Meantime, in the Midwest, the Ohio River continues to overflow its banks, making things very difficult indeed for more than a few riverside towns. Marietta, Ohio, perhaps chief among them. Alina Cho is there. Hi Alina.

ALINA CHO, CNN CORRESPONDENT: Hi there, Heidi.

Marietta is often ground zero for flooding in Ohio. It has seen more than its share of floods in its 217-year history. It is the oldest city in Ohio. And it is actually built between two of the state's largest rivers. And that makes it especially vulnerable when those rivers flood.

Now today, the Ohio River, just to the right of me, crested above its 35-foot flood stage for the third time in 4 months. And a second time in a week. Now, thankfully today there was no major damage to speak of. But last week, quite a different story. Many of the businesses in Historic Marietta got the warning, cleared out their stock and actually shut down.

Now, some of the businesses, interestingly enough, actually are built on a tilt, at an angle so that when the water flows into the stores, it can actually flow out right away. And that minimizes the damage.

Now Marietta is a very small city, population about 15,000. But people like the mayor say the river is a big draw.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

MICHAEL MULLEN, MAYOR OF MARIETTA: It's the river that gives it the charm.

CHO (on camera): But it is also giving you a lot of headaches.

MULLEN: Well, we've had the two highest floods in the last 40 years. And unfortunately, they've come in the last 4 months.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

CHO: Historically, Marietta used the waterways as roadways. But today, the mayor says that more cargo flows through here and through the Ohio River than flows through the Panama Canal. And even though Marietta is especially vulnerable to flooding, people we talked to here said there's no reason to build a flood wall. That would take away from the charm.

COLLINS: Man, what is going on with the weather? Alina Cho live from Marietta, Ohio tonight. Thanks Alina.

360 next, more than a week after a toxic train crash some people still can't go home. We'll show you how this small town is coping.

And the South's little secret. One lawyer calls it a divorce epidemic. We'll talk to him coming up.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

Surely you have not forgotten this scene at La Conchita, California earlier this week when what was a saturated hillside suddenly became a thick, brown river of mud, swallowing whole houses and taking ten lives. We're joined now in Santa Barbara by Bob Coleman who must surely be grateful to be alive. He was at home there in La Conchita during that mudslide. Thanks for being with us, Mr. Coleman. It is nice to see you. I know that you were in your house vacuuming when this thing hit. What did you see and feel, for that matter?

BOB COLEMAN, LANDSLIDE SURVIVOR: That's correct. We had just returned home because there was a mud flow that had crossed the 101 freeway and closed that off. And I had taken my wife and son up to see that. And get us a better picture of our young neighborhood and what was going on there. We just returned home and had a little bit of a discussion, and then, yes, started vacuuming. So I was in our front room, which I have a picture of, and that was about 30 yards from the site of the slide. So I watched the slide go from behind my house to down the street.

COLLINS: So even though you were vacuuming which is obviously loud, you felt this thing.

COLEMAN: Yes, it was like a 3.0 to 4.0 earthquake. A rolling type of feeling in the house. The sounds were just -- they were horrifying. There was a retaining wall that was quite massive and strong. And it snapped and broke. I watched telephone poles lift out of the ground. I watched telephone poles fly through the air, shaking. I saw the straps. And then at that moment we started hearing yelling and screaming and crying.

COLLINS: Mr. Coleman, I want to read you something that the sheriff said. He mentioned this. "We believe the La Conchita community is a geologically hazardous area. It has been historically, it is today, and it will remain so. We do not recommend that people return to this area or that people who stay here remain here." Will you go back to your home, sir?

COLEMAN: Most definitely. That's my home. That's where my son was born. That's where I plan to raise my son.

COLLINS: That's a pretty tough thing to hear. No matter what the cost?

COLEMAN: Well, within reason. I'm a reasonable person. Yes, the safety of my wife and son and myself is, of course, the most important. And that's why right now we will stay away. It's a simple thing, though. It's about saturation of the hill. And what happened ten years ago, what happened now, is caused due to water. While there's been a lack of control of that water, and so this happens. Honestly, there's been more slides on the 101 freeway than there has been in La Conchita. I'll tell you it's almost more dangerous to be on the freeway.

COLLINS: Rob Coleman, we wish you the best of luck. Thanks for being with us tonight.

For some folks in Graniteville, South Carolina, the cloud has finally lifted. The killer in the night. A toxic chlorine gas that spewed from this train crash last Thursday claiming nine lives, is no longer rampant. Nearly 5,500 people had been evacuated and since yesterday, authorities have been allowing many of them to return home. The rest may soon follow.

I was in Graniteville this week and sat down with a couple of families as they waited to go back.

(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)

UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: I like playing with my friend. I like watching TV. "Powerpuff Girls" and "Spongebob."

COLLINS (voice-over): She is child of the lintheads, the people that have worked the local cotton mill in Graniteville, South Carolina, for generations.

JUDY KEY, GRANITEVILLE RESIDENT: We was called lintheads. Balls of cotton would get in your hair. A lot of people would come out of the mill, they didn't brush their hair, comb their hair, they would just come on out like they was.

COLLINS: Abby (ph) lives with her mom and her grandmother. For now they live here, in a hotel filled with hundreds of other people who fled their homes one week ago. A train accident left deadly chlorine gas spewing into the air.

UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: I didn't know it happened. When it was on that train day. I didn't know it happened.

COLLINS: Nine people were killed. Hundreds injured. And thousands, many of them family and neighbors, sent to hotels just like this one.

UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: Because I like going to hotels and stuff. Because hotels are fun.

COLLINS: Unaware of the tragedy around her.

UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: I didn't check mine.

COLLINS: She thinks of it as an adventure. But the adults know better.

KEY: He was in a wheelchair.

COLLINS: Some of the victims were friends.

KEY: I miss Rusty Rushton. We knew him.

COLLINS: Abby and Nanny only live half a mile from where it happened.

KEY: Just sounded like just a hard thunderstorm.

COLLINS: They were evacuated from the area. Forced out of their home. Left with nothing but uncertainty.

KEY: You really don't know what to do. You don't know what questions to ask. All you can do is sit and watch TV.

COLLINS: Nanny and Abby are just part of the old mill town community at the heart of Graniteville. KEY: Where everybody knows everybody. Everybody works in a mill.

COLLINS: Their home, like the others in the neighborhood, built a century ago. Nanny's been in the same house for 37 years.

KEY: I don't know what kind of shape my house is in.

COLLINS: Making it that much harder to accept that gas may have damaged her beloved home beyond repair.

KEY: You just hear so many rumors.

COLLINS: Officials have yet to get close enough to the accident site to learn what can and cannot be salvaged.

KEY: Some say they're going to burn them. All such rumors as that. I said, well, if I have to, you know, move, leave home, I'm just going to buy me a little old place with a pond in the front yard and feast the rest of my life.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Everybody grew up with everybody. I mean, it's a small town. It has everything you need.

COLLINS: Tim and Lynn Heath live next door to Abby and her nanny back at home, and now they are in the room right next door at the motel.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: I want to go home. But I want to know that I'm safe in my home. I'm nervous as a long tailed cat in a room full of dogs.

LYNN HEATH, GRANITEVILLE RESIDENT: I'm scared for my daughter.

COLLINS: The future for them and their family also uncertain.

HEATH: The worst would be losing our home. Because we've lived there since me and my husband's been together. And he's been there since he was a kid. Ever since he was born.

COLLINS: When you think about going back, I hear you saying a lot of things about when I go back. Or when it's safe. What if you can't go back at all?

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: : I haven't really thought about that. If you can't go back, you've got to go forward. You can't let something like this stop you in your tracks. Just take what life gives you.

HEATH: It's as simple as that.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: You have to make it simple as that. If you don't, you dwell on it. It will eat you up on the inside. It's not worth looking at the negative aspects of this. Just kind of put blinders on, look straight ahead.

COLLINS: And straight into each other's arms if need be. Neighbors or family, they're one and the same for people of this old mill town.

HEATH: We just look forward to going back home.

COLLINS: Wherever that home may be.

(END VIDEOTAPE)

(on camera): I just spoke to the family a little while ago and they tell me they are hopeful yet still don't know for certain whether or not they'll be able to go back to their homes.

360 next. The South's dirty little secret according to one lawyer. He says it's facing a divorce epidemic. We'll talk to him about lost love southern style.

Plus the red carpet battle. Joan Rivers faces competition at this weekend's Golden Globes.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

COLLINS: Half of all Americans who say "I do" will eventually say, "I don't." But it's down South where breaking up is really booming. No wonder some call it the Divorce Belt. And January being the unofficial start of divorce season, plenty of red-state marriages will soon be turning blue. My next guest says 35 percent of all divorces occur in the South. Joining me from Atlanta now is John C. Maydue, family attorney, and author of "Southern Divorce: Why Family Breakups Have Fractured the South and How to Cope With It." Thanks for being with us, Mr. Maydue. We appreciate your time here.

As we've said, four of the five highest state rates of divorce are in the South. You call it the South's dirty little secret, in fact. So why is the divorce rate higher there in the Bible Belt?

JOHN MAYDUE, AUTHOR, "SOUTHERN DIVORCE": What I find astonishing, Heidi, is we're sitting here in the land of the Bible Belt, the so-called land of family values, and your chances of getting divorced in the South are much greater than they are in other regions in the country. Now, social scientists tell us that we get divorced more in the South because we get married too young, because we get married closer to the poverty line, and because we get married less educated. None of that explains to me, however, how we're the number one church-going region in the country. We go to organized religious services more than any other place in the country. And yet here we are professing family values but divorcing at a much greater rate than, for example, the northeastern United States.

COLLINS: So you think it's a little hypocritical?

MAYDUE: I don't like to use that word. I like to say it's inconsistent. But the greatest explanation I've seen for it that makes sense to me is I think there's more idealism in the South regarding the institution of marriage. And I think we're taught earlier that this is an ideal relationship. When we realize that it really isn't, and you couple that with the fact that no-fault divorce is sometimes easier to file and obtain than perhaps renewing your driver's license, that's what the dynamic is causing I think more and more divorce.

COLLINS: Well, the state with the lowest divorce rate, though, is Massachusetts. Is there something we can learn from the people there?

MAYDUE: Isn't that astonishing? Here's the land of Teddy Kennedy, the land of organized or I should say legal gay marriage, and yet they have the lowest divorce rate in this country.

Now, I've heard two explanations. One being there's more Lutherans and there's more Catholics there. That doesn't really fit with me. I have heard that there's more of a structure in the communities that promote marriage. And I think that issue of it -- it's called social integration -- may give us a better explanation.

COLLINS: What do you think about Southern state governments? Are they doing enough to tackle the divorce problem?

MAYDUE: I'd say yes and no. There's an initiative in the South toward covenant marriage, which basically says we're going to make it harder to get married and harder to get divorced. It's very controversial. I've not seen any statistics that tell me that that works.

What's interesting, both the Bush administration and some states have had these marriage initiatives. And they're going to teach us how to stay married, teach us how to have family values. And what I love about that, Heidi, who are the teachers going to be? Our politicians such as former President Bill Clinton? Is he going to teach us? Who is going to teach us? I don't mean to pick on him. But I mean, I'm not sure I want the politicians giving their storied pasts, particularly socially, telling us how we should live.

COLLINS: Right. Well, John Maydue, we appreciate your time here today. Something interesting to think about indeed. Thanks again.

MAYDUE: Thanks for having me.

COLLINS: 360 next, the battle of the celebrity interviews. Joan Rivers has competition now on the red carpet at the Sunday's Golden Globes. More on dueling divas ahead in "The Current."

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

COLLINS: In tonight's "Current," a battle royale will be shaping up at the Golden Globes this Sunday, long before the first award is given out. There's a showdown brewing on the red carpet, a real cat fight between two Rivers and one Star.

(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)

COLLINS (voice-over): In this corner, the mother/daughter duo, dishing the dirt on what designers the stars wear when they walk the red carpet. Joan and Melissa Rivers.

JOAN RIVERS: Now, who helped you pick your dress? COLLINS: They did their catty chat on the E! Channel for nine years. This year, they'll be talking the talk on the TV Guide Channel.

And in this corner, the newcomer Star Jones. No, make that Star Jones-Reynolds. Replacing the Rivers on E!, filling both pairs of (UNINTELLIGIBLE) or Jimmys or Christians or whatever.

Now, those who think about these things are wondering, is the red carpet big enough for all of them?

SARAH BERNARD, NEW YORK MAGAZINE: Now it's going to be, you know, which one are you going to tune into? Because it's going to be a huge ratings war, and Star is famous for fawning over everyone.

COLLINS: So one way to decide which of the dueling divas to watch before you watch the awards could be appropriately enough, a question of style.

Let's compare. The Rivers' on the red carpet.

RIVERS: Hi, can I talk to you for a minute?

COLLINS: Star on the red carpet.

STAR JONES: Hi, (UNINTELLIGIBLE).

COLLINS: Joan and Melissa.

RIVERS: I'm wearing Pamela Dennis, but the color is hematite.

COLLINS: Star.

JONES: Looks like Mr. Armani designed that just for you.

COLLINS: Still can't decide? Well, both teams have been taking their cases to "The Today Show."

MELISSA RIVERS: I feel like it's my job to bring the excitement of the moment to the viewers.

JONES: I'm a big fan. I mean, for me, television and film, this is like manna from heaven for me.

COLLINS: Of course, there's always the chance of the occasionally confused Joan committing one of her now famous faux pas.

UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: If you could get the names right, that would be a big improvement for you.

COLLINS: And the E! Channel is promoting its new star on its Web site with "no wedding talk, we promise."

Of course, you could just skip the red carpet cat fight and tune into the live coverage on CNN, where Sibila Vargas will be asking, let's face it, the only question you really want answered. UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: What are you wearing?

(END VIDEOTAPE)

COLLINS: I'm Heidi Collins. Anderson Cooper returns on Monday. Up next, "PAULA ZAHN NOW." Hi, Paula.

TO ORDER A VIDEO OF THIS TRANSCRIPT, PLEASE CALL 800-CNN-NEWS OR USE OUR SECURE ONLINE ORDER FORM LOCATED AT www.fdch.com


Aired January 14, 2005 - 19:00   ET
THIS IS A RUSH TRANSCRIPT. THIS COPY MAY NOT BE IN ITS FINAL FORM AND MAY BE UPDATED.
HEIDI COLLINS, HOST: An avalanche near Park City, Utah, and fears of a dam breaking in California.
360 starts right now.

A huge avalanche hits just outside a major ski resort in Utah. Rescuers searching for survivors trapped beneath the snow. We'll take you live to the scene of the slide.

Mother Nature's fury unleashed. Overflowing rivers and streams wreaking havoc as thousands of residents are forced to flee from a dam ready to burst.

Mourning the loss of lives from the California mudslide. Tonight, meet one lucky family counting their blessings, who escaped the deadly mountain of mud.

The commander in chief opens up. Tonight, the words President Bush says he wishes he hadn't said.

And the awards show battle of the red carpet. It's Star Jones versus the Rivers girls. Tonight, how the two teams plan on going toe to toe at the Golden Globes.

ANNOUNCER: Live from the CNN Broadcast Center in New York, this is ANDERSON COOPER 360.

COLLINS: Good evening again. Anderson is off tonight. I'm Heidi Collins.

We begin this evening with late-breaking news of an avalanche near Park City, Utah. Search and rescue operations under way right now on U.S. Forest Service property near a ski resort called the Canyons there in Utah. Officials say more than two people are missing.

Summit County Sheriff David Edmunds is at the scene of the avalanche. He joins me now by phone from there.

Sheriff, good evening to you.

What is the very latest? How many people are trapped at this point?

SHERIFF DAVID EDMUNDS, SUMMIT COUNTY, UTAH: That's a real good question. We don't have definitive information that would tell us how many folks are up there. What we are willing to release at this point is, we believe that there are multiple victims.

COLLINS: We are looking at some live pictures here of the area, once again, known as the Canyons Ski Resort. About 20 miles away is Salt Lake City. Sheriff, what kind of search and rescue methods are being used right now? I understand there are dogs?

EDMUNDS: That's correct. We have several dog teams on scene. We have several ground-pounders that are actually using probes. We're using peeps (ph) and shovels, we're using airships. Every piece of technology and equipment that we have, we're throwing at this particular problem.

COLLINS: Some people who might be listening tonight may not be familiar with that terminology, peeps, beacons. Talk to us a little bit about how skiers who go to these out-of-bounds areas, lots of times try to carry avalanche beacons with them.

EDMUNDS: Well, the smart ones do. There's a couple of things about back-country rescue that everybody needs to be aware of when they go to the back country, is number one, that you're wearing the appropriate equipment, which includes the peeps or beacons. And also the equipment to dig your buddy out. And typically, in avalanche situations, if you can't self-rescue, or your buddy can't rescue you, your chances of survival are very slim.

COLLINS: Talk to me also, if you would, about shooting down these avalanches. I mean, I realize that there has been quite a bit of snow to fall in this area at this resort. Usually, the officials on scene there keep a very good track of how much snow is falling in order to control it with shooting avalanches down with small dynamite charges.

EDMUNDS: Absolutely. We use explosives to do that. And, you know, it's important to note that this particular avalanche was triggered outside of the resort property. So there was no avalanche -- there was no avalanche explosions that were being conducted in this area. There was no avalanche treatment.

These folks were in an area where they were skiing at their own peril. They had gone over -- under the ropes, so to speak, and they'd actually passed numerous signs indicating that they were leaving resort property and going into an area where there was no avalanche control.

COLLINS: I'm sorry, you say that they had left signs that they left the out-of-bounds, or they went into the out-of-bounds area. They told several people...

EDMUNDS: No, no, no...

COLLINS: ... that they were going there?

EDMUNDS: No. Sorry, I think you misunderstood. What I said was is that they had passed signs, and they had disregarded those signs... COLLINS: I see.

EDMUNDS: ... and gone underneath the ropes and gone into those areas on their own.

COLLINS: Well, you bring up a good point. We know that in the ski season of 2004 to 2005, there were 13 deaths across this country due to avalanches, six of them in your state alone. At this point, you know, what do you have to say to people who disregard those signs?

EDMUNDS: Well, what I would say to anyone that ventures into the back country, you know, you're doing it at a very perilous time. We haven't had avalanche conditions like this out here in the state of Utah for a number of years. And where we're at is, we're at a situation where it's just extreme. And if you decide to go into the back country, you are literally taking your life into your own hands. You are risking everything by doing that.

So the message that I have for anyone that would come and recreate here in Summit County, Utah, which is a huge tourist destination, is, if you stay inside the boundaries of the resort centers, you're going to be fine, because they conduct proper avalanche control. But anytime you decide to go outside of those boundaries, there's a good chance that you're not going to make it out of it with your life.

COLLINS: All right. Well, Sheriff David Edmunds of the Summit County Sheriff's Department, we appreciate your time here. We'll let you get back to what will probably be a very busy night ahead. Thank you, sir

EDMUNDS: Thank you very much.

COLLINS: And here now is just a little of what Salt Lake City's TV station KSL had to tell its viewers a bit earlier about the conditions that combined to lead to the avalanche.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

ARLEN RANDOLPH, KSL METEOROLOGIST: I want to take you back to Viper, and we'll go back over how much snow has fallen just, really, just in the last couple of weeks. Recent storms, everybody. Yes, let's talk about it. We know they've pounded the mountains. They've dropped anywhere from 30 to 60 inches of snow. But that was really heavy snow.

The flow, the atmospheric winds delivering all that moisture, came off the Pacific, off of Southern California. So the snow density was very, very high. We're talking about eight to 10 inches of snow to one inch of water.

Along with that, we had winds recently between 50 and 90-plus miles per hour. Oh, my goodness. They created snow cornices, they rearranged the snow that had fallen. Huge mountains of heavy, wet, drifting snow piled up all over our mountains of not only northern Utah but the central and south as well. And that snow, Keith and Carol, let me talk about this. Fifth -- over -- between 15 and 20 feet of snow have fallen this season alone for the Canyons. Canyons' total is 243 inches of snow. Continuing the snow, nine feet of snow, just since December 28 at the Canyons Resort.

The impact of the weather, I think, has been quite large in that the way the snow was delivered, with early fluffy snow laid down, and then this layer of what sometimes we refer to as Sierra cement, this heavy, wet, high-density snow on top of a very, very difficult and rotten snowpack for the most part. So that's the situation.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

COLLINS: And you were just listening to KSL meteorologist Arlen Randolph a little bit earlier in the night.

Right now, we want to take you directly to the area live. The same affiliate is listening to their helicopter pilot give an update on the situation. Two hours earlier there now, so still a little bit of daylight to work with. Let's listen in.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: ... at this altitude whether they really specifically found something. But we certainly have spotted a number of different areas of interest. Jay is going to back out again a little bit and try to find one of those areas. One of the tricky aspects of trying to work the camera from up here is that sometimes you get in a little bit too close and a little bit of movement will take us off the area. So we're going to try to find another one of those areas for you.

But we have spotted a number of different areas where it appears that rescue dogs and rescue workers have focused on an area. They're working with probes, even at times digging feverishly, trying to get into the snow. But it's really hard to tell up here without having any kind of direct communication with those workers, whether they have found anything specific, or whether they just think that it could be something.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: We saw medical helicopters sitting on the snow earlier. Are they still there, from what you can see?

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: We saw one of the medical helicopters took off a little while ago. Whether it's still there right now, I don't know. They may still have one on the ground. We did see, and we have seen in the last five or 10 minutes, a lot of those rescue workers, ski patrol people, heading down. So it could be that a number of their folks are starting to come down off the mountain.

I haven't had any contact with the sheriff's department down on the ground. So I'm not exactly familiar with when they're going to cut off the search, or whether they're going to search for a number of hours.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Yes, they're going to run out of light here pretty soon, so that may be a factor. OK, Jed Bull (ph), live in Chopper 5 over the avalanche in Summit County this afternoon, thanks.

UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: Thanks, Jed.

Joining us now is Adam Moffat (ph), who's a KSL photographer, and is here to show us video he shot of that same area, how long ago?

ADAM MOFFAT, KSL PHOTOGRAPHER: It was about last year I decided to take my helmetcam and go up there and kind of ski. And as you can see there, there are the gates...

UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: There it is.

MOFFAT: ... that you have to go through. It's pretty obvious, and you have to go through those gates. There is no if, ands, or buts. You have to see that sign. And...

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: That's the boundary of the ski area, right?

MOFFAT: Yes.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Not just -- OK.

UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: All right. Now, Adam, isn't that terribly scary?

MOFFAT: Yes, it is. But it's one of those -- it's part of the thrill. And, you know, as a skier and snowboarder all my life, it's what we do it for.

UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: All right, so you, there you are.

MOFFAT: Yes, this is me going down. And I believe that is right about dead center where that avalanche happened. And as you can see, there's been people that have gone down at the time I went down it. And it's just -- it's so scary to me, to see what can happen. And I was right there. This could have been me in this avalanche.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: How long is that run?

MOFFAT: I don't know. Once you get going, it's only about a minute and a half.

(CROSSTALK)

MOFFAT: You know, it's an hour hike for a minute and a half. But...

UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: Wow.

MOFFAT: ... it's untracked powder. And it's what, you know, as a skier and snowboarder, what we kind of live for.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: So you're just going in between the trees, and... MOFFAT: Yes.

UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: Yes. And you're snowboarding at this point.

MOFFAT: Yes, I'm snowboarding at this time. But you can see how many people go down and up, up and down that.

UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: You can. That is absolutely amazing.

MOFFAT: Yes.

UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: And that's the exact area. This must give you chills today.

MOFFAT: Yes, it makes me real nervous. Because (UNINTELLIGIBLE)...

COLLINS: We were just listening to our affiliate KSL and their live broadcast tonight, trying to get everybody up to speed on the avalanche that has occurred at the Canyons Ski Resort, that's about 20 miles from Salt Lake City, Utah.

Also spoke with the sheriff there in the area of Summit County. He said he didn't want to talk about numbers, but he knows at least two people are missing at this point. So they are really working with a deadline of daylight, as you see. It is about 5:10 or so in that time zone. So they're working furiously to try to get ahold of those people using all kinds of probes, shovels, beacons. They're looking for the light to flash underneath the snow. Sometimes those who ski out of bounds wear those beacons with them.

So we will, of course, will keep you up to date on this story, and have much more on it as we get it throughout the show.

Meanwhile, to California now. After weeks of rain, it was a hillside that gave way some days ago, taking 10 lives with it.

Now there are fears that a dam may give way. This is the Prado Dam near Corona, about an hour south and east of Los Angeles. Eight hundred of so people, nearby -- 800 or so nearby homes, that is, have been evacuated. There are conflicting reports, though, over whether the dam has sprung a leak, or, as the Army Corps of Engineers says, water is deliberately being released to ease the pressure on the structure.

CNN's Eric Philips joins us now from Corona with the very latest.

Eric, what can you tell us?

ERIC PHILIPS, CNN CORRESPONDENT: Well, Heidi, good evening.

I'll clear up that confusion in just a moment.

But first, what the most important information is of the hour, and that is that residents are being allowed to go back to their homes. About 800 homes, as you just said, were evacuated this morning because of that seepage situation at the dam. That was a mandatory evacuation.

Just a little while ago, the mayor here, Mayor Darrell Talbert (ph), said that that mandatory evacuation is now a voluntary evacuation. He's urging residents to stay out until Monday, but he is saying that if they insist, they can go back to their homes.

But this is the situation at the Prado Dam. Early yesterday morning, U.S. Army Corps of Engineer workers recognized that there was a seepage situation happening at a container surrounding a construction area at the dam. They kept their eye on it all day long, and as it got worse and worse, as the seepage increased exponentially, they notified local authorities, who decided to go ahead and evacuate residents for their own safety.

Now they're saying that seepage situation is under control. It continues to leak, but it has substantially decreased, and they're saying it's not a threat at all. And that's why the mandatory evacuation has gone to a voluntary evacuation.

They're saying that they are deliberately releasing millions of gallons of water at this point, and that by Monday at 12:00 noon, that seepage should stop altogether. So again, the leak continues to happen, but they're saying it's not a threat at this point, and residents can, if they insist, go back to their homes. But officials here are asking that they not do so, Heidi.

COLLINS: A little bit better news, anyway, for the weekend. All right, Eric Philips live from Corona, California, thanks, Eric.

Lots of golf courses have water hazards, as you know, but not like the ones at Pebble Beach, California now, where the torrential rains we've been covering have caused massive sinkholes and other kinds of erosion on some of the most famous fairways in the country. This is the 18th hole. And whatever it used to be, it's got to be a par 12 now at the very least.

And 360 next now, abuse, torture, and pictures seen around the world. Was it orders from above, or soldiers acting on their own? A jury has decided.

Also tonight, one of Saturn's moons up close. A first step for mankind with pictures that are out of this world.

Plus, President Bush unplugged. Find out what he's calling a confession and a regret.

But first, your picks, the most popular stories on CNN.com right now.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

COLLINS: We want to update you on the latest involving that avalanche near Park City, Utah. Right now, more than two people are still missing after this afternoon's avalanche near a ski resort. Still working to clarify that number for you.

But Jill Atwood is a former reporter who was there when it all happened. And earlier today, she told CNN in chilling detail what she saw.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

JILL ATWOOD, FORMER REPORTER (on phone): It looked like someone took a knife and cut through the side of the mountain, just a huge slab has fallen off. And you can see where it came to rest down in a valley. And right now, I can tell you, search and rescue are down there with their dogs. I have a life flight helicopter hovering overhead as we speak.

They're using dynamite to blow away some of the extra snow, the loose snow that still could threaten some of the ski patrol that are down there right now, trying to help. Just -- it was a huge slide.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

COLLINS: Once again, more than two people are still missing after the avalanche. We're going to stay on top of this one for you and bring you the very latest developments just as soon as they come in to CNN.

There are some images, though, that are hard to forget, like this one, a photograph of a group of prisoners naked at Iraq's Abu Ghraib prison. In a humiliating human pyramid, U.S. troops nearby, smiling, abusing the prisoners for laughs.

Pictures like that one sparked international outrage toward the U.S. military when they became public last year.

And just a short time ago, we got a verdict in the court-martial of the Army reservist accused of being the ringleader of the abuse at Abu Ghraib. Specialist Charles Graner, guilty tonight.

Let's go right to (UNINTELLIGIBLE) CNN's Susan Candiotti at Fort Hood, Texas, now. Susan, good evening.

SUSAN CANDIOTTI, CNN CORRESPONDENT: Hello, Heidi.

You know, at the beginning of this trial, Specialist Charles Graner said, "We'll find out what kind of monster I am."

Perhaps the jury has spoken. After deliberating about five hours, the jury found him guilty of nine of the 10 main counts. He now faces a maximum of 15 years behind bars in a military prison, almost twice as much time as the four others who so far have pleaded guilty before trial.

(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)

CANDIOTTI (voice-over): The signs inside Abu Ghraib prison said, No photographs in a high-security cell block. Yet Specialist Charles Graner, his sergeant, and other guards, brought cameras to Iraq. And it was their disregard for this very first rule, taking photos like this, that documented the prison abuse scandal.

Taking the witness stand, the sergeant and two other guards who already have pleaded guilty. They testified it was Graner who put the leash around this prisoner's neck and took this photo. It was Graner who arranged these naked Iraqis in a human pyramid. It was Graner who punched a detainee moments after this photo was taken.

The defense blamed the atmosphere of abuse on military intelligence agents assigned to the prison. An example, this guard, Megan Abyooal (ph), testified intelligence staffers told her to go watch naked Iraqi detainees in the shower, and to mock them. Abyooal's testimony was undercut by her admission she had an affair with Graner, about the same time Graner had been sleeping with another reservist, PFC Lynndie England, seen in some of the most notorious photos.

In closing arguments, the defense called Graner a scapegoat for the Army and military intelligence. The prosecution said Graner was acting on his own. At the end, it showed the jury the pyramid photo and said, This cannot become a recruitment poster for the United States Army.

(on camera): When the verdict was read, Graner stood stiffly at attention, showing no visible reaction. Deliberations are now under way for the sentencing, and those deliberations could go well into the night, Heidi.

COLLINS: All right, Susan Candiotti in Fort Hood, Texas, tonight. Susan, thank you.

Shortly after the September 11 attacks, President Bush said Osama bin Laden was wanted, dead or alive. Those were tough words, but words Mr. Bush now says had unintended consequences.

In interviews this week, he expressed misgivings over the vocabulary he used while trying to make a point.

CNN's Elaine Quijano reports on some rare candid moments with the president.

(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

GEORGE W. BUSH, PRESIDENT OF THE UNITED STATES: ... got to follow the path...

(END VIDEO CLIP)

ELAINE QUIJANO, CNN CORRESPONDENT (voice-over): He's joked about his plainspokenness many times, and even made it a part of his stump speech.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

BUSH: Sometimes I am a little too blunt. I get that from my mother.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

QUIJANO: Now, President Bush, who last year struggled to name a mistake he'd made...

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

BUSH: I just haven't -- just put me under the spot here.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

QUIJANO: ... says he can think of two times he wished he would have chosen his words more carefully. Once, when he discussed insurgents in Iraq, just months after the U.S.-led invasion of that country.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

BUSH: There are some who feel like that, you know, the conditions are such that they can attack us there. My answer is, bring 'em on.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

QUIJANO: In an interview airing tonight on ABC's "20/20," Mr. Bush expressed second thoughts about that statement.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP, "20/20, ABC)

BUSH: When I, I said some things in the first term that probably a little blunt. "Bring it on" was a little blunt. And I was really speaking to the -- to our troops. But it came out, and it had a different connotation, a different meaning for others. And so I've got to -- I'll be, I'll be more disciplined in how I say things.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

QUIJANO: Another time happened in the days after September 11 at the Pentagon, when Mr. Bush said this of Osama bin Laden.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

BUSH: I want justice. And there's an old poster out West, as I recall, that said, Wanted, dead or alive.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

QUIJANO: The president candidly admitted that phrase raised the ire of the first lady.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP, "20/20," ABC)

BUSH: I guess it's not the most diplomatic of language. Laura, as a matter of fact, chewed me out right after that. So I, I, I, I, I do have to be cautious about, you know, conveying thoughts is, in, in, in a way, maybe, that doesn't send wrong impressions about our country.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

QUIJANO (on camera): Now, the president said he didn't know if his acknowledgement of poor word choice should be called a regret, a confession, or simply a lesson. And while he expressed misgivings about the language he used, he also made clear he had no regrets about the actions he took, Heidi.

COLLINS: Elaine Quijano tonight. Elaine, thanks.

360 next, an avalanche near Park City, Utah. Rescue operations under way right now. We're bringing you the latest as it unfolds.

Sex, bombs, and angry rats. The Pentagon dreams up some creative ways of incapacitating enemy troops. Wait till you hear the details.

Also tonight, Bush unplugged. The president shares a confession and a regret.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP, "HISTORY OF THE WORLD, PART 1")

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: They'll be here any minute!

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Not to worry, not to worry. We are now armed with mighty joints.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Mighty joints?

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: (UNINTELLIGIBLE), let's go, (UNINTELLIGIBLE).

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Quickly, after them!

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: We've got to -- we've got to...

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Get moving. We've got to stay loose, you know? Let it cool. Let the coolness get into our vertebrae.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Go, men! Go northward. You go southward. I'm going to walk here around in a circle.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

COLLINS: I don't know how you can't laugh. Mel Brooks, incapacitating opposing armies in his movie "History of the World, Part 1."

As far out as that weapon was, it seems to fall right in step with some proposals for the military. According to one magazine, researchers were tinkering with some bizarre weapons ideas. Now, we want to be clear, these ideas were rejected long ago. So think of this as an entertaining diversion of what ended up in the trash bin.

(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE) COLLINS (voice-over): Consider modern combat. Could an enemy love itself to death? According to the Sunshine Project, a group which tracks research on chem- and bioweapons, the Pentagon has reviewed plans to develop various nonlethal weapons, including a so- called gay bomb, an aphrodisiac weapon to make enemy soldiers so irresistible to each other, morale would plummet.

Other weapons ideas dating from 1994 at the U.S. Air Force Research Lab, unleashing wasps or rats on the enemy. And a chemical to cause such severe halitosis, it would gross out the enemy.

The U.S. Marines, issuing a statement today, saying ideas are submitted from many sources. Quote, "None of the systems described in that proposal have been developed."

JOHN PIKE, DIRECTOR, GLOBALSECURITY.ORG: It's no surprise that they would be looking at all kinds of ideas to how to incapacitate enemies on the battlefield. Some of them might actually work. And the problem is that in developing any of these weapons systems, you know in advance that half of them are bad ideas. You just don't know in advance which half are the bad ones.

COLLINS: One of the bad ones predates the psychedelic '60s, the era of make love, not war. In the '50s, according to globalsecurity.org, the Army's Chemical Corps launched a project called Psychochemical Agents and tested the hippie drug LSD. The idea was to release it from airplanes and make the enemy hallucinate. It didn't work, and LSD was dropped.

Can you picture the U.S. striking back with bats? Project X-Ray was launched during World War II. The military's idea was to attack using bats wearing tiny explosives.

PIKE: Under the theory that when the bats went home to roost inside Japanese houses, that the firebombs would go off, and be able to burn down Japanese housing. By the time the atomic bombs were dropped, they still hadn't figured out how to make it work, and then the war ended.

COLLINS: Pike says it's impossible to know what the military is actually testing right now. But he says hope springs eternal the military will come up with ways to incapacitate the enemy without having to kill them.

(END VIDEOTAPE)

COLLINS: Amazing newly released images of last month's tsunami as it rips apart a construction site. That tops our look at global stories in the uplink.

Take a look at this. The video taken by an Australian tourist during his visit to Phuket, Thailand. As you can see, the tsunami just destroyed the area, even left one man stranded on a mound in the middle of the wave.

Darmstadt, Germany, more astounding images beamed to earth this afternoon from Saturn's moon Titan. They're the first we've seen from the moon's surface, which scientists believe closely resembles earth in its early stages. The images, taken by the European space probe Huygens, show what appears to be drainage channels and a shoreline, which will likely made a liquid, made by a liquid, but not water. Hmm.

London, England. Prince Harry will not go to Auschwitz. Some British newspapers said a visit to the concentration camp site would be his punishment for wearing this Nazi costume at a party. But the office of Prince Charles denies that, saying instead it's negotiating to have Prince Harry work with local Jewish charities. The prince has apologized for the incident.

And across the U.K., the king still rules. Elvis Presley's "Jail House Rock" will likely return to the top of the U.K. charts this weekend. Sony music is rereleasing Elvis Presley's No. 1 hits in the U.K. to mark would have been his 70th birthday. And that's tonight's "Uplink."

A huge avalanche hits just outside a major ski resort in Utah. Rescuers searching for survivors trapped beneath the snow. We'll take you live to the scene of the slide.

And the award show battle of the red carpet. It's Star Jones versus the Rivers girls. Tonight, how the 2 teams plan on going toe to toe at the Golden Globes. 360 continues.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

COLLINS: The latest now on our developing story, an avalanche in Park City, Utah. About 30 search and rescue workers are on the scene right now outside the Canyons Resort. Officials say more than 2 people are missing.

I want to talk more about it now. From Salt Lake City is Bruce Tremper, who is the manager of the Forest Services Avalanche Center in Utah. Mr. Tremper a life long mountain man, a long time ski racer, also the author of the book "Staying Alive in Avalanche Terrain."

Thanks so much for being with us, Mr. Tremper. Appreciate your time here.

So over the past 2 weeks, this area has seen about 7 feet of wet, heavy snow. These are prime avalanche conditions.

BRUCE TREMPER, FOREST SERVICES AVALANCHE CENTER, UTAH: Yes, we've had a huge storm that's come over the last two and a half weeks, starting just around Christmas and going almost nonstop for two and a half weeks. And it ended with a flourish with a huge amount of water weight coming down, because the storm was unusually large and unusually windy and unusually warm. So it made a very dense, hard, stiff slab over the top of these buried weak layers.

And that's the problem. Kind of like trying to park a Cadillac on top of a pile of potato chips. It just doesn't work. So, it's overloading these weak layers and things are sliding out. It was much worse a few days ago when we had extreme avalanche danger ratings and avalanche warnings going on.

Things have kind of settled down a little bit recently. So there's less avalanches. As you can see, there still are avalanches occurring.

COLLINS: Yeah. We're looking at the video now, trying to conduct this rescue operation. We also want to take a look at an avalanche in action. How fast do these things move? Some people I know try to outrun them or outski them. Not a smart idea?

TREMPER: Avalanches can go very fast. Just within a few seconds, they're going 60, 80, sometimes even 100 miles an hour. So they're very difficult to outrun. Most of the time they're triggered by the victim or somebody in the victim's party. Which is actually good, because it means we can avoid avalanches most of the time if we want to. It's not like getting struck by lightning or something like that.

COLLINS: I don't know if you can see our video but it is amazing how fast these slides happen. I know you've been caught in one. Tell us what that was like.

TREMPER: Well, it's like somebody pulls a rug out from underneath you. A lot of people think avalanches are just a bunch of loose snow. But they're actually a slab of snow, a plate of snow that slides off the mountain like a magazine sliding off the table. And it's like somebody pulls a rug out from underneath you, like I say. And you fall down. And suddenly you're tumbling. And snow is just going everywhere. It's going under your eyelids, down your underwear. Every time you take a breath it just forms this plug of snow in your mouth.

COLLINS: Yeah. And you can't breathe. I mean, you're suffocating.

TREMPER: Yeah. Then when you get buried, you can't move. It's like being frozen in concrete. And you die from asphyxiation. Carbon dioxide builds up in the snow around your mouth. And you only have about 15 minutes to live underneath the snow, so you've got to get people out from under very quickly.

COLLINS: Yeah. And that's what they're doing right now.

Bruce Tremper, we are very glad that you made it out of your experience alive. Thank you so much for your expertise tonight.

TREMPER: Thank you.

COLLINS: Meantime, in the Midwest, the Ohio River continues to overflow its banks, making things very difficult indeed for more than a few riverside towns. Marietta, Ohio, perhaps chief among them. Alina Cho is there. Hi Alina.

ALINA CHO, CNN CORRESPONDENT: Hi there, Heidi.

Marietta is often ground zero for flooding in Ohio. It has seen more than its share of floods in its 217-year history. It is the oldest city in Ohio. And it is actually built between two of the state's largest rivers. And that makes it especially vulnerable when those rivers flood.

Now today, the Ohio River, just to the right of me, crested above its 35-foot flood stage for the third time in 4 months. And a second time in a week. Now, thankfully today there was no major damage to speak of. But last week, quite a different story. Many of the businesses in Historic Marietta got the warning, cleared out their stock and actually shut down.

Now, some of the businesses, interestingly enough, actually are built on a tilt, at an angle so that when the water flows into the stores, it can actually flow out right away. And that minimizes the damage.

Now Marietta is a very small city, population about 15,000. But people like the mayor say the river is a big draw.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

MICHAEL MULLEN, MAYOR OF MARIETTA: It's the river that gives it the charm.

CHO (on camera): But it is also giving you a lot of headaches.

MULLEN: Well, we've had the two highest floods in the last 40 years. And unfortunately, they've come in the last 4 months.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

CHO: Historically, Marietta used the waterways as roadways. But today, the mayor says that more cargo flows through here and through the Ohio River than flows through the Panama Canal. And even though Marietta is especially vulnerable to flooding, people we talked to here said there's no reason to build a flood wall. That would take away from the charm.

COLLINS: Man, what is going on with the weather? Alina Cho live from Marietta, Ohio tonight. Thanks Alina.

360 next, more than a week after a toxic train crash some people still can't go home. We'll show you how this small town is coping.

And the South's little secret. One lawyer calls it a divorce epidemic. We'll talk to him coming up.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

Surely you have not forgotten this scene at La Conchita, California earlier this week when what was a saturated hillside suddenly became a thick, brown river of mud, swallowing whole houses and taking ten lives. We're joined now in Santa Barbara by Bob Coleman who must surely be grateful to be alive. He was at home there in La Conchita during that mudslide. Thanks for being with us, Mr. Coleman. It is nice to see you. I know that you were in your house vacuuming when this thing hit. What did you see and feel, for that matter?

BOB COLEMAN, LANDSLIDE SURVIVOR: That's correct. We had just returned home because there was a mud flow that had crossed the 101 freeway and closed that off. And I had taken my wife and son up to see that. And get us a better picture of our young neighborhood and what was going on there. We just returned home and had a little bit of a discussion, and then, yes, started vacuuming. So I was in our front room, which I have a picture of, and that was about 30 yards from the site of the slide. So I watched the slide go from behind my house to down the street.

COLLINS: So even though you were vacuuming which is obviously loud, you felt this thing.

COLEMAN: Yes, it was like a 3.0 to 4.0 earthquake. A rolling type of feeling in the house. The sounds were just -- they were horrifying. There was a retaining wall that was quite massive and strong. And it snapped and broke. I watched telephone poles lift out of the ground. I watched telephone poles fly through the air, shaking. I saw the straps. And then at that moment we started hearing yelling and screaming and crying.

COLLINS: Mr. Coleman, I want to read you something that the sheriff said. He mentioned this. "We believe the La Conchita community is a geologically hazardous area. It has been historically, it is today, and it will remain so. We do not recommend that people return to this area or that people who stay here remain here." Will you go back to your home, sir?

COLEMAN: Most definitely. That's my home. That's where my son was born. That's where I plan to raise my son.

COLLINS: That's a pretty tough thing to hear. No matter what the cost?

COLEMAN: Well, within reason. I'm a reasonable person. Yes, the safety of my wife and son and myself is, of course, the most important. And that's why right now we will stay away. It's a simple thing, though. It's about saturation of the hill. And what happened ten years ago, what happened now, is caused due to water. While there's been a lack of control of that water, and so this happens. Honestly, there's been more slides on the 101 freeway than there has been in La Conchita. I'll tell you it's almost more dangerous to be on the freeway.

COLLINS: Rob Coleman, we wish you the best of luck. Thanks for being with us tonight.

For some folks in Graniteville, South Carolina, the cloud has finally lifted. The killer in the night. A toxic chlorine gas that spewed from this train crash last Thursday claiming nine lives, is no longer rampant. Nearly 5,500 people had been evacuated and since yesterday, authorities have been allowing many of them to return home. The rest may soon follow.

I was in Graniteville this week and sat down with a couple of families as they waited to go back.

(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)

UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: I like playing with my friend. I like watching TV. "Powerpuff Girls" and "Spongebob."

COLLINS (voice-over): She is child of the lintheads, the people that have worked the local cotton mill in Graniteville, South Carolina, for generations.

JUDY KEY, GRANITEVILLE RESIDENT: We was called lintheads. Balls of cotton would get in your hair. A lot of people would come out of the mill, they didn't brush their hair, comb their hair, they would just come on out like they was.

COLLINS: Abby (ph) lives with her mom and her grandmother. For now they live here, in a hotel filled with hundreds of other people who fled their homes one week ago. A train accident left deadly chlorine gas spewing into the air.

UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: I didn't know it happened. When it was on that train day. I didn't know it happened.

COLLINS: Nine people were killed. Hundreds injured. And thousands, many of them family and neighbors, sent to hotels just like this one.

UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: Because I like going to hotels and stuff. Because hotels are fun.

COLLINS: Unaware of the tragedy around her.

UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: I didn't check mine.

COLLINS: She thinks of it as an adventure. But the adults know better.

KEY: He was in a wheelchair.

COLLINS: Some of the victims were friends.

KEY: I miss Rusty Rushton. We knew him.

COLLINS: Abby and Nanny only live half a mile from where it happened.

KEY: Just sounded like just a hard thunderstorm.

COLLINS: They were evacuated from the area. Forced out of their home. Left with nothing but uncertainty.

KEY: You really don't know what to do. You don't know what questions to ask. All you can do is sit and watch TV.

COLLINS: Nanny and Abby are just part of the old mill town community at the heart of Graniteville. KEY: Where everybody knows everybody. Everybody works in a mill.

COLLINS: Their home, like the others in the neighborhood, built a century ago. Nanny's been in the same house for 37 years.

KEY: I don't know what kind of shape my house is in.

COLLINS: Making it that much harder to accept that gas may have damaged her beloved home beyond repair.

KEY: You just hear so many rumors.

COLLINS: Officials have yet to get close enough to the accident site to learn what can and cannot be salvaged.

KEY: Some say they're going to burn them. All such rumors as that. I said, well, if I have to, you know, move, leave home, I'm just going to buy me a little old place with a pond in the front yard and feast the rest of my life.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Everybody grew up with everybody. I mean, it's a small town. It has everything you need.

COLLINS: Tim and Lynn Heath live next door to Abby and her nanny back at home, and now they are in the room right next door at the motel.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: I want to go home. But I want to know that I'm safe in my home. I'm nervous as a long tailed cat in a room full of dogs.

LYNN HEATH, GRANITEVILLE RESIDENT: I'm scared for my daughter.

COLLINS: The future for them and their family also uncertain.

HEATH: The worst would be losing our home. Because we've lived there since me and my husband's been together. And he's been there since he was a kid. Ever since he was born.

COLLINS: When you think about going back, I hear you saying a lot of things about when I go back. Or when it's safe. What if you can't go back at all?

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: : I haven't really thought about that. If you can't go back, you've got to go forward. You can't let something like this stop you in your tracks. Just take what life gives you.

HEATH: It's as simple as that.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: You have to make it simple as that. If you don't, you dwell on it. It will eat you up on the inside. It's not worth looking at the negative aspects of this. Just kind of put blinders on, look straight ahead.

COLLINS: And straight into each other's arms if need be. Neighbors or family, they're one and the same for people of this old mill town.

HEATH: We just look forward to going back home.

COLLINS: Wherever that home may be.

(END VIDEOTAPE)

(on camera): I just spoke to the family a little while ago and they tell me they are hopeful yet still don't know for certain whether or not they'll be able to go back to their homes.

360 next. The South's dirty little secret according to one lawyer. He says it's facing a divorce epidemic. We'll talk to him about lost love southern style.

Plus the red carpet battle. Joan Rivers faces competition at this weekend's Golden Globes.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

COLLINS: Half of all Americans who say "I do" will eventually say, "I don't." But it's down South where breaking up is really booming. No wonder some call it the Divorce Belt. And January being the unofficial start of divorce season, plenty of red-state marriages will soon be turning blue. My next guest says 35 percent of all divorces occur in the South. Joining me from Atlanta now is John C. Maydue, family attorney, and author of "Southern Divorce: Why Family Breakups Have Fractured the South and How to Cope With It." Thanks for being with us, Mr. Maydue. We appreciate your time here.

As we've said, four of the five highest state rates of divorce are in the South. You call it the South's dirty little secret, in fact. So why is the divorce rate higher there in the Bible Belt?

JOHN MAYDUE, AUTHOR, "SOUTHERN DIVORCE": What I find astonishing, Heidi, is we're sitting here in the land of the Bible Belt, the so-called land of family values, and your chances of getting divorced in the South are much greater than they are in other regions in the country. Now, social scientists tell us that we get divorced more in the South because we get married too young, because we get married closer to the poverty line, and because we get married less educated. None of that explains to me, however, how we're the number one church-going region in the country. We go to organized religious services more than any other place in the country. And yet here we are professing family values but divorcing at a much greater rate than, for example, the northeastern United States.

COLLINS: So you think it's a little hypocritical?

MAYDUE: I don't like to use that word. I like to say it's inconsistent. But the greatest explanation I've seen for it that makes sense to me is I think there's more idealism in the South regarding the institution of marriage. And I think we're taught earlier that this is an ideal relationship. When we realize that it really isn't, and you couple that with the fact that no-fault divorce is sometimes easier to file and obtain than perhaps renewing your driver's license, that's what the dynamic is causing I think more and more divorce.

COLLINS: Well, the state with the lowest divorce rate, though, is Massachusetts. Is there something we can learn from the people there?

MAYDUE: Isn't that astonishing? Here's the land of Teddy Kennedy, the land of organized or I should say legal gay marriage, and yet they have the lowest divorce rate in this country.

Now, I've heard two explanations. One being there's more Lutherans and there's more Catholics there. That doesn't really fit with me. I have heard that there's more of a structure in the communities that promote marriage. And I think that issue of it -- it's called social integration -- may give us a better explanation.

COLLINS: What do you think about Southern state governments? Are they doing enough to tackle the divorce problem?

MAYDUE: I'd say yes and no. There's an initiative in the South toward covenant marriage, which basically says we're going to make it harder to get married and harder to get divorced. It's very controversial. I've not seen any statistics that tell me that that works.

What's interesting, both the Bush administration and some states have had these marriage initiatives. And they're going to teach us how to stay married, teach us how to have family values. And what I love about that, Heidi, who are the teachers going to be? Our politicians such as former President Bill Clinton? Is he going to teach us? Who is going to teach us? I don't mean to pick on him. But I mean, I'm not sure I want the politicians giving their storied pasts, particularly socially, telling us how we should live.

COLLINS: Right. Well, John Maydue, we appreciate your time here today. Something interesting to think about indeed. Thanks again.

MAYDUE: Thanks for having me.

COLLINS: 360 next, the battle of the celebrity interviews. Joan Rivers has competition now on the red carpet at the Sunday's Golden Globes. More on dueling divas ahead in "The Current."

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

COLLINS: In tonight's "Current," a battle royale will be shaping up at the Golden Globes this Sunday, long before the first award is given out. There's a showdown brewing on the red carpet, a real cat fight between two Rivers and one Star.

(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)

COLLINS (voice-over): In this corner, the mother/daughter duo, dishing the dirt on what designers the stars wear when they walk the red carpet. Joan and Melissa Rivers.

JOAN RIVERS: Now, who helped you pick your dress? COLLINS: They did their catty chat on the E! Channel for nine years. This year, they'll be talking the talk on the TV Guide Channel.

And in this corner, the newcomer Star Jones. No, make that Star Jones-Reynolds. Replacing the Rivers on E!, filling both pairs of (UNINTELLIGIBLE) or Jimmys or Christians or whatever.

Now, those who think about these things are wondering, is the red carpet big enough for all of them?

SARAH BERNARD, NEW YORK MAGAZINE: Now it's going to be, you know, which one are you going to tune into? Because it's going to be a huge ratings war, and Star is famous for fawning over everyone.

COLLINS: So one way to decide which of the dueling divas to watch before you watch the awards could be appropriately enough, a question of style.

Let's compare. The Rivers' on the red carpet.

RIVERS: Hi, can I talk to you for a minute?

COLLINS: Star on the red carpet.

STAR JONES: Hi, (UNINTELLIGIBLE).

COLLINS: Joan and Melissa.

RIVERS: I'm wearing Pamela Dennis, but the color is hematite.

COLLINS: Star.

JONES: Looks like Mr. Armani designed that just for you.

COLLINS: Still can't decide? Well, both teams have been taking their cases to "The Today Show."

MELISSA RIVERS: I feel like it's my job to bring the excitement of the moment to the viewers.

JONES: I'm a big fan. I mean, for me, television and film, this is like manna from heaven for me.

COLLINS: Of course, there's always the chance of the occasionally confused Joan committing one of her now famous faux pas.

UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: If you could get the names right, that would be a big improvement for you.

COLLINS: And the E! Channel is promoting its new star on its Web site with "no wedding talk, we promise."

Of course, you could just skip the red carpet cat fight and tune into the live coverage on CNN, where Sibila Vargas will be asking, let's face it, the only question you really want answered. UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: What are you wearing?

(END VIDEOTAPE)

COLLINS: I'm Heidi Collins. Anderson Cooper returns on Monday. Up next, "PAULA ZAHN NOW." Hi, Paula.

TO ORDER A VIDEO OF THIS TRANSCRIPT, PLEASE CALL 800-CNN-NEWS OR USE OUR SECURE ONLINE ORDER FORM LOCATED AT www.fdch.com