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Anderson Cooper 360 Degrees
Hurricane Katrina Headed for Florida; Bill Clinton in Africa; Unclaimed Luggage; Dumpster Diving for Food
Aired August 25, 2005 - 19:00 ET
THIS IS A RUSH TRANSCRIPT. THIS COPY MAY NOT BE IN ITS FINAL FORM AND MAY BE UPDATED.
RICK SANCHEZ, GUEST HOST: Good evening. This morning, it was a tropical storm, but at this time, Katrina is a hurricane, and at the moment, she's churning ashore off the Florida coast. It's 7:00 p.m. in the East, 4:00 p.m. out West. 360 starts right now.
(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)
ANNOUNCER: Say it ain't so. Another Hurricane, Katrina. Tonight, what you need to know as Katrina comes ashore.
Stranger in a strange land. Question: What do you get when former President Bill Clinton goes to a land scarred by profound misery?
BILL CLINTON, FORMER PRESIDENT OF THE UNITED STATES: It's sweeping the world like a firestorm, killing people of all ages.
ANNOUNCER: Answer, a stream of prayers, hopes and good medicine.
Who am I? Tonight, a story of three men suffering from amnesia, struggling to remember their identity. Tonight, hear for yourself the frustration, trying to unlock the mystery of their pasts.
What these people do will shock you. They're well-educated, well paid. So what are they doing in alleys and behind all these restaurants?
Live from the CNN Broadcast Center in New York. This is ANDERSON COOPER 360.
(END VIDEOTAPE)
SANCHEZ: And good evening, everyone. I'm Rick Sanchez. Anderson is off tonight.
We're going to begin with a developing story out of Florida. Hurricane Katrina, already the 11th named storm of the season, right now getting even stronger.
Just a short time ago, Katrina made landfall. Millions of people, as you know, are in its path.
CNN is your hurricane headquarters. We have live team coverage. CNN meteorologist Rob Marciano is in Hollywood Beach. John Zarrella is in Delray Beach, and Jason Carroll is going to be live along Deerfield Beach as we continue to follow the story northward. Now, let's start with Rob. Rob, you're the closest to downtown Miami area, are you not?
ROB MARCIANO, CNN METEOROLOGIST: Yes, we are, just north of the Broward/Miami-Dade line there, which is pretty much where the storm came ashore, or is coming ashore right now. Our winds earlier were from the west to the east offshore, indicating that the thing was to our east-northeast. Now, the winds have come onshore. You can see behind me the palm trees blowing in the wind. You can see the strong surf also, which has built up the last couple of hours.
Luckily, the tide right now is low and not expected to crest until well after midnight.
So the timing of this storm coming on land really couldn't be better.
But now, winds coming onshore as the eye, very ragged eye to our south, passes off to the east.
Broward County took no chance with this. They shut down part of the Everglades. They're shutting down the airport tonight. They're shutting down schools as well. But there is a lot of folks out here who are just coming out to see the storm.
Just to the south, Rick, where you mentioned Miami, folks out and about like it's no problem at all, but this is still going to last for a good three or four hours, a very slow-moving storm, Rick. And as it continues to press onshore, I would suspect -- I can't see the radar, but I suspect there's some nasty weather on the east side of that eyewall, and we'll be here throughout the evening to tell you about it. Back over to you.
SANCHEZ: Rob Marciano, following that storm for us. As you can see, we're going to be keying in on the northern part of the storm, because that's where oftentimes the most damage is found. So let's go now a little further north. Hollywood Beach, from there we go to John Zarrella. He's standing by in Delray Beach. John, what are you seeing there?
JOHN ZARRELLA, CNN CORRESPONDENT: Well, a lot of wind and steady rain here. You can see out there, the ocean, the surf really pounding in, Rick. Those white caps, the wind whipping the tops off of those white caps.
We've had tropical storm force winds steady here for about the last three hours, gusting around 45, 50, 55 miles an hour.
Now, I want to bring in Burgess (ph), who's actually done a really good -- he was out surfing. That didn't go too well. But right along the edge of the water, Burgess (ph) found an endangered sea turtle, a hatchling, that had just hatched, probably about a day ago. I'm not sure, that may be a loggerhead, Rick, and he saved it, pulled it out of the surf from the beach, and he's going -- what are you going to do with it now, Burgess (ph)? UNIDENTIFIED MALE: I'm probably going to bring it to Gumbo Limbo in Boca Raton. They do -- they save turtles and fish, and all that type of stuff.
ZARRELLA: So that's a preserve.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Yes, it is.
ZARRELLA: So what were you doing? You were telling me you were just doing the right thing.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Yeah, I'm just trying to do the right thing. I mea, this thing hasn't even had a chance to live yet, and I think everybody has a chance at life.
ZARRELLA: Burgess (ph), good job by you to bring that turtle in.
So, again, one of the survivors, a hatchling sea turtle here. At this time of the year, a lot of those down here.
But again, the wind coming out of the north, Rick, and we've been getting these steady tropical storm force winds. The real concern with this storm is not so much the wind, but it's going to be the rainfall, because the storm is going to linger over us for so many hours. The potential for serious flooding over the next 24 hours -- Rick.
SANCHEZ: Of course, South Floridians know how to gauge these things, and they know the difference between a one and a five. This being a one, how are people treating it, John?
ZARRELLA: Well, I wouldn't say lackadaisical, Rick, but I can tell you, look, there's people out here, they're hanging out, they're on their cell phones, they're coming down to the beach. So, it is one of those events where the folks out here really want to get a look at nature's power, and with a one, you can go do that. You can't do that with much else -- Rick.
SANCHEZ: Well, we went north when we went to John; let's continue going north now. Our coverage of Hurricane Katrina takes us a bit up the coast to CNN's Jason Carroll. He is joining us now from Deerfield Beach. And Jason, what are you seeing there?
JASON CARROLL, CNN CORRESPONDENT: Well, Rick, I know you're used to things like this, but I'm a California boy, so this is new to me. So I want to tell you, I know you were talking about how people are treating it. Take a look at some of these guys over here. They're hiding behind that bush there, as you can see. They probably should be inside, because the sand out here is stinging. The wind and the rain is incredible at this point. Forty-four-mile-per-hour gusts is what we been experiencing out here, along with a few crazy locals who are trying to have a good time in all this madness.
In terms of the wind, you can see just from looking at me, Deerfield is actually being hit pretty hard. These guys out here were telling me the wind gusts out here were stronger than what they expected even for a category one. Forty-mile-per-hour gusts is what we've experienced out here so far. You can see how the trees -- how they look in all the wind. Some of the street signs there have been flapping in the wind as well.
Deerfield is under a voluntary evacuation, but (INAUDIBLE) many of the guys who are out here, they're just hanging out here trying to wait out the storm, waiting to see what the hurricane decides to do next -- Rick.
SANCHEZ: Jason Carroll, following the story for us from Deerfield Beach. We thank you.
Katrina arrives near the anniversary of another hurricane that a lot of people in Florida, including this reporter, will certainly never forget.
Here's a 360 download for you now. Hurricane Andrew slammed into the state August 24th, 1992. The category five storm, with wind as high as 177 miles an hour, remains the most destructive hurricane in American history. Andrew is responsible for 23 deaths in the U.S. and damages of $26.5 billion.
We're going to have a lot more on the hurricane in just a moment, but first, let's go over to Erica Hill from HEADLINE NEWS. She's joining us with some of the other stories that she's been following for us on this night. What do you have, Erica?
ERICA HILL, CNN HEADLINE NEWS ANCHOR: Hi, Rick, good to see you. Hurricane Katrina, of course, a big potential flood worry in Florida tonight, but much of central and southeastern Europe has already been under water at this point for days. Check out some of these pictures. Floodwaters are receding, but still, more than 40 people are now confirmed dead. High waters and landslides destroyed thousands of homes and displaced countless people from Switzerland all the way to Romania.
In Washington, one of the best known military medical hospitals may shut its doors. The Base Realignment and Closure Commission today approved the Pentagon's plan to close Walter Reed Army Medical Center. In recent years, the center has treated some of the wounded in the Afghanistan and Iraq conflicts. Most of its work would move to a more modern hospital in Maryland, which will be renamed Walter Reed.
New York City now, where actor Russell Crowe is paying a high price for throwing a telephone at a hotel employee who failed to put through a call for him. Published reports said Crowe paid $100,000 to settle a civil lawsuit filed by the hotel clerk, but he still faces criminal charges of assault in the case. In fact, he could spend seven years in jail if he's convicted.
And Jerry Seinfeld is a dad again for the third time. Seinfeld's publicist revealed today Shepherd Kellen Seinfeld was born on Monday. Quipped Seinfeld in one of his former stand-up routines: "Make no mistake about why these babies are here. They're here to replace us." Rick, watch out.
SANCHEZ: He's got three now, I understand, right?
HILL: Three indeed.
SANCHEZ: He's got one more to catch me.
Thanks, Erica. See you in about 30 minutes.
Ahead on 360, about strangers in a strange land. What former President Bill Clinton is doing for people who have all but given up hope. 360 MD Dr. Sanjay Gupta joins the former president as he brings the might, the wealth and the big heart of the United States to Africa. A prescription from Hope.
Also, missing souls. What's left when you suddenly lose yourself? The painstaking steps of unlocking the secrets of amnesia.
And then later...
FREDRICKA WHITFIELD, CNN CORRESPONDENT: And, Rick, ever wonder what happens to lost or unclaimed baggage? Well, guess what, it ends up here, in, of all places, Scottsboro, Alabama. This is a place where all the public is available -- can buy anything available -- everything from these silk blouses, $5, $10, all bargain prices.
We'll go shopping in a minute, Rick.
(COMMERCIAL BREAK)
SANCHEZ: And welcome back to 360. I'm Rick Sanchez filling in for Anderson.
We are watching Hurricane Katrina as it hits the Florida coast, closely tracking the storm is Max Mayfield. He's the director of the National Hurricane Center. And he's joining me now live from Miami.
Max, let me start off by asking you -- if you could show our viewers that body of water between the Bahamas and Florida that's both shallow and usually very warm. What happened when the hurricane hit that area?
MAX MAYFIELD, NATIONAL HURRICANE CENTER: Well, the gulf stream water is very, very warm. It's just like high-octane fuel. The air flow environment has been very favorable. And it did indeed strengthen the forecast. And is making landfall as we speak here as a category 1 hurricane.
SANCHEZ: As a category 1 hurricane, you would describe it as how? What type of damage might people expect there?
MAYFIELD: This is certainly no Andrew. And it is not a major hurricane, that's the good news. But this ring, or the doughnut if you will, around the eye there and it's coming on the center is very near the Broward County, Miami-Dade County line and still has some very strong winds in it. Port Everglades just reported 92 miles per hour, a gust of 92. This is not a good night to be driving around anywhere in Broward County or the northern portion of Miami-Dade County. There are some strong winds. There will be trees coming down. They can fall on cars. We really want people to be very, very careful. The winds will die down after tonight. And then we'll deal with the rainfall for the next couple of days.
SANCHEZ: Max, you worry about people seeing a hurricane like this be somewhat weak and then maybe not preparing for the next one because of it?
MAYFIELD: Well, I think there will be lessons learned from this, Rick. We just had a report in of a death, a tree falling on a car in Broward County a few minutes ago. And the point is, that we've been saying this all through the day, this is not a day to be out driving around.
As the core that a hurricane moves in, it's going to weaken tonight as it goes across the peninsula, but then as it comes on from the Gulf of Mexico, we fully expect it to restrengthen and unfortunately, it's likely to head up towards the Florida panhandle, or at least in the northeastern Gulf. And the folks out there don't want to hear that again, but they may have to go through the drill again.
SANCHEZ: Max Mayfield, we appreciate you being there. Nobody better to watch it than you. So far, you've nailed every storm this year. We thank you again.
360 next, a side of Bill Clinton you've never seen before. It's his mission of hope.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
BILL CLINTON, FRM. PRESIDENT OF THE UNITED STATES: It's 100 percent preventable. And yet it's sweeping the world like a firestorm, killing people of all ages in its path.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
SANCHEZ: He's talking about the fight against AIDS. 360 MD Sanjay Gupta sits down with the former president for a revealing interview.
Also tonight, imagine not knowing who you are. We're going to talk to men and women suffering from amnesia who are trying desperately to unlock the mysteries of their own lives.
And then a little later, tracking Katrina. We are live in Florida with the very latest on this hurricane.
(COMMERCIAL BREAK)
SANCHEZ: And welcome back. In tonight's world in 360, the man from Hope, Arkansas, goes across the world on a mission of hope. Former president Bill Clinton says public health is becoming his life work. He's spending time in Africa, spending much time on the AIDS crisis. 360 M.D. Sanjay Gupta recently accompanied the former president on a trip there, a visit to people who had all, but given up on hope.
(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)
CROWD: It is possible. All things are possible. Let me show you how.
CLINTON: You want to be a doctor?
SANJAY GUPTA, CNN MEDICAL CORRESPONDENT (voice-over): Meeting new friends, greeting old ones, it looked every bit the triumphant campaign. Six countries in eight days, promoting programs to bring doctors to rural areas, medicine to children and touting the efforts of the Clinton Foundation to bring down the cost of AIDS-fighting medicine.
DR. GRACE PAIRI, LESOTHO: There is hope. There is hope for this community.
GUPTA (on camera): Some doctors call this the best AIDS medicine in the world. You can't get it in the United States. But I did find it here in the countryside of Rwanda.
(voice-over): Anti-retro viral drugs or ARVs revolutionized AIDS treatment. Generic drug makers copied the original formulas, even improved them. For example, combining several doses into two daily pills. But because of patent laws, only one generic is available in the U.S.
The vast majority of patients around the world can not afford ARVs because they cost anywhere from several hundreds dollars in Africa for generics to more than $10,000 in the United States for brand names.
But in late 2003, the Clinton Foundation brokered a deal, reducing the generic price to as little as $148 per patient per year; low enough for governments to buy them in mass quantities. I caught up with Mr. Clinton in Zanzibar in Tanzania.
(on camera): Well I want to say hello. Sanjay, CNN, nice to see you.
BILL CLINTON, FORMER PRESIDENT OF THE UNITED STATES: Nice to see you. How are you?
When I started, it just cried out for somebody to step in and put it together -- just put things together. There were all these people wanting to spend money. There were medicines to prevent a mother-to- child transmissions. Mothers -- the ARVs give people normal lives. It's 100 percent preventable and yet it's sweeping the world like a firestorm, killing people of all ages in its path.
GUPTA (voice-over): Mr. Clinton's feat was to convince these companies that a good deed could be good business. CLINTON: In the case of the drug companies, we didn't ask any sacrifice of them. Their current strategy then was high margin, low to modest volume.
We said, look, we're going to buy lots of this medicine and then the global fund is coming on. The Bush administration's initiative is coming on. There's going to be an explosion in demand for antiretrovirals. You should go to a high-volume, low-margin strategy.
GUPTA: In 2003, President Bush pledged $15 billion to fight AIDS in Africa.
GEORGE W. BUSH, PRESIDENT OF THE UNITED STATES: To turn the tide against AIDS in the most afflicted nations of Africa and the Caribbean.
GUPTA: But the president's emergency plan known as PEPFAR, only paid for brand-name medicine, since generic drugs were not adequately tested. PEPFAR now says some generics do meet safety standards, but hasn't bought any as of yet.
GUPTA (on camera): This issue of what they're going to fund in terms of drugs and not, is a controversial issue. What do you say about that? I mean, these drugs save lives.
CLINTON: Yes, they do. Keep in mind, this is a long way from where we were when I started this in late 2002, when the administration's position was, you know, if you're dealing with the Clinton Foundation with the generic drugs, you can't use our money.
And then we started spending money together when they would pay for the training and we would pay for the drugs. And then they have now gone to the FDA and said, you know, if you can get through our FDA, you can use our money on these drugs. That's a long way from where they were. So, I just think we have to keep working through this.
GUPTA (voice-over): Of course, money alone can't buy hope. It takes political will and manpower. In eastern Rwanda, it takes a bicycle.
Jean Claude, a volunteer at a new hospital, rides through the countryside day after day, visiting the same two patients, delivering AIDS medication and checking on their health.
John Gerwangra (ph) is 47 years old. He doesn't have a job or a television or a newspaper, but he knew about Mr. Clinton and his visit.
GUPTA (on camera): Do you think he might help? .
UNIDENTIFIED MALE (translator): In Rwanda, most of us miserable. So he can do something. He has to do for us.
GUPTA (voice-over): Despite the enormous challenges, the ex- president's visit was about hope. In the Rwandan capital, Kigali, the National AIDS Commission building got a facelift. Inside is a world- class laboratory. Money came from the Clinton Foundation and the Global Fund to Fight Aids, Tuberculosis and Malaria.
CLINTON: We actually do know how to do this now and we have a lot of Americans who didn't understand the connection that we have to other countries; much more sensitive to it after 9/11. So, I'm -- I feel more optimistic about this than I ever have.
Dr. Sanjay Gupta, CNN, in Tanzania.
(END VIDEOTAPE)
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
ANNOUNCER: Who am I? Tonight a story of three men suffering from amnesia, struggling to remember their identity. Tonight, hear for yourself their frustration; trying to unlock the mystery of their pasts.
What these people do will shock you. They're well-educated, well-paid. So what are they doing in alleys and behind all these restaurants? 360 continues.
(COMMERCIAL BREAK)
SANCHEZ: And welcome back. What we want to do right now is bring you updates on our top story -- a developing story no less. It's Hurricane Katrina. Right now, the storm's eye has crossed over the Florida coast. It could, could bring as much as a foot of rain, we're told, to some of the densely populated areas. Let's get you caught up now with the very latest by CNN's meteorologist, Rob Marciano. He is joining us again. He's in Hollywood Beach, which is just north of Miami. I imagine you're starting to see some pretty good bands already developing -- Rob?
ROB MARCIANO, CNN METEOROLOGIST: Rick? Hello? Hey, Rick?
SANCHEZ: Go ahead, Rob.
MARCIANO: OK, Rick. You're cutting out. Things have gotten really nasty since we last talked. I mentioned then that looking offshore looked like some really bad weather coming and I think at that point, we were on the northern fringes of the northeastern eye wall and now I think we're getting the eastern part of the eye wall, which can often be the worst.
A little bit about my position here: Directly to my right is the beach and the ocean, scattered palm trees. The only danger standing here, really, is the sand and we're getting absolutely sandblasted. It's like needles peppering your face right now.
Winds have easily been gusting over hurricane force. We had offshore wind gusts to 60 miles-an-hour, earlier. Certainly the onshore winds now have been greater than that. Even so, once this storm comes fully on onshore and it will take several hours before that happens, the main threat with this storm, Rick, not this wind that's blowing around, not this wind that's knocking off power right now -- this entire block is done with power, shingles from the hotel are coming off and these winds, according to the hurricane hunters, are only clocked at about 80 miles-an-hour.
Imagine if it was a cat two or a cat three. Once we get this thing onshore and we knock down these winds the main concern -- the main concern will be flooding: 10 to 15 inches of rain possible, Rick. And you know how flat Florida is. They have lowered the drainage canals to make way for that water, but The main concern right now or the next two to three hours are the strong winds coming onshore. That's the latest from here. Back up to you.
SANCHEZ: Rob Marciano, following that for us. We certainly thank you, Rob, for hanging in there for us.
Now, turning to a disturbing condition that certainly nobody wants to have. Imagine you wake up and you don't know who you are. For some people that's reality. I heard about these people and I wanted to see who they were firsthand. So I went to visit them and here's what I found.
(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)
SANCHEZ (voice-over): Amnesia. Memory loss. A classic starting point for Hollywood story telling. We found more than 50 movies that rely on the premise, "Who am I." From Matt Damon in "The Bourn Identity."
MATT DAMON, ACTOR: Who am I?
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: You're a U.S. government property!
SANCHEZ: To Laura Hering in "Mulholland Drive."
LAURA HERING, ACTRESS: I don't know what my name is.
SANCHEZ: To Jim Carey in "The Majestic."
Many of these fictional accounts are actually inspired by real- life stories like those we found in the halls of the Crestview Rehab Center in Atlanta.
UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: This way, Jose. Let's go to your room.
SANCHEZ: Jose is 53, not here because there's something wrong with his body, but rather, his mind.
(on camera): I want you to stop right now and imagine what it would be like to look at yourself in the mirror and simply not know who the person is that you're looking at. That is Jose's dilemma.
Do you remember where you come from?
JOSE: No.
SANCHEZ: (SPEAKING SPANISH).
JOSE: No.
SANCHEZ: Qui en es familia (ph)? Do you have a family?
JOSE: No.
SANCHEZ: No qui es familia (ph).
JOSE: No.
SANCHEZ (voice-over): Life for Jose is now based on the hope that one day it will all come back to him. In fact, it was only three months ago that out of blue he suddenly recalled part of his name, Jose Abraham, he toll his nurse.
(on camera): Do you remember why you came here? (SPEAKING SPANISH)
JOSE: No.
SANCHEZ: (SPEAKING SPANISH)
JOSE: No.
SANCHEZ: (SPEAKING SPANISH). You were in an accident. Do you remember that?
JOSE: No.
SANCHEZ: (SPEAKING SPANISH)
JOSE: No.
SANCHEZ: You don't remember.
(voice-over): Jose's plunge into mystery began three years ago after he stepped in front of a car and received a serious head injury.
Down the hall from Jose, another patient, another blank history.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Mr. Doe, John, are you going to look at the card?
SANCHEZ: John Doe is the name given to patients who have no known past or no other name.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Do you have any children?
No.
What about a brother? Do you know?
SANCHEZ: Nurses try and try, but the man behind this blank stare reveals nothing. Just three years ago he, too, suffered a head injury. But there are clues, under his socks his feet are smooth. His nails, well manicured, not a laborer, but perhaps a businessman or a tourist. Because he was exersizing, though, when he was found he had no wallet, no keys, no cell phone, in short, no identity.
DENISE SIMPSON, GRADY HOSPITAL SPOKESPERSON: It's very frustrating. We know there's got to be family looking for them somewhere and they just don't know where to look. We know they want to see family, but they don't know how to tell us to get to family.
SANCHEZ: Then, here, down another hall we found Albert Smith, or at least we think it's Albert Smith. That's the name he uses. But he remembers little else since he was found four months ago lost and confused walking through downtown Atlanta.
(on camera): Do you remember working? Do you remember having a job?
ALBERT SMITH: Oh, yes.
SANCHEZ: Did you work in a factory?
ALBERT SMITH: No. I went home, went and got me a job at a sawmill.
SANCHEZ: Oh, you had a job in a sawmill.
ALBERT SMITH: Uh-huh.
SANCHEZ (voice-over): In fact, that's about all Albert remembers, just vague recollections of working in a sawmill, perhaps as a young man in a town in Georgia, somewhere between Macon and Savannah, maybe Dublin. He's really not sure. And neither are workers and investigators who say they've exhausted their leads.
SIMPSON: We have checked out just about everything he's told us. He's mentioned some names from people in an your in South Georgia that he's familiar with. We've actually gone down there, called down there, checked on those names, unfortunately we haven't had any luck with locating any of those individuals. We just keep trying. We just keep -- every day we try something new.
SANCHEZ: As time passes for these mystery men, try is all they can do. And sometimes it works. Remember Jose with the head injury? A story about him appeared in a local newspaper and was then reprinted in Guatemala. Reporter Rafael Navarro wrote the story.
(on camera): A neighbor recognized Jose from the picture in the article, called his sister Kateralina (ph) and said, I just saw your brother in a newspaper, right?
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: yes.
SANCHEZ (voice-over): We wondered, would that connection unlock something in Jose's sealed mind? We called his sister. We handed him the phone. The reaction was instantaneous.
I'm poor and my mother is old and sick, she told him. But I'll take care of you.
So with tears in his eyes, the man who was in search of his own identity now even has a full name. Jose Abraham Osorio Barrios has something else as well, he now has a future that may reveal the secrets of his past.
(END VIDEOTAPE)
SANCHEZ: Who knows, this report could possibly reveal the secrets of somebody else's life. If you happen to recognize any of the victims, the people that you saw in this report, you can call the Crestview Rehabilitation Center in Atlanta, Georgia. It's 404-616- 8100. That's 404-616-8100.
You know what we're going to do now? We're going to bring in somebody who knows an awful lot about this. 360 MD Sanjay Gupta joins us from Atlanta. Because he's an expert on this, some of the people that he works in are actually in these hospitals -- Grady Hospital for example.
Sanjay, why do some people get head injuries and end up in a condition like these guys and other people get head injuries and a month, a couple of weeks later they're able to walk away?
GUPTA: Yeah, you know, we don't really know. And it's an amazing sort of area, sort of speaking to how complex the brain can really be with regards to memory. Memory actually has several different areas in the brain that are responsible for it. So, some people have a head injury in one discreet area might have a profound impact on their memory and others might not.
What's interesting, as well, Rick, is that there's been some progress in being able treat amnesia more -- or the loss of memory. But the good news is a lot of people get better on their own. For those who don't, there's behavioral therapy, there's hypnosis. There's also things like sedatives and antidepressants sometimes work as well. But it can be very tricky sometimes, Rick.
And sometimes being triggered by a voice that he might be able to recollect as we saw in there.
GUPTA: Yeah, that was great.
SANCHEZ: Hey Sanjay, thanks so much for being with us.
GUPTA: Thank you.
SANCHEZ: More on memory problems when 360 returns. You may be surprised what happens when people are stressed out. How much will they remember?
Also tonight...
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: Clean and wrap (ph)!
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: People don't throw out food like that.
UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: They do every day.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
SANCHEZ: Shocking revelations about the trash that people throw away and who picks it up. You won't believe what you're about to see.
(COMMERCIAL BREAK)
SANCHEZ: More now about memory. This time we look at how it can play tricks on us, especially in times of stress. 360 M.D. Sanjay Gupta joins us again to tell us about a military exercise on the mind that is producing some surprising results.
(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: I'm not going to listen to any more lies from you. You've been lying to me off and on ever since we started this interview.
GUPTA: You'd think it would be unforgettable. Imagine, nearly an hour face to face, an interrogator leans in, cajoling, then threatening, demanding the code word.
This is the military's elite survival school at Fort Bragg in North Carolina. The final exam, three days of hell: Hiding in starvation in the woods, inevitable capture and interrogation by an instructor playing the role of a brutal warden in a POW camp.
If you want to study the effect of stress on memory, this is the place. Dr. Andy Morgan of Yale University tested trainees during the mock interrogations. Not surprisingly, he found that stress measured by hormone levels is extremely high.
DR. ANDY MORGAN, YALE UNIVERSITY: When I say extraordinarily high, I mean specifically that it's higher than levels that can be seen in people who landing on an aircraft carrier at night for the first time. It's higher than people who are skydiving for the first time. So, the physical pressure can be up. People can actually physically touch them and their heart rate goes way up to about 165, 175 beats a minute.
GUPTA: A day later, Morgan showed trainees a lineup like the ones used by police. Could they identify the guard who was grilling them? Remarkably, the answer for most was no.
Details of the training are classified. The military did not let us film the mock interrogation, but we can say the interrogator's face is uncovered and comes within inches of the squirming prisoner. And yet, when shown a set of photos, only 34 percent could identify the man or woman who had confronted them. In the experiment, the eyes were not covered as they are here.
MORGAN: People picked a male when it was a female who'd interrogated them and other people swapped the gender. They said no, it was a female when it was a male. But yes, we had people who were interrogated by white men, who picked black men in the lineup and other minorities. We had people who were picking folks as their interrogator who have hair on their head when in fact their interrogator was bald.
GUPTA: When photos were shown one by one instead of all at once, accuracy was a little better, but still 49 percent. Memory may have suffered from lack of food and sleep, but Morgan says stress was the key and that the more stress the trainee registered, the less accurate he was.
MORGAN: So for the high-stress event, whether you did live lineups, photo spreads or the sequential photo lineup, you would have done better flipping a coin.
GUPTA: Intuition tells us some memories are indelible, but research shows otherwise: When it comes to memory, we often can't trust our own eyes.
Dr. Sanjay Gupta, CNN, Atlanta.
(END VIDEOTAPE)
SANCHEZ: 360 next, you are not going to believe what some wealthy folks are doing late at night. They are digging through other people's trash. What in the world would make them do this, you ask. We will explain.
Plus, we're tracking Hurricane Katrina as it hits Florida. We will bring you the latest.
(COMMERCIAL BREAK)
SANCHEZ: In tonight's "Current", the life of a freegan. What are freegans, you say? Well, for starters, they're folks who dig through the trash looking for food.
So, now you're probably thinking, "what are they poor, right?" No, they're not hungry, they're not poor. Some in fact, make a very good living. So,k why are they spending their nights rummaging through other people's garbage. Here's CNN's Adora Udoji.
(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)
ADORA UDOJI, CNN CORRESPONDENT: Madeleine Nelson lives the good life in New York City. She's an executive at a Fortune 500 company, earning enough to shop at the best stores, eat at the best restaurants. But in her world, grocery shopping means heading out at night without coupons or a wallet.
MADELINE NELSON, FREEGAN: All right. Let's get to it. UDOJI: Sometimes when the stores are closed. She's freegan. She and others like her are disgusted by food they see wasted. So instead of buying their food, they do something many people would find shocking. They dig for food out of the garbage.
UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: Breads, bagels.
UDOJI: Not exactly the kind of people you'd expect to find rummaging through mounds of trash outside grocery stores. Tonight the executive is joined by a high school teacher, some college students and the founder of Freegan.Info.
UDOJI (on camera): And you don't have any compunction of just pulling that out.
UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: No. I mean they store it all separate than the rest of the trash. This is just a bag, literally, of bread that was made today.
UDOJI: How do you know that was made today.
UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: Because they advertise that they don't sell day-old bread.
UDOJI: It smells pretty fresh.
UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: Yes.
UDOJI (voice-over): Surprisingly, on this mild summer night, the garbage doesn't stink, but it's still garbage, some of it seemingly untouched. Tomatoes, croutons and berry; hundreds of dollars of food.
NELSON: I think more stuff is getting thrown out now than ever before. Anything with the tiniest bit of an imperfection, out it goes into the trash.
UDOJI (on camera): Isn't there an ick factor, you guys, at least the first time you did this. You said, "It's garbage. It's stinky."
UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: It's as if we were trained in the society that garage is garbage and once you throw it away, you know, you can't tough it. It's dirty. But, I mean, look at all of this. This looks perfectly good.
UDOJI (voice-over): That keeps them coming once or twice a week; always striking just as the trash goes out. Tonight, they found plenty; packing their bags with food that will last days.
NELSON: That first night I was so inspired. I was so inspired by the fact that you can basically expose this system of waste.
UDOJI: She, like all freegans, is committed to helping reduce that waste, not contributing to it. They buy second-hand clothes, dumpster dive for furniture, sometimes finding computers, books, magazines, toiletries; always finding something.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: It's disgraceful, frankly.
UDOJI: Studies estimate stores throw away 55 billion pounds of food a year, that Americans waste $43 billion worth a year. For each American family that's $600 a year down the drain.
Freegans say their movement is global though there are no hard numbers. On any given day, Freegan.Info founder Adam Weissmann, says they get 70,000 hits. There are books, videos and hundreds of Web sites on the dos and don'ts of dumpster diving, where to shop, when the garbage goes out, how to prepare food safely. Remember, they're not street people down on their luck. They're on a mission.
UDOJI (on camera): A whole can of Cheese Whiz.
NELSON: Yes. Isn't that fabulous?
UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: They are cold.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Yes.
UDOJI: But do you think that came out of the refrigerator?
NELSON: Definitely. It probably just came out ten minutes ago.
Peppers!
There is a fun aspect to it of you're going through and you're -- it's almost like a treasure hunt.
UDOJI: How long have you been doing this?
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: About 10 years.
UDOJI: About 10 years and you've never gotten sick one time.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: It's just common sense. I mean, if you -- with any food, if you look at it...
UDOJI: Nutritionist Dr. Ruth Kava says that's true. All food should pass the look and smell test. And she says Even though dumpster diving sounds gross, it's not necessarily harmful. But she warns people should avoid meat and dairy products that spoil fast in summer heat.
DR. RUTH KAVA, NUTRITIONIST: The chances are, it's more likely to be contaminated or dirty if it's picked up in a dumpster, unless it's in its original wrapping and it hasn't been -- it hasn't been broken.
Freegans say they're careful, though sometimes they have trouble convincing others, because lots of people stare. Some take the food, others don't.
UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: Want some cookies?
(CROSSTALK) UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: It's all clean and wrapped. Clean and wrapped.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: You got food in trash?
UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: Clean and wrapped.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: People don't throw around food like that.
UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: They do every day.
UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: I feel really good about what I'm doing. I know that there's at least some food that's not going to end up in a landfill. I know that we're educating people. I know that we're getting -- getting food onto our own table, sometimes onto other people's tables.
UDOJI: They all give away food to others. But Freegan Alexis Cole (ph) takes it further, using what she and her husband find to bolster their church's pantry, to feed the congregation.
UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: We are going to have a cream of celery soup, flavored with dill and some of that parsley. We're going to make it creamy with the potatoes. We're going to have stuffed peppers. We're going to have corn on the cob.
UDOJI: That's menu planning the Freegan way, on the streets of New York City. She makes that dinner for 12 a day later, the food looking nothing like it did on the street.
They ate well and felt good, knowing this week they'd done their part to turn so-called garbage into golden meals.
(END VIDEOTAPE)
UDOJI: Some Freegans save up to $600 a month on food. Many of them donate the money that they save to other causes, like tonight we have some samplings, courtesy of our friend Madeleine Nelson (ph). These was the result of their dumpster diving last night, and take a look.
SANCHEZ: Remarkable. Did you try any of it?
UDOJI: No, no, I was going to actually ask you, Rick. In fact, I brought you a napkin.
SANCHEZ: I'll take a little grape.
UDOJI: There you go.
SANCHEZ: And I'll eat it, because if it's packaged, it could be possibly -- well, I would bet there's nothing wrong with it.
UDOJI: I think they're pretty good at it. I mean, they follow very specific rules. I mean, they have a medical adviser who tells them about the kind of food that they should be looking for in the summertime. Obviously, meat with the heat, you know, could create some sort of cross-contamination on the other food. The bread, how they should prepare some of this food...
SANCHEZ: Yeah, it seems that way. And as you look at it, it looks very fresh and you know what?
UDOJI: It does, and we have some (INAUDIBLE) too.
SANCHEZ: Tastes good, too.
We'll get to those later.
360 next -- thanks so much. Things found in unclaimed luggage on sale in Alabama.
WHITFIELD: Rick, you're not going to believe what we found and where we found it. For instance, this sparkling 15-carat emerald ring. It retails for $20,000, but you can buy it here for half price. And this men's Rolex. Rick, I know you'd like that. Ordinarily selling for $2,500; selling for $1,450. Bargain basement deals on items once lost, now found.
(COMMERCIAL BREAK)
SANCHEZ: Welcome back. I'm Rick Sanchez, sitting in for Anderson.
Before the break, we told you about people with money who scoop up perfectly good pieces of food from the garbage. But trash bins aren't the only place to find some tossed away treasures. In Scottsboro, Alabama, you can buy all kinds of things left behind in unclaimed luggage. Maybe you'll find some of your own stuff.
CNN's Fredricka Whitfield joins us now from Scottsboro. Fred, what have you found?
WHITFIELD: Well, Rick, I know a lot of folks always wonder, whatever happened to that unclaimed or lost luggage? It ends up here, in the Unclaimed Baggage Center in Scottsboro, Alabama, as you mentioned. And these are some of the things that you can find here. Women and men's suits worth hundreds of dollars. This one, a beautiful designer suit, $100. You can also find electronic items and a lot of jewelry.
That's really the great item here. Karen Cantrell (ph) is the director of marketing and sales. You've got incredible bargains here. Engagement rings, pearls, you name it. What have we got?
UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: Well, we had a beautiful diamond ring priced for about $18,000. With all our fine jewelry, we sell it (INAUDIBLE) value. Cultured pearls, Rolex watch. Tiffany cufflinks. We see a lot of these things.
WHITFIELD: And those cufflinks ordinarily retail for 850. You are selling them for $650, and these undrilled, 12-millimeter pearls, which apparently are very difficult to find... UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: Very rare. They are priced for about $7,000 or $8,000, and you can get them here for about $3,500.
WHITFIELD: Wow. Well, take me through the store, and tell me who are some of your customers. People come out here, they know they're going to get a great deal, and they travel from far and wide, don't they?
UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: They do. We have people that depend on us for their everyday life, and we have people that drive up in Jaguars every weekend to come get designer pieces of jewelry and clothing.
WHITFIELD: Everybody wants a bargain. What are among the most extravagant things that you've found in some of that unclaimed luggage?
UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: Well, over the years, we've seen a 5.8 carat diamond solitaire ring. We've recently sold a 41-carat emerald. A full suit of armor. A rattlesnake. It's not necessarily exquisite, but it's unique. A little bit of everything.
WHITFIELD: We are talking about 40,000 square feet here. This really is like a department store. It acts like one. You have merchandise that's so varied. Electronics, a DVD player here, just over a couple hundred dollars, right?
UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: Absolutely. We get these in quite often. We also get things that are left on overhead bins and compartments on airplanes.
WHITFIELD: Digital cameras. You get something like 7,000 new items per day.
UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: Absolutely.
WHITFIELD: You can't possibly hold on to all of this stuff for too long. What do you do with it?
UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: Well, we don't necessarily sell everything that comes in. We donate about a third of the items, and then we also throw away about a third. And so the rest of it, we do sell in our retail store.
WHITFIELD: Wow. And then, of course you get some boots, women's boots here, designer boots. The faux fur stuff is really in this fall.
UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: Absolutely.
WHITFIELD: You've got a men's tie. Rick, I picked this out for you, this Ferragamo tie, at a pretty good deal, just...
UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: $25.
WHITFIELD: $25. You got CDs. And Rick, because I know you are a Floridian, I know you must be a diver. I got you a full wetsuit here, at a bargain $80.
And you've got some other really high-priced, ordinarily high- priced designer outfits from Prada, Anne Klein, et cetera. And I love this.
UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: The showgirl...
(CROSSTALK)
UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: Yeah, the showgirl outfit. It's a popular thing to look at, but we haven't had any buyers yet.
WHITFIELD: All right. And you are open Monday through Friday, including Saturdays as well.
UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: Yes. And we've been in business for 35 years. So come on by.
WHITFIELD: All right, great deals. Karen Cantrell (ph), thanks so much. Director of sales and marketing here at the Unclaimed Baggage Center here in Scottsboro, Alabama. You do not want to miss it. It certainly is an obscure location, Rick, but it's worth the drive.
SANCHEZ: Keep an eye out for an old 9-iron and a box of cigars. All right, Fred? And we'll (INAUDIBLE).
WHITFIELD: I think I can find that.
SANCHEZ: We thank you. Fredricka Whitfield, following that story for us.
I'm Rick Sanchez. CNN's prime-time coverage continues now with Paula Zahn. Hi, Paula.
END
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