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Containment 'Hat' in Place; In the Pressure Cooker; Biggest Jobs Gain in Decade; Oil Bird Rescues Increasing; Youngest Climber to Summit Mount Everest
Aired June 04, 2010 - 14:00 ET
THIS IS A RUSH TRANSCRIPT. THIS COPY MAY NOT BE IN ITS FINAL FORM AND MAY BE UPDATED.
ALI VELSHI, CNN ANCHOR: Hey, it's a brand new hour, and we've got a brand new "Rundown." Here's what I've got for you.
Every day for the past 46 days, oil has been leaking into the Gulf of Mexico. Today, some of that oil is being captured.
Plus, I think the latest jobs report has some decent numbers in it. Some of my colleagues think not so much. We're going head-to- head in the next few minutes.
Also, the world's tallest mountain conquered by a 13-year-old. A seemingly impossible mission, so it's our "Mission Possible."
But first, let me tell you what's going on in the oil spill. Let's go back to the Gulf of Mexico and talk about what's happening.
Dramatic new projections today from the National Center for Atmospheric Research about the loop current. But, actually, let's not do that.
Let's go to Josh.
Because you've got the most up-to-date stuff on what's happening.
Josh Levs is at the -- our board there.
What have you got, Josh?
JOSH LEVS, CNN CORRESPONDENT: All right. You know what? Let's do this -- I'll talk to you about the images you were just seeing. We can go back to those live pictures.
Folks, today is what could be a real turning point. Seven weeks, nearly seven weeks into this crisis, we could see a real turning point today.
This is the first time that there is a cap that has been placed on the area of the blowout preventer in the Gulf where all that oil has been gushing. And what we want to know is how much of the oil is no longer going into the Gulf waters, but is instead being brought up to a ship, which is right behind me, right here?
Now, I'll just explain to you the basic idea behind this. What we want to see is that oil being captured as much as possible inside the device going through the cap that they created, up through the pipe, and up here. Now, BP has said today that there is oil and natural gas that is making it up here. So, that's big.
What we don't know is how much. They're saying, you know, is it five percent, is it 80 percent? We don't know yet, and they're saying it could be one or more days before we see that.
Let's go to the next video I have for you, because I want you all to see that dramatic video that came in last night when they were trying to get this cap open. All sorts of terms flying around for what you're going to call this new cap. Some people are calling it new top hat. BP is calling it LMRP 6. Lots of terms flying around.
The basic idea is it fits on top of the area where the oil is gushing, but it's not a 100 percent seal. It's not designed that way. It gets some of it and guides it up to the surface.
It's also designed with these four vents that needed to be open in order for the cap to go on. What they've been doing today is working to close those vents so that more and more can go through.
We have a little piece of sound from earlier. Listen to this.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
DOUG SUTTLES, COO, BP: The oil you see escaping is actually coming through four vents that are designed into the top of the cap. And what we will be doing through the course of today is, as we bring this system on and start to capture the oil, we'll successively close each of those four vents until, hopefully, we only have a very small amount of oil coming around the base of the cap.
So, what you're seeing right now is not a surprise. It's part of the design. It's to prevent the hydrates from forming. And as we go through the day, we'll successfully close these vents.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
LEVS: So that's it. We're waiting for word from BP that those vents are successfully closed, which can keep more of the oil and gas coming up to the ship here. And we're hoping on the weekend -- I'll be here staking it out -- we're hoping to learn on the weekend, Ali, what percentage of that oil and natural gas is no longer going to the Gulf, and instead working its way up to the Enterprise on top. That's what we want to see -- Ali.
VELSHI: Josh, you are doing such a good job of this. And a lot of this news does develop over the weekend.
So, for those of you who are very interested in this, please stay with CNN.
But you just do a great job of making this so clear. Thank you for that. President Obama is on his third visit to the Gulf of Mexico. He's touching down. I think he's in New Orleans right now.
Kelly (ph), is that where he's touched down?
Let's take a look at that. There's Air Force One touching down in New Orleans. He is going to be heading out very shortly.
Ed Henry is on that -- well, he's there. He's already on the ground. So we'll be talking to him very shortly.
But that's where he is. That's where Kyra Phillips is. Kyra was on a rig. She was with the incident commander, Thad Allen, who is in charge of basically this whole response.
We're going to be talking to her in just a moment, as soon as we take a break and we come back.
No. You know what? That was the shortest break we've ever seen. The break's over.
Kyra is in New Orleans.
Sorry, I was just faking you out there, Kyra. But you were out there yesterday with Thad Allen --
KYRA PHILLIPS, CNN CORRESPONDENT: It's been a long day. I understand.
VELSHI: And you showed us -- an hour ago we saw some really, really good stuff from the rig that you were on, which was right above where that whole incident is taking place. But you reminded us very clearly, this -- Thad Allen's job and the Coast Guard's job is not just right there over that rig.
He's got a whole lot of other concerns -- the cleanup, the environmental damage, angry fishermen, people who are worried about oil coming onto their shores. And you got us an inside look at how he runs his day.
PHILLIPS: Yes, it's interesting. The quote that I'll never forget, one of the things I said to him as I was observing him while being embedded with him -- you know, he's taking it from all ends. And I said, "How do you handle all this criticism? How do you handle all these demands?" And he said, "I'm very careful with whom I let rent space in my head."
And I thought about that. That's something maybe that we should all keep in mind when there's so much criticism going on. Sometimes you just -- you have to let it go and you have to focus on your job and what you need to do.
And we talked a lot about, over the course of the day, Ali, the unprecedented access we had to those oil rigs. I got to talk to the workers. I got to see the operations. I got the inside, exclusive look that -- to what is happening there, and how these workers are trying to stop that oil gusher.
At the same time, I've been working on putting together a more comprehensive piece on this embed with Admiral Thad Allen to try to give you an inside look to what he deals with every day, minute by minute, and the demands that are on him, demands that you just pointed out.
Here's a little sneak peek at a piece that we're working on for 8:00 Eastern Time tonight.
(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)
PHILLIPS: Good morning.
ADM. THAD ALLEN, NATIONAL INCIDENT COMMANDER: How are you?
PHILLIPS: Good to see you.
(voice-over): It's still dark on the Gulf Coast. But Admiral Thad Allen has begun another day in the eye of the storm.
The 61-year-old commandant of the U.S. Coast Guard officially had his change of command last month. But he's now on the toughest assignment of his long career.
First, a jolt of caffeine. The admiral's security detail knows every coffee shop on the Gulf Coast. And then the first calls of a very long day -- the White House, federal agencies, governors, the Army Corps of Engineers. They never stop.
Today's top priority, hammering out an agreement on getting sand barriers built to protect the Louisiana coast and paying for them. It's an issue that has sharply divided states and federal government. The admiral has to be broker, diplomat, decision-maker, and the public face of the administration's efforts to tackle the worst environmental disaster in modern history.
Then, it's on to the incident command post, the nerve center of the massive operation to deal with the spill.
ALLEN: Good morning. The briefing this morning is something from our incident command post --
(END VIDEOTAPE)
PHILLIPS: And that little peek into the inside of -- or the -- an inside look into our embed, that was only about the first hour and 45 minutes of the day, Ali. So, you can just imagine the rest of the story that we have to tell tonight.
VELSHI: He's got a remarkable disposition. He does -- what was that quote, "I'm very careful about who I rent space to in my head"?
PHILLIPS: Yes, hold on. Yes, when I was asking about the -- I actually went back, because it's been a very long three days, Ali.
VELSHI: Sure.
PHILLIPS: And I should get -- out of respect to the admiral, I should get that quote exactly right. I was asking about the criticism, and he looked me right into the eye, and he said, "I'm very careful who rents space in my head."
VELSHI: No, what an interesting way to think about it.
PHILLIPS: Isn't it? Well, and you know why I asked about the criticism? He brought up his iGoogle page. He was wireless in car.
And I said, "Show me what's on your page." And he said, "Well, I've got the leadership quote of the day. I have my Spanish word of the day. I've got sports scores. I've got weather."
But on the right side he had every single news story that exists that involves Thad Allen, oil disaster, BP. And I was just looking at the string of headlines, and that's what led me to that question --
VELSHI: Yes.
PHILLIPS: -- "How do you deal with this pressure? How do you deal with this criticism? How do you balance all of this?" And that's where that quote, "I'm careful of who rents space in my head."
VELSHI: Very interesting. Well, we're really grateful that they got you involved in this and that you went out there to do this, because it is an important part of the story, to find out how people -- it will help us know how people who are supposed to be dealing with this are doing it.
Thank you so much, Kyra Phillips.
From Kyra, staying in New Orleans, to the president, that's a live picture of him getting off of Air Force One in New Orleans, headed -- pardon me.
Kelly (ph), we think he's headed to Grand Isle, Louisiana? Is that correct?
He's going to Grand Isle. That is a place where we've had a lot of attention. Grand Isle is right next to Port Fourchon, where the oil comes in offshore.
Grand Isle is a fishing town. It's also one where we've seen a great deal of oil. A lot of the shrimpers are based out of there.
Ed Henry is there. He's following this very closely. We'll be checking in with Ed very shortly. It's just a short hop in a helicopter over to Grand Isle from where President Obama is.
But here he is greeting people. This is his third trip.
The last one was last Friday. And by the way, the issue, as Ed was telling us, is that last Friday, some people criticized him. The White House doesn't like this characterization, but some people criticized the president for having a lot of official meetings, but maybe not talking to a whole lot of people who were affected by it.
So I think you may see him talking to some regular folk a little later on today. We'll stay on top of it.
Take a look at the Dow, by the way. There it is. Look at that -- wow -- 275 points off right now.
A lot of that's in response to the jobs numbers that came out today? Why is that? Because there were 431,000 added in the month of May. The unemployment rate went down.
Why is the market off nearly 300 points? We're going to look at the numbers and explain why this is happening with a real smart guy on the other side of this.
(COMMERCIAL BREAK)
VELSHI: All right. The Dow is down a lot right now. It was down a moment or so ago. I checked. It was about 275 points lower.
All this has to do with the jobs report that came out today. It's Friday, first of the month. The first Friday of the month, we always get the jobs report for the previous month, which was May in this case.
We got good news. The unemployment rate was 9.9 percent for April. It's 9.7 percent for May. Why is that bad, you ask? It's not.
Look at that, the number of jobs created. I'll tell you about that. It was 431,000 jobs in May. How is that bad?
Now take a look at the chart. Go back to January of '09. That's when we first started losing jobs in this recession. That was -- that's actually -- we started losing jobs a year earlier than that, but that was the worst of it. That was the bottom.
We lost about 740,000 jobs. And look at all of '09. It was getting better. We were still losing jobs.
When we get into 2010, we've only been gaining jobs. In April, we gained a lot of jobs. And now, May, we gained more jobs.
Why are we not celebrating? Why are there not candles out there? Let me show you why. Let me show you the difference between government jobs and private sector jobs.
In an economy like ours, we want the private sector, private businesses, to be gaining jobs. In March, the private sector added 158,000 jobs, and we thought that was fantastic. In April, the private sector added 218,000 jobs, and we thought that was even better. So we wanted better than 218,000 in May.
If you take out all the government jobs that were added, all the Census jobs that were added in May, private sector only added 41,000 jobs. We have gone backwards. That is why some people are saying this isn't a great jobs report. And I can't entirely disagree with that.
I just think that, you know, we get to a point where we're complaining about the fact that 431,000 jobs have been created, maybe we're a nation of naysayers. But there is something to be said for maybe these are not the right jobs that we need created, so I want to talk to my friend, Peter Morici, who is right there. He is an economist, a professor of economics at the University of Maryland, and he is here to shake some reality into me -- Peter.
PETER MORICI, PROFESSOR OF ECONOMICS, UNIVERSITY OF MARYLAND: Well, you know, it would be nice if we really created some 440,000 jobs, but 411,000 were Census jobs. We get those every 10 years.
They're going to go away. They last a few months. They're the folks in your neighborhoods with the clipboards.
We are not seeing the private sector jobs growth that we should. Even at this stage of the recovery, we should be starting to pick up some mo.
Now, there are some bright spots in this report, and we want to focus on that. For example, we picked up 29,000 jobs in manufacturing. Again, not a big number. We've lost 5.6 million over the last --
VELSHI: No, but we thought manufacturing was dead.
MORICI: -- decade, but every month now. We thought it was dead. It's not dead. You just talked to somebody at NASA about the next generation of airplanes.
VELSHI: Yes.
MORICI: Well, I got news for you. We're also going to build the next generation of automobiles.
I was talking earlier in the week with Ford. I was talking to Mark Fields. And there are wonderful plans going on in Detroit, and we're starting to see some real significant, substantial recovery in the American auto patch.
They are building market share, and they're not doing by discounting this time. So that's very positive.
We're starting to see -- we haven't seen yet, in the jobs numbers, the pick-up in residential construction that came out of that housing credit --
VELSHI: Right.
MORICI: -- for first-time homebuyers. We know those sales took place. We're going to see that employment show up in the June, July, August numbers. That's going to be good news.
So, you know, it's not all dark. It's not what we were hoping for, but it's not all dark. Let's not go jumping out of windows or quitting on our president right now.
VELSHI: Why, then, is the Dow down today 260 points?
MORICI: Well --
VELSHI: Whoever knows why the Dow is down on a Friday afternoon in summer?
MORICI: No, I know why it's down. The economists had out there -- the consensus forecast was 535,000, 440,000 jobs. It came in remarkably lower.
Everybody knew the Census number was going to be big, but the private sector number wasn't there, so we're getting this negative reaction. My forecast, for the record, was 325,000.
VELSHI: Right.
MORICI: That's what Reuters published in their survey.
VELSHI: So you're not all that disappointed by this?
MORICI: Well, I would be very happy to be wrong on this occasion and to have seen my colleagues be right, but my forecast was very consistent with this, and that is flat in the private sector this month.
VELSHI: All right. And that's what we need to see changed in order to get a real recovery in this economy. We need the private sector to be hiring.
Peter, good to talk to you. Thanks for your sound judgment on this one.
Peter Morici with the University of Maryland, a good friend of ours.
Now, you remember the name Neel Kashkari. If you ever saw him, you'll actually remember he looks a little bit like me.
This was the bailout chief. This is the guy that the former treasury secretary, Henry Paulson, hired, former Goldman guy, to run TARP. This was the bailout program back in October of 2008, the Troubled Asset Relief Program.
Well, earlier, I talked to him. He's going to be on my weekend show on "YOUR $$$$$."
But listen to a little bit about what he told me.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
NEEL KASHKARI, FMR. BAILOUT CHIEF: Absolutely. We went to Congress to get the TARP authority to prevent the financial system from collapsing. I'm really pleased sitting here today that it seems that our actions worked. We avoided a financial collapse. Nonetheless, the shock was a very serious shock to our economy, and it's going to take years for our economy to fully recover from that. But the risk of a collapse is now behind us, and we should all feel good about that.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
VELSHI: But, he said there are risks or problems of Europe, and we talked to him about that. You can watch the entire interview on Saturday at 1:00 p.m. Eastern, or on Sunday at 3:00 p.m. Eastern, with my good friend, Christine Romans, who is my co-anchor of "YOUR $$$$$."
All right. Helping your neighbor. One woman is determined to give older Americans dignity and independence. She's starting in her own back yard.
We'll meet this week's CNN Hero when we come back.
(COMMERCIAL BREAK)
VELSHI: Well, the baby boom is turning into an elderly explosion. According to the U.S. Census Bureau, in 20 years 20 percent of Americans will be over 65.
Now, this week's CNN Hero is using her own story as an inspiration to help others, allowing older Americans to stay active, engaged, and most importantly, independent.
Take a look.
(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)
IRENE ZOLA, CNN HERO: Before my mother's experience, seniors on the street were pretty much invisible to me. My mother went in the nursing home after a stroke. I didn't want to leave my mother in a place where people were ignoring her.
Here's my mom. This was a month before she passed away.
I was shocked that our culture doesn't have a place for very old people except in nursing homes, and I decided that I wanted to do something about that.
My name is Irene Zola, and my organization is Helping Seniors Age at Home.
Do you want to sit on a bench for a moment?
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Yes. OK.
ZOLA: So, we help to connect seniors with people in the community, and the volunteers provide any kind of informal care that is wanted by the seniors.
UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: I brought you chicken noodle soup.
ZOLA: There is a growing population of elders. Families are living great distances from one another.
UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: Hello.
ZOLA: So, this is one way that a community really makes a difference.
UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: You're a sweetie. She makes you feel enriched, and she has a way about her like somebody cares.
UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: It definitely made me more aware. It's made me feel more connected to my own neighbors and my own neighborhood.
ZOLA: Some people believe that old age is a time when people stop learning, but it's not. Why not live life to the fullest? And that's what I love to see.
(END VIDEOTAPE)
VELSHI: Irene Zola and her team of volunteers have helped nearly 30 seniors remain independent.
To see how a community has become a family, or to nominate someone you think is changing the world, go to CNNHeroes.com.
All right. CNN is your place to get all the latest news on the Gulf of Mexico oil disaster.
It is, sadly, day 46. Today, BP says they've begun siphoning some oil to the surface from the broken well. Late last night, they finally got the new cap in place. Later today, they plan on closing valves on the cap to stop more of the flow into the Gulf.
Israel's Gaza blockade being put to the test again today. An Irish ship loaded with supplies is close to the area right now. Israel says they have no desire to board the ship but will not allow it through to Gaza. This comes just days after the deadly Israeli raid on the flotilla that was trying to bring humanitarian supplies through that blockade.
Joran van der Sloot is headed back to Peru right now. Peruvian police suspect him of killing a 21-year-old woman in a hotel. He was arrested in Chile. Van der Sloot is still the prime suspect in the disappearance of American teenager Natalee Holloway in Aruba.
Americans are not doing all that well when it comes to the environment. We'll check the green ratings, straight ahead.
(COMMERCIAL BREAK)
VELSHI: OK. Let me bring you up to speed with what is going on.
It's day 46 of that oil disaster in the Gulf of Mexico. In theory, this got a little bit better today when that top hat went on top of the oil spill. But take a look at that. Why is there all that oil coming out of there? Now, I can't tell you, because we're just observing these cameras, so I don't know whether that's a lot of oil or a little bit of oil, it would look the same. BP says it is collecting some oil from its top hat.
Here's the issue. They say that the top hat that has been put on top of the gusher has got vents on it, and they're going to start closing the vents. And you're going to see some of that oil disappear. They're going to try and do that, and we'll tell you if that actually works.
The other issue is the loop current. The loop current is something that happens in the water, and if this oil leak gets a lot worse, here's how it's projected to go -- around the East Coast and into the Atlantic Ocean. And it could actually double back. That all depends on what the local weather conditions are and what the wind conditions are, but there's a possibility it could double back on to the East Coast.
Let's take another look at that and just give you a sense of it. We'll keep you up to speed on what's going on over there.
Also, President Obama. We just showed you some live pictures a few minutes ago. Air Force One has landed in New Orleans. He's on his way to Grand Isle, Louisiana, where we have been keeping a close eye on things going on over there. So, we'll keep you posted on all of that.
When we come back, we are going to show you, notwithstanding this whole Gulf -- oh, I learn so much about these breaks that aren't happening. Let's just get right down to it. Never mind doing it after a break.
All right. I want to tell you, notwithstanding this Gulf disaster, just judging by the way we live here in the United States, we're not the greenest folks around, let me tell you. There's a survey that's out. It's the Global Green Ratings.
It's a country-by-country ranking by National Geographic and a group called Globe Scan Survey, and it's called the Greendex. It's basically an index of greenness.
It monitors consumer behavior and consumption. This is where it always becomes a problem, because a lot of greenness is based on how we consume things.
Seventeen thousand consumers in 17 countries were studied. It's a 17-country rank, and consumers were asked about their behavior as it comes to housing, transportation, food, everyday goods, and big-ticket items that they buy.
OK. Let's push into the USA for a second.
Where do you think we stand on this thing? We are in dead last for the third time in a row, third year in a row. The United States on a list of 17 countries. Let me bring up the bar graph and show you what this looks like, all the different countries.
The greenest people, according to this survey, are Indians. Then Brazilians, then Chinese, then Mexicans, Argentina, Russians, Hungarians, South Koreans, Swedes, Spanish, Australians, Germans, Japanese, British, French, Canadians and Americans. Germans, Japanese, British, French, Canadians and Americans, that's the bottom of the list. What do those countries have in common? These are some of the wealthiest most industrialized western countries.
Why is it that the most sophisticated, scientifically advanced and wealthiest, most prosperous countries are at the bottom of the green index? Is it because we consume too much? Is it because we package too much? Is it because we're wealthy and we drive big cars and travel on planes? I don't know what it is. We'll get into it, but the bottom line is the U.S. is dead last for the third time in a row.
Now I should tell you, the actual rating, look at that, that's the dark bars are 2010. The lighter bars are 2009. Everybody seems to have gotten worse. From 2010 -- from -- everybody seems to have gotten worse from 2009 to 2010. South Korea and Spain seem to have -- have gone the other way. They seem to have improved.
All right, that's the Greendex. We'll talk a little more later on about how we fix that. But right now we actually have to fix the situation in the Gulf of Mexico.
Birds covered in oil -- that is the immediate, tangible effect of the Gulf oil disaster. They're coming in to rescue centers at an increasing rate. We're checking in with people who are determined to get them cleaned up and back in the air.
(COMMERCIAL BREAK)
VELSHI: Hundreds of birds covered in oil, those numbers are likely to rise into the thousands before the disaster is even cleaned up in the Gulf. Right now, teams of dedicated workers are huddled in makeshift rescue centers, dabbing down and washing off those birds.
CNN's Gary Tuchman shows us how it's done.
(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)
GARY TUCHMAN, CNN CORRESPONDENT (voice-over): This animal is basically unrecognizable but it's a small gull, the latest bird that has come in contact with the BP oil. We're at a makeshift intensive care unit for birds.
This fearful-looking brown pelican is being cleaned in a warehouse by trained workers in the town of Burris, Louisiana. All oil birds in the state are now being brought here.
JAY HOLCOMB, EXECUTIVE DIRECTOR, INTERNATIONAL BIRD RESCUE RESEARCH CENTER: And what happens is the birds tend to plunge feed for fish, the fish swim underneath the oil and the birds think it's going under plants or whatever, birds don't know what it is and they plunge in to get it and they get covered.
TUCHMAN (on camera): It's quite stunning when you take your first look at a bird that has just been brought in. Inside this compartment here is a brown pelican that was just found a short time ago and taken on a boat to the facility. It was found in the Gulf of Mexico near Grand Isle, Louisiana southwest of New Orleans, and you can see he's completely covered.
(voice-over): In the first month after this disaster, a total of only about 60 birds were brought here. But the pace is suddenly accelerating.
HOLCOMB: We're probably going to end up to over 30 birds by the end of the day.
TUCHMAN (on camera): So, this is the turning point for you?
HOLCOMB: This is the turning point, yes.
TUCHMAN (voice-over): The oil prevents the birds from flying. It means they can't eat. Their body temperatures drop.
HOLCOMB: Some of the worst-looking birds that you are looking at right now are some of the ones that have the best chance and the reason for that only is that they were captured really fast. They were just picked -- this little gull was picked up out of the water today as was this pelican. So they didn't have a chance to sit there and get really, really cold.
If we can keep them stable and have the nutrition going in and we can get them washed really soon, within 24 hours, there's a good chance for them.
TUCHMAN (on camera): And this is Pelican Island, the final stop after the birds are cleaned off. I'll take you inside.
You will see the brown pelicans are remarkably passive. It's almost like a spa. They have a swimming pool. There's about four, five, six, seven, two more here. They have a nice supply of fish to dine on.
And these brown pelicans are all ready to go back into the wild. They'll be here until the weekend, then the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service picks them up and they'll be flown on a plane to the Tampa Bay area, that's where they'll become free.
(voice-over): Just before we leave, another brown pelican is brought in. Drenched in oil as bad as any bird these experts have seen. It's going to be a busy night in the life-and-death struggle for so many birds.
(END VIDEOTAPE) VELSHI: Here's a chance for to you to have an impact on your world, by going to CNN.com/impact. And you can -- you can take a look at all that kind of stuff.
On top of the world -- let's go from there to on top of the world -- many people have reached the summit of Mount Everest, but no one as young as 13. We're going to talk to the American lad who is the youngest to ever to summit Mount Everest right after this.
(COMMERCIAL BREAK)
VELSHI: OK. Every day we do "Mission Possible," somebody who is doing something that could be an inspiration to you. The youngest person ever to summit Mount Everest joins us now.
Thirteen-year-old American Jordan Romero, this is him doing it on May 22nd. He was accompanied by his dad and three guides. Look at that. He's trudging along to the top there. Can't get enough of this. Thirteen years old. I guess the benefit of being 13 years old and doing this is you're in good shape, probably don't feel as cold as us old guys do.
He joins us now from our New York studio. Jordan, great to see you. How was that?
JORDAN ROMERO, YOUNGEST TO EVER CLIMB MOUNT EVEREST: It was -- it was a great climb. It was so fun, and we all in the end had a very successful trip. Everything went smoothly. And, you know, the whole family did it, the whole team did it. So, couldn't ask for anything better.
VELSHI: Now when you say that it went smoothly, I always think these things don't always go smoothly. I mean, was it really smooth or did you get those times when you were kind of suffering and way too cold or was it really smooth?
ROMERO: Well that's all the time. It was cold and we were suffering, but do you know what, there weren't any, like, big problems like nobody got hurt or anything. So that's what I mean by "smooth."
VELSHI: What are you up to on this? You're into climbing all seven summits, you're one summit away?
ROMERO: Yes, we are one summit away. We still have one more mountain to climb, that's the highest mountain in Antarctica, Mount Vinson Massif the 16,000-foot-high mountain, and that will be this December, January.
VELSHI: OK. The one thing these mountains have in common is that they're mountains, but they actually aren't all that similar in how you climb them and how easy they are to climb. What's been your toughest experience so far?
ROMERO: Well, yes, Mount Everest was the coldest mountain I think I've ever been on and definitely the windiest. So, you know, those may have been the two toughest experiences so far. And we're on oxygen up there, and it's -- it's cold as heck. It's minus 40, so, um, you know, so --
VELSHI: What are the other ones you've climbed?
ROMERO: I've climbed Mount McKinley, highest mountain in North America; Mount Kilimanjaro, Africa; Mount Aconcagua, Mount Elbrus in Russia.
VELSHI: Wow.
ROMERO: Mount Carson's pyramid in Indonesia, so all these other summits of the seven.
VELSHI: So, you will have summited the seven highest peaks. When are you going to do -- when are you going to do the last one?
ROMERO: The last one will be in December, and then I'll be the youngest.
VELSHI: So, you'll be 14, 15? How old will you be when you finish that?
ROMERO: I'll be 14 years old. I'm still 13 right now and I turn 14 in July.
VELSHI: And then what? You'll be a veteran of the seven summits, then what will you do with your life after that?
ROMERO: We still haven't thought about that. You know, 2011 is kind of left on a blank right now, but we have tons of plans for 2010. We still have some plans, you know, between Mount Vinson Massif and Mount Everest. Right now we have the 50-state tour high pointing all the 50 states, climbing all of them. And then Mount Cho Oyu, the sixth highest mountain in the world, I want to ski that mountain, so during that trip we'll be going back to Tibet.
VELSHI: All right, Jordan, good to meet you. If you're doing the 50 states and you're doing one near Atlanta and it's not too high and old-out-of-shape guys can come, give me a call. Maybe I'll join you up there, I'll bring a camera with me or something like that.
Jordan Romero, congratulations. Great to have you on the show, thanks so much.
ROMERO: Thank you, good to be here.
VELSHI: This rocket launcher that we were looking at earlier today, the Falcon Nine by SpaceX, about a minute and a half to another attempt to launch. I think -- is John Zarrella there? John, you with us?
JOHN ZARRELLA, CNN CORRESPONDENT: I'm here, Ali.
VELSHI: It looks like the countdown on my screen says just over two minutes, 2:11.
ZARRELLA: Right, right, exactly. Coming up on two minutes. They're going to try it again.
Of course, once they get off the ground, Ali, it's a two-stage rocket. First stage will light for about three minutes, separation, that's a critical point that Elon Musk has said that that's critical. The second stage runs for about five minutes.
Then they'll be in orbit at about eight minutes, and they're going to put what they call a test article into orbit, they hope, and that will actually circle for about a year before it burns up and disintegrates.
That's their plan. They are go for launch. We just got that word. So coming up on their second attempt. You know, Ali, if it was the space shuttle, chances are with the short little launch windows, this wouldn't be happening. No, no.
VELSHI: What was happening, you and I were watching it live, we were counting down, it was two seconds to go and you I both heard abort. Now what we found out and what I asked you, how does it get to two seconds and you were saying it's probably something automatic. And that's what it was. There was some kind of a reading that said this can't happen.
ZARRELLA: Yes.
VELSHI: But there are all sorts of safety mechanisms. There's the ones that aren't involving people and then there are those that involve the Air Force and people like that have to say if something were to go wrong with this and we got to take this rocket down, we've got to make sure it's safe and we can do that.
So at this point they seem to have dealt whatever it was that aborted this thing at two minutes and we're now less than 50 seconds. Tell me what you think is happening now.
ZARRELLA: Well, right now they're going through the final phases, the check-outs have all been done.
It's on internal power now. The vehicle is basically operating on its own, the computers have taken over the system. And just like what happened at that two seconds, what would happen, then, if anything goes wrong have an automatic shutdown.
Now, the humans in the control room, Ali, are now less than 30 to go, if they see something in their telemetry and read-outs -- there we go, Ali. It's lifting off.
VELSHI: Let's listen to the control room.
ZARRELLA: It's lifting off!
VELSHI: They're counting 15 seconds. I don't understand why this thing's already in the sky.
ZARRELLA: And it's -- it's gone.
VELSHI: So, so much for the countdown.
ZARRELLA: It's off the flight deck, Ali. Yes.
VELSHI: Wow, that was not what we expected to see. All right, it's in the air.
(CROSSTALK)
VELSHI: That is the Falcon Nine. Let me tell our viewers that don't know, it's the Falcon Nine rocket ship by SpaceX, a company headed by Elon Musk, he's the founder of PayPal and the founder of Tesla Motor Cars. And they are experimenting with this rocket because they have a contract with NASA for this to be the type of rocket that carries cargo and possibly astronauts into space, succeeding the space -- the space shuttle program, which will be discontinued at the end of this year, so we are watching this to see -- this is a historic moment. Is this going to be the successor to the space shuttle program?
We were waiting for that countdown, and for some reason this thing took off more than 15 seconds away from the countdown. It's now been in the air for 40 seconds. Even Elon Musk, the head of this company, said they are looking at a 70 percent to 80 percent chance of success for this rocket. The issue, this has been scrubbed a couple times, because the issue is the Air Force wants to make sure that if something went wrong on the launch of this rocket that if it were to come down they were able to shoot it out of the air or destroy it without it hitting -- without it harming people.
They seem to have been able to get past those issues, and then a couple of hours ago it was going to launch and it was scrubbed with two seconds to go. Now they have lawn. It again. We'd like to find out, get some clarity on this, because it seemed like it launched before this happened. Now, what are we looking at -- let's listen in to the control room.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Gaining speed substantially.
VELSHI: All right. We -- we -- we're sort of trying to monitor what they're saying in the mission control room. They are saying it's gaining speed. John Zarrella, you were saying it's a two-part process. It does seem to be -- are we in the second part of this?
ZARRELLA: Correct. At three minutes, at three minutes in, I can't see a countdown clock.
VELSHI: I've got a counter here somewhere. We'll see what it is. Kelly, let's put the counter back up, if we can get it.
ZARRELLA: They haven't had that separation yet.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: The lack of oxygen after the burning of the plume.
ZARRELLA: Now, they're heading downrange, Ali, going, you know, east and north of -- of the launch pad now. Out over the Atlantic Ocean. We should be coming up to separation fairly quickly now.
VELSHI: Let's watch very carefully on the right side of your screen you're seeing our image from ground. On the left side you're seeing a camera mounted on the Falcon Nine facing Earth, so you're looking back at the a -- at the fire coming out of this thing on the back. On the right side is the telemetry.
We should be coming up. We've lost the clock but we're trying to get a sense -- I'm walking up really close to the TV here. We're at one -- yes, can't really tell how far we are. But at three minutes this is going to separate. We should be very close to that at this point. We may not be able to see it from our angle, but this is so far a successful launch --
ZARRELLA: Yes.
VELSHI: -- of the Falcon Nine.
ZARRELLA: Yes, we've lost it, too, Ali, we can't see it from the ground anymore either.
VELSHI: We've still got a vague cloud and we're got the shot from -- Kelly, are they still talking in mission control? Kelly, you'll let me know if they say something that indicates -- OK, something seems to be happening. Something is happening here. Let's take a look. OK. Separation is happening now, John. We can see it.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: We have separation!
VELSHI: Let's take it to mission control.
ZARRELLA: That's a huge milestone.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: And separation is confirmed.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: And chamber ignition confirmed.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: And we have a clean stage separation, and the second stage ignition. The Merlin vacuum engine has begun lifting the second stage and dragging into orbit. As you saw, there were several stiffening rings on the MVAC nozzle expansion skirt that fell away, as designed.
Initial velocity of 3,000 --
VELSHI: John, this is incredible.
ZARRELLA: Yes.
VELSHI: It separated as planned. It took off. We were not sure it would happen. They had a window until 3:00 p.m. to do it. It was there and it launched and it still seems to me a few seconds earlier than they thought it would. They launched it and we're losing the picture from SpaceX, it's coming in and out.
Tell me our audience why this is important. These are live pictures coming to us from SpaceX.
ZARRELLA: Hugely important from the standpoint that NASA wants to turn over to the commercial sector the ability to fly astronauts and cargo to the International Space Station, allowing NASA to free up its resources to do the cutting-edge work of getting humans to the planets, to the asteroids. This success is a huge milestone in that effort. SpaceX says that by next year they'll be able to take cargo to the space station, and by 2013 they'll be able to fly astronauts, if they continue to have successes like this one.
Everything is nominal we're hearing, Ali.
This is -- this is very, very big for them. The separation, the second stage igniting and very likely now the ability to put the test article into orbit will mean that their vehicle is a success. At least at first blush, certainly things can go wrong downrange, but the idea is they can bring down the coast of getting things into orbit, they can bring up the reliability of getting things to orbit, and the safety factor, by a magnitude, Elon Musk says, of 100 times safer --
VELSHI: Yep.
ZARRELLA: -- than space shuttles into orbit -- Ali.
VELSHI: I wish, I wish you could see this with me, because it is such a remarkable picture. This is the picture we're getting from SpaceX, this could mean taking over the responsibility of transporting cargo and people into space. So you are watching a historic flight. I should tell you the separation was about three minutes in. This whole flight's supposed to last about ten minutes. This isn't a big flight, but it's supposed to -- this is meant to demonstrate that it works, that they were able to get this thing up.
It's not just another rocket launch, and I know, John, you've seen a lot of them, you never treat them as just another rocket launch, but the reality is this could be a turning point in technological history for this country.
ZARRELLA: Without a doubt and, you know, Elon Musk has said the ability to do this could be tantamount. Now that may-- this may be a stretch, to when John Kennedy at Rice University said, by the end of this decade, we're going to be putting humans on the moon.
Their ability to do this may be tantamount and a turning point, as you said, in the history of space travel. There's no question about it.
VELSHI: Okay. I think we figured out what the issue was with the timing. Sounds like they actually launched this thing on time. We had -- some of what the we had, some of what we had our audio and our video were on different feeds and that's why it appeared that it wasn't not delayed. It was not delayed. But for those of you who didn't see it, this is the launch moments ago of the Falcon Nine rocket ship into space. Take a look.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP) UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Eight, seven, six, five, four, three, two, one.
UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: Stage one.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Liftoff!
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: We have --
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Lift off of the Falcon nine.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
VELSHI: And there it was. A little piece of history. The Falcon Nine in flight. This flight will be over within ten minutes or so, but just to prove that it can work. John, thanks very much for joining us and letting us know. I'm glad we were able to see this happen before we take off for -- for the weekend. John Zarrella, Cape Canaveral.
All right, Ed Henry, got some kind of a blastoff of his own when we come back stay with us.
(COMMERCIAL BREAK)
VELSHI: Ed Henry is sticking out the president in Grand Isle, Louisiana. No spaceship launches from there, but, really, a mission that is almost as complicated, perhaps more complicated, than launching a rocket into space.
In fact, Ed, I had somebody tell me on TV the other day that they think we know more about space in some cases than we do about this oil spill on the bottom of the ocean, technologically speaking. You're there because for the third time in about a month, the President is on his way to Grand Isle, Louisiana, where you are right now.
ED HENRY, CNN SENIOR WHITE HOUSE CORRESPONDENT: Yes. President just landed a short time ago in New Orleans. That's about a 2 1/2- hour drive. He's behind closed doors in a briefing. Robert Gibbs before that briefing said that they're sort of cautiously optimistic that top cap may finally be essentially capping that well.
But they're not going to get too far ahead of themselves obviously. But the president going behind closed doors for that briefing is not really what they're here for, they're here to get out here to Grand Isle and meet with some real people. We've been talking about that the last few days about the impact on the fishermen et cetera and how the president has done a lot the briefings these official things but people here are really hurting.
They want to know the president understands that. I started talking to some of the people here, because they're waiting, because the president now cannot take Marine one here because of this weather. It was just pounding down rain a moment ago. Visibility is really awful, so it's going to be a 2 1/2-hour drive for the president, so they're going to wait a few more hours before they see him. I went to a bait and tackle shop down the road where a lot of Secret Service agents were there and they were sweeping for security. So, we don't know for sure whether the president will stop there. They may be just preparing. It could be one of many different places where he could stop.
But I briefly spoke to the owner who told me, that look, he has a general store that sells potato chips and soda things like that for the fishermen who are going out. He's got and a tackle shop across the street, he said he's basically closed he says shut down because nobody's coming in here to fish right now, the beaches are closed.
And the beach just down the way from where I'm standing now, I was here as you know last Friday, we were just getting the little tar balls of oil, but Mark Biello, one of our great photojournalists, was just out on that beach and there's oil basically pouring in there. They've got -- they're trying to do the system where they cycle through the water and they separate the oil. He just got some pictures of these workers with oil, you know, all over them essentially. Out on that beach where just last Friday there were just tiny little tar balls, now there's oil.
VELSHI: What's happening with that discussion you and I were having yesterday about why is the president here again and is there going to be some greater sense with him connecting with the people? I mean, he can't get more-- in terms of real folks, you can't get closer than you can at Grand Isle,
This s a fishing community, shrimpers come in there, recreational fisherman, commercial fishermen, I mean these are the real folks affected by the idea that oil is coming into those waters.
HENRY: You're right. And I should note the owner of the general store who told me, look, I'm shut down, I'm really worried about this business basically going under, defended the president and told me, look, I'm not sure how much more he could have done.
As you noted, this is 5,000 feet below the surface, the great scientific minds can't figure out how to fix it, and he said, I'm not sure the president could have done much more, but maybe the people here at least want to know that he understands, feels their pain as Bill Clinton used to say.
There are signs on the side of the road that I just saw, one of them saying end this nightmare. another one was pretty harsh, it was basically saying can't fish, can't swim, how the heck -- how are we going to feed our families now? People are angry here and they're worried that they're not going to -- literally not to be able to feed their families and small businesses will go under. People here obviously wants to know that the president gets that, Ali.
VELSHI: All right, Ed, so it's -- well, a bit of a delay. We thought we might be hearing from the president now. We're not going to it will be at least a couple hours before he gets there. You'll be on the story. Ed Henry with the stakeout in Grand Isle, Louisiana. Hey I spent a -- I spent a hurricane there. Say hi to the folks on Grand Isle, they are amongst the most one of the most hospitable people I've ever been around.
(CROSSTALK)
VELSHI: In the worst of circumstances. Very good folk. If you ever, if you need anything, just drop some names and they'll take care of you.
HENRY: Use your name? all right, maybe I'll get a good table somewhere.
VELSHI: All right, Ed Henry in Grand Isle, Louisiana, the president will be there in just a little while.
Look at that Dow behind me. A little worrisome, always get a little worried when we have cross the 300 number on the Dow. The Dow is down 330 points right now. It's been accelerating in the last few minutes, down to 9924.
A lot of this was a reaction earlier today to these bad job numbers that came out this morning. They actually were not bad on the surface. The unemployment rate is down in this country, 431,000 jobs were created in the month of May, but a lot of the jobs were census jobs and if you take those out because those would have happened regardless, only 41,000 jobs were created in the private sector in this country and that has a lot of people alarmed.
The other thing this happens in summer. Trading is lighter on weekends in the summer and on Friday afternoons people take off. They don't-- a lot of investors don't want to be in the market over the weekend because we've got this whole situation in Europe, folks don't really know what is going to happen, they don't want to have their money tied up. I don't generally get too alarmed what happens on a Friday afternoon, but I want to bring to your attention that the Dow is down over 300 points right now.
My good friend T.J. Holmes is going to take over in a couple minutes for, Rick Sanchez. So it will be just something for them to watch out for. No reason for alarm. There's nothing in there that is terribly alarming just yet.
With that I'm going to hand it over to T.J. He's got a whole lot of stuff happening this afternoon, including the president on his way to Grand Isle, Louisiana. T.J. good to see you my friend you have yourself an excellent show.
