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Wind Chill Could Dip To Negative 30 Degrees; NFL Fans Face Potential Cold Weather Dangers; Mental Patient Captured After Escaping Hospital; Marines Delay 3-Pull Up Requirement For Women; Did SeaWorld Impact Blackfish Poll Results?

Aired January 03, 2014 - 14:30   ET

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

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

BROOKE BALDWIN, CNN ANCHOR: Bottom of the hour, I'm Brooke Baldwin. News flash, it is going to be cold, really cold for the NFL tomorrow and Sunday. They have playoff games, four big ones, including one in Green Bay on Sunday. Green Bay, Wisconsin, late this morning, a shovel brigade at Lambeau Field, and wait until I tell you the expected game time temperature. Stand by for that.

But first, let me tick through the other three games. You have the Chiefs and the Colts in Indianapolis freezing at game time tomorrow. They will play that game, though, inside. Then you have the Saints and the Eagles, bitter cold in Philadelphia, windchill perhaps as low as 16 degrees tomorrow night. Chargers versus the Bengals on Sunday, possible snow at game time.

Temperature right around freezing and here we go, Green Bay, Wisconsin, late Sunday afternoon. The sun will be down by halftime, and we're talking about a windchill Sunday night, get ready, folks, minus 30 degrees.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

TODD EDLEBECK, FACILITY MANAGER, LAMBEAU FIELD: We always aim to do the best we possibly can to make it safe, but there are always some possibilities of spillage of alcohol or something like that, that may cause icy spots, but you know, I would just say prepare for the cold weather and dress appropriate.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

BALDWIN: That's the Packers facility manager. In case you had not heard, the situation has begun to invite comparisons to the Ice Bowl. The Ice Bowl so cold in Green Bay. This is back on New Year's 1967, that the referees couldn't make their whistles blow, and trumpets got stuck to band members' lips, just think about that for a minute.

The windchill estimated at 48 degrees below zero at that 1967 NFL championship game. Jim Tunney was there. He was an alternate ref at the Ice Bowl, and he spent a lot of time on the sidelines. We have a photo, standing next to the Vince Lombardi, the Packers legendary head coach. So Jim, thank you so much for taking the time with me today.

JIM TUNNEY, FORMER NFL REFEREE, CALLED "ICE BOWL": We're glad to be here. Thank you and my hands are still cold from 1967.

BALDWIN: I cannot imagine. I read where one of the refs tried to blow his whistle, had it freeze to his lips, and then he ripped his lips open trying to pull the whistle out. Is that true?

TUNNEY: That's true, and I hate to even think about that. It bothers me. It chills up my spine just thinking about it. That's years and years ago, but that's what it was. We worked the best we could. I was on the sideline with Coach Lombardi, as you mentioned, and the good news was as soon as I could, I would get to the heaters on the bench.

BALDWIN: OK, so you had the heaters, but how did you keep your hands, your feet, your nose warm? How did you keep from freezing, Jim?

TUNNEY: Well, ironically, when we got there Saturday night, the weather was pretty good. The sky was clear. It was cold, but not to the degree it was on Sunday. When we woke up Sunday morning, it was cold. We weren't prepared. We had no real equipment for that. We went downtown in Green Bay and knocked on an Army-Navy store door, and we bought everything we could. They were mittens those days, not Gortex like we have now. We weren't prepared for that.

We even took garbage bags and cut a hole in the bottom, put the bag around our body and taped around our waist with adhesive tape and keep the heat in, the same thing with our feet. We would put on a pair of stockings, cotton, and then put a plastic bag over that, and then another pair of socks over that to try to keep warm.

It was difficult to heat your hands and your feet warm because officials had to run on the field, and it was tough for them. But the players had a tough time, too. Coach Lombardi had put a blanket there, an electric blanket, but it didn't work, and the field was frozen.

BALDWIN: I could hear you go on and on, all the details with the refs. I imagine they were trying to use hand signals because clearly the whistles weren't working. I don't know if grown men were crying that freezing, freezing cold day, but did anyone at any point say, you know, let's call it?

TUNNEY: There was a conversation about that. Not from the officials, but from security, thinking that maybe we should postpone it to another time, and everybody said, nah, it's football. Let's play. That's what we do, we play in the rain, the snow, the cold, and that's what we do in the NFL.

BALDWIN: Jim Tunney, you are a tough, tough man. We appreciate you, and I hope one day your hands get a little warmer after that frigid, frigid cold day at Lambeau. Thank you very much.

As we're talking about the Ice Bowl back in '67, an elderly fan actually died of exposure. This can be an extremely dangerous situation for everyone. Sanjay Gupta joins me, just listening to him, and the details, the garbage bags, the mittens.

DR. SANJAY GUPTA, CNN CHIEF MEDICAL CORRESPONDENT: Yes, cold hands, warm hearts.

BALDWIN: Exactly, but talk about the risk of hypothermia.

GUPTA: Look, it's obviously pretty significant. Jim made a really excellent point. We have gotten better at coming up --

BALDWIN: The Gortex, yes.

GUPTA: Various materials to insulate ourselves. That's the key, you want to limit your time outside, the players don't have the option, but a lot of fans -- I know the game is sold out you're talking about. You want to minimize, going inside a bit, getting into some sort of heat if you can, and also dressing in layers that Jim was describing, and also, I'll add something else, making sure the layers aren't too tight.

One of the keys is to allow warm air to get trapped between the layers of clothing. If they're really tight, it doesn't work as well. People talk about wearing a hat. You lose about 20 percent of your body heat through your head. Make sure your head and your ears stay warm, the frostbite areas, the fingers, toes, ears, and nose, really keep an eye on those areas.

If they're red, that's expected. If they start to turn white, that could be the beginning of frostbite. And something I tell people, you eat a big meal ahead of time, your body start to generate more heat than normal so eat beforehand.

BALDWIN: So eat a lot. That's easy.

GUPTA: And don't drink a lot.

BALDWIN: That was my next point. Listen, this is an awesome game. People are boozing. It's just a fact. I have to think that makes you warm and it fools you.

GUPTA: Exactly. This is the non-intuitive part. You feel warm, but what does alcohol do? It dilates the blood vessels in your skin, allowing you to lose more body heat than you want or should. It's having the opposite effect than you want. It might impair your judgment, as well.

BALDWIN: Don't take your shirt off and paint, you know --

GUPTA: You put wet paint on and you're losing all your body heat, yes, basic rules.

BALDWIN: Listen to the doctor.

GUPTA: Trying to help out.

BALDWIN: Dr. Gupta, thank you very much. Happy New Year. Good to see you. And now this --

A psychiatric hospital in South Carolina is trying to explain how a man accused of murder disappeared. The 39-year-old Jason Mark Carter escaped from the facility on Thursday. He was found incompetent to stand trial for the brutal killing of his parents. The crime simply stunned the family's community.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Surprised, it's a quiet neighborhood, never any break-ins or problems. And they were very nice people as far as I could tell.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

BALDWIN: Carter was apprehended earlier today in Tennessee, but that will not quiet the questions about how the hospital could lose track of him, especially given his background. HLN's Lynn Berry joins me right now. How the heck did this happen?

LYNN BERRY, HLN ANCHOR: You just said it. That is key especially given his background. The answer, we just don't know yet. There's an investigation under way to see what fell through the cracks. Here's what we do know. He worked as a supply building, went missing, and a short time later, a white Chevy van was discovered missing belonging to the facility. They put two and two together.

The big question, why was he left unsupervised and long enough to take a van and why did he have access to the van? We say considering his background because in 2006, he was accused of the brutal murder of his mother and stepfather. He was discovered with the bodies. They were wrapped in plastic. He had spent three days eating, drinking, and sleeping with the bodies.

He was found not guilty because of insanity and put in a mental facility. But the question is, why and the facility, I looked it up and did a little research, and apparently, they keep the criminals separate or the people from the Criminal Justice System separate from other patients in a more secure area. As you see, it didn't work.

BALDWIN: Where did they find him?

BERRY: They actually found him about 500 miles away near Nashville, Tennessee, at a motel. Within a half hour, they had an alert out to every police department with this guy's face, all over the media, and they found him pretty quickly. No incident, took him into custody, and now the investigation begins because this guy was accused of an extremely brutal murder. The fact he could escape so easily and so undetected was unnerving.

BALDWIN: Lynn Berry, thank you as always.

Coming up next here, the majority of female Marines cannot do three pull-ups, which is required during boot camp. These ladies can, I can tell you that. I was with them today. Changes are coming. Is this right? I talk to a couple female trainers. We'll see what they have to say.

Plus, have you seen this cover photo? Jane Seymour, sexy, 62 years young. What this bikini cover says about age and beauty in 2014 in America.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

BALDWIN: The path to equal rights in the U.S. military has taken an interesting turn. The marines are reportedly pushing back a January 1st deadline to require female Marines to be able to do three pull- ups. Women recruits train for much of 2013 to reach the minimum fitness standard, which is the same for men. The Marine forces reserve even put out a video, take a look.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

MAJOR ANN BERNARD, U.S. MARINE CORPS: Focus on quality over quantity and over time you will end up with a high quantity of quality pull- ups.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

BALDWIN: The quality may be there, but not so much the quantity. The "San Diego Union Tribune" reports that about 55 percent of the women at Parris Island Boot Camp in South Carolina could not do three. That's why the Marines are delaying the requirement. The paper also reports some military bloggers are in an uproar, sighting unfairness for the men.

So today, we wanted to see just how fit a woman has to be to pull off a pull-up. So we visited two personal trainers and they say pull ups are definitely a challenge for us women.

(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)

AMY BUSH, PERSONAL TRAINER: Lot of women are more so lower body strength. Not a lot of upper body strength with women naturally. It's more of a male-dominant kind of strength.

BALDWIN: This is someone who can do how many pull-ups?

BUSH: Probably five.

BALDWIN: An average woman coming through here, can they really pull one off?

BUSH: The average woman?

BALDWIN: I think I'm good doing a push-up, but a pull-up, you have to be kidding me.

BUSH: A lot of progression, mainly assisted pull-ups at first, and then even with a brand, and then progressively to body weight because you have to think you're putting all your body weight on a couple muscle groups.

BALDWIN: Do you think it's fair that women to be in these positions should be required to do three?

BUSH: I think so. If they're going to be in the armed forces, I believe they need that strength and ability for combat situations.

LIZ MCAULEY, PERSONAL TRAINER: They're in the armed forces. They should be able to meet the strength requirements and three isn't an absurd amount.

BALDWIN: Show me how it's done. I'm not doing it, but they are.

BUSH: Competition?

BALDWIN: Yes.

MCAULEY: All right.

BALDWIN: One, two. Look at those guns. Three, four.

BUSH: Come on, Liz.

BALDWIN: Five. One. Two. Three.

MCAULEY: Come on.

BALDWIN: Four.

(END VIDEOTAPE)

BALDWIN: Yes, if you're asking, no, I didn't try. They did an awesome job. Amy and Liz, thank you, both. It was a year ago this month the Department of Defense announced it was opening combat jobs to women. The previous ban on women in certain military functions led to a lawsuit, and my next guest here is one of four women who filed the suit decrying the fact she said her gender limited her military career.

She's Zoe Bedell. She was a lieutenant in the Marine Corps and she now serves in the reserves. She joins me from our Washington Bureau. Zoe, can you hear me? Welcome.

ZOE BEDELL, FORMER LIEUTENANT, U.S. MARINE CORPS: I can hear you now, thank you.

BALDWIN: Excellent. We saw the video of the pull-ups. Women required to do at least three. Do you think you could do that?

BEDELL: I know if I was training for it, and this was a requirement, absolutely. I have done it in the past.

BALDWIN: OK, so if you were training for it, you could do it. The number that I cited, 55 percent, 55 percent of women Marines cannot do it. So giving these women, now that they're pushing the deadline back, given the women more time to train, do you think that's fair?

BEDELL: Yes, I mean, the Marine Corps is making important steps towards achieving gender equality in its stands. They need to make sure do it in a way that gives all the Marines an equal opportunity to perform. They're clearly aware of what the standards are and what's needed to get there. If they think this is the best choice, I just appreciate they're moving in the right direction.

BALDWIN: So allow me to play devil's advocate. Women were fighting to meet the same standards as men, and now the standards are changing, one could say lowering, as the number differential exists between women and men. Is that counter intuitive? I mean, if you want women to be treated equally, should they be required to fit the same number?

BEDELL: Well, I think that there are a couple of different points here. First of all, we want to make sure that everyone is fit enough to do the job before them, right? So the Marine Corps is able to determine, you know, maybe a woman doesn't need to do 20 pull-ups to do the job. We have been in combat for the last ten years without having to meet a 20 pull-up standard.

But to do the same jobs, combat jobs, we do need to meet the same standards. There are women who are doing exactly that. There have been 13 women who graduated from Marine Corps Infantry training meeting the exact same standards as the men. It's definitely achievable. It's just a question of getting the whole force there.

BALDWIN: You are a graduate of Princeton. You are currently at Harvard Law School. You're quoted as saying your ship has sailed when it comes to joining the combat ranks. Do you feel like the military is adapting, at least in the direction you and other female colleagues had hoped, had wanted?

BEDELL: They're moving in that direction. I'm happy to see movements like this towards gender equality and the physical standards, but frankly, it's still very slow. As I said, we had women graduate from Marine Corps Infantry training. Instead of becoming infantry Marines like all the men who graduate, they're having to go on to other jobs and they are not allowed to use that training. It's happening, but there are still a lot of steps that need to change.

BALDWIN: Zoe Bedell, thank you so much for joining me, and thank you for your service.

BEDELL: Thanks for having me.

BALDWIN: Thank you.

Coming up next, SeaWorld getting a lot of backlash after the CNN film "Blackfish," but a new survey shows 99 percent of people's opinions of SeaWorld was not changed by the film, but there's more to the story especially when you ask the question, who voted? Did someone rig the poll? Stay right here.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

BALDWIN: Controversy over the CNN film "Blackfish" has taking another interesting twist here. The film documents the treatment of whales at SeaWorld and has left the marine parts under fire ever since it was released.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: When Telicom arrived at SeaWorld, he was twice as large as the next animal.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: We stored these whales in what we call a module, which was 20 feet across and 30 feet deep, and the lights were all turned out.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Probably led to what I think is a psychosis.

UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: All whales in captivity, they're all psychologically traumatized.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

BALDWIN: Well, the result of this recent online poll, this was by the "Orlando Business Journal," showed that 99 percent of respondents said the film did not at all change their perception of SeaWorld and it remains positive. Online polls are generally not scientific, but 99 percent support seemed like a pretty large number, so reporters at the journal did a little digging, as reporters do, and they say they discovered a large number of yes votes in the poll came from SeaWorld's one IP address.

CNN's Martin Savidge is here with me. So you have that one IP address, also keeping in mind, this is the Orlando paper, hometown of SeaWorld.

MARTIN SAVIDGE, CNN CORRESPONDENT: Very good point to bring up. People are employed there, brings in a lot of revenue. So no doubt there would be a lot of supporters of SeaWorld. But as you point out, this three-day poll that was done online, when they began to analyze the data and look at the IP addressed, 54 percent of the votes that were supporting SeaWorld came from SeaWorld, came from the company web IP address.

BALDWIN: Can you blame them for doing that?

SAVIDGE: In some respects, no. Obviously, if you're an employee, you love your job. If you think what you're doing is good, you vote. The question would be here. Did the company in any way try to orchestrate it? SeaWorld has put out a statement, by the way, and their statement is essentially, no, they didn't orchestrate a thing.

"Our team members have strong feelings about the park, and they have strong feelings of support." So they encourage them to make their opinions known. Not surprising. I suppose if somebody put out a poll on CNN, I would vote for it, too.

BALDWIN: I would as well.

SAVIDGE: But it raises this kind of --

BALDWIN: Ethical question.

SAVIDGE: I don't know, yes, and trending now, if you look at the poll since it's already out there.

BALDWIN: Where is it now? SAVIDGE: A lot of people who are opposed to SeaWorld are now voting and it's running two to one against SeaWorld, in other words, "Blackfish" had a huge impact negatively, but you can't trust it now because it's a cause, not a sampling, interesting.

BALDWIN: It is interesting. Thank you very, very much.

Coming up next here, millions of people dealing with the nor'easter, but brutal cold temperatures that are the stories on the way, we'll take you outside for that.

Plus, more news -- more on our news just in that the car that actor, Paul Walker, was riding in when he died was going over 100 miles per hour. This is according to this coroner's report, but there's so much more that's coming out today. Those new details, next.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

BALDWIN: Top of the hour. I'm Brooke Baldwin. Are you ready for part two of the nor'easter? It drops several feet of snow and is pulling away from the coast. But in its place, a chilling blast of year that could be the coldest we have seen in 15 to 20 years. CNN has been all over the storm with our correspondents spread all across the affected areas.

Margaret Conley in Boston where nearly 15 inches have fallen, Brian Stelter toughing out the conditions in New York, Poppy Harlow checking flight delays for us in LaGuardia, and there he is, Ted Rowlands, I can't blame the man. He has probably been sitting in the satellite truck, trying to get warm in Naperville, Illinois. You get the prize for the coldest spot today. We're going to get to all of you momentarily.

But let's begin with where the storm is headed. Meteorologist Alexandra Steele is here with us with the latest track. Alexandra, I see football behind you.

ALEXANDRA STEELE, AMS METEOROLOGIST: Yes, right now, where Ted is, it's 1.

BALDWIN: One degree?

STEELE: So one degree. So it feels even colder than that. And we've got some of the coldest air we've seen in years. We're talking decades. Next week, it's really the time period between Sunday and Wednesday. So here we go, here comes this incredibly cold air, really from Minneapolis to Chicago. So let's show you what we're going to see.

In Minneapolis, actually, schools have already been canceled. So these are the cold, hard facts, coldest temperature there in a decade. We'll see high temperatures on monday, minus 15, low minus 30, windchill, minus 50. In Chicago, temperatures even colder than that, the coldest in 17 years.