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Southwest Plane Lands at Wrong Airport; West Virginia May Designate Safe Water Use "Zones"; Rodman Apologizes Again; A-Rod's Attorney's To File Suit Today Fighting His Suspension From Baseball; Supreme Court Declines To Hear Arizona Abortion Appeal, Law Is Struck Down; Feds Probe Christie's Use Of Sandy Aid

Aired January 13, 2014 - 10:00   ET

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

CAROL COSTELLO, CNN ANCHOR: Andy Scholes, thanks so much. The next hour of CNN NEWSROOM starts now.

Good morning. I'm Carol Costello. Thanks so much for joining me. The NTSB is investigating a huge mistake by a Southwest Airlines jet late last night. The plane actually landed at the wrong airport. Flight 4013 took off from Chicago's midway airport heading for Dallas, Texas. The Boeing 737 was scheduled to make a shortstop at Branson Airport in Missouri, but landed instead about 7 miles away at a much smaller airport. Passengers knew something was wrong when the pilot stepped on the brakes hard shortly after touchdown.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

SCOTT SCHIEFFER, PASSENGER: So we landed and, as I said, it was a hard landing. There is burnt rubber. At that point, the pilot came on and said, welcome to Branson, but didn't say anything else. Then, he comes on about 5 minutes later and says, we have landed at the wrong airport. We landed at Clark Field, which is near Branson airport.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

COSTELLO: That's a big, whoops! The runway at Taney County Airport is nearly half the size of the one the plane was supposed to land on at the Branson Airport. That caused some big safety concerns and I mean, big. CNN's Rene Marsh is live in Washington to tell us about that. Good morning.

RENE MARSH, CNN AVIATION AND GOVERNMENT REGULATION CORRESPONDENT: Good morning, Carol. Let's imagine this for a second here. You are coming in for a landing. The pilot jams on the brakes and the plane stops within feet of a steep embankment. Timing was everything last night. Officials say the Southwest Airplane could have gone over that embankment and on to a highway.

(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)

MARSH (voice-over): A hard landing and the smell of burning rubber, two indications to passengers on Southwest Flight 4013 that something was wrong after their plane landed at the wrong airport coming within 300 feet of a steep embankment at the end of the runway. UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: It sounds like a really rough landing. We were all like moving pretty close to the seats as we were landing because the runway, I guess, is too short for the plane.

MARSH: The plane carrying more than 100 passengers was scheduled to land at Missouri's Branson Airport Sunday night, but instead showed up at Taney County Airport, about seven miles from the intended destination.

UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: One of the planes ended up landing at point lookout airport and it needs mutual aid.

MARSH: The runway at Taney County Airport is about half the length of the runway at Branson.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: We got a call saying the plane has landed at an airport nearby and we're thinking surely not a jet plane could land there.

MARSH: Officials say if the pilot didn't brake when he did, the plane could have overshot the runway and tumbled on to a nearby highway. Passenger, Scott Schieffer, captured the aftermath on video, which shows passengers being evacuated from the plane before being bussed to the larger airport. This is the second case of a plane landing at the wrong airport.

In November, a Boeing 747 Dreamlifter cargo plane landed at the wrong Kansas airport on a runway half mile shorter than it usually uses. Despite fears, the Dreamlifter would be stuck indefinitely. The jumbo jet eventually took off without incident. Southwest is hoping for a similar successful outcome for their Boeing 737, although they've given no timetable as to when they plan to fly out.

(END VIDEOTAPE)

MARSH: Well, at this hour, no info just yet on if or when they will be able to get that plane out of there. Lots of calculations must be done first. They have to determine if it is safe and looking at the weight and the length of the runway. We still don't have any answers as far as how did this all happen in the first place. Of course, we are keeping tabs on the plane there at that airport -- Carol.

COSTELLO: Just unbelievable. So we want to talk more about this, Rene. Thanks so much. For more, let's bring in Mary Schiavo, the former inspector general for the Department of Transportation. Welcome.

MARY SCHIAVO, FORMER INSPECTOR GENERAL, U.S. DOT: Thank you, Carol.

COSTELLO: So first of all, you heard that passenger, the passenger said the pilot got on the intercom system and said, welcome to Branson and shortly after that, said, whoops, we are not in Branson. How can that happen? How can you not know what airport you are at?

SCHIAVO: The way it usually happens is the two airports have the same runway heading, that's the indicator on the compass. So if it is 27, the airports will have the same orientation on the runway. Usually, what happens is you are handed off. You say you have the runway in sight. Air traffic control says OK and the pilot takes it from there.

If you are doing an instrument landing, it wouldn't happen. It is usually a visual landing on side by side airports not too far apart. It happens many times. There is a place in Florida where it happens frequently. It even happened at my flight school.

COSTELLO: OK, so once -- the pilot may not have been aware that the runway was short until he actually touched down. Is that how it would have happened?

SCHIAVO: Yes, that is how it happened. Once you touch down, there are markings on the runway that let you know you are passed the midway point when you are getting towards the end of the runway. So he or she might have been very surprised to find out that they were running out of runway very quickly, the fast action. Southwest pilots do hand fly the plane. They don't do full auto land as much as others sometimes.

So they often credit Southwest pilots as being good hands-on pilots. In this case, that came in very handy because if he had overshot the runway or she had overshot the runway, it could have been a very disastrous result by accident, of course. If you overshoot the runway as Southwest has done a couple of times at the right airport, it is a bad result.

COSTELLO: So how serious is this incident?

SCHIAVO: It is very serious. Unlike the dream lifter that landed in Kansas, this plane was full of passengers. That presents a really serious issue, because all the lives were at stake. They are at the wrong airport. It is a big deal because it was a commercial-scheduled service airline. The FAA, the Federal Aviation Administration, likes to see the pilots stay very tight on their instruments.

If you were watching the instrument now, seven miles is pretty close, but with modern instrumentation, you know 70 feet, much less 70 miles. So the FAA will also be interested, not just NTSB as to why they weren't on top of their instruments and aware of their situation. They call it loss of situational awareness.

COSTELLO: Mary, thanks so much for your insight this morning. We appreciate it.

It has been four days. People in West Virginia still don't know when they can drink or bathe in their own water. Right now, officials are meeting to try and figure out some safe zones for water usage. The 300,000 people have been forced to live on bottled water after poisonous chemicals contaminated their water lines. CNN's Alexandra Field live in Charleston, West Virginia, with more for you. Good morning.

ALEXANDRA FIELD, CNN CORRESPONDENT: Good morning, Carol. Those samples of the contaminated water are being tested around the clock. West Virginia officials now say the levels are moving in the right direction, but they have not yet given the all-clear for people to turn their taps back on. Another day now starts without water running from the faucets here in West Virginia.

What we are learning is that once the water is deemed safe, users will not all be able to flood the system at once. That could create more problems after the system has been down for a few days. Officials say, instead, they are going to designate zones and they will let people know when their zone can begin to use water. The priority will be given to zones where water is most badly need.

That would include zones that have hospitals. The governor of West Virginia is, his sole priority, main focus, is restoring water service here in the state. He says after that, he will be turning his attention to the investigation, as to how this leak happened and whether there was any way to prevent it. Here is what he told us.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

GOVERNOR EARL RAY TOMBLIN (D), WEST VIRGINIA: I could tell you that there will be and should be a thorough investigation of what happened and why this incident happened at Freedom Industries.

FIELD: Do you have any indication that they may have known that they had a problem waiting to happen?

TOMBOLIN: I do not have any indication, having not known about the condition beforehand but, obviously, there were problems there.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

FIELD: Freedom Industries held a press conference on Friday. They have not spoken publicly since. In the press conference, the president of Freedom apologized, state officials say the company is now working with them on the mediation efforts and the company says the chemical has since been removed from the state. Also Carol, the U.S. attorney is investigating and considering whether criminal charges could be brought.

COSTELLO: Well, I just talked to an official last hour who said there was a hole in one of the tanks that you could actually see. It was small, but you could see it and of course, that leads to the question, if you walked up to the tank and saw it, why didn't anyone at the company notice.

FIELD: The explanation that we have been given from environmental officials who have been briefing the media here in West Virginia is that this hole was in the underground portion of a tank that can be seen above ground. So that the hole itself would have been in the underground portion of that tank. Obviously, the person you spoke to is raising a potentially different issue here.

But our understanding, according to these officials of what happened is that the hole is somewhere in the bottom of the tank, the portion underground. The chemical spilled, flooded the soil around it and rose up breaching a containment wall and flowing into the river. A lot of people are raising questions as to why these chemicals were stored in a facility just about a mile away from a water treatment facility. So a lot of parts of this investigation -- Carol.

COSTELLO: I know you'll stay on the story. Alexandra Field, many thanks to you.

Dennis Rodman is apologizing again fresh off his latest trip from North Korea. The former NBA player talked to reporters in Beijing, but eventually stopped to say that, he is no diplomat, just a regular guy that wanted to play basketball.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

DENNIS RODMAN, FORMER NBA STAR: I'm sorry about all the people. I'm sorry. I am not the president. I'm not an ambassador. I'm Dennis Rodman, just an individual showing the world that we can get along and be happy for one day. I love to see -- I love to see --

(END VIDEO CLIP)

COSTELLO: Rodman says he is sorry for what goes on in North Korea politically, but it is certainly not his fault.

Alex Rodriguez fight against Major League Baseball goes on. A few minutes ago, you heard from one of A-Rod's attorneys who tells CNN he is filing suit today in federal court to overturn the 2014 regular season and post-season ban. The A-Rod legal team argument, a 162-game suspension is unprecedented especially since he never failed a drug test.

Another picture of A-Rod is emerging, this one delivered by the Biogenesis clinic founder, Anthony Bosch. In a bombshell "60 Minutes," he alleges he gave A-Rod a drugstore of banned substances and even told him how to beat the system.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: What were the various banned substances that he was taking?

ANTHONY BOSCH, CLAIMS HE GAVE BANNED DRUGS TO ALEX RODRIGUEZ: Testosterone, insulin growth factor, one, human growth hormone, and some different forms of peptides.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: All of them banned?

BOSCH: All of them banned.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

COSTELLO: He added to that some testosterone-laced gummy bears that supposedly A-Rod, you know, munched on while he was in the dugout. CNN Rachel Nichols joins me now. You know what struck me, A-Rod keeps saying, I never failed a drug test, but neither did Lance Armstrong.

RACHEL NICHOLS, CNN SPORTS CORRESPONDENT: Yes, absolutely. There is no question that testing in major leagues sports is behind the cheaters. It's only is going to be because if you think about it, you can't invent a drug test to test a drug protocol that hasn't invented itself. They are never going to be able to get ahead of these guys. What they can do is try to catch up and catching them through testing and also through investigation.

This is really the first time we have seen a U.S. major sports league use this much investigation to proactively go after the players and the athletes that it thinks is cheating and in this case, it worked. They are also hoping to toughen penalties that players feel more scared if there is something that they get caught for, they might be out of the game for up to a year now.

They are talking about instilling that. So they are basically finding other ways around just testing. Testing is never going to be the sure fire way to stop performance-enhancing drugs in this game.

COSTELLO: Well, the punishment has to be consistent too, right? When you look at Jhonny Peralta, he got a 50-game suspension, but he signed a big fat $53 million contract with St. Louis. Then, just reaction from the baseball world itself, Chipper Jones went on Twitter and he was talking about Bosch and what a scum he was.

But other baseball players came out and said, they are mad that Jhonny Peralta is playing again. There are all these different things happening in the world of baseball and none of it frankly is going to work when it comes to cleaning up the sport.

NICHOLS: Yes, it is tough because you have someone in Tony Bosch who is not exactly an upstanding citizen. Major League Baseball, the way they categorized it, is we don't need to consider his personal credibility. That's not what's at issue here. What's at issue is the physical evidence that he can give us.

Whether you think this guy is scummy, whether you think he is generally a liar or not, doesn't really matter. If he has physical evidence, that's what we are going to go by. That's what he provided to Major League Baseball. It wasn't just Alex Rodriguez. We have to remember. This isn't just a he said, he said. There were 13 other players involved with biogenesis.

In every single case, except for Alex Rodriguez, the hard evidence that Tony Bosch provided major league baseball was so overwhelming that all those players and all those players lawyers said, you know what, you got me. I did it. They took their punishment. They served their suspension.

Alex Rodriguez is the only player that says, nope, Tony Bosch is a liar, nope, he is making it up, nope, I didn't do this. Either you have to believe that Tony Bosch actually helped all of these other players, because the other players acknowledged it and somehow made up and pretended and singled out Alex Rodriguez or that perhaps Alex Rodriguez isn't telling us the whole side of the story.

COSTELLO: So bizarre. Want to make a quick prediction. Will Alex Rodriguez ever be in pinstripes again?

NICHOLS: Well, it is hard to say. His lawyer is obviously taking this to federal court. We heard that this morning on CNN. Most legal analysts think they have much of a chance in federal court because the players union, which Alex is a part of, has agreed to this binding arbitration. Courts are very reluctant to turn over what is now a legal question.

Is that arbitration actually something that should be hearing this case, not the question of did Alex Rodriguez actually do performance- enhancing drugs? No one expects him to get a lot of relief in federal court. The big question is now a game of chicken with the New York Yankees. Under the rules of Major League Baseball, Alex is allowed to show up at spring training, even though he will be suspended once the regular season starts.

Does he actually show up at spring training? Do the Yankees let him in the locker room or tell him he has to go across the street to the minor league facility. They are not going to pay him for this season, because he is suspended. He is owed three more years after that, $61 million. Is there bargaining there over how much they are going to pay him later? It all has to play out, Carol. There is a lot more to come.

COSTELLO: Spring training starts in a couple of weeks. Their spring training camps in Tampa where I want to be. Rachel Nichols, many thanks to you. Be sure to watch "UNGUARDED" with Rachel Nichols, Friday, 10:30 p.m. Eastern right here on CNN.

Still to come in the NEWSROOM, it gets worse for New Jersey Governor Chris Christie as he deals with bridge gate. Federal investigators have questions about how his office spent money from Superstorm Sandy.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

COSTELLO: Moments ago, the U.S. Supreme Court declined to hear Arizona's appeal to reinstate a law that would ban most abortions after 20 weeks. Now the ruling is in 2012 state law cannot be enforced. Last year, a federal appeals court said the restrictions were unconstitutional. Arizona was appealing that court's decision.

Jonathan Turley is a law professor at George Washington University. He joins us now by phone. Hi, Jonathan.

JONATHAN TURLEY, PROFESSOR, GEORGE WASHINGTON UNIVERSITY (via telephone): Hi, Carol.

COSTELLO: So explain this ruling to us.

TURLEY: It is a very significant ruling even though it is essentially a non-ruling. They are not going to review it. The reason we were all following the horn case is because it represented a sweeping challenge to Roe V Wade and its progeny. What the state was doing was not only shortening the period in which you could have a lawful abortion to 20 weeks, instead of the lowest, which was 24 weeks that exist under the Supreme Court cases.

But it was asking the court to consider things like fetal pain and other factors that would increase the authority of state to restrict abortions. The final question for them to the court was actually to say, look, there have been a lot of medical changes. A lot of scientific changes, and we think you should review the entire line of Roe V. Wade for a major overhaul. All of that the court declined to do.

COSTELLO: Interesting because as you well know, many, many states are putting into place very restrictive abortion laws. Texas comes to mind. So how might this non-decision decision affect states like Texas?

TURLEY: That's interesting question, Carol, because Texas is still out there. A number of these states have live torpedoes in the water. We are not too sure. The court can always take a later case. It didn't rule on the merits here. It did allow the Ninth Circuit decision to stand. I think you are going to continue to see these challenges.

The reason is that many people don't realize that Roe V Wade was fundamentally changed in a case called Casey. A lot of people refer to the trimester system, which is something the court did away with. The one thing that the court retained was this question of viability, that once that fetus becomes viable outside the womb, the state's authority increases.

So this was a very clever effort by the state to say we now think that point comes earlier, because science and medicine have had such advances. That's going to be an issue that's going to continue to come back to the court as more and more technology comes online that allows earlier points of viability.

COSTELLO: Interesting. Jonathan Turley, thanks for making things so clear. We appreciate it.

TURLEY: My pleasure, Carol.

Still to come on the NEWSROOM, Republican darling, Chris Christie, he bruised and battered from a traffic jam. Now, on the horizon, new fallout from Hurricane Sandy. We'll have exclusive details of a new investigation.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

COSTELLO: New information this morning about yet another investigation into New Jersey Governor Chris Christie's office, but this time it's not about the closure of all those toll lanes on the George Washington Bridge. Chris Frates of CNN Investigations is breaking this exclusive story. He joins me now live. Chris, what have you learned?

CHRIS FRATES, CNN INVESTIGATIVE UNIT: Well, Carol, we've learned that it could be more bad news for Governor Christie this morning. Federal officials are now looking into a controversy featuring a tax-pair advertised campaign that featured the New Jersey governor and his family all in an election year.

(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE) FRATES (voice-over): When Hurricane Sandy hit New Jersey, Chris Christie led from the trenches and his skillful response to the devastating superstorm rocketed him into political super stardom. But a new federal investigation into how the New Jersey governor spent some of the Sandy relief money could threaten to wash away the foundation of his political brand.

CNN has learned that federal investigators will examine the state's $25 million tourism marketing campaign, a campaign that was paid for with Sandy recovery money.

UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: The Jersey Shore is open.

GOVERNOR CHRIS CHRISTIE, NEW JERSEY: Because we're stronger than the storm.

FRATES: A campaign that featured Christie and his family during an election year. Democratic Congressman Frank Pallone, a vocal Christie critic requested the investigation and tells CNN it's now moving ahead, but he says this is not about politics.

REPRESENTATIVE FRANK PALLONE (D), NEW JERSEY: This was money that could have directly been used for Sandy recovery. As you know, many of my constituents still haven't gotten the money that is owed them to rebuild their homes or to raise their homes of to help.

FRATES: Pallone says promoting New Jersey tourism after the Superstorm was a good idea, but he has a big question about how much taxpayer money was spent to make those ads. The winning bid, a $4.7 million campaign featuring Christie and family. The next lower bid that lost out was nearly half the price at $2.5 million and wouldn't have featured the governor.

The ads caused controversy as they hit the airwaves while Christie was running for re-election. Democrats slammed him arguing it gave the incumbent governor an unfair advantage. At the time his aides said the winning bid provided more value. The office of the inspector general at the Department of Urban Development has concluded there is enough evidence to launch a full-scale investigation according to Congressman Pallone.

PALLONE: Taxpayer dollars that could have been used for Sandy relief were used for adds promoting the government because he was in them with his family during an election campaign.

FRATES: But as bad as the George Washington Bridge scandal has been for Christie, if the investigation finds he misused funds, it could get far worse tarnishing the signature achievement that has helped propel toward the White House.

(END VIDEOTAPE)

FRATES: Now we have reached out to Christie's office and we have not yet gotten a response. The inspector general told us that they are not going to comment on any investigations. Now Congressman Pallone has said that the investigation by the HUD inspector general, it's likely to take months, but it will result in an official report that will be released to the public.

COSTELLO: Chris Frates, thanks so much. We want to get more on the political fallout for Governor Christi so we are now joined now by our national political reporter, Peter Hamby. I know Chris Christie's state of the state address is tomorrow. You think he will address any of this?

PETER HAMBY, CNN NATIONAL POLITICAL REPORTER: We'll have to wait and see. It is clear, Carol, that this is completely paralyzing Christie's agenda as he begins his second term this week. I can't imagine there will be any headline coming out of the state of the state address tomorrow evening that does not address either the story that Chris just talked about, the HUD investigation or the bridge story.

These two stories are bad for reasons that Chris just mentioned they undercut Christie's brand, but they are also bad because they are going to drag on and on and on. Last week, you saw the sort of rush to judgment about Christie and whether he will survive. There is this tendency in Washington to have a smart take on everything and render judgment on these big stories.

But the Democrats in the State House of New Jersey have subpoena power. There is going to be a drip, drip, drip, coming out of this potentially, that could damage Christie as he travels around the country in 2014 campaigning for governors. He is the chairman of the Republican Governor's Association. If he is in Ohio or Florida or Iowa in any state where there is a competitive governor's race, he could be shrouded in controversy.

Those are headlines these candidates might not want. Both stories, we are going to keep seeing stories come out over the next weeks in the coming weeks and months. Both really bad stories that will drown out his agenda as he tries to kick off his second term in New Jersey -- Carol.

COSTELLO: Peter Hamby, many thanks to you. NEWSROOM will be right back.

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