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Blimp on Loose; South Carolina Violent Arrest; Presidential Race. Aired 2-2:30p ET

Aired October 28, 2015 - 14:00   ET

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

[14:00:02] ANNOUNCER: This is CNN breaking news.

BROOKE BALDWIN, CNN ANCHOR: All right, here we go. Breaking news on CNN. I'm Brooke Baldwin.

I don't think I've ever seen these words before, but there's a first time for everything. A blimp is on the loose. We are told it is flying somewhere in the skies over Pennsylvania. There are F-16 jets that have now been scrambled. Boy, oh, boy, do I have some questions on this one. So let's bring in our Pentagon correspondent Barbara Starr. Also with me, our CNN aviation analyst Mary Schiavo.

And, Barbara, first of all, we're looking at pictures of what I presume to be an example of what said blimp would look like. Can you tell me what the heck happened, please?

BARBARA STARR, CNN PENTAGON CORRESPONDENT: Well, what we know at this hour is NORAD, the North American Aerospace Defense Command, has now confirmed that this blimp, it's called JLENS, came loose from its mooring, from its tether rope at Aberdeen Proving Grounds, a military facility just north of Washington, D.C., this morning. It was on a tether. This is a system they're testing out there. It's full of radar equipment to try and test its ability to detect unidentified objects, unidentified aircraft, cruise missiles, that sort of thing. But it came loose.

So now this blimp, filled with helium, is flying north. It is now over Pennsylvania, we are told. Two F-16s in the air. They were scrambled out of their air station near Atlantic City, New Jersey. The military not saying yet whether those F-16s are armed because right now the U.S. government is trying to figure out what to do about this. I talked to an official tracking this whole situation just a few minutes ago, and he said we are trying to figure it out.

So the U.S. military now working with the FAA. Obviously, a lot of concern to make sure air space safety is maintained. This is flying uncontrolled at about 16,000 feet right now over Pennsylvania. They have to make sure there's no unexpected air traffic that would get in its way, that would get in the way of this path of this blimp. So air safety a very serious concern at this hour. Also trying to figure out the obvious question, what do they do to bring it down, to get it on the ground in a safe manner?

BALDWIN: Yes. Yes. STARR: No answer to that question at this moment. There is, I'm told,

a fairly energetic effort between a number of federal agencies looking at all of the options. They don't think at this point it's about to lose helium anytime soon and drift to the ground. Are they going to have to take military action and shoot it down? This is the same dilemma, and I know Mary can talk about this in more detail, that you often have when there have been, you know, small, private planes that lose their oxygen system, the pilot's unconscious and, you know, these planes pose a potential threat on the ground. But this is a massive, much larger than a small airplane. So they have to figure out a way to get it down, get it on the ground safely, not injure anybody on the ground, and not cause any damage on the ground.

So shooting it down could theoretically be an option, but you would have to have a pretty good engineering analysis to know where that wreckage might go, what the winds are, how it might drift, and where it would impact on the ground. They're going to want to make sure - we know the military always wants to make sure when unidentified things are out there, that they stay away, they keep them away from populated areas. How they do that right now, no answer.

BALDWIN: OK. So, F-16s scrambled. We don't know if they're armed or not. To your point, Barbara, Mary, what - run through possible options. Maybe option a, shooting it down. But to Barbara's point, you've got to be very careful. This is a large blimp. Where this thing would potentially land. What else?

MARY SCHIAVO, CNN AVIATION ANALYST: Well, and in shooting it down, things are very different from the days of the Hindenburg because the air, the helium inside the blimp is compartmentalized and it's far less flammable and explosive than in the days of the Hindenburg days. So they could, if they had to, shoot it down. They - one shot would not just cause it to basically pop like a balloon because it is compartmentalized. And so they could bring it down gradually, not losing the payload on board, and also not causing a - sort of a catastrophic event where it would come down.

The problem is, is that it's not like an aircraft in that an aircraft, if the pilot is incapacitated, the aircraft will maintain the heading and the attitude of the plane that was last input into the aircraft. In other words, it will glide and we know where it's going to glide. With a - with a blimp we don't have that because it's subject to air currents, and that's why a plane or a helicopter could not try to get one of the tether lines. Remember, it does have lines from the front of the blimp and the back of the blimp and then hanging down from the blimp, but you can't get near it because it doesn't have a trajectory like an aircraft that's disabled. So my guess is, they will try to take it down gradually with one shot into different compartments. And it will not end up like the Hindenburg.

[14:05:17] BALDWIN: OK. Maybe they have a chase van on the ground watching because of the wind speeds. Ladies, don't go too far. We're going to keep our close eye on this blimp on the loose. Mary Schiavo and Barbara Starr, thank you both so, so much.

Got to get to South Carolina, though. A huge story. The Richland County sheriff has just announced, just recently here, he has officially fired this school resource officer and the sheriff's deputy, Ben Fields. Fields lost his job now just two days after this video surfaced online showing him taking down this 16-year-old girl at Spring Valley High School. Officials say Fields was called in after the girl refused orders to leave her math class. And while the sheriff criticized the student for not following orders, he explained how Fields totally break policy in the sheriff's department.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

SHERIFF LEON LOTT, RICHLAND COUNTY, SOUTH CAROLINA: What he should not have done is thrown the student. That's what he should not have done. He could have maybe done a lot of things that he is trained to do, but he was not trained to throw the student. When you make an arrest from someone who does not have a weapon that you need to escape from, you never let go of that subject. You maintain control of them.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

BALDWIN: The sheriff also added that many at the school supported this school resource officer, including the teacher and the school administrator who initially ordered her to leave the class unsuccessfully. But a second student arrested, for she says protesting her classmate's physical takedown, said that Fields has a reputation for being rough and that is why cell phones were pulled out.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

NIYA KENNY, SECOND STUDENT ARRESTED: I mean just seeing her being thrown across the classroom like that was really traumatizing. I've never seen anything like that in my life. And it just really broke my heart to watch it.

We've heard about his reputation, and we've heard that he's a really - I don't want -- yes, I guess I could say dangerous man to get involved with, you know, on that level. So when he came in the classroom, I immediately told my classmates, get your phones out, get your phones out. I think this is going to go downhill, and it did.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

BALDWIN: Let's discuss. With me now former prosecutor and civil rights attorney Charles Coleman and also with us Marvin Thompson. He is the CEO and president of Lighthouse Education Foundation and former principal of the now closed charter school that was featured on "Blackboard Wars" on Oprah Winfrey's network down there in New Orleans.

So, gentlemen, thank you both for joining me.

And, Charles, let me just turn to you. I read your piece in "The Root." You actually asked, -- one of the questions you ask in your piece is similar to what we heard from the sheriff, that being, you know, he's really going to look into whether or not the school resource officer should have been called in for this disciplinary action in the first place. What do you think? CHARLES COLEMAN, CIVIL RIGHTS ATTORNEY: Sure, Brooke. I think that

this issue raises a lot of questions about how school resource officers are being engaged in our classrooms with respect to student populations. The purpose of the school resource officer and - in schools in general is to ensure the safety and protection not only of students but also of faculty. And that's typically going to be engaged when you're talking about something insane like a school shooting.

BALDWIN: Like a school shooting?

COLEMAN: Exactly or something of that nature. School resources offices are not supposed to be used as backups to teachers who can't control their classrooms. The teachers, counselors, those are the people who are adequately trained to be able to deal with disruptions in the classrooms and things of that nature. But when you're talking about school safety and when you're talking about viable threats to the actual physical safety of students or of teachers, those are the instances that school resource officers should be reserved for.

BALDWIN: Marvin, I want to ask you specifically about your school in New Orleans, because I know you had, what, at least one S.R.O. that teachers and administrators could call in. Do you think that this was an appropriate time for a school resource officer to be called in over a disciplinary, you know, issue apparently involving this young woman not putting her phone away, asked to be - you know, leave the classroom. She wasn't compliant. What would you - what would you say to that?

MARVIN THOMPSON, FORMER HIGH SCHOOL PRINCIPAL: Well, I think this issue really is about classroom management. Teachers are trained with a variety of strategies to address that type of issue that we saw. So I think the S.R.O.'s presence only escalated a power struggle between a teacher and a student. And teachers are well versed in how to deal with those power struggles. And one of the primary strategies and things that they are all aware of is, never engage in a power struggle with a student in front of their peers. Both the student is going to try to maintain face and that means not giving in. And whether it's passively or whether it's aggressively. And there are a host of strategies that this teacher could have used. But the ultimate goal, whatever the strategy, the outcome is to establish a relationship with that student so that the issue at hand doesn't recur. And that -

[14:10:00] BALDWIN: So are you saying that the teacher in this - the teacher in this case failed doing her or his job?

THOMPSON: Well, when you start using police officers to manage classroom behavior, you create a police state mentality. And when you do that, for every little offense, particularly those of such a minor offense not - like not putting away a cell phone, you create a mentality amongst the student population that it's us against them. That becomes a pervasive response to any type of disciplinary action, whether in a classroom. And no S.R.O. can maintain that kind of work effort. And teachers, once that culture begins to establish itself, it is a hard way to get back to establishing positive relationships with young people. So my answer is, no, the S.R.O. should not have been called. And I understand an administrator was also present at some point.

BALDWIN: That's right.

THOMPSON: That's a teach - and that's a teaching opportunity from the administrator to the teacher. That's the moment of engagement in real time to reinforce the strategies that all good teachers know.

BALDWIN: But - OK, and, Charles, I'm going to turn to you. You know, I can only hear, I'm channeling my teacher friends who would say, hang on a second, I love my students, I love education, I came into these classrooms to teach. Yes, I will be the disciplinarian up to, you know, a point. But when a student is mouthy and won't - you know, is disrupting the rest of the class and stopping me from doing what I came here to do, to educate, I'm going to call in reinforcements. That's not my job.

COLEMAN: Well, I think part of the thing that people need to understand, even teachers who have that sort of remark or response to this, is that when you get law enforcement involved, it becomes a criminal situation. And that is, if there's anything that I could take away positively from the sheriff's remarks today in his press conference is that they were called in and at the point that the school resource officer gets involved, he's treating it as a criminal situation. He's not worried about classroom discipline. He's not looking at it as a school situation. His mind-set is taking down a criminal.

Now, I completely disagree with that mind-set in terms of how that was executed -

BALDWIN: Yes. It's not great (ph) for the young people.

COLEMAN: Oh, it sends a horrible message to the kids in that classroom. I mean, think about it, you're talking about school safety officers who are in that classroom to insure the protection of those students. And if you watch that video, what you see on the faces of those children is terror. You see fear. And that's woefully ironic that the person who is charged with protecting them is the person that they fear the most, which is a real problem. So, you're right, it's a horrible message. But again, to those teachers who would say, well, I'm having a problem controlling my classroom, that's not why you bring school resource officers into the picture. That's not their purpose and that's now what they're there for.

BALDWIN: Such an important conversation as there are S.R.O.s used all across this country.

Charles Coleman, thank you very much.

COLEMAN: Thanks.

BALDWIN: And Marvin Thompson, I appreciate you there in New Orleans.

Coming up next, another violent incident caught on tape. A high school student body-slamming his principal. That's what happened in South Carolina here. We're talking about something totally separate. That's ahead.

Also, he loses the top spot and, as he does so, Donald Trump asks voters in Iowa what the hell are you thinking? How far is he willing to go in tonight's Republican debate? We'll take you there live.

And much more on our breaking news here. A U.S. military blimp is on the loose somewhere over Pennsylvania. F-16 jets have been scrambled. Stand by for that.

You're watching CNN. I'm Brooke Baldwin.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

[14:17:33] BALDWIN: All right, if you're just now joining us here, these are pictures of what this blimp that is now currently on the loose looks like. It is - this is what we're hearing from NORAD. This is a blimp used with radar equipment. It got loose from its moorings earlier this morning from Maryland and is somewhere over the skies of Pennsylvania. Barbara Starr from our Pentagon was just reporting on how the F-16s have now been scrambled. No word as to whether or not the F-16s are armed to potentially have to shoot this blimp down. So we're watching this very closely. Hopefully can get eyes on it and figure out how they will bring it down to safety and hopefully also in a very rural area. So stay tuned for that.

Meantime, second place. Not exactly a place Donald Trump likes to be, especially not heading into a crucial debate. Here we go, round three tonight, and Trump is not happy. In the last couple of days, Trump got trumped by fellow political outsider Ben Carson. Both in a new national poll, as well as more than one poll in Iowa. And let's just say he's not taking it so well.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

DONALD TRUMP (R), PRESIDENTIAL CANDIDATE: And Iowa, what the hell are you people doing to me? I don't like being second. Second is terrible.

Iowa, will you get your numbers up, please? Will you get these numbers up? I promise you I will do such a good job.

You know, by the way, before I forget, will you get the numbers up, Iowa, please? This is ridiculous.

And please do me a favor, let me win Iowa. I refuse to say, get your asses in gear. I will not say that.

Now, if I lose Iowa, I will never speak to you people again. That I can -

(END VIDEO CLIP)

BALDWIN: Oh, let's go to Boulder, Colorado, where debate preps are under way. With me now, David Chalian, CNN political director, and MJ Lee, CNN politics reporter.

And, David Chalian, you were wondering what a second place Trump would look like. Now we know. My question to you is, how far is he going to go tonight on that stage?

DAVID CHALIAN, CNN POLITICAL DIRECTOR: Well, listen, obviously being on stage with the other candidates is different than being in front of all your supporters. I mean that was an unbelievable approach last night that he gave, sort of begging people to get with the program and get his poll numbers up. But he clearly is coming into this debate very differently than he went into the last two, Brooke. And so I do think we're going to see a different calculus on his part.

He also thinks that the economy, that being the central issue of this debate, is his wheelhouse and so I am sure he wants to draw a sharp contrast with his closest competitor, the guy now in number one, Ben Carson.

[14:20:00] BALDWIN: How, MJ, I know you just published an article on CNN talking about, you know, how we - he will be forced to change his tactics in the debate. He being Trump. How do you think he'll do it?

MJ LEE, CNN POLITICS REPORTER: Well, I mean the question is, can Donald Trump handle being not in first place anymore, as David just said? I think the question also is, is he going to take on Ben Carson in a way that he hasn't in the past debates? Trump has really enjoyed going after some of the other candidates that will be on stage tonight. Jeb Bush, Marco Rubio. But has really steered clear of going after Ben Carson. Ben Carson, whose personality is probably as opposite as you can get from Donald Trump. But in the last couple of days, Trump has gone there. He has raised questions about Ben Carson's religion. He has said that Ben Carson is too low energy to be commander in chief. So this is something that I think we might start to see tonight. Although I would point out, Brooke, that this isn't a no-risk strategy. You never want to be sort of the bully in the school playground going after the nicest kid in the class. And Ben Carson is sort of the nicest kid in the class. He doesn't want to be the attack dog. He doesn't like to go after his rivals. So I don't know if the audience and voters will take to that kindly. And I think Trump is going to find out the more he goes after Carson.

BALDWIN: All right. So that's Trump/Carson. What about, David, John Kasich, Ohio governor, because, you know, we know for so long he vowed the one thing he wouldn't do is go negative. And he did it. Take a look.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

GOV. JOHN KASICH (R), PRESIDENTIAL CANDIDATE: Do you know how crazy this election is? Let me tell you something. I've about had it with these people.

But I want you to know, I'm fed up. I am sick and tired of listening to this nonsense. And I'm going to have to call it like it is, as long as I'm in this race.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

BALDWIN: That was yesterday. I bet that's a preview of more of what we'll see from John Kasich tonight. I wanted to ask you about another establishment guy being Jeb Bush. I mean, listen, talk about make or break. I mean if he has a bad debate performance, this could be bad, bad for him in terms of dollars and cents. He could lose donors. How high are the stakes for Jeb Bush?

CHALIAN: They're pretty high, Brooke. But let's connect the two. Let's connect Kasich, what you just heard there, and, remember, Jeb Bush over the weekend had similar sound of frustration with the state of the race. These two establishment guys are letting their frustration out, airing it out in public ahead of this debate with the insurgent wing of the party and the Trumps and the Carson crowd sort of taking over. And they are clearly frustrated by that.

Jeb Bush has a lot on the line tonight. You're absolutely right. He had this confab in Houston with his big donors and his family. But they are still wringing their hands a little bit. He needs to walk out of this debate tonight having convinced his big donors and his supporters that he has turned things around, that he's got this for the long haul and that he is the horse they want to ride. If they start getting shaky on that fact after tonight's debate, Jeb Bush could be in a world of hurt.

BALDWIN: Wow. David Chalian, MJ Lee, thank you, in Boulder. A quick reminder, do not miss our special two-hour edition of "AC 360" tonight starting at 10:00 p.m. Eastern. Anderson Cooper, the whole team, break down the highlights, the lowlights after tonight's Republican presidential debate.

Next, their graves were already dug. Hostages rescued during a U.S. raid from ISIS terrorists are now speaking out for the first time and revealing just the horrors they endured there.

We are also watching our breaking news, this military blimp on the loose somewhere above the northeastern United States. Two F-16 fighter jets currently tracking this thing. We'll have the very latest for you when we come back.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

[14:27:46] BALDWIN: Back to our breaking news here. We are tracking this U.S. military blimp that has been on the loose for quite a little while today. We are told it broke loose from its moorings sometime and somewhere over Maryland, flying now somewhere over Pennsylvania. F-16 jets have been scrambled. So I have with me Major General Spider Marks.

So let me just begin with, general, how the heck do they bring this thing down?

But we first have Tom Sater, who is standing by in the CNN Weather Center.

So, Tom Sater, let me go to you.

TOM SATER, CNN METEOROLOGIST: OK.

BALDWIN: How big is this blimp? SATER: I believe it's 230 feet. This is big.

BALDWIN: Whoa!

SATER: And it's large and white and it's only half the distance of where flight level is for planes. So if you see a plane, obviously 30,000, 35,000 feet, this is only 16,000. There are going to be some areas that we're going to get all kinds of video because even though there is rain, and I think that rain is going to keep it at 30 - or 16 maybe 18,000 feet from rising too high, but we're probably going to get some video.

But let's talk about what we know and what we do not know, Brooke, because this is important. When you talk about the National Weather Service, several time a day, several offices release weather balloons. It's made of latex. And they fill it with hydrogen. They can fill it with helium, but that's more expensive. We know this blimp is filled with helium, all right. We do not know if it's a heavy-duty latex. And that's important because when weather balloons rise from the National Weather Service, they can reach heights up to the tropopods (ph), which is 60,000 feet. The pressure drops so the balloon expands until it pops. That's why the material is important. If they let this thing rise, how much pressure can it stand at what height and elevation would it pop and they'd let it fall?

[14:29:33] Here's the other thing. We don't know how heavy the equipment is on this blimp. Obviously it's experimental and it's military. They know and they're tracking it. But right now Aberdeen, northeast areas of Maryland, you can see the rain in the region. What's more importantly are the winds. So let's look at the winds at the height level of this blimp, meaning 16,000 to 18,000 feet here. All right, this is not 60,000 where those weather balloons go. Across northeast Maryland into Pennsylvania, where in Pennsylvania we're not sure, but most likely it will enter extreme northern New Jersey and then possibly extreme southeastern New York state, maybe make its way into parts of New England and Connecticut, Massachusetts. But if you follow the winds, they go across the northeast