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United Airlines Grounding 24 Boeing 777 Planes From Service; Japan Tells Airlines To Ground Boeing 777s; Interview With Rep. Debbie Dingell (D-MI); NTSB Says Fan Blade Being Investigated As Cause Of Catastrophic Engine Failure; Studies Suggest Pandemic Taking Toll On Kids' Mental Health; Desperate Families Seek Water And Food. Aired 7- 8p ET

Aired February 21, 2021 - 19:00   ET

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

[19:00:19]

UNIDENTIFIED REPORTER: The U.S. is closing in on half a million people dead from the virus.

People decades from now are going to be talking about this as a terribly historic milestone.

UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: I have a husband. I have children, grandchildren. And I want to be around to be with them.

FREDRICKA WHITFIELD, CNN ANCHOR: Texas is warming up and thawing out, but the state remains in a major crisis.

DEANDRE UPSHAW, DALLAS RESIDENT: And the last thing that I'm thinking about is that $7,000 bill from my utility company.

MAYOR SYLVESTER TURNER (D), HOUSTON: It's not the consumers who should assume that cost. The bill should go to the state of Texas.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: There's a big boom and the kind of sound you don't want to hear when you're on an airplane.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: We looked at each other, my wife and I, held hands and just wished our kids, we would see them again.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

ANNOUNCER: This is CNN Breaking News.

PAMELA BROWN, CNN HOST: And I'm Pamela Brown in Washington. Welcome to our viewers in the United States and around the world. You are live in the CNN NEWSROOM. And it is a busy Sunday.

Breaking news on CNN, very dramatic steps being taken right now in the United States and around the world. The goal, to keep commercial air travel safer both in the skies and on the ground. And this is the reason. That terrifying and fiery failure of a United Airlines 777 engine this weekend.

The pilot managed to land in Colorado with everyone aboard safe, but the plane scattered huge metal parts all over a neighborhood below. And now U.S. federal air travel officials, the FAA, ramping up inspection of all 777 aircraft in the U.S. fleet flying with a certain type of engine.

Also this evening the government of Japan is grounding all Boeing 777 planes in the Japanese fleet that operate that certain type of engine. Full details on that in just a moment including the impact these steps will have on the airline and travel industry in the U.S. right now.

Our teams are covering this from all angles. Pete Muntean is in Washington and Selina Wang is in Tokyo.

But first, to you, Pete Muntean, our aviation correspondent, this just came into CNN that United Airlines specifically is taking a bold step in light of this weekend's frightening incident over Colorado. What can you tell us?

PETE MUNTEAN, CNN AVIATION CORRESPONDENT: This is so significant, Pamela. United Airlines says it's immediately and temporarily grounding its Boeing 777-200s with the Pratt and Whitney PW4000 engine. This is almost immediately after the FAA issued an emergency order stepping up inspections on the PW4000 engine particular to the 777. It says it found problems in this investigation with the fan blades of the United Flight 328.

New issues keep coming to light every moment here. You can see that engine on fire there. You know, this is so significant because the crew had to be confronted with a very serious emergency in flight. A loud boom has been reported. They had to turn the airplane back to the runway and make a successful emergency landing. An uncontained engine failure is what that is referred to. The PW4000 engine in particular here will be something that investigators will focus in on.

It's something that is used widely in aviation on other airplanes, not just the Boeing 777, 747. Airbus A330s. But the FAA says the issues are particular to the 777-200 because the fan blades are made of hollow titanium they're particularly hard to inspect. So swift action here after yesterday's incident of the United Airlines Flight 328 near Denver almost 36 hours after the fact. Things are happening very quickly here not only from regulators but also from airlines.

BROWN: And we'll see if more is to come. I know you'll keep us updated on that.

Pete Muntean, thanks so much.

And meantime over in Japan, Japan is taking major steps in response to that engine failure in Colorado. CNN international correspondent Selina Wang is in Tokyo.

So, Selina, what have you learned?

SELINA WANG, CNN INTERNATIONAL CORRESPONDENT: Pamela, that's correct. A major step here coming from Japan. But the big question is, are other countries going to follow suit? Now Japan has ordered all domestic airlines to halt operations of the Boeing 777 that are equipped with this Pratt and Whitney PW4000 engine.

Now Japan's Transport Ministry has issued this order to All Nippon Airways, as well as Japan Airlines which have fleets of 19 and 13 of the Boeing 777. Now, Japan has faced problems with this particular plane and the particular engine in the past. We know that the United Airlines flight coming from Denver suffered engine failure. Well, on December 4th an engine of the same series as the United Airlines engine, caused an incident in Japan which forced an emergency landing of a Japan Airlines plane in Okinawa also due with issues with that same engine.

[19:05:14]

Now according to the national broadcaster NHK, part of that aircraft's engine cover was lost during flight and caused a hole that measured 28 centimeters across on the horizontal tail.

Now, Pamela, Japan's Ministry of Transport at the time called it a serious incident and at the time asked domestic carriers to increase inspections of the Boeing 777 with that engine. Now CNN has reached out to Boeing for comment. They had no comment specifically on the incident in Japan and their reaction. Again, the big question here, however, is this going to have a domino effect? How are other countries going to react?

BROWN: That is a big question and we shall see. Selina Wang, thank you very much.

And for more on this breaking story, I'm joined by CNN aviation analyst Miles O'Brien and CNN aviation analyst Peter Goelz, who is the former NTSB managing director.

Great to see you both again.

Peter, I want to start with you. United Airlines is grounding 24 Boeing 777 planes that are powered by Pratt and Whitney 4000 series engines. Out of an abundance of caution, they say. How should other airlines approach this?

PETER GOELZ, CNN AVIATION ANALYST: Well, they're going to have to do the same thing, Pamela. I mean, this is an extraordinary event, and frankly it underscores just how far the FAA has fallen in terms of its worldwide leadership in aviation safety. It was the Japanese Civil Aviation Authority that pulled the plug on the 777, not the FAA.

And this is our plane. The FAA certified it. The FAA oversees it. And they have fallen so far in terms of its credibility internationally that the Administrator Dixon and the new secretary of Transportation that's going to take a long time for them to recover their standing.

BROWN: And then you have to look at the setback overall, the big picture, Miles. A setback for United at a time when the airline industry has already been hurt by the COVID pandemic.

MILES O'BRIEN, CNN AVIATION ANALYST: Yes. And there's a lot of question marks, Pamela, as to what this stepped up inspection order from the Federal Aviation Administration might do. It's important to know that the Japan airlines, the Japan fleet, ANA and Japan Airlines fleet, subsequent to the events at the end of this past year, the uncontained failure that had occurred there, they went through the Pratt and Whitney prescripted inspection.

And it was prior to that event, and yet they still had the uncontained failure. So the question is how do you properly inspect these fan blades? They're hollow, they're big. Each of them weighs about 30 pounds and they crack from the inside out. And so what the inspections will do and what they will reveal and how they will do them differently this time in order to find any potential failures are open questions right now.

BROWN: So you have the inspection stepping up on these hollowed fan blades. What does that tell you, Peter, about the nature of what happened in Colorado yesterday, the nature of the problem that we saw?

GOELZ: Well, Miles has underscored it. They crack from inside. And the NTSB inspected the Pratt and Whitney facility in Hartford, Connecticut, back in 2008 and was highly critical not only of the way in which these inspections were taking place, but they were critical of the way in which the FAA was overseeing these inspections.

And I think we are in for some hard times again, the FAA, and I think this aircraft is going to stay on the ground for a while until the inspection process is reviewed and we are sure that it can catch these little minute flaws that under extreme pressure can rupture an engine.

BROWN: So then given what we saw yesterday and then also happened in Amsterdam, do you expect, Miles, more airlines, more countries to do what we saw in Japan and what United has done with grounding some of these planes with this engine?

O'BRIEN: Well, it's four specific variants of the Pratt and Whitney 4000 series that are affected right now. And as it happens these happen to be hung beneath Boeing 777 in the United fleet in the United States as well as all the 777s in Japan and also in South Korea. So right now it's a limited group of aircraft and Pratt and Whitney engines.

[10:10:04]

The question is, though, you had that 747 yesterday, PW4000 series. I'm not exactly sure which particular model number it was. Is there something broader here in the PW4000 series which is an awful lot of engines out there flying around 2500 or so. So this could get broader as this process continues.

The bottom line is, Pamela, it's very time consuming and very expensive. And in many cases extremely difficult to inspect these blades for these minute cracks on the inside that can cause these kinds of failures.

BROWN: So then that raises the question about the timeline, right? How long will this take and at what point will they make those critical decisions of whether to continue to ground the planes or not. So a lot of unanswered questions. We'll see how this plays out.

Miles O'Brien, Peter Goelz, thank you so much.

And we have new stunning details about the Capitol insurrection, why an alleged leader of the fringe Oath Keepers group says she met with the Secret Service and was only there to provide security.

Congresswoman Debbie Dingell joins me live to react.

And the severe winter weather may be gone but the crisis is far from over in Texas. We're going to get a report from the ground where residents are lining up for water. We'll be back.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

[19:15:36]

BROWN: Well, one of the leaders behind an alleged conspiracy in the U.S. Capitol insurrection may have been much closer to then President Trump and his security apparatus than was previously known. In a new court filing Oath Keepers member Jessica Watkins claims that she was given a VIP pass to the pro-Trump rally that preceded the riot on January 6th and that she met with Secret Service agents and provided security for legislators that day. And in response to this the U.S. Secret Service denied that private citizens were working with them to provide security on January 6th.

And I'm joined now by Democratic Congresswoman Debbie Dingell of Michigan. Nice to see you, Congresswoman Dingell. Thanks so much coming on. You have been very vocal about the Capitol riot and how misinformation has played into it. What is your reaction to this Oath Keepers' claim that she was working with Secret Service allegedly leading up to the insurrection?

REP. DEBBIE DINGELL (D-MI): Well, clearly I don't have all the information, and it's not even clear which side -- I hate to say this word "sides," but there were people that came to prevent certification from happening and to do harm. So I want to have more facts, but I think it's further evidence that there was more organized effort to what happened at the Capitol on January 6th, which is why we need to understand, why we need to get a commission set up, we need to study and we need to understand these groups.

If you're from Michigan you understand how organized these groups are and how they are really targeting the fundamental pillars of our democracy. So it just for me is another fact I want more information about but proves it was more organized than people thought on January 6th.

BROWN: And then as you know in the aftermath of the attack there was talk about rioters having inside help in the Capitol. Do you expect the House will reveal any more information about that at this week's hearing on the riot?

DINGELL: I think what we are trying to do is get the facts. In these kinds of incidents we always need the facts. That's what's happened for the last four years. We haven't used facts. The hearing will be one tool of people trying to gather the facts about what happened. But there certainly are anecdotal that lead people to believe. And look, I saw a group of people touring the Capitol the day before when we weren't supposed to have any tourists in the Capitol.

They found places in the Capitol that I can't find and most people would say I've pretty much been around the Capitol for a while. So we need information. We need to understand what happened. We need to understand who organized, how it got organized, and we need to find a way that were going to keep the Capitol, one of the most visible symbols of our democracy, safe and yet keep it open for the American people.

BROWN: But do we expect any more information to come out that hasn't already been out there particularly in the impeachment trial? I just want to be clear on that.

DINGELL: I think we're going to find more information. I think the FBI is talking to a lot of people. I think the FBI investigation is very important. You're going to see the Justice Department look at it, and I think that you will see a 9/11 kind of commission be established shortly, which really will get at many more facts of how this was planned.

And I think we need the facts. And while I'm not sure that the hearing this week it will maybe shed some light, I want the national security experts to do their job, help us get those facts.

BROWN: All right, talking about facts this week, the Energy and Commerce Committee which you are on is holding a hearing on disinformation and extremism in the media. Now this comes on the heels of some pretty stunning examples of misinformation about the Texas storm on FOX News. Here's a moment from Governor Greg Abbott.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

GOV. GREG ABBOTT (R), TEXAS: So this shows how the Green New Deal would be a deadly deal for the United States of America. Our wind and our solar got shutdown, and they were collectively more than 10 percent of our power grid. And that thrust Texas into a situation where it was lacking power in a state-wide basis.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

BROWN: OK, so it is flat-out incorrect to claim that wind and solar were primarily responsible for the state's power outages. According to the state's grid management company itself wind shutdowns accounted for less than 13 percent of the outages. What does your committee plan to do to break through this type of misinformation and noise?

[19:20:05]

DINGELL: Well, and I have to say this, too. I think that this week we're going to be looking at social media, which I'm worried about from two perspectives. One is people have been quarantined, they've been staying home. They're lonely. They're living on social media, and they're getting a lot of bad facts and they're getting a lot of bad facts on the pandemic, on COVID-19.

We know that social media has been used to organize some of these militia groups, some of these anti -- I don't even know what the right word is. What you just showed me was a governor who didn't have the facts, and he was on all the major news outlets, and we have to hold public officials accountable for making sure they're telling the truth, too. So I don't think our hearing this week will get at public officials telling the truth, but what we really are trying to look at it is we don't want to violate freedom of speech.

People should have freedom of speech, but social media is becoming a vehicle for spreading misinformation that's actually doing harm.

BROWN: And there's a difference between misinformation and disinformation. Misinformation being you're saying something false, it's not with nefarious intent necessarily. And then the disinformation it is with nefarious intent. So it's an important distinction.

DINGELL: Correct:

BROWN: But it does come from the highest levels.

DINGELL: Yes, it is.

BROWN: And we're seeing it from politicians in Washington spewing conspiracy theories. I mean, we do see it really across the board right now.

DINGELL: Right, Pamela. And it gets repeated on social media. But I'm going to also tell you that all of us, you are doing it. The mainstream media has to hold people and the voters need to hold public officials, elected officials who deliberately do disinformation, who don't tell the truth, we have to go out now. The governor of Texas is being contradicted in a pretty more public way in the last few days. The voters of Texas need to remember that when he's up for re-election in two years.

BROWN: But what do you do about this disinformation problem when people just want to go into their corners on social media and believe what they want to believe, and they just don't care about the facts?

DINGELL: Well, I'm living with that almost every day. Where I have people yelling at me, that tell me I don't know what I'm talking about. I do a blog every morning, and I have some great responses. And I have some not good responses.

We've got to try to educate people but we have to figure out how we can hold people accountable that are deliberately doing disinformation on social media and other places, and how do you do that without violating the Constitution.

But it's a very important question, and quite frankly it's having harmful consequences. Not only do you see it in the conspiracy theories that you're talking about, people are dying because of disinformation and that is not OK. BROWN: And overall, it's important because it is a threat to

democracy, disinformation is.

DINGELL: Correct.

BROWN: I mean, we could go on and on about this and I have received similar messages that you have mentioned, just, you know, a member of the mainstream media.

So, Congresswoman Debbie Dingell, I hope that we can continue this conversation. Thanks so much for coming on.

DINGELL: Hope we will. Thanks, Pamela.

BROWN: Well, this past week Cruz-gate was seen as a major political blunder and self-inflicted wound. While millions of freezing Texans suffered days without power or water, Republican Senator Ted Cruz found plenty of hot water by taking his family on vacation to sunny Cancun, Mexico. Well, "Saturday Night Live" made quick work of it.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: The whole trip was the girls' idea. They love Cancun. There's so much for kids to do, the topless beach, shops at senior frog, swimming with sick dolphins. They love it.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

BROWN: Well, Cruz did tell CNN affiliate KTRK that flying to Cancun, quote, "was a mistake." But this story took up a lot of oxygen. But for the record Cruz isn't the only politician who made a significant error last week. Topping the list is New York Democratic Governor Andrew Cuomo.

The Democrat is in the midst of political fallout from revelations that his administration had concealed the full extent of nursing home related deaths during the pandemic. And now Democratic Assemblyman Ron Kim tells CNN that Cuomo called and threatened political retribution if he didn't show support. "SNL" also took a swipe at the governor.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Some of the people who died in the nursing homes were not counted as nursing home deaths. They were counted as hospital deaths, which is basically what happens at Disney World, OK? The people die and they move the bodies. They say, oh, I guess Brenda died in the parking lot, not on the teacups. So, you know, we just did the Disney thing. All right? It's what we've done here.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

BROWN: And meanwhile back in Texas the Electric Reliability Council clarified that problems with the natural gas system were mainly responsible for the distribution trouble.

[19:25:09] But first as we noted earlier Governor Greg Abbot seized on the issues with wind turbines and blamed the whole power crisis on renewable energy and he even slammed the Green New Deal. And you know the one that has never passed Congress, the Green New Deal, that one, well, that's like slamming your neighbor's unplugged space heater after a fire destroys the whole apartment complex.

And another eyebrow-raising comment came from former Energy secretary and Texas governor, Rick Perry. He suggested that Texans wouldn't mind freezing for a few days longer to keep the government out of their business. And then there's Republican Senator Ron Johnson of Wisconsin who said on radio that the deadly insurrection at the Capitol was not an armed one. This is not true.

The mob used bats and other blunt instruments in combat with Capitol Police officers, and PolitiFact wrote that numerous weapons were found in and around the Capitol brought there in some cases by people who saw themselves as soldiers in a war.

So it was clearly a week where questionable political decisions on both sides of the aisle ran rampant. At best comments and ill-timed vacations leave us shaking our heads. And at worst lies and cover-ups mislead the public and could lead to real life consequences.

And we have some breaking news just into CNN. A source familiar with the situation telling CNN tonight that investigators believe a fan blade in the engine of the United Boeing 777 that had a catastrophic engine failure broke off and then took out another blade.

CNN aviation correspondent Pete Muntean joins me live.

I know I laid out a lot right there, Pete. What more can you tell us?

MUNTEAN: Well, Pamela, this is the single biggest development we have learned into this investigation. A source familiar with that investigation tells me that a fan blade inside the right engine of that Boeing 777-200 on United Airlines Flight 328 broke off and took out another fan blade.

This is significant because we're now learning what may have caused this plane to litter debris over the Denver area after that catastrophic engine failure as the flight crew was trying to turn the plane back and make a successful emergency landing. All 241 people onboard safe.

All of this comes after swift action by regulators and airlines, United Airlines says it's grounding all 24 of its Boeing 777-200s in service with that Pratt and Whitney PW4000 engine. That has become a focal point of this investigation, and the FAA just issued an emergency order calling for stepped up inspections of the PW4000 engine.

What's so interesting here about the fan blades is that they are particularly hard to inspect. They are made out of titanium, they are hollow and it is very hard for somebody to get a clear picture of a crack or a nick that may have caused this incident. Thankfully nobody onboard hurt, nobody on the ground hurt in this incident, but it could have been so much worse.

BROWN: Absolutely. So much breaking news coming out. Thank you so much, Pete, for bringing us the very latest. And I know you'll probably be bringing us more in this hour. Thanks so much. No pressure.

Well, there is a fierce debate tonight, right now, about getting kids back in class amid a rise in mental health issues in children. I'll speak to one father who lost his son to suicide and is now speaking out about the mental health crisis facing children across the country.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

[19:32:56]

BROWN: Well one of the biggest reasons behind the push to reopen schools is the toll that the coronavirus pandemic has taken on children academically and mentally.

According to the C.D.C., emergency room visits among children between the ages of 12 and 17 for mental health reasons tripled in 2020.

Clark County, Nevada reopened schools last month after 19 students took their own lives. Nevada isn't alone. This is happening all across the country.

Eighteen-year-old Dylan Buckner died by suicide and January, leaving behind his mom, dad and little brother Ethan. Dylan was the quarterback and captain of his football team. He had hopes of attending M.I.T. next year.

His parents are now speaking out to help others struggling through the pandemic. And joining me now is Dylan's father, Chris Buckner.

Chris, we are so, so sorry, for your loss. I know words just seem so hollow when you've gone through such a devastating loss. But if you would just start off telling us about your son, about Dylan.

CHRIS BUCKNER, SON DYLAN DIED BY SUICIDE IN JANUARY: Well, thank you for having me on. Dylan was a great kid. I felt like he had everything a teenager could want.

He was smart, a good student. He was very athletic, good at any sport he got involved in. I thought he had all kinds of friends, you know, more friends than anyone could use. And, you know, living this great life.

But you know, what we found, unfortunately, is that a lot of the things you read about suicide and depression and the signs that your teenager might be giving you for suicide or depression are not as easy to see as you might think.

And in our case, were largely invisible and silent.

BROWN: Yes, and in your case, the pandemic changed everything. Tell us what happened. How did it impact Dylan? I mean, you were also under the same roof as him for so long in this pandemic, staying home, being in quarantine, so tell us about that evolution with him.

[19:35:12]

BUCKNER: Yes, so Dylan was a very serious student and a very, very serious football player. He was a quarterback on the football team, and so his days pre-pandemic, March before the quarantine set, involved, you know, waking up early, going to school, after school, there was always some type of football related activity, whether that was lifting weights or throwing with his receivers.

In the summer time, there would have been, you know, football camp, and recruiting trips and college visits to go on. And then in the fall, in Illinois, we were not allowed to play football, and many fall sports were canceled in Illinois.

So Dylan lost all of that, and for him, as a very structured kid, with no school and Zoom school, starting in March was half days for us with no school on Wednesdays. He just found himself with a lot of free time, alliance and dreams derailed by the pandemic.

And with the benefit of hindsight, now, we can see that, you know, having all that taken away from him, you know, basically close to a year of a teenager's life is obviously such a huge percentage, that that contributed to him, you know, his hopelessness and his despair, and his feelings that things wouldn't get better.

And then a lot of things he'd worked for, he was going to lose, and you know, his depression may have killed him, you know, six months, or nine months or a year from now. But there's just no doubt in my mind that, you know, had the pandemic not happened, or our country had done a better job managing the pandemic, so that it was shorter, that, you know, he'd still be alive today.

He would have had the interactions at school. He would have had the football season. And, you know, those bright spots would have been enough to, you know, give him more time to beat his depression and come out of the dark back into the light.

BROWN: So what do you want to tell other parents right now who may be worried about their kids? Or who may not be worried but perhaps need to be. What should they be looking for?

BUCKNER: Yes, well, I think first of all, the stereotype that you might think of depressed or suicidal teen from TV shows and movies or the books is just not at all what we experienced.

I really thought Dylan had the perfect life. And, you know, he hid his depression from us, and from most of his friends. Suicide is the second leading cause of death among teenagers.

There will be tomorrow, in the high school demographic, according to statistics that I believe are reliable, will be over 3,700 suicide attempts tomorrow in the U.S. of kids in high school. And one in 25 of those attempts will be successful.

So there will be 150 kids who will die tomorrow because of suicide. And, you know, as I said, second leading cause of death behind auto accidents. And so I'm sure parents talk to their kids about not texting and driving, not drinking and driving, not being distracted when they drive.

But the parents ought to really talk to their kids about depression and suicide, and in the case of my son, you know, you really had to talk to him. It was not going to be easy to get him to talk about it, to get him to be open about it.

And you know, things are only getting worse, because of the pandemic, whether you think -- you know, whatever you think of Dylan's story, you know, you gave the statistics. The reality of it is that there is a mental health crisis that's exploding because of the quarantine and lockdowns and the stress that these teens are feeling because of COVID.

And we just absolutely have to talk about it more, eliminate the stigma of it. I'll end answering this question with, you know, my advice to kids and to parents alike that, you know, depression is a mental illness and that's a mental illness that's not really a whole lot different than cancer or breaking your leg in a freak accident.

You wouldn't be ashamed if that happened to you. You wouldn't try to hide it. And you certainly would expect to get better without talking to your parents, talking to your friends, seeing a doctor and taking medication.

BROWN: That's a hundred percent true. I've struggled with anxiety, I've written about it. And I remember a doctor telling me it's just like you have asthma, you would treat your asthma. It's nothing to be ashamed of.

And I remember finding that being so relieved because I was embarrassed by it initially, and it is nothing to be embarrassed of. And we're going to try to aim to do more coverage on mental health and the crisis that is happening on this show every weekend if we can.

And Chris Buckner, thank you for getting us started on that sharing your story and again, our deepest condolences to you. If you or someone you know is in crisis, there is help available. Please call the National Suicide Prevention Lifeline. The number right on the screen, right there you can see it and I will also tweet it out.

We'll be right back.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

[19:44:14]

BROWN: Well, this incredible story of survival just now coming into CNN.

We have just learned that five men have been rescued off the Florida Coast after spending 16 days aboard a man-made raft. These pictures are seen here just came in to us just a few minutes ago. A little under two weeks ago, the U.S. Coast Guard rescued three Cuban

nationals from a deserted island in the Bahamas where they had been living off coconuts for 33 days.

Meantime, weather in Texas has finally returned to its usual form with temperatures reaching the 60s and 70s. But a recovery from the winter blast is far from over. It brought disaster to residents who lost power and water, 26 people even lost their lives.

CNN's Natasha Chen is in Houston with more on the challenges ahead.

[19:45:04]

(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)

RACHEL STEVENS, AUSTIN, TEXAS RESIDENT: So we lost power on Sunday night and we got it back Wednesday. Things have defrosted enough that we were able to get in and check out stuff and we had lines that were just gushing water.

So now we've got zero water in the house just due to having to turn it off until somebody can come up here to start fixing things.

NATASHA CHEN, CNN NATIONAL CORRESPONDENT (voice over): Rachel Stevens was without power and water for days. Now her family is left to clean up the damage left behind from frozen pipes, conditions found across much of the state.

MAYOR SYLVESTER TURNER (D), HOUSTON, TEXAS: Right now with so many homes across the city having pipes that burst because of the frigid weather and major leaks, major water damage, we need a lot of plumbing materials and supplies like right now.

CHEN (voice over): In the meantime, Texas officials are investigating the massive bills some customers who pay variable rates for their energy are now facing.

DEANDRE UPSHAW, DALLAS RESIDENT: While I'm trying to get, you know, gas and groceries and make sure that my pipes aren't exploding, the last thing that I'm thinking about is a $7,000.00 bill from my utility.

TURNER: All of this was foreseeable. I wrote about it in 2011. And so for these exorbitant costs, it is not the consumers who should assume that cost. They are not at fault for what happened this week.

UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: Well, who should then?

TURNER: The bill should go to the State of Texas.

CHEN (voice over): Calls for accountability are also coming from the other side of the aisle.

WILL HURD (R), FORMER U.S. REPRESENTATIVE FROM TEXAS: This was preventable. This wasn't a problem with any individual fuel source. This was a problem of lack of leadership and lack of long-term planning.

DOLORES LOZANO, HOUSTON RESIDENT: We all have a voice and we all need to use it accordingly because there's a lot of people in leadership that are just really just chilling in Cancun.

CHEN (voice over): Also this weekend, embattled Texas Senator Ted Cruz is tweeting pictures of himself handing out bottled water to residents.

Cruz has been under fire after he was spotted jetting to Cancun with his family, while many Texans suffered through the storm.

REP. MICHAEL MCCAUL (R-TX): Look, when a crisis hits my side, I'm there. I'm not going to go on some vacation.

I know Mr. Cruz called it a mistake, and he's owned up to that, but I think that was a big mistake.

(END VIDEOTAPE)

CHEN (on camera): State leaders are now turning their attention to address those skyrocketing energy bills. The Governor today said that the Public Utility Commission called an emergency meeting to issue a moratorium on disconnection of service due to nonpayment as well as to restrict electric providers from sending invoices at this time.

Abbott said that would allow time for them to address those huge energy bills -- Pamela?

BROWN: Okay. Thanks so much.

And Ted Cruz in Texas isn't the only Republican lawmaker trying to spin his way out of an inconvenient truth.

This morning, the number two Republican in the House continued to push the big election lie more than three months after the fact.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Clear this up for me. Joe Biden won the election. He is the legitimate President of the United States. The election was not stolen. Correct?

REP. STEVE SCALISE (R-LA): Look, Joe Biden is the President. There were a few states that did not follow their state laws. That's really the dispute that you've seen continue on.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Congressman, I know Joe Biden is the President, he lives at the White House. I asked you, is he the legitimate President of United States? And do you concede that this election was not stolen? Very simple question. Please just answer it.

SCALISE: Once the electors are counted, yes, he's the legitimate President. But if you're going to ignore the fact that there were states that did not follow their own state legislatively set laws, that's the issue at heart that millions of people still are not happy with and don't want to see happen again.

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BROWN: OK, so Republicans like Scalise are decrying the fact that executives in states Biden won changed election rules, executives, like Secretary of State or Governor because of the pandemic, now, without the legislators signing off.

So then why isn't he applying that same argument to battleground states that Trump won like North Carolina, Ohio and Texas where the same thing happened?

In North Carolina, it was late arriving ballots. In Texas and Ohio, it was drop boxes. This was all litigated and every one of those states some went in favor of Republicans, some went in favor of Democrats.

It is one thing to say we want to look at how these changes should be made by states for future elections, but it is another to muddy the waters like Scalise and other Republicans are to cast doubt on the entire election, which Biden won by more than seven million votes.

We'll be right back with more breaking news on the investigation into that dramatic jet engine failure over a Denver suburb yesterday. Don't go anywhere.

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BROWN: Well, the N.T.S.B. is now confirming that investigators are looking at a broken fan blade as the cause of the catastrophic engine failure aboard a United Boeing 777 yesterday near Denver.

CNN aviation correspondent, Pete Muntean joins me live. So what's going on here, Pete?

PETE MUNTEAN, CNN AVIATION CORRESPONDENT: Well, Pamela, this is a significant finding. The N.T.S.B. is essentially confirming our reporting from earlier that a fan blade inside the right hand engine of United Airlines flight 328 broke off, broke another fan blade and now the N.T.S.B. is saying they were able to find these parts in particular in the containment trail. That's actually what you can see on your screen right now that's exposed. It's the inner ring of the engine. The outer ring, the cowling has actually been blown free.

You know, investigators say this is pretty significant because this could be -- our aviation experts say this is significant because this could be a window into what could have caused this engine to fail so dramatically making the flight crew have to turn the airplane around at a relatively low altitude, 13,000 feet and get it back to Denver International Airport.

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MUNTEAN: So, these fan blades are in particular, very peculiar. They are hard to inspect. They are hollow. They are titanium. And this is something that investigators will zero in on.

The Pratt & Whitney 4000 engine in particular, the one on the 777-200 is the only one with this type of fan blade, so this is a big deal.

BROWN: Big development. Pete Muntean, thank you very much for bringing us the latest there.

And in this week's new episode of CNNs Original Series "Searching for Italy" Stanley Tucci travels to Rome in search of the perfect pasta. And earlier, I spoke to Stanley about tonight's episode and here's some of that conversation.

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BROWN: Well, Stanley in this week's episode, you take us to Rome, definitely known for its historic sights and ruins, but not as well known for its food. So tell us what makes Roman cuisine so special?

STANLEY TUCCI, CNN HOST: Well, it's very interesting. Rome is obsessed with pasta, and I think most people in the world are obsessed with pasta.

And we focus on three different kinds of pasta dishes. We focus on carbonara. We focus on all'Amatriciana and alla Gricia, which is a really wonderful, really simple dish.

BROWN: You know, something else that people may not realize is that Rome is known for its Jewish cuisine. And you visited with an expert who shared the secret to one of the most popular Jewish Roman dishes. Tell us about that.

TUCCI: Yes, you know, it is very interesting, because there ghettos. And ghetto is actually an Italian word, G-H-E-T-T-O. And it was the ghetto in Venice and there was the ghetto in Rome.

And during World War II, as we know, the Germans at one point came in and they took in one night, I think it was 3,000 Jews.

The woman who runs this restaurant that we went to, two restaurants actually was a little girl at the time. She was able to escape the city for a short period of time enough to keep her safe, until the city once again became safe.

She is probably one of the last remaining Jews alive who experienced the horror of those days. And that Jewish ghetto now is a very vibrant and sacred, sacred place. And her restaurant is incredible.

BROWN: So you also visited a restaurant that features some more unusual cuts of meat on the menu. What did you try there? And do you recommend it?

TUCCI: Oh, without question. Yes. You know, that's the other thing that Rome is known for. It's because there was a big Jewish community. And there were like, every time -- so they were very poor communities. They got the off cuts of meat. So in other words, there's the fifth quarter is what they call it, the

quinto quarta, which is the entrails basically of every animal, but those entrails were taken and made into something incredible.

So you had pasta made with intestines. You had pasta that was made from the shoulder glands of a lamb. You have pasta made with the heart of an animal, and I know it may be disturbing and sound gross, but it's -- actually these dishes are incredible.

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BROWN: You can see from my face there, I thought it sounded gross, but I take Stanley's word for it. Make sure you tune in tonight, a new episode of CNN's Original Series "Stanley Tucci: Searching for Italy." It premieres at nine Eastern after an encore of the series premiere at eight right here on CNN.

And while we're getting you in the mood for some food and beverages, Senator Ted Cruz probably needs a drink after the week he just had and because he didn't get to enjoy one on his Mexico Beach trip, a Washington, D.C. bar is mixing one in his honor.

Say hello to the Cruz and Cancun. Ingredients tequila, coconut, rum, banana liqueur, lime, and cinnamon.

The bar says to pour it over ice and enjoy. Cheers.

Well, that does it for me. I'm Pamela Brown. Have a great night.

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