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Sunday Landfall Anticipated As Hurricane Henri Eyes Northeast; Joe Biden Cancels Trip To Delaware Amid Afghanistan Evacuations; Anti- Lockdown Protesters Clash With Police In Australia. Aired 10:30-11p ET

Aired August 21, 2021 - 22:30   ET

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

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[22:32:09]

AMARA WALKER, CNN HOST: Parts of the Northeast begin to feel the first impacts of Hurricane Henri as a storm barrels closer to the coast.

Meantime, a potentially deadly new threat are merging amid the chaos in Kabul. Defense officials now telling CNN they fear ISIS could be about to attack the evacuation at the airport.

And CNN at the disaster zone in Haiti as aid agencies tried to get survivors of a huge quake to safety.

Good evening, everyone. I'm Amara Walker in Atlanta and you are in the CNN NEWSROOM.

All right, let's start with the story that is about to impact about 40 million people. Hurricane Henri is threatening the Northeast with damaging winds, storm surges, flooding and power outages. The storm could crash into Long Island or southern New England Sunday at or near hurricane strength.

In Connecticut, some coastal towns are under mandatory evacuation orders. A state utility is predicting half of its customers could lose electricity because of the storm and people are being told to prepare for the worst.

Let's go now and get the latest on where the storm is headed to Tyler Mauldin now who is tracking Henri from the CNN Weather Center.

Good evening, Tyler. So what's the latest?

TYLER MAULDIN, CNN METEOROLOGIST: Hey, Amara. Yes, so we're seeing the showers and thunderstorms already beginning to pop up on radar, as you can see those outer bands beginning to move north. Conditions are going to go downhill in the northeast and New England as we get past midnight.

Right now, Henri is a 75-mile-per-hour hurricane and it is roughly 250 miles to the south of Montauk. Montauk is under a hurricane warning at the moment because as the system does push to the north, it's going to maintain that hurricane status and it could make landfall on Long Island as a low end category one hurricane, maybe a strong tropical storm as you see.

So again, conditions are going to go downhill after midnight. Long Island will start to feel major impacts around daybreak tomorrow. And then once we get to two o'clock in the afternoon, tomorrow, we're watching this thing come ashore.

And then really slows this forward motion and hangs out across New England for about 24 to 36 hours. This isn't great news, because that means a lot in the way of rainfall in this area. This area is already saturated. We've picked up four or five inches over the last seven days and we're going to see roughly six inches of rain fall in this area because of Henri.

Again, hurricane warning in effect for Long Island, as well as Connecticut, and actually the entire States of Rhode Island and Connecticut are under some sort of warning whether it's a tropical storm warning or a hurricane warning. And then we have in New York City under a tropical storm warning as well. Nantucket you're under a tropical storm warning.

We could see in addition to those potentially hurricane force winds coming ashore tomorrow, we're also seeing the chance for some major storm surge, up to five feet in some areas.

[22:35:11]

MAULDIN: The storm is going to coincide with high tide and we also have a full moon, so that is going to exacerbate the tiding situation here -- the tide situation.

Now, in terms of the rainfall, as I mentioned, we're going to see this system slow down once it comes ashore, a lot of rain will fall as it slows down. We're looking at from New York City, all the way through Hartford, Springfield, maybe on into Manchester as well and even Albany, around four to six inches of rain.

The National Hurricane Center warns that we could see isolated areas of up to 10 inches. This will warrant the potential for some flooding. It's definitely going to lead to some power outages. I mean, that ground is already saturated. You take that saturated ground, you take in a tropical storm force, a hurricane force wind, that's going to lead to trees toppling down and tree limbs or branches, one of the leading causes of power outages.

I know we have crews from nearly 30 states, D.C. and Canada coming to New England to help and restore power after the storm. About 12,000 crews are going to New England to help restore power. That's what kind of storm we're looking at.

And Amara, we are looking at the potential for that flash flooding, too, so a multifaceted system is going to be impacting the Northeast, New England over the next 12 to 24 hours. Again, we're going to see those tropical storm and hurricane force conditions. We're going to see storm surge up to five feet. And yes, the potential for flash flooding as well that will lead to power outages.

So, if you're not ready yet, make sure you start finalizing those plans because Henri will be here in a hurry -- Amara.

WALKER: Yes, it's really extraordinary that we're talking about the New England area. That is where Hurricane Henri is about to bear down on. In the meantime --

MAULDIN: This is rare, I mean, it's only happened -- the last time it happened was more than three decades ago.

WALKER: Yes, I was reading that. And I was wondering, you know how long it's been or if it's ever happened before. Tyler, so in the meantime, Hurricane Grace hit Mexico this morning. What's the latest there?

MAULDIN: Yes. So Grace has now dissipated, but Grace made landfall in in Mexico. And what it's done is it's basically rained itself out over an area of Mexico that is very mountainous. And when you take nearly 10 inches of rain, which is what we're seeing in in Mexico, where Grace made landfall, well, when that happens, you're going to see a lot in the way of flash flooding and we have gotten some reports of that, and that could lead to the potential for mudslides, too. So that's something we have to be mindful of as well.

Again, the system has dissipated over Mexico, but get this, Amara, as it pushes west, what's left of it could reemerge into the East Pacific and get this, it could actually form into a tropical storm, maybe a hurricane in the East Pacific, those remnants. So, everything is connected here in the world of weather.

WALKER: Wow. All right, Tyler Mauldin, thank you so much for that.

And right now severe weather is also taking its toll on Tennessee. Officials in Humphreys County tell our affiliate WSVN that at least 10 people are dead after flash flooding there and tragically, at least two of the bodies that they have recovered are toddlers. Thirty one people are said to be missing right now.

The Tennessee National Guard says they sent a Blackhawk helicopter to the scene to assist with water rescues and these pictures are just devastating. Tactical vehicles and Humvees are also being used in the rescue operations.

And for the latest on the track and other extreme weather headlines, you can sign up for CNN's extreme weather alert at cnn.com/weather alerts.

Well, a short time ago we learned that President Biden will again address the nation tomorrow. It will be his third time in a week with the focus on two developing crises: the hurricane as we just mentioned, bearing down on the northeast and the chaos in Afghanistan.

Meanwhile, it has been a day of sadness and anxiety at the Kabul Airport. Seven Afghan civilians have died today in the crushing crowds desperately trying to get on flights leaving Afghanistan. This, as an alarming new threat emerges from ISIS.

CNN's Arlette Saenz is at the White House. ARLETTE SAENZ, CNN WHITE HOUSE CORRESPONDENT: Amara, President Biden

canceled a trip to Wilmington, Delaware on Saturday and instead remained here at the White House monitoring the situation in Afghanistan.

The President convenes his national security team for a meeting Saturday morning seen here in a photo in the Situation Room. A White House official says they discussed the ongoing security situation at the Kabul airport, as well as efforts to evacuate Americans and Afghan allies from the country.

[22:40:00]

SAENZ: Now another issue that was discussed was counterterrorism operations against the terror group known as ISIS-K. A U.S. defense official told our team that there is a strong possibility ISIS-K may try to carry out some type of attack at the Kabul Airport and that has prompted the U.S. military to try to establish alternative routes for transporting Americans and possibly Afghan allies to the Kabul Airport as the security situation there is constantly evolving.

Now, in addition to Afghanistan, President Biden also was monitoring Hurricane Henri, which is currently barreling towards northeastern states. The President was briefed on it throughout the day and also held a call with governors from northeastern states to try to explain the Federal government's preparations for this oncoming storm as the President trying to keep us focused both on Afghanistan and the storm, which could impact the U.S. -- Amara.

WALKER: Arlette Saenz, thank you for that update.

Also overnight, the first flights carrying Afghanistan evacuees touchdown at Ramstein Air Base in Germany, roughly 1,600 people have been processed at the U.S. Military Air Base.

CNN senior international correspondent, Atika Shubert is there.

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ATIKA SHUBERT, CNN SENIOR INTERNATIONAL CORRESPONDENT (voice over): Plane after plane carrying men, women, and children, evacuees who are part of the chaotic scramble to airlift people out of Afghanistan following the Taliban's takeover.

Now, safe at the Ramstein U.S. Air Base in Germany, one of the biggest outside of the United States soon capable of taking in up to 7,500 people from this unprecedented airlift explains 521st Air Mobility Operations Wing Commander Colonel Adrienne Williams.

COL. ADRIENNE WILLIAMS, U.S. AIR FORCE: It's an enormous because it is such a huge humanitarian mission, but I can tell you, on each one of those C-17s, we've gone from 75 passengers on board all the way up to 400.

SHUBERT (on camera): So as you can see behind me there, that's the C- 17 Globemaster and these are the flights that have been coming in and out of Ramstein Air Base, bringing passengers, one just landed and what happens is passengers disembark. They are brought here by bus and the first person they meet is a USO Imam. They are given a welcome to Germany, to the Ramstein Air Base, and then they proceed through medical checks, as well as security checks.

Then they are brought to a holding area where their IDs are checked. Then finally, they'll be able to get to their temporary living quarters here on the base.

SHUBERT (voice over): This is an all hands on deck effort between the U.S. Air Force Army as well as more than 1,500 civilian volunteers including the Red Cross.

But safety and security is the priority here and that includes rigorous ID checks, fingerprints and iris scans to screen for anyone flagged by Federal databases. This is Brigadier General Joshua Olson 86th Airlift Wing-in Installation Commander.

BRIG. GEN. JOSH OLSON, U.S. AIR FORCE: First and foremost is the security and so we focus heavily on the security and then from making sure we take care of all of their health needs. COVID checking, and so making sure that they don't have any symptoms, and then also, we do a very robust check with the Department of State and also all of our federal agencies.

SHUBERT (voice over): This is their home for the next two or three days, hastily assembled cots for beds and 40 people to a tent. Women and children are inside the cavernous airplane hangar. Men sleep in the tent city outside with a small area in between for families to meet. None are allowed to leave yet.

SHUBERT (on camera): These are the temporary living facilities. The capacity here at the moment is 5,000. They're hoping to get that up to 7,500. But there is a flight arriving here almost every hour and a half and it's filling up fast.

SHUBERT (voice over): On our way out, we meet Haseeb Kemal, he says he's a U.S. citizen from Virginia and had flown to Afghanistan to visit family and got married there last week.

HASEEB KAMAL, AMERICAN EVACUEE: So I just like rushed, like everybody else and the only people that I could get in was my dad and my sister. U.S. forces were shooting fires, Taliban and also like Afghan forces, too, at the gate. So, people were getting hurt left and right and it was really bad situation.

SHUBERT (on camera): I mean, that's incredibly traumatic. Have you been able to speak to your family since you were separated from them at all?

KAMAL: Only this morning for two minutes. That's it.

SHUBERT: What did they say?

KAMAL: They're in shock. They were worried about us, and we are worried about them. And they said, what's going to happen to them? And I was like, I don't know.

SHUBERT (voice over): But this is only a temporary reprieve. There are still so many questions about where they will go and what will happen to families still trapped in Afghanistan. Many here looking to the U.S. for answers.

Atika Shubert, CNN, Ramstein Air Base, Germany.

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WALKER: And those are the lucky ones. Coming up this hour, thousands of people in Australia fed up with strict COVID restrictions take their anger to the streets even as the country records its highest daily case count.

Also ahead, injured survivors of a huge earthquake continue to flood hospitals in Haiti. Our Matt Rivers has new reporting tonight from the disaster zone.

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[22:49:05]

WALKER: Tonight, the delta variant fueling a surge of new coronavirus cases across the U.S. Nearly 200,000 new cases reported on Friday. The Department of Health and Human Services says one in five hospital ICUs now has at least 95 percent of beds occupied. This, as we are seeing a sharp increase in the worst metric of them all. The U.S. once again approaching a COVID death rate of nearly a thousand per day.

But there is some hope. For the third day in a row, the C.D.C. says more than one million Americans received a COVID vaccine and a source tells CNN that full approval of the Pfizer COVID vaccine by the F.D.A. could come as soon as Monday.

Meantime, thousands of unmasked protesters clashing with police in Australia. The country just reported the worst single day jump in COVID cases they have ever seen. But new restrictions to control the outbreak are being met with violent resistance.

Thousands of demonstrators are openly defying lockdown orders in multiple cities. CNN's Angus Watson is in Sydney where dozens of protesters were arrested just earlier today. Angus, walk us through what's happening right now.

ANGUS WATSON, CNN PRODUCER: Amara, scenes of violence in Australia not seen for quite some time on Saturday in Australia's largest city of Melbourne. Four thousand protesters turning out in the center of the city bent on violence. The police say they came there to cause mayhem.

The result: Dozens of people arrested and nine police officers hospitalized with injuries such as broken noses, head and spinal injuries, concussions. We hope that those police officers are okay, but they're still in hospital right now as their colleagues search for these people, these 4,000 people to make more arrests, to try to clamp down on this sort of anger that police say was driven by young men protesting against lockdowns there.

They said that a very small minority of people there were protesting peacefully, but the majority causing mayhem just for the sake of it, Amara.

But Melbourne has now been in lockdown for a cumulative total of over 200 days since the pandemic began. So that city going hard with these lockdowns to try to achieve as few coronavirus cases as possible because the backdrop to this, Amara, is that Australia has a dangerously unvaccinated population, just over 20 percent of the population is vaccinated and that comes as delta cases mount here.

So, authorities in Melbourne, in the capital city Canberra and where I am here in Sydney, Amara, doing what they can with these lockdowns to try to stop the spread through an unvaccinated population -- Amara.

WALKER: Yes, it's concerning, you look at that video, large crowds, protesters gathering, marching and most of them from what I just saw that video not wearing masks. Quite concerning. Angus Watson, appreciate your reporting there from Sydney. Thank you.

All right, coming up, a week after a devastating earthquake hit Haiti, many areas still have received little or no help.

Next, CNN takes you to the Haitian islands where earthquake aid cannot reach.

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[22:56:21]

WALKER: One week after a massive earthquake devastated Haiti, injured Haitians from remote parts of the country continue to flood hospitals near the epicenter after days of travel. Many parts of the country continue to wait for help.

CNN's Matt Rivers went along with rescuers and filed this report.

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MATT RIVERS, CNN INTERNATIONAL CORRESPONDENT (voice over): Our chopper takes off with no clear destination in mind, flying with charity group World Central Kitchen or WCK, we want to find remote villages in Haiti that still need help. A week after this earthquake just finding out where the needs are, remains a challenge. A tip led us to Grande Cayemite an island off Haiti's coast.

On the ground, we're told damage is actually a bit further west, which it is seen from above. Dozens of structures were damaged and the contact in town told us no one has come to help them yet, but we can't either.

RIVERS (on camera): So, there was damage in that town and the people there clearly wanted us to land, but the problem was there was no safe area for us to touch down and that gives you an idea of how difficult it is to access these places. Just because you want to go somewhere doesn't mean that you can, at

least right away.

RIVERS (voice over): Another tip leads us back into Haiti's mountains and the remote town of Minish. Destruction greets us as we land and the charity starts to assess the damage.

RIVERS (on camera): In terms of figuring out exactly what needs what, you really need to go to the ground?

JEAN MARC DEMATTEIS, BOARD MEMBER, WORLD CENTRAL KITCHEN: Correct and unlock these areas are remote for the cell service has been knocked out and due to damage from the earthquake. So, there's no substitute for just getting out there and on the ground.

RIVERS (voice over): Their team fans out and so do we, the damage is as bad as anything we've seen. Entire blocks destroyed, near some damage, the distinct smell of bodies lingers. Amidst all the rubble, there is grief.

Rose Mika Fontus' mom died when her home collapsed. "My mom was everything to us," she says, "And now she's gone. We're just waiting for help."

Rose is now homeless, saying the government has yet to visit her town. They've had to make do with what they have, not easy in such a remote place. That's where charities like WKC are trying to help fill the gap.

People crowd around as the team drops off a few hundred sandwiches. Now that they know where to go, aid workers save thousands more meals will likely follow soon.

RIVERS (on camera): And of course, it is a good thing that organizations like the World Central Kitchen have identified. This town is in dire need of assistance, and that they're starting to figure out exactly what those needs are. But those are just first steps, unfortunately. Getting those substantive resources actually moved into that area is a different challenge altogether. And this is not the only town affected by this earthquake. They're scattered throughout the region, affected by all of this, many of which haven't gotten any help so far.

Matt Rivers, CNN, Port-au-Prince, Haiti.

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WALKER: And for ways to help Haitians recover from this devastating earthquake, go to cnn.com/impact.

Hi, everyone, I'm Amara Walker in Atlanta. You are in the CNN NEWSROOM and we begin with breaking news. A new advisory just issued on Hurricane Henri, the storm has been building strength over the Atlantic and has triggered watches and warnings and states of emergencies in the northeast.

Let's get right to meteorologist, Tyler Mauldin who has been tracking all of this. What's the latest? Tyler?

[23:00:06]