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Portable Morgues Needed for COVID Deaths; Education Department Investigating Mask Mandate Bans; 20 U.S. Service Members Wounded in Kabul; Dangerous Heat Looms after Storm; Gas Prices may Go Higher. Aired 9:30-10a ET.

Aired August 31, 2021 - 09:30   ET

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

[09:32:01]

JIM SCIUTTO, CNN ANCHOR: Many hospitals around the country are under stress due to the recent surge in COVID-19 infections. New numbers show that five states in particular are nearly out of ICU beds. Alabama, Georgia, Texas, Arkansas and Florida, they have less than 10 percent of ICU beds left and available.

CNN's Leyla Santiago is live in Miami.

Leyla, the situation is so dire, I mean, you have this scene we saw at some of the worst parts of the pandemic, and that is portable morgues brought in to deal with the dead.

LEYLA SANTIAGO, CNN CORRESPONDENT: Right.

SCIUTTO: Tell us where you're seeing that and why.

SANTIAGO: Well, listen, where we are right now, at Jackson Health System in Miami, they have two refrigerated freight trucks on standby as a precautionary measure because they continue to see an increase in COVID-19 deaths.

So that's here in south Florida. Go up north a little bit, you'll go to central Florida. The Central Florida Medical Disaster Coalition telling me they have four portable morgues that will be arriving today. The priority, they say, is Volusia County, that's the Daytona Beach area, and ten more by the end of the week.

They placed the order on these portable morgues because they say in talking to hospital systems in their area, they are telling them that their highest priority right now is morgue capacity, and they're also seeing a delay in funeral homes picking up people who have died from COVID-19. I confirmed that with a funeral director that I spoke to yesterday who says they are being inundated with COVID-19 deaths.

Now, let's keep this in perspective. Some of the hospital systems are telling me that they are ordering the portable morgues or some sort of freight, refrigerated freight truck as a precautionary measure, but then you have some like Broward County reporting to us that they are already using coolers to help with capacity right now.

SCIUTTO: I mean that's because too many people dying, right? I mean it's such a -- it's such a sad fact, right, and a brutal one.

SANTIAGO: Yes. Right.

SCIUTTO: OK, so in the midst of this, school districts, they've tried to get kids to wear masks. By the way, kids not vaccinated, right, if you're under 12.

SANTIAGO: Right.

SCIUTTO: The governor's now making good on a threat to penalize them financially, taking money away. Tell us where that's happening, what it means.

SANTIAGO: So that is happening in Alachua County, so Gainesville, Florida, as well as Broward County, south Florida. And that was announced yesterday. The education commissioner, Richard Corcoran, sent out a letter saying they are going to start withholding the salaries of board members that took part in mandating masks without a parent opt-out, calling it a violation of the law given that Governor Ron DeSantis, in late July, signed an executive order banning that.

But here's the thing, Jim, the timing of this is critical to understand, because just last week, remember, we reported that a judge in Leon County, a Florida judge, ruled that the governor basically didn't have the authority to place such a blanket ban on in Florida.

[09:35:13]

So we're going to see now quite a back and forth because the governor now says that he will appeal, and then you have school districts like Alachua County this morning saying, they, too, are seeking legal actions because of this.

SCIUTTO: Leyla Santiago, watching it unfold, thanks very much.

Well, the U.S. Department of Education has launched investigations in five states to determine whether statewide bans on school mask mandates, like we were just talking about, violate the rights of students with disabilities. The civil rights arm of the education department sent letters to leaders in Iowa, Oklahoma, South Carolina, Tennessee and Utah.

CNN's Evan McMorris-Santoro joins me now.

So, Evan, the argument here essentially that without mask mandates schools are unsafe, particularly for students with compromised immune systems. How does this play out from here?

EVAN MCMORRIS-SANTORO, CNN CORRESPONDENT: Well, that's exactly right, Jim. I mean as we heard in Florida, what this really is, is a huge step up in what is the most remarkable political story of COVID, if you ask me, this battle over keeping kids safe in school during this delta variant spread. Those states you mentioned, Iowa, South Carolina, Utah, those states, they don't have mask mandates for universal -- they have bans on universal masking.

And so the Department of Education is using its power to investigate a 1973 law prohibiting discrimination against disabled students, as well as the landmark 1990 ADA, the Americans with Disability Act, to investigate if the disabled students, kids with immunocompromises, are getting a fair shake in these schools with delta variant spreading and no universal masking.

In a statement, the Department of Education, education commissioner, just excoriated these schools. He said it's simply unacceptable that state leaders are putting politics over the health and education of students they took an oath to serve. The department will fight to protect each student's right to access in-person learning safely and the rights of local educators to place policies -- to put in place policies that allow all students to return to schoolrooms full-time, in-person safely this fall.

That is just the kind of thing we're hearing from the White House that has been pushing back against state governors. As I mentioned -- you know, as you heard in Florida, these are not the only states. These ones that are currently under investigation are the only states that have these mandate bans. But judges in those states, like Arkansas and Texas, places that I've been, and South Carolina, have been, during this school year, talking to parents, talking to educators who have been very concerned about these bans on masks.

Judges in those places have put those mask mandates in place. They have stopped the governors from banning them. So the Department of Education not investigating them for now. But these other states are under investigation and we're going to see what happens next and it could be a big step forward in this battle over masking, kids, schools and the delta variant.

Jim.

SCIUTTO: We'll see. Meanwhile, many of them going to school, right, in the midst of an outbreak without masks. So that's the reality.

Evan McMorris-Santoro, thanks so much.

Well, thousands of evacuees are at Ramstein Airbase in Germany as they await a flight to a new life. What kind of emotions are they feeling now that the last U.S. military plane has left Afghanistan?

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[09:43:04]

SCIUTTO: You may not know this, but in addition to the 13 service members who were killed in that terror attack at Kabul airport last week, 20 service members were injured, as well as ten Afghan civilians. They were all flown to Landstuhl Regional Medical Center in Germany, which has an enormous and very capable medical facility.

Journalist Atika Shubert, she is in Landstuhl right now.

What do we know about the condition of those service members and are any of their lives in danger?

ATIKA SHUBERT, JOURNALIST: Well, they were brought here. They were medevacked here immediately after that explosion. Quite a few of them very -- in very serious condition requiring special intervention on the flights over here.

Fortunately, though, as we learned from a briefing with the commander of the Landstuhl Regional Medical Center, Colonel Landers, that all of them, all 20 service members are now in stable condition. They've actually been transferred to the Walter Reed Hospital. And when they flew out, they were all conscious, communicating with staff. Quite a few of them speaking directly with staff about how thankful they were for the care they got here.

Take a listen to what Colonel Landers had to say.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

COL. ANDREW LANDERS, COMMANDER, LANDSTUHL REGIONAL MEDICAL CENTER: They lost their brothers and sisters in arms. So from that standpoint, it's hard to say, hey, I'm feeling really great when they know they're feeling the loss of a teammate. But for their own personal sense, they are all extremely thankful for the care that they received.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

SHUBERT: Now, in addition to those 20 service members, as you mentioned, there are at least ten Afghan civilians who were also brought here to the hospital. They are still here receiving treatment. We understand they are all in stable condition as well.

But this really is a top notch facility. It has a level two trauma center. And that means they can get 24-hour in-hospital coverage by a trauma surgeon and anesthesiologist. So they are getting hop quality care here, Jim.

SCIUTTO: I'll tell you, I've been there, and it's -- it can be heartbreaking to see all those young, broken bodies there, but they do a great job of saving lives.

[09:45:01]

All right, so you're a few miles from Ramstein Airbase, and that is where, well, now, 14,000 Afghan evacuees, they're awaiting word about their next destination. There's a screening process. Do we know how long that takes and where they're all going?

SHUBERT: Yes. Well, ideally, it would take only 48 hours. The reality is many people are there for as long as a week. And they're living in very basic, temporary shelters. These are tents with cots for beds. There are some toilets, but no real showers. So it has been very tough for some of the families that are there.

The good news is that the commercial flights that are bringing them to the states have picked up. So now we're seeing as many as ten a day going out, and I believe the total number that have been brought from Ramstein Airbase to the U.S. is now 10,000.

But as you point out, there's still 14,000 at the base. So they really need to start processing people more quickly, try to get them out as soon as they can because, remember, the airbase actually has an agreement with Germany. They can only keep evacuees here for a maximum of ten days, Jim.

SCIUTTO: There are many thousands of Afghans who would take those conditions in a moment I'm sure.

Atika Shubert, at Landstuhl, thanks very much.

Well, the effects of Hurricane Ida are not only being felt in states such as Louisiana, Mississippi. People across the country, they feel the impact when they go to fill their gas tanks in the days ahead. We'll tell you why.

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[09:50:53]

SCIUTTO: Well, many millions of Americans are under flash flood alerts this morning as remnants of Hurricane Ida move further inland. The heavy rains will move through central Tennessee today, parts of which are still recovering from deadly flooding. You may remember a few days ago with more than a million people without power in Louisiana, the state is bracing for a heat wave today. It's not going to be easy there.

CNN meteorologist Chad Myers following.

So what's happening as this storm moves inland. Is it dumping as much rain as you and I were concerned about in the last few days?

CHAD MYERS, AMS METEOROLOGIST: You bet it is, Jim. I mean six inches across a wide swath of Pennsylvania, almost all the way up to New York City. I'll show you the map here in a second.

But we also have thunderstorms that are building across the Gulf Coast here on the southern end of this thing that's supposed to be long gone. It isn't long gone for you just yet. Moving to the northeast at about 12 miles per hour. There goes the rainfall. The heavy rain, though, is right over this area west of Nashville that had all of that flooding that you just talked about. So it is raining in that area with very saturated ground.

Down to the south, though, this is where we're seeing the storm still coming on shore across the Gulf Coast. Not as much of a risk today of these storms rotating but that risk is not zero. There still could be tornados with some of these, especially waterspouts coming onshore with some of these bigger storms down across the south. You wish it was over, but it's not.

It is still going to be raining on top of places. Everywhere that you see purple, that's ten inches of rain or more and the highest number that I've found is somewhere between 17 and 18 inches since the storm started. So, yes, flash flood watches are posted all the way to the northeast.

And this is what the rainfall is going to look like. This red area here, six inches or more. It's kind of interacting with a little bit of a front up here. So we're still have the gulf moisture, it's still a tropical downpour across a lot of these areas, but it's going to last for a long time. Some of these rain showers are going to last for six or ten hours. You get an inch of rain an hour, Jim, that's not even that heavy. But for ten hours, that's a lot of rain.

SCIUTTO: It is. Chad Myers, always good to have you on it. Thanks very much.

MYERS: You're welcome.

SCIUTTO: Well, for now, gas prices, thankfully, are holding steady, but Hurricane Ida's direct hit in Louisiana caused a massive disruption of U.S. oil production and refining over the weekend. At least nine major refineries in the state were shut down or had to reduce operations due to the storm. More than 95 percent of the oil production in the Gulf of Mexico was sidelined for a time.

CNN's Matt Egan has more on this.

Matt, do we know how big an impact this will have over days or is that something that the industry can recover from.

MATT EGAN, CNN REPORTER: Well, Jim, we don't know the answer yet and that's because it's still early. The big key is going to be how much damage was done here to really what is one of America's most important energy hubs. In particular, the question is how much damage was done to the refineries that churn out gasoline and diesel and jet fuel. And that's going to depend on the damage assessment. And those assessments are still underway.

But here's what we do know, 95 percent of the Gulf of Mexico's oil production knocked offline. In the past, these offshore facilities, they were the fastest to recover. At least nine Louisiana refineries partially or fully shut down. Now these refineries are decades old and it can take some time for that to reopen.

The Colonial Pipeline also shut down as a precaution two of its fuel lines. But we have learned in just the last few minutes that the Colonial Pipeline was able to successfully reopen those fuel lines last night.

Now, all of this is still going to take some time. And CNN's Brian Todd, he talked to some drivers in Louisiana yesterday who waited two plus hours for gasoline. Here's what one of them told him.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

BRIAN TODD, CNN CORRESPONDENT: How desperate are you for gas?

ALEX GEORGE, LOUISIANA RESIDENT: Very desperate.

TODD: Why? GEORGE: There's just no -- no resources. Just don't have any resources

for gas. You know, (INAUDIBLE) have Shell. That's it. Nobody else's.

TODD: Do you need it for your car, for a generator at home?

GEORGE: Need it for a generator. Yes.

TODD: What's your situation at home? Does your family need that to survive?

GEORGE: Oh, yes, sir. Yes, sir.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

EGAN: Now, we should urge people not to overreact here.

[09:55:00]

We saw in May, when hackers shut down the Colonial Pipeline for six days, how panic buying can actually exacerbate the situation and we do not want a repeat of that.

But the timing here is key because this hurricane hit when gas prices were already at seven-year highs, up 40 percent from a year ago, up 80 percent from the 2020 lows. All of this suggests that Americans could be paying more for gasoline when they hit the road this Labor Day weekend.

The question, Jim, is how much more and how long those prices will stay high. And we just don't know the answer yes.

SCIUTTO: Yes, and by the way, some of that increase we're seeing there is from the recovering economy over the course of the last year.

Matt Egan, thanks very much.

Well, the governors of California and Nevada declare states of emergency as the fast-moving and just huge, huge Caldor Fire forces evacuations for more than 50,000 people. It's threatening Lake Tahoe now as well. We're going to take you there.

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