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Rocket Barrage Fired From Gaza Toward Israel; IDF: Some Militants Have Entered Israel From Gaza; PM And Defense Minister Conduct Security Assessments; U.N. Human Rights Office Reacts To Hroza Strike; At Least Two Killed In Russian Strike On Kharkiv; Iranian Activist Narges Mohammadi Wins 2023 Award; U.N.: More Than 150 People Killed In Ethnic Clashes; Hamas Claims 5,000 Rockets Fired In "Al-Aqsa Storm"; Arrest Warrant For Fmr. Opposition Leader Juan Guaido; Venezuelan, Haitian Migrants Killed In Bus Crash; Painting Valued At $15 Is A Rembrandt; Could Sell For $18m; Using AI To Find Missing Hikers. Aired 1-2a ET

Aired October 07, 2023 - 01:00   ET

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

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[01:00:28]

MICHAEL HOLMES, CNN HOST: Hello and welcome, everyone. I'm Michael Holmes. Appreciate your company.

Coming up on CNN Newsroom, at least one person is dead as a barrage of rockets is fired at Israel from Gaza. Russia launches another deadly missile strike against Ukraine, killing a 10-year-old boy as he slept in Kharkiv.

And the daughter of jailed Iranian activist Narges Mohammadi sends a special message to her mother for winning this year's Nobel Peace Prize.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Live from CNN Center, this is CNN Newsroom with Michael Holmes.

HOLMES: And we begin with breaking news from Israel where a barrage of rockets was fired early Saturday into the country. Israeli officials say there are multiple injuries, some of them serious, at least one fatality. The barrage began about 6.30 in the morning, local time, when most people were likely asleep.

The smoke you see in the sky there is the trails from those rockets. Sirens triggered as far north as Tel Aviv.

CNN's Hadas Gold joins me now live from Jerusalem. I don't think I've seen anything like this for a while. This appears to be a large scale coordinated attack and even reports of Palestinian fighters inside Israel, which would be extraordinary. What are you hearing?

HADAS GOLD, CNN JERUSALEM CORRESPONDENT: Yes, this intensity is really something unprecedented since 6 30 this morning. It has been essentially a nonstop barrage of rockets, red alert sirens going off across the country. My phone, which has this app that tells you when sirens are going off around the country, has not stopped vibrating since 6:30 in the morning.

That gives you an idea of just how intense this attack is. It's happening 6 30 in the morning on a Saturday. As you know, that most people be asleep. Also, it's Shabbat. So if you're religious, you don't have any of your electronics going, you would hear the sirens going off in your neighborhood, but you wouldn't have your cell phones or televisions or anything else like that on.

We are already hearing of injuries and fatalities. At least one woman in her 70s has been killed. We're hearing of several other injuries, including severe injuries. Michael, these rockets are going off across the country, everything from the southern part of Israel, the Negev and Be'er Sheva to northern Tel Aviv, even around the airport that could lead to the airport potentially being shutting down. And actually, even here in Jerusalem.

When I was on my way here to the CNN studios, I heard at least two sounded like boom, some sort of explosions in the sky. No sirens have gone off within Jerusalem itself. That gives you an idea. If we're hearing something in Jerusalem, typically Jerusalem tends to be sort of kept out of these sorts of conflicts. That gives you an idea of how intense this could be.

And then we have something new, these infiltrations. The Israeli military has confirmed that there have been some infiltrations, what they call a number of terrorists have penetrated into Israeli territory from the Gaza Strip. We've seen reports of militants in the backs of pick-up trucks firing in neighborhoods in Southern Israel.

Just listening to hear if I can hear an announcement potentially from the street. But that gives you an idea of how this is completely unprecedented here. The idea of militants infiltrating Israel. We don't know whether they came in this morning, whether they were already within the country prior to this happening, because there are thousands of workers from Gaza who are allowed to enter Israel every single day with work permits to come in.

It is not clear yet how these people managed to get in. Of course, the question is why, why is this happening? We are getting statements as we speak from Hamas. They say that they claim they fired more than 5,000 missiles towards Israel. they say that they have previously warned the enemy. They're talking about the Al-Aqsa Mosque compound, which is also known as Temple Mount, a place so holy for both.

Jews and Muslims saying that Jews have been desecrating, that Israel has been desecrating the mosque because there have been several hundred Jewish visitors to the compound within the past week or so during the Jewish holidays. Non-Muslims are allowed to visit the compound, but it is a very sensitive subject there about who gets to visit, when, whether they are praying there or not.

The Hamas statement also mentions what they say are hundreds of martyrs who have been killed by the Israeli military this year. We have, of course, been reporting for weeks, for months about the intensity in the West Bank of clashes between militants and the Israeli military, the regular Israeli military incursions into Palestinian cities where we have had a record death toll.

And there's also been a record number of Palestinian attacks towards Israelis within Israeli territory itself. It's been a very tense period, but I do think this has come as a surprise. Because while there have been some clashes along the fence, protests along the fence between Gaza and Israel, there's been some tensions in Jerusalem. There's been this sort of ongoing situation in the West Bank.

[01:05:08]

The intensity of what we've just seen in the last few hours is something I don't think anybody was expecting because there was no clear trigger point that caused it. So that's what's sort of very surprising about all this. We should look also at the geopolitical implications of what's happening right now.

Of course, the march towards normalization with Saudi Arabia between Israel and Saudi Arabia. Potentially this could be somehow connected to that. Right now, though, we should be looking for what the response will be.

And the response from the Israeli military, I will tell you, I'm quite sure will be quite big because this has been such a big unprecedented attack, including these infiltrations on the ground. We know that the prime minister has already been briefed. He's holding a security assessment. We should expect a very major response from the Israeli military, and this could drag on for quite some time. Michael?

HOLMES: Yes. And to that point, I mean, we are seeing reports already of IDF return fire into Gaza, the Prime Minister calling for security meetings. What more do we know about the Israeli response? And certainly, you know, if passed as prologue, it will, as you say, be severe. I keep going back to these infiltrators. I have never seen that before.

GOLD: I've never seen that before either. I've never seen both the intensity of this sort of attack attached with what was clearly, I mean, some sort of planned, coordinated situation where you have rocket attacks and then these infiltrations.

And that's what's really shocking here is because, unfortunately, this region has gotten used to sort of the exchange of fire, the rockets, and then the Israeli military responding, bombing Hamas targets or Islamic-Jihad targets in Gaza.

These infiltrations, these would be very, very new. This would really change the situation on the ground for the Israelis, because, typically, when these rockets happen, you know, Israelis try to go about their daily lives, and then when they hear a siren, they run into their bomb shelters.

But, if these infiltrations are happening and happening just -- and even happening beyond the sort of area around Gaza, that will change the daily life for the Israelis as well, who are more likely to, you know, stay within their homes at all times.

There's already been a directive by the Israeli Home Front Command for people in central and southern Israel to stay close to their shelters, but clearly this is a very tense and very potentially dangerous situation here because the intensity of this I have not seen in my time here.

HOLMES: Yes, agreed. And gunmen driving around in the back of pickup trucks on Israeli soil is certainly unprecedented. Hadas, I know you're busy going to keep across it. We'll check in with you in a bit.

Hadas Gold there in Jerusalem. Extraordinary scenes there in Israel.

Turning to Ukraine, and a village there trying to come to grips with a Russian strike that wiped out about a sixth of its pre-war population. On Friday, a makeshift memorial appearing in the village of Hroza for 52 of its residents killed the day before.

Their families, friends and neighbors have begun the somber task of laying them to rest. U.N. Human Rights investigators have now arrived at the scene of the strike, which flattened the building where the victims were gathered. You can see there, the site is being cleaned up, the rubble off to the side, but you can see the building was utterly destroyed.

The investigative team came after the organization's coordinator in Ukraine called the attack a war crime. The U.N. Human Rights Office had this to say on Friday.

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ELIZABETH THROSSELL, SPOKESPERSON, U.N. OFFICE OF HIGH COMMISSIONER FOR HUMAN RIGHTS: Now, what is clear is that the strike is one of the deadliest since the 24th of February 2022. But, of course, it is far from being the only one. U.N. High Commissioner for Human Rights, Volker Turk, who saw for himself the horrific impact of such strikes, is profoundly shocked and condemns these killings.

The appalling scenes from the village of Hroza in the Kharkiv region of Ukraine underscore once again the terrible price civilians are paying 20 months after Russia's invasion.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

HOLMES: A day after that strike, a Russian missile attack also targeted the city of Kharkiv, about 80 kilometers northwest of Hroza. We have to warn you, the images you're about to see are graphic. Ukraine says this 10-year-old boy, you see him there in the middle of your screen there, was killed as he slept. He's still wrapped in his blanket when his body was uncovered in the rubble. Officials say the boy's grandmother was also killed.

CNN could not independently confirm the authenticity of that image. It was, though, released by Ukraine's defense ministry. CNN's Fred Pleitgen with the latest.

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FREDERIK PLEITGEN, CNN SENIOR INTERNATIONAL CORRESPONDENT (voice- over): Another massive missile attack in eastern Ukraine. Two killed, dozens wounded when the city of Kharkiv was hit early Friday. The Ukrainians say this was the work of the same type of missile that killed more than 50 in a village close by just a day earlier.

Anatoliy Androsovych (ph) tells me pretty much every family in Hroza lost someone. His brother and his brother's wife also among the dead.

[01:10:05]

I just heard the explosion, looked at the dust and realized my brother, Nikola (ph), was there, he says. They identified the bodies. Their son went to pick them up. We will bury them tomorrow.

The plot for their burial already marked at the local cemetery, close to the fresh grave of the soldier whose wake the victims were attending at a local cafe when the missile struck. At the attack site, crews already clearing the debris.

(on-camera): The authorities here quickly realized that they weren't going to find any more survivors underneath debris. And you can see here this has now gone from being a search and rescue to being a recovery operations with the teams here searching for human remains.

(voice-over): Amidst the belongings of those killed littering an adjacent playground, police officers catalog what they believe are parts of the powerful Iskander missile that annihilate the building. Nearly a third of Hroza's residents lost their lives here. Those who are left shocked and grieving.

73-year-old Valentina Kozienko lives right next to the site.

"I knew all of them," she says. "They are all from here, all from our village".

Fred Pleitgen, CNN, Hroza, Ukraine.

(END VIDEOTAPE)

HOLMES: Narges Mohammadi, the winner of this year's Nobel Peace Prize, may not yet be aware she's been recognized for her years of human rights activism in her native Iran. That's because the 51-year-sold woman is currently serving a lengthy prison sentence in Iran's infamous Evin Prison. It has been eight years since she last saw her family, who now live in Paris.

After Friday's announcement, French President Emmanuel Macron lauded Mohammadi for her courage in standing up to the Iranian authorities.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

EMMANUEL MACRON, FRENCH PRESIDENT (through translator): I think it is a very strong choice for a freedom fighter who has always faced up to the reality and cruelty of this regime, including enduring several years in prison and terrible sentences.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

HOLMES: In Paris, Mohammadi's teenage daughter said she was extremely proud of her mother for fighting for women's rights in Iran, even at the cost of her own freedom. She had this message for her mom.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

KIANA RAHMANI, DAUGHTER OF IMPRISONED ACTIVIST, NOBEL LAUREATE (through translator): Don't worry about the fact that you are not here. We are keeping strong for you. There's no problem. Go on with your fight. We will stand by you no matter what. You will always be our beloved mother.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

HOLMES: Iran's foreign ministry condemned the Nobel Award to Mohammadi. A spokesman saying this quote, "The Nobel Committee has awarded a prize to a person convicted of repeated violations of laws and committing criminal acts. We condemn this action and consider it as biased and politically motivated".

Reactions on the streets of Tehran were mixed.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE (through translator): As a woman in this society, I very much agree with this. And in my opinion, in this society where women do not have any rights, this award can at least be a relief for us that there's at least somebody who cares about us.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE (through translator): It was certainly political, I would say, in my opinion. And I don't know why this award was given to this lady. Otherwise, we have had many peace ambassadors.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

HOLMES: Tehran clearly not pleased by the international attention. The Nobel Prize has now focused on the regime and its abysmal human rights record. Narges Mohammadi has spent years exposing and documenting the abuse, especially against Iranian women. And for this reason, even from prison, she is still known by many as the voice of the voiceless.

Still to come here on the program, Indian security personnel under investigation after a peaceful protest turns violent in Manipur state. We'll hear from one victim who survived dozens of head wounds.

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[01:16:15]

HOLMES: Well, for months, India's remote northeast state of Manipur has been on edge. Ethnic clashes between two groups have killed more than 150 people and displaced tens of thousands, that's according to the U.N. Last week, a demonstration by students turned violent, families of the injured now levelling serious allegations of excessive force by security personnel, which the state government is now probing.

Here's Vedika Sud.

(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)

VEDIKA SUD, CNN REPORTER: This X-ray of a 20-year-old student has shocked doctors. The pin-shaped foreign objects sticking out from the back of Sorbam Utham's (ph) head are pellet gunshot wounds. More than 60 pellets have already been extracted, his sister told CNN. Dozens more will have to be removed surgically.

Last week, thousands of students like Utham (ph) descended on the streets of Manipur's capital, Imphal, calling for justice after the state government confirmed the deaths of two students who had gone missing in July. Soon, peaceful protests don't violent.

Students say security forces use tear gas, rubber bullets and pellet firing shotguns to disperse the crowds.

After the violence escalated, we ran towards a house and hid there. Rapid action force personnel came looking for us with flashlights. Defied indiscriminately at us from close proximity, says Utham (ph).

Police claim students hurled metal rods and stones at them, and that they simply fought back with tear gas, injuring only a few. But it was more than just a few. Doctors say over a 100 students were hospitalized, sparking further outrage. But the wounds inflicted by these pellets on Manipur's young students are something Dr. Devendra, a general surgeon in Imphal, has never seen before.

A senior officer in India's Central Reserve Police Force, who doesn't want to be named, told CNN that forces use tear gas shells and munitions to disperse violent crowds only if the situation calls for it. He refused to confirm the use of pellet firing shotguns on students in Manipur. The use of these shotguns as a means of crowd control has been widely criticized.

MEENAKSH GANGULY, ASIA DEPUTY DIRECTOR, HUMAN RIGHTS WATCH.: The U.N. has already said to the Indian authorities that the use of pellet guns is -- causes tremendous harm because of the very nature of this weapon, which is indiscriminate and targets a very white serpent, including bystanders.

SUD (voice-over): Loitongbam Kishan Singh (ph) can no longer move his body without assistance. His family says the 17-year-old was shot at point blank with a pellet firing shotgun as he took part in the demonstration. Left with a gaping wound and a shattered shoulder, he so far had 60 of the hundred pellets pulled out.

The state's chief minister has been quick to reassure residents in Manipur.

NONGTHOMBAM BIREN SINGH, CHIEF MINISTER, MANIPUR (through translator): If the security forces are found using live rounds that can harm students with excessive action, then the government will not tolerate it.

SUD (voice-over): But despite the attempts by political authorities to reduce tensions, the wounds inflicted by security forces have only stoked more anger.

Vedika Sud, CNN, New Delhi.

(END VIDEOTAPE)

HOLMES: All right, back to our breaking news from Israel where a barrage of rockets was fired early Saturday into the country. Israeli officials saying, there are multiple injuries, some of them serious, at least one fatality.

[01:20:04]

CNN's Hadas Gold joins me now from Jerusalem with an update. And we were talking at the top of the program. When you look at the reasons for and the timing of this attack, you mentioned, you know, visits to the Al-Aqsa Mosque compound or Temple Mount by settlers and others, and now there's an announcement by Hamas calling this operation Al- Aqsa Storm.

GOLD: Yes, they're calling this the Al-Aqsa storm or tornado directly connecting it to the situation that we've been experiencing at the Al- Aqsa Mosque compound, also known as Temple Mount. This is a place that is, of course, so sensitive to both Jews and Muslims.

But what's interesting is that, unlike in previous conflicts where we've seen rockets fired from Gaza, there were no major clashes at Al- Aqsa. There were no major police raids into the compound or into the mosque itself. There have been visits by Jews there during the normal visiting hours, but this is something unprecedented and new.

Hamas saying in their statement they fired at least 5,000 rockets towards Israel, and we have also now confirmed something that's been really never seen before, and that is these infiltrations of militants into Israel at the same time as these rockets are being fired.

We are seeing reports from communities in southern Israel of militants on the back of pickup trucks firing into towns. We're hearing reports from Israeli media that residents in southern Israel are still reporting as we speak in the last few minutes. Militants firing on the streets of these towns.

And Michael, just in the last few minutes, actually, we ourselves, we had to go and seek shelter because sirens went off in Jerusalem. Sirens have not gone off in Jerusalem since 2021 since that major 11- day war between Hamas and militants and Israel, that of course, that was such a major moment in this region.

We have not heard sirens like that in Jerusalem for some time, and usually Jerusalem is sort of kept out of these sorts of situations. We heard -- we're getting reports of at least five explosions here. This might have been interceptions in the Jerusalem area.

But that -- so we've got sirens under -- we've got rockets towards Jerusalem. We've got rockets across all of Israel. We've got infiltrations on the ground. This is a completely unprecedented situation. We do expect a very major Israeli military response to what this will be. I think that this will be an even bigger potential response and even a bigger potential conflict than what we saw in 2021.

HOLMES: It does certainly look that way, Hadas. There have been routine conflicts and clashes, but this does seem different.

Hadas Gold in Jerusalem covering all of this for us. Appreciate that.

You're watching CNN Newsroom. We'll be right back.

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HOLMES: The exiled former Venezuelan opposition leader, Juan Guaido, remains defiant after the Venezuelan government issued an arrest warrant against him. Stefano Pozzebon reports.

STEFANO POZZEBON, CNN JOURNALIST: In an interview with CNN on Friday, Venezuelan opposition leader Juan Guaido said that the historic flow of Venezuelan migsrants who are trying to reach the United States will continue until democracy is restored in Caracas.

Guaido spoke with CNN just hours after the Venezuelan Attorney General issued an international arrest warrant for him for charges spanning from treason to money laundering and corruption late on Thursday night.

Also on Thursday, the White House announced that the U.S. will start deporting Venezuelan migrants who enter the country illegally in a major policy shift.

[01:25:02]

From Florida, where he's been living on a political asylum since April, we don't blame the embattled Venezuelan President Nicolas Maduro for the migration crisis.

JUAN GUAIDO, FORMER VENEZUELAN OPPOSITION LEADER: Venezuelans go to New York, it's because of the starvation, it's because the lack of opportunities back in Venezuela. That's what happened in Venezuela every day, every day. So New York, it's only so a little bit what happened in Venezuela every day, hopefully.

So if we want to stop the situation, to stop the migration, we have to put in the cause of the migration. That is the Maduro regime.

POZZEBON: Meanwhile, more than a dozen migrants from Venezuela and Haiti that were traveling towards the United States in Mexico were killed on Friday when the bus they were traveling on overturned in the state of Oaxaca in southern Mexico. With hundreds of thousands of migrants on the move, many in dangerous, precarious conditions, just like the ones who lost their lives in Oaxaca.

Central American leaders and leaders in South America, but also all across the regions are urging authorities to find a unified and multi- partisan solution to the migration issue.

For CNN, this is Stefano Pozzebon, Bogota.

HOLMES: A painting with a $15,000 price tag just two years ago, well, it turns out to be the work of the 17th century Dutch Master Rembrandt, and now it could fetch $18 million at auction in London.

Christie's auction house sold the Adoration of the Kings two years ago in Amsterdam. They originally believed it could have been created by one of Rembrandt's students or an artist close to him. But after 18 months of x-rays, examinations and extensive discussions with scholars, the work was deemed to be the real deal.

The auction is set for December the 6th in London. Would have liked to have gotten that for 15 grand.

I'm Michael Holmes, thanks for watching. My friend Laila Harrak will be along with more CNN Newsroom at the top of the hour. Tech for Good is up next.

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[01:30:09]

KRISTIE LU STOUT, CNN HOST (voice-over): Hiking in Hong Kong means three things -- greenery, great views, and a hell of a lot of steps.

(on-camera): I'm feeling a little bit winded right now. But look at this beautiful view. Check that out. That's the reward right there.

(voice-over): I'm on a trail called Dragon's Back, a mountain ridge in southeast Hong Kong Island with a summit of nearly 300 meters.

(on-camera): I'd say we're about, what, a half hour car ride from central Hong Kong, and you're here. Lush, green, verdant Hong Kong where you can get lost in the hills, where you can see wildlife, where you can see the coast.

(voice-over): Speaking of getting lost in the hills, it's the perfect place to come see the latest life-saving rescue technology in action, which is what this show is all about. We'll get a glimpse of the next generation of rescue tech for first responders, from fire drones to unmanned rescue vessels.

I'm Kristie Lu Stout. This is Tech for Good.

(on-camera): It's hot. Trust me. I'm sweating.

(voice-over): Here on Dragon's back, we're not far from the city but still, a lot can go wrong.

(on-camera): Oop! (voice-over): Up here, the weather can change in an instant. But you can see the appeal, right? Worth the risk. Or that's what a lot of Hongkongers think.

(on-camera): So another hiker just warned us of a snake sighting.

(voice-over): In 2022, the authorities here had about four times the number of rescue cases compared to 2019 due to more hikers on the trails. And if someone's lost up here, help can be a long time coming.

That's what these guys are trying to solve. Max Lee and Josua Chan graduated with a degree in Aviation and Aeronautical Engineering in 2020. The following year, they met with the Hong Kong Fire Services Department, who were looking for new technology to help find missing hikers faster.

The authorities were using drones to take high resolution photos of an area, then looking at each one individually for signs of people. But they quickly realized they needed something more.

MAX LEE, CO-FOUNDER AND CTO, LIFESPARROW SOLUTIONS: It's very hard for a human eye to see missing victims in these mountains. And it also takes a lot of time because the image is very large and very high resolutions. So then we've developed this AI model to speed up the entire process and to find a potential missing victim in a faster time.

LU STOUT (on-camera): And to develop the AI model, you have to train the AI model, right? So you're here with your drone to get data so you can do just that.

JOSUA CHAN, CO-FOUNDER AND CEO, LIFESPARROW SOLUTIONS: The goal is to get as much data as we can from all the environment in Hong Kong, all different types of terrains in Hong Kong, just to train our model with a very high quality. They had to distinguish between a person inside an image or just vegetation in the rocks.

LU STOUT (voice-over): Lee and Chan asked their friends to hide along the trails to mimic lost hikers.

CHAN: It took us around 25 hikes and we collected over around 6,000 images.

LU STOUT (voice-over): So why not just use a drone with a live video stream to search for missing hikers? Well, Lee says, it depends a lot on image quality, connectivity and internet speed, which can be unreliable in remote areas.

(on-camera): So do you think your technology has helped lead to the rescue of people in distress?

CHAN: Well, I think our technology definitely helped in, you know, using in, or, you know, cut down the rescue time for some of the missing hikers in some of the cases recently.

LU STOUT (on-camera): So let's it rip. Let's see how the data collection part works.

CHAN: So, right now we're going to mimic what the fire services department is going to do. So we're going to fly a drone and we're going to take pictures of a search area. And then we're going to see if the image is going to pick Max up. And then we're going to run the images through our software so we can see if the software is going to detect the Pacific time, which is Max right here.

When we have the identification inside the image, the geotag of that image will be flagged and, you know, alert the authorities.

You can see, not right now. Strange is out there.

LU STOUT (voice-over): As you can see, finding a person in a tree canopy is kind of like finding a needle in a haystack, or more like a backpack in a bush from 60 meters in the air. Not easy.

[01:35:09]

(on-camera): Where is Max?

CHAN: I think that's him right there, at the crosshair.

LU STOUT (on-camera): That's right there. You got him.

CHAN: Yes.

LU STOUT (voice-over): The next day. I met Lee and Chan at their alma mater, the Hong Kong Polytechnic University to see the AI algorithm in action.

LEE: So yesterday we took about 32 images in total, and then this is the first image. So right here, you can see that we have a map that shows the location as well as the image and as well as the detections of the potential victims inside those images. So over here, I can zoom in. So it shows me right here, lying down on the ground.

LU STOUT (on-camera): How accurate is your technology?

LEE: Out of 100 hikers, we can successfully detect 97 of them.

LU STOUT (on-camera): Not bad. How efficient is your model?

CHAN: Right now, based on our statistics, we can cut down around two- thirds of the time in comparison to reviewing each image manually.

LU STOUT (voice-over): Developed in partnership with the Hong Kong Fire Services Department, Chan says the AI program can also detect different colors and objects like backpacks, as well as mapping the surrounding terrain for the rescue services. It's a Hong Kong train solution to a local problem, but something that Lee and Chan would like to scale up and make global someday.

(on-camera): Your technology has the power to save lives. How does that make you feel? LEE: It makes me feel great. I really want to make an impact in this world and I think through this software, if we can even save one life, then that already means a lot to us.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

LU STOUT (voice-over): Over 7 million people often living pretty much on top of each other. It's what gives Hong Kong its energy and its edge. But life in tower blocks means a long way up and a long way down.

(on-camera): You do get a little bit of vertigo. But you see everything down below, the restaurant, the art center, and then dozens and dozens of stories leading up to where we are now. 36 floors up in the air. Welcome to vertical Hong Kong.

(voice-over): People are just living their lives up here. There are houseplants and the laundry. From 36 stories up, it's hard to imagine what might happen if there was a fire here. A fire like Grenfell Tower. The deadly West London blaze in 2017 devastated the community and posed a monumental challenge to rescue services.

[01:40:08]

PROF. DR. MIRKO KOVAC, AERIAL ROBOTICS AT IMPERIAL COLLEGE LONDON: I was living in London and was commuting by the Grenfell Tower every day. For me that was a real catastrophe.

LU STOUT (voice-over): Mirko Kovac is a professor of Aerial Robotics at Imperial College London.

KOVAC: I got a phone call asking us whether we have a drone that can fly inside of the fire and take pictures and check structural damage, check on survivors and so on. And at that time, we didn't have that. The technologies didn't exist that would allow us to fly in those conditions types of extreme hot environments.

Since then, or that was the nucleus of the idea to create a drone that can operate in extreme hot and extreme cold environments.

LU STOUT (voice-over): Kovac is also head of the Empa Laboratory of Sustainability Robotics in Switzerland. It's a partnership between Imperial College London, and the Swiss Federal Laboratories for Material Science and Technology. The idea is to combine the latest in aerial robotics technology with cutting edge material science to create a fleet of problem solving drones. Basically, drones for good.

KOVAC: The FireDrone project is really relatively complex because the materials that we used are not just readily available. We had to adjust and re-engineer the materials to be structurally lightweight. Be structurally sound and strong and not shrink during heat exposure.

LU STOUT (voice-over): The FireDrone team looked to the animal kingdom for inspiration, studying the thermal regulation abilities of arctic foxes and penguins. DAVID HAUSERMANN, EMPA'S SUSTAINABILITY ROBOTICS LAB: Penguins, which have black feather coat on their back to absorb radiation from the sun. We somehow took the inverse of it and we applied a coating of aluminum to reflect the heat from the fire.

LU STOUT (voice-over): They even look to spittle bugs whose foamy fortresses keep them cool.

HAUSERMANN: The components which need to be shielded from the extreme temperatures are all housed within this central aerogel housing. Aerogel are high performing insulation materials, which are also used in space applications, for example. We have designed the fire drone this way that it can sustain 200 degrees of environmental temperature for up to 10 minutes.

LU STOUT (voice-over): By withstanding heat, it can give firefighters crucial, life-saving data through CO2 sensors and regular and infrared cameras to help save lives before and after a fire.

KOVAC: The firefighters are the real heroes. They really risk their life and their health to support in fire situations. We need an insight onto the situational awareness at the moment of the fire, but we also need to protect the firefighters and provide tools that can allow them to operate and to do their job with a lower risk.

LU STOUT (voice-over): The fire drone is still very much a work in progress. But the team has high hopes for its future.

KOVAC: My dream for this technology is that it really takes off, literally, so it scales up and really brings a value, brings a change in the world.

LU STOUT (voice-over): On the other side of Europe, Gemma Alcock is also dreaming of drones for good. She told us how she saved her first life when she was 22, working as a lifeguard for the Royal National Lifeboat Institute. It happened near here in Poole Bay in the south of England in 2015.

GEMMA ALCOCK, FOUNDER AND CEO, SKYBOUND RESCUER: A lady got into difficulty on a beach that wasn't lifeguarded at that time of year. So a member of the public alerted us to it. I ran about 400 meters, swam out about 100 meters to an unresponsive lady in the water.

I knew instantly that this was life critical. So we managed to get her back to shore very quickly and conducted casualty care that took her from unresponsive to being alive and well. That moment consolidated my passion and love for life saving.

LU STOUT (voice-over): The incident got her thinking about what might have helped them get to the victim sooner.

ALCOCK: With a drone we'd be able to see further and so we would have been able to see her get into difficulty so that it didn't have to get to the stage of doing casualty care to bring her back to breathing.

[01:45:02] LU STOUT (voice-over): The idea for SkyBound Rescuer was born. A network of automated drone hubs in risk hotspots across the U.K., ready to respond to an incident in just five minutes.

Mission Control is here in South Hampton, where Alcock and her team are developing the framework for her vision, starting with the latest automated drones on the market.

ALCOCK: So this is an automated drone station. First of all, it enables a precision takeoff and landing through this marking here. The camera uses that to align itself. And it also enables a remote recharging of the battery without needing to take the battery out and put it on charge. So these rods come in here and charge the batteries.

LU STOUT (voice-over): These drones are then synced with the company's custom built emergency response AI software, which maps out the rescue operation and calculates the level of risk. The idea is that emergency services like the Coast Guard, Fire Brigade, Police or Ambulance will be able to easily request a drone on demand for any eventuality.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Copy that, taking off.

LU STOUT (voice-over): It's kind of like an Uber for rescue drones, but with a drone pilot in the driver's seat at Mission Control.

ALCOCK: 04 (ph), this is SkyBound Control, over.

In the beach lifeguarding example, we could do routine patrols of these high risk beaches. The drone would fly its mission, and when it spots someone in distress or someone nearing a high risk area, the lifeguards can have eyes on that drone footage so that they can get there as quickly as possible.

We have a growing list of mission types that our software is capable of. Currently, it is missing person searches, hotspot monitoring, which could be crime hotspots or transport hotspots or something else.

But does a fleet of eyes in the sky drones mean privacy is sacrificed for safety?

ALCOCK: And an example that I often use with drones is CCTV cameras. When they first came out, people thought they were being spied on, and it didn't make them feel comfortable. But now, when people see CCTV cameras, they feel safer. And so our aim is someday when someone sees a SkyBound drone in the sky, they feel safer.

Alcock says regulations in the U.K. currently restrict drones flying outside the line of sight of the drone pilot. But she is hoping an exemption will soon be granted for her company so she can make her vision a reality.

ALCOCK: I don't think there's any greater purpose than life saving. It gives someone a second chance at life. But for the lifesaver, it is also the most profound feeling. It is my most proudest moment, and it's what motivates me every single day.

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[01:50:39]

LU STOUT (voice-over): The sun is shining. The sea is calm.

(on-camera): Oh, sorry, sorry. Wrist break.

(voice-over): And this is my first time kayaking.

(on-camera): Oh, sorry.

(voice-over): I mean, you can probably tell, right?

(on-camera): No, this is tougher than it looks. It does require skills, skills that I do not have. A lot of strength, which I wish I had more of. But you do feel the natural environment around you. It's nice.

(voice-over): We're here because Hong Kong is a kayaker's dream. Hundreds of islands, so many places to explore, and so many places to get lost.

(on-camera): I've tripped and away. I'm sorry.

(voice-over): So I'm not alone here, obviously. There's my crew. But as nice as it is out here, I can still feel how the ocean can be a big lonely place, especially if you're far out to sea in need of rescue.

Sam Mayall has been sailing since he was 10 years old. As he got bigger, so did the boats and the level of risk.

SAM MAYALL, FOUNDER, OFFSHORE SURVIVAL SYSTEMS: When I lived and worked offshore, I was unfortunately involved in a number of accidents. Unfortunately, some of them were fatal.

We got the call on Channel 16. Man overboard, man overboard. Your adrenaline just goes through the roof, and it's right, how quickly can we get there and rescue that guy? We got in the boats, we went as fast as we could to the guy in the water. Trying to find someone in the water is exceedingly difficult.

After an hour of searching, we found him face down in the water. The key theme was time and risk. The quicker you could get something in the water to go and rescue people, and the better the chances of recovering them alive. And the second was the risk. Do we want to put three of our guys in harm's way to go and save one person that's gone overboard?

LU STOUT (voice-over): Six years ago, then age just 22, Mayall began dreaming up what would become a trio of life-saving technologies. The first, finding people stranded at sea.

MAYALL: The challenges with the human eye is really associated around fatigue. There's inconsistency between my eyes at the beginning of a search and my eyes half an hour in. LU STOUT (voice-over): So Mayall's team engineered an AI software program that can be applied to existing camera feeds like drones or CCTV.

MAYALL: It applies AI in a novel way over the top of that image to autonomously detect casualties and target objects. We're working at about a 90 percent accuracy at the moment and the more the system is, is used, the better it becomes.

LU STOUT (voice-over): The second life-saving technology is designed to get people out of the water fast.

MAYALL: So cold water shock sets in within three minutes. You need to get the guys out of the water very, very quickly. When you work in an offshore wind farm, you could be three, four, five hours from a lifeboat and over two hours from a helicopter.

LU STOUT (voice-over): That's where the SWIFT system comes in. A conveyor belt that Mayall says can get people out of the water in around 30 seconds.

Former Army Engineering Officer Laura Tognarelli is in charge of rolling out this technology.

LAURA TOGNARELLI, FORMER ARMY ENGINEERING OFFICER: The SWIFT employs a basic conveyor technology that most of us have seen in other areas that has been adapted to the maritime environment. It allows us to use it on a range of platforms from larger crew transfer vessels, so the boats that take you out as an offshore worker, to being in a position to use it on potentially cruise liners or bigger commercial ships.

Man overboard, port side. It takes away the stigma of needing to have a certain level of strength or endurance to work offshore, and it allows that rescue to be open for everybody.

[01:55:11]

I think the key thing for me with it, is its technology isn't replacing people, it's very much a tool to enhance people.

LU STOUT (voice-over): And the third lifesaving technology, keeping rescuers safe.

MAYALL: Everyone thinks that you put your hero capes on and off you go and save the guys. But the reality is, is quite different. In a lot of cases worldwide, the decision is made not to launch the rescue assets because of the risk to the rescuer.

LU STOUT (voice-over): This is an early prototype for the Guardian, a remotely operated, unmanned rescue vessel with a swift conveyor attached.

TOGNARELLI: So, imagine seeing your computer game system and you're controlling the boat from there. That coupled with the cameras around the vessel and the option for mics allow it to be a two-way scenario. To allow you to talk to those who are being rescued but also get that full environmental sense of the situation.

This reduces the need for crew to be put at risk to be launched. It allows the captains to go, you know what, I'm going to launch the Guardian anyway, although I won't put more of my crews' lives at risk to rescue that life.

Mayall's Edinburgh based company, Zelim, is working with the U.S. Coast Guard and a number of offshore energy companies to crack the code of saving lives with more speed and less risk.

MAYALL: A lot of the technologies employed offshore now are the same technologies that have been there for the last 40, 50 years. We're now in a position where technology is changing. There's new technologies on the market. We're integrating that and we believe we can set a new benchmark in safety.

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