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Early Start with John Berman and Zoraida Sambolin

Satellite Data of Flight 370 Released; Nigerian Military Found the Kidnapped Girls; More Violence in Ukraine; Families Received Flight 370 Data

Aired May 27, 2014 - 05:30   ET

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

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

CHRISTINE ROMANS, CNN ANCHOR: Demands answered. Months after Flight 370 disappeared, we're now getting a first look at the satellite data used to chart its path into the Indian Ocean, but what does it really show and will we ever really know what happened to this jet?

We are live in Kuala Lumpur with the latest.

JOHN BERMAN, CNN ANCHOR: Where are the girls? Nigeria says it now knows where terrorists are holding more than 200 teenagers abducted from a school, but a rescue mission, they say, would be too dangerous. So what is the next step? And is Nigeria even telling the truth here?

We're live with what's happening right now.

ROMANS: Danger and destruction, tornadoes tear through parts of North Dakota as heavy rain soaks south Texas. Guess what? It could be bad again today for millions of us out here.

Welcome back to EARLY START. I'm Christine Romans.

BERMAN: And I'm John Berman. Great to see you today, about 30 minutes after the hour.

And we have new details on the final moments of Flight 370 based on just-released satellite data. This is information that families of missing passengers have pleaded for for months. The fate of the plane and those on board still unknown. Could this now log, this log of released data, be the key that unlocks this mystery?

Saima Mohsin is live in Kuala Lumpur with more on this newly released information.

Saima, what's in here? What does this tell us?

SAIMA MOHSIN, CNN CORRESPONDENT: Well, John, to you and I and most people, this will just be a bunch of numbers, a series of crucial numbers, of course, that are the data communication logs between the plane and the satellite. And crucially, those numbers that are leading to the multinational search in the Southern Indian Ocean. And it's so important for the families to ask to see that because they feel that all things are resting on this data. Everyone is relying on it. Just the other day, I spoke to the Transportation minister, Hishammuddin Hussein, who said, well, look, we're also relying on this data, and hopefully, it's conclusive. If it's not, we're going to have to turn to other analysts. And actually, that is the concern and suspicion that is raised amongst family members, many of them talking to me throughout today since the data has been released, saying, well, it is just a bunch of numbers, but how do we know that we can rely on them?

One of the crew members' husbands, who didn't want to be named, told me that, look, I'm still hopeless. I have no hope. I don't believe in this data. I don't believe it's 100 percent proof that this is where the plane is, and until I find debris, I won't have closure.

Other family members saying that they're very frustrated with the way authorities are dealing with this situation. Of course, you and I both know it's taken so many weeks to release this data. We're constantly talking about why they haven't, when they will.

And another family member saying, well, do you know what, I don't care. I don't care about the data being released. What I want is to find out where the plane is and where my loved ones are.

But of course, Sarah Bajc, the woman spearheading this campaign to put pressure on the Malaysian authorities and Inmarsat, the satellite company from the UK, to release this data, she says she's going to take it and share it with a panel of experts that she's been talking to over the last few months since the plane disappeared.

Some of them have contacted her themselves. Others she's approached. And she's going to take it to them for what she feels will be an independent analysis of the data.

And so, of course, some people feel this is going to open a Pandora's Box, if you like, of various theories of where the plane may well be, if not in the Southern Indian Ocean -- John.

BERMAN: It will be interesting to see what this new analysis says when people get a chance to take a look at it.

Our Saima Mohsin live this morning in Kuala Lumpur. Thanks so much.

ROMANS: In Nigeria and in this country this morning, there's some skepticism about a new claim from the Nigerian military that they know the location of hundreds of kidnapped girls. The U.S. cannot confirm it, but a top Nigerian official says the location is being kept secret while they work to bring the girls home and he cautioned force is not an option.

Arwa Damon live in Abuja, Nigeria, this morning.

Arwa, what should we make of these claims?

ARWA DAMON, CNN SENIOR INTERNATIONAL CORRESPONDENT: Well, there were comments made by the Defense chief when he was addressing a group of protesters. There's been some speculation as to whether or not it was just to try to appease people. There's been a growing sense of frustration amongst the population here and most certainly amongst the parents of those kidnapped schoolgirls. One can just imagine what -- how agonizing this entire process has been.

Now the reason why military force is being taken off the table, at least at this stage, that very much boils down to the type of terrain that these girls most likely are being held in, also to the ruthlessness of an organization like Boko Haram, launching a military operation against them when they have so many of these girls in captivity would prove to be nearly impossible, even for the most highly trained militaries.

Two informants that we spoke to who know Boko Haram incredibly well, they've lived amongst their members, say that they firmly believe that Boko Haram would not hesitate to use these girls as human shields. It leaves very little options when it comes to military maneuvering.

Now when it comes to some sort of negotiation, well, the Nigerian government has said that they will not negotiate with them. Lines of communication at one stage did appear to be open, but they proved to be fruitless. And also there is the reality that Boko Haram is not necessarily a top-down organization, and therefore, who specifically would you negotiate with to try to secure the release of all of these girls?

So, while the parents, if it does prove to be true that the Nigerians have pinpointed the location of the missing girls, could see some hope in that. Trying to actually safely secure their release is going to prove to be incredibly and sadly difficult.

ROMANS: Difficult, indeed. And the world is still watching.

Arwa Damon for us this morning in Abuja. Thank you, Arwa.

BERMAN: Thirty-six minutes after the hour. A Colorado sheriff said they are praying for a miracle this morning with no sign yet of three men missing after this incredible landslide.

Look at these pictures. At least three miles of mud came off a mountain, breaking trees and burying the ground underneath. Authorities say it moved with such force that the mud actually went down into a valley, then up and over a hill on the other side.

The three men missing now included a county road worker and his son, who had traveled out to the region to check on damage from an earlier slide.

ROMANS: Texas could witness more extreme weather today, a day after heavy rain soaked a big part of the state's Gulf Coast. These pictures are from the town of Victoria, not far from Corpus Christi. It piled up several inches of rain in just hours.

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MARY CAULKINS, RESIDENT: We looked outside and the rain was up to our sidewalk, close to our house. And in about 90 minutes, we had six inches of rain.

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ROMANS: The storm cell moved east fast, causing this destruction closer to Houston. High winds ripping these trees from the very wet ground, and they landed right on homes. Luckily, no injuries have been reported.

BERMAN: And in North Dakota, take a look at this.

ROMANS: That is so scary.

BERMAN: This is a tornado on the ground not far from Bismarck, right in the middle of the oil country there. This twister hit a trailer camp housing oil workers in Watford City, leaving nine people hurt, one critically. More than a dozen trailers were damaged.

Now authorities do say they got word of the storm early so most of the people who lived in the camp, luckily, were able to get to safety.

Gives you a sense of what's going on in the country right now. Indra Petersons tracking these storms and the threat for today -- Indra.

INDRA PETERSONS, AMS METEOROLOGIST: More severe weather today just a little bit farther in through Texas. Again we're talking about places like Waco down through about Corpus Christi looking for those strong thunderstorms, strong winds out there, and still that threat of isolated tornadoes will be out there today. But this is only going to be one side of the equation.

One of the things we're going to be looking at there is the heavy rain. We're looking at lots of rain out there, anywhere from three to six inches as the low is kind of spinning around here down to the south. So with that, we're talking about the potential for flooding. And notice even scattered showers spreading all the way into the northeast.

Look how wet this is. There is a lot of moisture coming up from the gulf, so you're looking at all of this really funneling in. So pretty much no matter where you are in the eastern half of the country today, you do have that threat for scattered showers.

Again, the heaviest right around Texas, Louisiana, maybe in through Arkansas, but again, into the northeast you're going to feel a change, and it's not going to be just the rain after a beautiful Memorial Day weekend. What you're going to be noticing is the temperature drop. Boston already dropping about 15 degrees today. Notice New York City at 88.

Let me take you forward to Wednesday. Boston goes down to more 50s. Even New York City goes down to the 60s. It's going to feel a lot different out there. The good piece of news I have for you is it's not going to last too long. You see a nice pattern change by the end of the week and temperatures will warm back up. Just a little mild for a couple of days.

BERMAN: Slow entrance to the summer.

PETERSONS: Yes.

BERMAN: All right, thanks, Indra.

ROMANS: An EARLY START on your money news this morning.

Stocks in Germany at record highs. Record watch here, too. The big number today, anything above S&P 1900, achieved for the very first time ever on Friday. An important read on housing comes later this morning. You know, home prices have been steadily climbing. We'll want to see if there's a little bit of a slowdown in how quickly they've been climbing.

But the rising home prices have helped spur home equity loans. New data shows a 20 percent jump in new lines of credit last year. Still home equity loans far below 2006 levels.

Meantime, mortgage rates are still falling. The calls for mortgage rates this year were they were going to go up and up and up. Look at this. The 30-year fixed rate 4.14 percent.

BERMAN: Wow.

ROMANS: The lowest since October. Still higher than a year ago, but the lowest since October. And when you look at the 15-year -- you know, the popular refinancing tool is a 15-year, 3.2 percent, I think. 3.2 or lower.

BERMAN: Very low.

ROMANS: Very low.

BERMAN: All right. Thirty-nine minutes after the hour.

Gun battles on the streets of Ukraine this morning as militants fight security forces for control of a major airport there. There've been new developments overnight. Peace shattered, despite promises from the country's president-elect. We're live with the very latest, next.

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BERMAN: The fighting in eastern Ukraine this morning shows no sign of easing up. Ukrainian forces now trying to regain control of a major airport there after it was seized by separatist gunmen, this as the new president-elect makes an ambitious vow to unite Ukraine after months of violent struggle.

Senior international correspondent Nick Paton Walsh has the latest live from Donetsk this morning.

And Nick, a lot of confusion about just who controls this key airport this morning.

NICK PATON WALSH, CNN INTERNATIONAL CORRESPONDENT: Well, the Ukrainian government say they control all and even the separatists can see that the National Guard of the Ukraine Army is on part of the airport territory, but they claim, the separatists, that they control part of it, too, so that tug-of-war still refusing to abate.

We're hearing from the separatists, they accept they lost 35 militants. And also the mayor's office, the pro-Kiev mayoral authorities here saying 38 separatists killed and two civilians as well. Four civilians injured as well in yesterday's clashes. That makes it one of the worst days we've seen since this crisis began.

As you just came to me, John, here in the center of Donetsk, where life is going about normal more or less, we heard the sound of a jet in the sky because civilian commercial traffic has stopped now the airport has been seized, and a scene of an intense battle yesterday. That can only mean the Ukrainian military have their jets in the air and that often happens in support of their operations on the ground.

Their officials telling us that their security operation against the separatists or terrorists, as they refer to them, is continuing right now. But the real question is, of course, who controls the airport. But where do we go next from here? Is this the beginning of a pitched battle for various strategic objects inside this otherwise previously peaceful city of Donetsk, around which the unrests swell but didn't really impact daily life here, or is there a potential political way out?

Yesterday morning everyone talked about negotiation between Moscow, Kiev and this new president, Petro Poroshenko. That vanished solely with the violence at the airport. There are signs of many casualties on the separatist side. What's that done to their will -- John.

BERMAN: We'll have to wait and see as the smoke clears, literally, this morning from that airport.

Nick Paton Walsh live for us in Donetsk this morning. Thanks so much.

ROMANS: All right, it's Tuesday morning, long weekend for Chris Cuomo. Let's take a look at what's coming up on "NEW DAY." He is back with fish stories no doubt.

CHRIS CUOMO, CNN ANCHOR, NEW DAY: Don't hate, Christine.

(LAUGHTER)

ROMANS: I love. I love.

CUOMO: Don't hate --

ROMANS: I love.

CUOMO: Don't hate, I had a great weekend and we were some fish- killing fools this weekend.

(LAUGHTER)

ROMANS: I knew it.

BERMAN: But I'll tell you about that when I see you. You can look on my Facebook and Twitter page.

BERMAN: We saw. We saw it all.

BERMAN: Easy, J.B. What you're interested in most people are not. So we have a lot of news, though, to greet us as we return from Memorial Day. The long-awaited satellite data used to figure out Flight 370's possible resting place. Well, it's been released. So are the families satisfied? The answer is a qualified yes.

What is said to be missing? We have our experts digging into the analysis that was used. Why isn't that there?

Also, we're going to be learning more about the man involved in this killing spree in California. Should we be fascinated by who this man was and why he did what he did? Arguably no. We'll have some experts weighing in on that. The focus will be, what opportunities were missed to help this guy? What opportunities were missed to stop him that weren't taken?

So we're going to go through that as well and all the other morning's big stories for you.

BERMAN: Fantastic. Look forward to it. Thanks so much, Chris.

ROMANS: Thanks, Chris.

BERMAN: As Chris mentioned, we're talking about Flight 370, the new data released.

ROMANS: Yes.

BERMAN: It's the families that have been leading the push for this data. Now that they have it in front of them, what do they think? Is it enough? We're live in Beijing right after the break.

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ROMANS: For months, families of missing Flight 370 passengers have pleaded with Malaysian officials for this. This morning, they're finally getting it, satellite data from that flight, but will this information bring them any closer to solving the mystery of what happened?

David McKenzie is in Beijing following how the families are reacting.

And you need a PhD or you have to be some sort of aviation engineer to actually make sense of all this stuff. So what are the families going to do with it, David?

DAVID MCKENZIE, CNN INTERNATIONAL CORRESPONDENT: Well, that's a good question, Christine. And yes, you not only need to be an aviation engineer, you'd have to have PhDs in several fields, and Inmarsat said this data isn't really for people then to put their own calculations to. It's just to see how they came up with the decision that they say the plane went down in the Southern Indian Ocean. But still, family members say they're going to take these numbers and they're going to put them to experts.

(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)

STEVE WANG, SON OF MISSING FLIGHT 370 PASSENGER: It is very technical, and we are not experts, so we may ask some other people who is kindly to help us. Maybe some of them mathematicians or some of -- some other people who is good at physics or something like that. And we'll ask them to help us analyze, again, about whether they are searching the right place.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

MCKENZIE: Ultimately, the question is why do the family members want this information? Well, for two reasons. One, because they just don't trust the information they're getting from any authority in the search for the plane. And secondly, they just want to get some kind of closure in this matter, because many of them have said until they physically can grasp some evidence, be it a photograph or a piece of wreckage, they just won't believe that their loved ones have passed away.

And therapists have told me that delay in coming to some kind of closure is just particularly psychologically damaging -- Christine.

ROMANS: And it's just such a mystery and they need to know what happened, and there's a lot of information and no information all at the same time. Just so frustrating.

David McKenzie, thank you for that -- David.

India's new prime minister, Narendra Modi, holding bilateral talks with regional leaders, including rival Pakistan. Just one day after being sworn in as the country's 15th prime minister. Last week, his party scored a resounding victory at the polls. Modi took the oath of office in New Delhi Monday, along with his newly appointed cabinet.

It's the first time in three decades that a political party with an absolute majority will take the reins in India.

BERMAN: No comment from the White House after a big intelligence blunder stemming from the president's surprise trip or unannounced trip to Afghanistan. The administration accidentally releasing the identity of the CIA's top official in Afghanistan. This name was included on a list of people at a military briefing for the president. Some 6,000 journalists got that information.

ROMANS: Oh, no.

BERMAN: Due to safety fears, CNN is not releasing the agent's name.

ROMANS: Now that is a big blunder.

BERMAN: Let's get an early check on your money, coming up next.

ROMANS: Coming to CNN, a new series from executive producers Tom Hanks and Gary Goetzman, "THE SIXTIES." It's the decade that changed the world. The space race, the cold war, free love, as John Berman says, civil rights and more. The 1960s reshaped Americans' lives in ways that still affect us today. Be sure to watch it or set your DVR for the premiere.

BERMAN: Or both.

ROMANS: Thursday night, 9:00 Eastern, 9:00 Pacific here on CNN.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

ROMANS: All right, let's get an EARLY START on your money. And Berman, checking futures, if things hold -- if things hold here before you could see another record. Because before you hit the beach and the barbecue this weekend, the S&P hit a record high, and futures are indicating we could do it again. Futures pointing to a higher open. Look, Dow futures right now at 66 points.

BERMAN: Everyone's been waiting for this bull market to end.

ROMANS: I know. I know, and then you had tech stocks that sold off, you know, in the middle of the spring, but now tech stocks for this month are probably up something like 1.7 percent for this month, so the tech stocks came back and you're right near records again.

Another story I'm watching today, college is still worth it. A new study finds despite student debt and a challenging job market, college grads make more money. Data from the Economic Policy Institute published in the "New York Times," look at this, shows college graduates earned 98 percent more last year than non-grads.

Now why is that so significant? Because it's much better than even a decade ago when college grads made 85 percent more than non-grads.

And we've got this for you. The most stolen car in America is the Honda Accord. For the fifth year in a row. Lojak says the second most stolen car also a Honda, the Honda Civic, followed by the Toyota Camry.

No one is stealing the B-Train, which I used to take to work for years.

BERMAN: You know what happened to my car twice in the last three weeks? My boys have left the light on in the back seat so the battery has been dead. So if anyone wants to steal that car, it's in the garage, not moving because there's no battery life in it ever.

ROMANS: You're going to need a jump.

BERMAN: "NEW DAY" starts right now.

CHRIS CUOMO, CNN ANCHOR: Breaking overnight, the data family members of Flight 370 have been asking for is finally released. What does this Inmarsat raw data show and what is missing? Answers ahead.

KATE BOLDUAN, CNN ANCHOR: New details about the killer behind that rampage in Santa Barbara and his parents' desperate attempts to stop him as the families of his victims, all college students, speak out.

MICHAELA PEREIRA, CNN ANCHOR: Located. The Nigerian government says they've found hundreds of the schoolgirls kidnapped by a terror group, but they aren't able to rescue them. So what happens next?

CUOMO: Your NEW DAY starts right now.

ANNOUNCER: This is NEW DAY, with Chris Cuomo, Kate Bolduan, and Michaela Pereira.