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CNN Live At Daybreak

America's New War: Congress May Agree on $15 Billion Bailout

Aired September 19, 2001 - 08:11   ET

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

THIS IS A RUSH TRANSCRIPT. THIS COPY MAY NOT BE IN ITS FINAL FORM AND MAY BE UPDATED.
PAULA ZAHN, CNN ANCHOR: Right now, it's time to turn our attention to John King.

John, I was just handed a little clip of paper indicating that congressional leaders are telling some of our CNN producers that Congress is nearing an agreement on a $15 billion bailout plan of the airline industry.

Do you have anything to add to that?

JOHN KING, CNN CORRESPONDENT: Well, the airline industry wants a $24 billion plan, Paula. Most in Congress were ready to go along with that -- the leadership anyway ready to go along with that. We are told that the Bush White House, they decided that that was a bit too much money in their view, at least in the short term -- that they wanted to deal with the immediate crisis, so the Bush administration trying to hold the line here at a package of about $15 billion.

There will be urgent negotiations this afternoon -- a bipartisan group of congressional leaders coming to the White House this afternoon to meet with President Bush and his economic team on this issue. So certainly, the word in Congress is they want to do this as soon as possible, perhaps even today or tomorrow to send a signal not only to the airline industry, but to Wall Street, that the Congress and the White House are serious in tackling the economic problems posed by this crisis, but still a disagreement over the exact number.

I want to bring in now, Paula, to our discussion -- we are talking a lot about the economy, but as Bill Hemmer and others there at ground zero in New York have been reporting throughout the week and our correspondents across the river at the Pentagon, some horrific pictures. Also some pictures of hope and triumph, as we watch the firefighters and other rescue workers sorting through the rubble.

I am joined now here in Washington by Captain James Chinn. He is of the world-renowned now Fairfax County Fire and Rescue Squad.

Sir, your group has deployed around the world.

CAPTAIN JAMES CHINN, FAIRFAX COUNTY SEARCH AND RESCUE: That's right.

When the embassies were bombed in Kenya, your group went there -- the Oklahoma City bombing here, earthquakes as well. Mayor Giuliani in New York yesterday saying it's probably now beyond hope that we could find any survivors.

Based on your expertise, is that a fair assessment?

CHINN: Well, we have seen -- in recent times, we have seen people survive these incidents and several days into it. You know, Mayor Giuliani is right in saying that it is beyond hope. I think there is still a chance of survivors. The weather conditions here have been favorable. We haven't had any, you know, outrageous weather either, you know, low temperatures or high temperatures. So, you know, the chance of survival is very good, because of weather conditions and because of everything we have seen so far. The hope of finding void spaces is always with us. We're always constantly searching these areas. Hopefully, you know, there is still a chance that that may happen.

KING: Now, your group from Virginia has deployed around the world in the past -- a much more local crisis this time -- deploying to the Pentagon after the jetliner struck.

Describe the scene there. Seen anything like it before?

CHINN: No, this was something new to us. We're not, you know, usually two hours from where we're deploying to. We saw it on CNN when it first happened. We immediately responded to the area. We had crews on-site within two hours of the incident working. With it being in our backyard like this, we were faced with a new disaster with the fire being, you know, an issue. We're not normally geared up to arrive on a scene that fast, start operating and having to, you know, work in concert with the fire departments and everything to get this -- to get on-site immediately like we did in this incident.

KING: It's a difficult question, perhaps, because some in New York perhaps still holding out hope, but as we are now in the eighth day here, is there a public health risk to the fact that there are still as many as 5,000 bodies buried under that rubble?

CHINN: I think we always have that risk. One of the things that we do as a team is we do on-site cleaning of everything. We do not take anything off the site with us. We try to capture any body fluids or anything like that. There may be a portion of what we are exposed to during this. We try to leave it on-site. We do it almost like a hazardous material incident where, you know, the people going into the site are cleaned before they come off the sites. We try to minimize that risk and try to keep it localized right on the site of the incident.

KING: Much has been made about the transforming nature of this event -- more strict airline security, an increase fear of terrorism. Your men are trained -- your men and women are trained to combat earthquakes, to deal with hurricanes and tornados. A different world now, new training required?

CHINN: Very much so. We learned after the embassy bombing in Kenya that we need to change our focus. We were originally designed to do earthquakes and natural disasters of that institute. And we have studied terrorist activities, and now, you know, each terrorist activity seems to be getting a little worse, and nobody would have ever dreamed that, you know, a 747 would have been used as a primary device or a secondary device in terrorist activities.

So with every incident we learn something. We'll take everything that we have learned from this one, and we'll take it back, and in our interactive (ph) report, we'll address the training needs of the future, so...

KING: All right. Captain James Chinn, thank you very much for your thoughts this morning, and our thoughts and prayers for your men and those up in New York still leading the recovery effort as well -- now back to Paula Zahn in New York.

ZAHN: Thanks, John.

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