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Live From...
Matara, Sri Lanka; Tsunami: Money Trail; Ukraine Election
Aired December 30, 2004 - 14:00 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.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: People screaming as maybe the water hit them. It was trees cracking, half of them floating. It was just so horrible.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
CAROL LIN, CNN ANCHOR: A little girl caught up in a huge disaster finally makes it home. Her family's story this hour.
MILES O'BRIEN, CNN ANCHOR: Responding to disaster. People around the world sending help to Asia. We track how one charity spends the money you have donated to the cause.
LIN: And laser beams into airline cockpits. Several incidents raise the question, is someone deliberately targeting airplanes and pilots?
O'BRIEN: And politics, poison and the power of people. We'll take you inside the protests that helped elect his man president. Jill Dougherty is in the house.
From the CNN Center in Atlanta, I'm Mile O'Brien.
LIN: And I'm Carolyn Lin, in for Kyra Phillips. This hour of CNN's LIVE FROM starts right now.
Well, if the numbers are incomprehensible, the pictures from Indonesia's ground zero are beyond description. First the numbers.
Almost 117,000 reported dead in Sunday's tsunamis. The vast majority in Indonesia, Sri Lanka, India and Thailand. Indonesia alone counts as many dead today as all the affected countries combined reported yesterday.
Now a new and staggering perspective on the carnage from a British conservationist who was able to fly over Aceh Province on northernmost Sumatra island. Mike Griffiths says a town of 13,000 just 100 miles from the earthquake's epicenter is vaporized amid a swath of total desolation.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
MIKE GRIFFITHS, CONSERVATIONIST: There was no villages left standing between Molabo and Chalong, which is about 100 kilometers north of Molabo. It's like a nuclear blast has hit the area and it's completely leveled everything except just for a few structures.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
LIN: Then there were new waves of panic today when Indian officials warned of another potential tsunami and coastlines across the region were evacuated. The Indians later backtracked then retracted the whole thing. India's science minister now says there's virtually no chance of another killer wave and, in fact, none has resulted from the dozens of aftershocks recorded since Sunday.
O'BRIEN: Sri Lanka counts almost 25,000 dead, with more than 6,000 others still considered missing. But none of these figures can begin to communicate the loneliness so many survivors feel, even when surrounded by thousands of others just like them. Nor do the numbers prepare us for the bizarre and the unexpected: elephants pulling cars out of rubble or children smiling when strangers hand out cookies.
CNN's Satinder Bindra is in the Sri Lankan City of Matara.
(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)
SATINDER BINDRA, CNN CORRESPONDENT (voice-over): Help and relief at last for thousands who've lost everything. Their loved ones are dead. Their homes destroyed. And their belongings swept away. Now they'll have to live on handouts for weeks and frightening memories for the rest of their lives.
"My father was pushed by the water onto the street," says survivor Anara Paragaki (ph). "That was the last I saw of him." Now as he buries his father, Anara Paragaki (ph) says millions of Sri Lankans feel the light has gone out of their lives.
Gamini Sumitnanaykar shows me what remains of the restaurant he built with his life savings.
GAMINI SUMITNANAYKAR, SURVIVOR: I feel like I am alone or something. I know I can't think of what I can do in the future.
BINDRA: Others feel it's time to try shake loose their shock. They employ local ingenuity to pull their valued possessions from under tons of debris.
What lingers on here is an intense and overpowering smell.
(on camera): Decomposed bodies are still being found everywhere. And health officials are getting very concerned. They're fearing the outbreak of an epidemic that could kill thousands more.
(voice-over): So far, there are no reports of any major health problems in southern Sri Lanka. But in some places, looters are taking advantage of the situation.
DAVID GITTINS, HOTELIER: My immediate neighbors from everybody from the local community walking on to my property, stealing, taking property that doesn't belong to them. I find it a very despicable thing. BINDRA: Meanwhile, hundreds continue scrambling for food and cookies. As he receives his tiny portion, this boy manages a smile. It's his way perhaps of saying thanks to all those across the world who are trying to help Sri Lanka.
Satinder Bindra, CNN, Matara, southern Sri Lanka.
(END VIDEOTAPE)
LIN: Well, faced with such a massive relief effort, the nations of the world are contributing to help tsunami victims. Here's just a look at some of the contributions so far.
The World Bank will give $250 million to the effort. Meanwhile, Britain today raised its contribution to $96 million. The British government had already pledged about $30 million.
And corporations around the world are using their profits for good. Companies from Anheuser-Busch to Coca Cola to Disney to Sears are contributing millions of dollars.
O'BRIEN: Cash not commodities. That's what private and government organizations are asking for to help the tsunami victims. But what happens when you donate your money to relief efforts? I think we've all wondered about that.
CNN's John Zarrella shows us the money trail.
(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)
JOHN ZARRELLA, CNN CORRESPONDENT (voice-over): Fourteen-year-old Roshan Bedelyanige (ph) has set up a Web site to collect donations. The Silver Spring, Maryland, teenager born in Sri Lanka has put up his own money too.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: I've put $100 I've received so far.
UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: And that's your Christmas money?
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Yes.
ZARRELLA: While the tsunami survivors need everything, relief agencies private and governmental say money will do the most immediate good.
ANDREW NATSIOS, USAID DIRECTOR: If people give commodities, it will take a month to get there, and the transportation costs are more than the value. Please do not send commodities. We need cash to these NGOs.
ZARRELLA: Most nongovernment relief organizations distribute cash donations in much the same way. This is how it works.
For example, Connecticut-based Save the Children deposits your donation in a New York bank. From there, it's wire-transferred to a bank in Jakarta, Indonesia. The money will then be wired to banks in the areas hit by the tsunami. There Save the Children offices can draw on the accounts to buy what's needed, from food to plastic sheeting for shelters, to salaries for health care workers.
BOB LAPRADE, SAVE THE CHILDREN: Being able to hire those people locally that understand the culture and the language and other things are very important to -- to implementing good quality programs that help children.
ZARRELLA: Children like 8-year-old Yuda (ph) in Banda Aceh who's entire family was swept away. At least aid organizations say the countries hit have well-established banking systems which makes it easier to get help to victims like Yuda (ph) who need it most.
John Zarrella, CNN, Miami.
(END VIDEOTAPE)
LIN: Victims caught in the frenzy of the tsunami had to make some quick decisions. In case you just missed it in the last hour, one mother was even forced to choose between the lives of her two children.
Well, Australian Jillian Cyril (ph) managed to survive the tsunami with her 2-year-old. She had let her 5-year-old drift in the water in order to save her younger son's life. That 5-year-old is now alive. But it was an agonizing decision.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: I knew I had to let go of one of them, and I just thought I'd better let go of the one that's the oldest. A lady grabbed hold of him for a moment, but she said that she had to let him go because she was going under.
And I was screaming trying to find him. And we thought he was dead.
He clung to a door. He said it just swept him into a barrel or something, and he said he was hold on to a door.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Does he know how to swim?
UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: No, he can't swim.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: How did he keep his head above water?
UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: He said he was doggie paddling in the water. And he said that the door kept him up. It was just horrible, and I'm just so thankful that I've still got my two kids with me.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
LIN: Every time I see that story, I get chills. The mother and her children are now safe at home, safe and sound in Australia.
Well, right here in the United States, a San Francisco family is back from Thailand after having to literally outrun the tsunami. Mom, dad and the kids told their incredible story to CNN's Rusty Dornin.
(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)
RUSTY DORNIN, CNN CORRESPONDENT (voice-over): The fears and anxieties...
UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: There they are.
DORNIN: ... finally erased as the Firmage family comes home. James, Vivian, Caitlin, 10, and 7-year-old Makayla (ph), outran a wall of water on Phi Phi Island in Thailand. They were on the beach and noticed the water behaving strangely.
VIVIAN FIRMAGE, TSUNAMI SURVIVOR: It really sucked really far back out, and then you could just see this ridge of water. And then one of the locals tapped my little one and said, "Start to run."
DORNIN: So they ran for their lives. Caitlin couldn't see what was coming, but she could hear it.
CAITLIN FIRMAGE, TSUNAMI SURVIVOR: The sound was just horrible. It sounded like a jet engine just right maybe five feet behind you. People screaming as maybe the water hit them. And the trees cracking in half, floating. It was just so horrible.
DORNIN: Their hotel was leveled, their belongings sucked out to sea. They spent the night on a hill with about 200 other survivors, awed by their survival and the kindness of the local people.
JAMES FIRMAGE, TSUNAMI SURVIVOR: They were so generous. They were missing their village, they were missing their families, and they would -- they brought up food and supplies. And we all sort of camped out on top of this jungle.
DORNIN: So much death and devastation. The Firmages said they tried to hide their girls from much of it, but the images won't be forgotten. Seven-year-old Makayla (ph) was keeping a journal.
UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: I don't know if I really want to write about it because it was pretty scary.
DORNIN: Both James and Vivian didn't think they would make it out alive, let alone make it home.
V. FIRMAGE: I can't describe it. I just -- I'm just so glad to be home. I just want to go home.
DORNIN: And that they did.
Rusty Dornin, CNN, San Francisco.
(END VIDEOTAPE)
O'BRIEN: A U.S. aircraft carrier, cargo planes being deployed to help people affected by the tsunami. Ahead, a look at some of the risks the U.S. military takes by getting involved. And is the military well suited for the task?
Also ahead, several incidents to tell you about involving laser beams in airline cockpits raising some concerns about safety in the sky.
And thousands of people took to the streets while the whole world watched. CNN reporter Jill Dougherty had a front-row seat for all of this. She's sitting right beside me now. She's give us an inside story of the Ukrainian election, the poisoning, the reelection, and now what's headed to the supreme court there. It's quite a saga.
(COMMERCIAL BREAK)
LIN: News "Across America" right now.
Pilots are being advised to touch their planes' wings before takeoff. The National Transportation Safety Board says it is a simple way to ensure a plane's wings are free of ice. The board says even a light dusting of frost could prevent the plane from taking off.
And California continues to bear the brunt of relentless and brutal storms pushing in from the Pacific Ocean. And forecasters warn the weather is about to get worse. Predictions for northern California and the Sierra Nevada mountains include snowfall, accumulations up to five feet by Friday night.
And Democrat Christine Gregoire is Washington State's official governor-elect. The results were certified today. She has rejected her rival's call for a re-vote. Republicans have until January 22 to contest the election in court.
O'BRIEN: In Ukraine, another victory for opposition leader Viktor Yushchenko. The Ukrainian Election Commission has rejected an appeal of his win in the country's presidential re-vote.
CNN's Jill Dougherty just back from Ukraine. She joins us here. It's a great honor to have her here.
JILL DOUGHERTY, CNN MOSCOW BUREAU CHIEF: Thanks.
O'BRIEN: Jill, great job on the frontlines there. It was really -- it must have been such a remarkable story to cover and to be there in the front row. You know, it seems like Woodstock for a while. I though, uh, oh, I hope this doesn't turn into Tiananmen Square.
DOUGHERTY: Absolutely.
O'BRIEN: It didn't go that way. And it is -- well, the forces of freedom, without getting too pollyanna about it, are they alive and well?
DOUGHERTY: I think so. I think that the people actually had a feeling that they surprised themselves.
You know, we were on the streets, initially you're right. There was a lot of fear, especially one night that there would be a crackdown, the military would come out with batons and that would be it.
But as time went on -- and it went on for -- you know, they were on the streets for more than a month -- I think people grew -- the understanding of what they were accomplishing really grew. And it's not -- it was basically young people. But I'd have to say there were older people, everybody else in between, who really got out there and made it happen and stayed in those streets in freezing temperatures.
O'BRIEN: It's so impressive to watch an upswell like that and see that it really can still have an impact in this way. The people, young people. You must have a million stories to tell. Do you have a few favorites about what it was like just being among them?
DOUGHERTY: Absolutely. Well, you know, to describe the scene, it was really like a revolution/party. And that's what I think all of us went -- you know, we went in with flak jackets and we were ready for like, you know, batons and danger.
And what happened was it turned into a party. And you would be out there, you know, doing live shots at 2:00 a.m. and what would be going by would be seas of people and cars, you know, honking their horns, bop, bop, bop, which was, "Yushchenko! Yushchenko!" And people yelling.
And then, actually true, they'd get out of their cars. The kids would get out of the cars, open the car doors, play their rap song, you know, groove to the rap song, and then go on for the rest of the night.
O'BRIEN: We have a little piece of tape, I believe, which shows the rap song. Let's play it if we have it.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
(MUSIC)
(END VIDEO CLIP)
O'BRIEN: And can you do it, by the way?
DOUGHERTY: The part that's coming up, because this is going to take off on the other one. Yes, I know it by heart.
O'BRIEN: And roughly translated, they're saying what?
DOUGHERTY: Well, actually, it's probably the first rap song that ever got the word "falsification" in. And basically there's a line that says, "We're not a herd of sheep." You know, "No to falsification. No to vote fraud," et cetera.
It's a great -- it's a great song. It's great dance music, I'll tell you.
O'BRIEN: In this language you've got to be careful how you say that. But was it difficult at some points to take it all very seriously and wonder where it would lead if it was -- had that sort of carnival almost Woodstock atmosphere?
DOUGHERTY: It did, but there was always, especially in the beginning, that feeling that it could turn bloody. And that -- that was very serious. And the stakes were very high because, after all, what you had here was an entrenched government, 10 years -- you know, President Kuchma was in there -- very big power structures, lots of money. There is still a lot of money in Ukraine and a lot of powerful interests that didn't want that to happen.
O'BRIEN: It will be interesting to see this -- if other former Soviet republics follow suit here.
DOUGHERTY: Yes.
O'BRIEN: You know, begin something.
The poisoning, we have to have a word or two about that.
DOUGHERTY: Oh, yes.
O'BRIEN: We've seen the before and after pictures. Still worth pointing out. There's that obvious degeneration, if you will, as a result of the dioxin poisoning. Bring us up to ate on what we know and what we don't know about that poisoning.
DOUGHERTY: Well, we know that he was definitely poisoned. This didn't just happen by accident.
It is still under question when it happened. He believes -- and I talked to his wife just the other day. They still both believe that it happened the night that he had a dinner with the secret service. The Ukraine's like the KGB, the former KGB of Ukraine. They deny that, by the way, the...
O'BRIEN: Well, yes. I've read some things that, you know, lay some -- some skeptic -- it's very skeptical account of that in the sense that dioxin takes much longer to take hold than one night. But nevertheless, she is an interesting character as an American. Give me a little of her story.
(CROSSTALK)
DOUGHERTY: She's an American citizen -- American citizen. Grew up in Chicago. Her name is Katia, Katarina (ph). And grew up in Chicago, and she actually worked with the State Department in the human rights area for quite awhile.
And then came over to Ukraine. Her parents are Ukrainians. In fact, prisoners of war from World War II.
O'BRIEN: Wow.
DOUGHERTY: Came to Chicago, made a better life. She went back and met Viktor, Viktor her husband, in 1993 basically in an airport when he was coming to the states to study the banking system. And she's -- they've got three kids, including a 9-month-old little boy. O'BRIEN: Wow.
DOUGHERTY: Yes.
O'BRIEN: It's such a fascinating story. I know -- it's probably hard to leave it. I know you deserve the leave and allll, but it must have been tough to walk away.
It's good that you can leave it with this note to it, sort of button it up with the fact that the reelection went the way it did.
DOUGHERTY: Right.
O'BRIEN: Jill Dougherty, great job out there.
DOUGHERTY: Thank you, Miles.
O'BRIEN: Enjoy your time off. We look forward to seeing you back in the streets of Kiev and elsewhere.
DOUGHERTY: Happy New Year to you.
O'BRIEN: All right. Same to you.
DOUGHERTY: OK.
O'BRIEN: All right -- Carol.
LIN: Boy, it's wonderful having the international correspondents in town, because we get a side of the story...
O'BRIEN: Get the whole scoop, yes.
LIN: Yes, that you don't normally get a chance to talk about on the air.
O'BRIEN: There's not as much time for it.
LIN: Especially seeing Jill Dougherty rapping.
DOUGHERTY: I didn't really do that.
O'BRIEN: Worth the price of admission right there.
LIN: All right. Good to see you, Jill.
In the meantime, we are talking about the oncoming -- our coverage of the tsunami. And people around the world are reaching deep into their pockets to help the victims.
O'BRIEN: Ahead on LIVE FROM, we'll talk with the man in charge of the United Nations food program about plans to get supplies to those most in need. Plus, we'll see what role the Pentagon is playing in the relief effort.
DAVID HAFFENREFFER, CNN CORRESPONDENT: I'm David Haffenreffer at the New York Stock Exchange. After all the fuss they caused during the holiday season, you may think iPod was the number one search term on eBay. You'd be way off.
What was it really? That's all coming up next on LIVE FROM.
(COMMERCIAL BREAK)
LIN: Well, it seems that death and destruction is all you see in parts of Thailand. Hundreds of corpses waiting to be identified and buried. Survivors desperately searching for missing loved ones. And more terrifying images of the moment the tsunami hit.
Here's ITN's Adrian Britton.
(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)
ADRIAN BRITTON, REPORTER, ITN (voice-over): It was not a dramatic crash of waves which killed so many. But this latest video shows the tsunami was a mighty push of sea, a constant force consuming every object and person in its path.
A man climbs to safety onto what was a few seconds before a first-floor balcony. And a family at the hotel in Kamala Bay looked dazed as they struggled to stay together.
Five days on and they've come to collect their dead. This is an outdoor mortuary in Krabi where the victims both Thai and foreign tourists are laid out for identification by relatives. Outside, westerners wearing masks to hide the stench of death, few photographs of diseased, many severely disfigured.
(on camera): It is nothing short of horrific for friends and relatives to see. Some of the bodies behind me have been laid out in the open heat for several days. Visual identification is now virtually impossible. It will have to be done forensically.
(voice-over): British missing and presumed dead. Lincoln Abraham who was on Phi Phi Beach. Today his friends viewed the mortuary photographs on a computer, an agonizing duty.
Yesterday, we told you of the search for Pierce Simon (ph) from Somerset. Today his brother Luke heard that one of the bodies at the Krabi morgue was wearing similar shorts.
LUKE SIMON, BROTHER MISSING: At the moment, we can't distinguish of his sort of bodily features on this -- on this body in the morgue. So I have to go down and double check.
BRITTON: There have been several false trails, but every possibility of finding his brother alive or dead must be pursued.
Where recognition of corpses is impossible, close family have to give DNA samples to establish identity. This young man believes he may have found the body of his younger sister. It is a necessary forensic formality so the body can be released. But in their grief, it is one more unbearable task to go through before they can take their loved ones home.
Adrian Britton, ITV News, Thailand.
(END VIDEOTAPE)
(COMMERCIAL BREAK)
O'BRIEN: Are you big on eBay?
LIN: You know, I hate to admit it, but I just discovered it this year.
O'BRIEN: Oh.
LIN: You can find anything.
O'BRIEN: It's a guilty pleasure. You can find it all on eBay.
LIN: Well, you know, I don't have -- a new mom, I don't have a lot of time. So if I'm looking for something...
O'BRIEN: It's a good way to do it.
LIN: ... there you go. Not meaning it to be an ad or anything.
O'BRIEN: Yes, but it does work. Sandy (ph) has become an addict, too.
The question is, what do most people look for? Apparently there's a list out.
LIN: Really?
O'BRIEN: David Haffenreffer has this and much more for us.
(STOCK MARKET REPORT)
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Aired December 30, 2004 - 14:00 ET
THIS IS A RUSH TRANSCRIPT. THIS COPY MAY NOT BE IN ITS FINAL FORM AND MAY BE UPDATED.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: People screaming as maybe the water hit them. It was trees cracking, half of them floating. It was just so horrible.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
CAROL LIN, CNN ANCHOR: A little girl caught up in a huge disaster finally makes it home. Her family's story this hour.
MILES O'BRIEN, CNN ANCHOR: Responding to disaster. People around the world sending help to Asia. We track how one charity spends the money you have donated to the cause.
LIN: And laser beams into airline cockpits. Several incidents raise the question, is someone deliberately targeting airplanes and pilots?
O'BRIEN: And politics, poison and the power of people. We'll take you inside the protests that helped elect his man president. Jill Dougherty is in the house.
From the CNN Center in Atlanta, I'm Mile O'Brien.
LIN: And I'm Carolyn Lin, in for Kyra Phillips. This hour of CNN's LIVE FROM starts right now.
Well, if the numbers are incomprehensible, the pictures from Indonesia's ground zero are beyond description. First the numbers.
Almost 117,000 reported dead in Sunday's tsunamis. The vast majority in Indonesia, Sri Lanka, India and Thailand. Indonesia alone counts as many dead today as all the affected countries combined reported yesterday.
Now a new and staggering perspective on the carnage from a British conservationist who was able to fly over Aceh Province on northernmost Sumatra island. Mike Griffiths says a town of 13,000 just 100 miles from the earthquake's epicenter is vaporized amid a swath of total desolation.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
MIKE GRIFFITHS, CONSERVATIONIST: There was no villages left standing between Molabo and Chalong, which is about 100 kilometers north of Molabo. It's like a nuclear blast has hit the area and it's completely leveled everything except just for a few structures.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
LIN: Then there were new waves of panic today when Indian officials warned of another potential tsunami and coastlines across the region were evacuated. The Indians later backtracked then retracted the whole thing. India's science minister now says there's virtually no chance of another killer wave and, in fact, none has resulted from the dozens of aftershocks recorded since Sunday.
O'BRIEN: Sri Lanka counts almost 25,000 dead, with more than 6,000 others still considered missing. But none of these figures can begin to communicate the loneliness so many survivors feel, even when surrounded by thousands of others just like them. Nor do the numbers prepare us for the bizarre and the unexpected: elephants pulling cars out of rubble or children smiling when strangers hand out cookies.
CNN's Satinder Bindra is in the Sri Lankan City of Matara.
(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)
SATINDER BINDRA, CNN CORRESPONDENT (voice-over): Help and relief at last for thousands who've lost everything. Their loved ones are dead. Their homes destroyed. And their belongings swept away. Now they'll have to live on handouts for weeks and frightening memories for the rest of their lives.
"My father was pushed by the water onto the street," says survivor Anara Paragaki (ph). "That was the last I saw of him." Now as he buries his father, Anara Paragaki (ph) says millions of Sri Lankans feel the light has gone out of their lives.
Gamini Sumitnanaykar shows me what remains of the restaurant he built with his life savings.
GAMINI SUMITNANAYKAR, SURVIVOR: I feel like I am alone or something. I know I can't think of what I can do in the future.
BINDRA: Others feel it's time to try shake loose their shock. They employ local ingenuity to pull their valued possessions from under tons of debris.
What lingers on here is an intense and overpowering smell.
(on camera): Decomposed bodies are still being found everywhere. And health officials are getting very concerned. They're fearing the outbreak of an epidemic that could kill thousands more.
(voice-over): So far, there are no reports of any major health problems in southern Sri Lanka. But in some places, looters are taking advantage of the situation.
DAVID GITTINS, HOTELIER: My immediate neighbors from everybody from the local community walking on to my property, stealing, taking property that doesn't belong to them. I find it a very despicable thing. BINDRA: Meanwhile, hundreds continue scrambling for food and cookies. As he receives his tiny portion, this boy manages a smile. It's his way perhaps of saying thanks to all those across the world who are trying to help Sri Lanka.
Satinder Bindra, CNN, Matara, southern Sri Lanka.
(END VIDEOTAPE)
LIN: Well, faced with such a massive relief effort, the nations of the world are contributing to help tsunami victims. Here's just a look at some of the contributions so far.
The World Bank will give $250 million to the effort. Meanwhile, Britain today raised its contribution to $96 million. The British government had already pledged about $30 million.
And corporations around the world are using their profits for good. Companies from Anheuser-Busch to Coca Cola to Disney to Sears are contributing millions of dollars.
O'BRIEN: Cash not commodities. That's what private and government organizations are asking for to help the tsunami victims. But what happens when you donate your money to relief efforts? I think we've all wondered about that.
CNN's John Zarrella shows us the money trail.
(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)
JOHN ZARRELLA, CNN CORRESPONDENT (voice-over): Fourteen-year-old Roshan Bedelyanige (ph) has set up a Web site to collect donations. The Silver Spring, Maryland, teenager born in Sri Lanka has put up his own money too.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: I've put $100 I've received so far.
UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: And that's your Christmas money?
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Yes.
ZARRELLA: While the tsunami survivors need everything, relief agencies private and governmental say money will do the most immediate good.
ANDREW NATSIOS, USAID DIRECTOR: If people give commodities, it will take a month to get there, and the transportation costs are more than the value. Please do not send commodities. We need cash to these NGOs.
ZARRELLA: Most nongovernment relief organizations distribute cash donations in much the same way. This is how it works.
For example, Connecticut-based Save the Children deposits your donation in a New York bank. From there, it's wire-transferred to a bank in Jakarta, Indonesia. The money will then be wired to banks in the areas hit by the tsunami. There Save the Children offices can draw on the accounts to buy what's needed, from food to plastic sheeting for shelters, to salaries for health care workers.
BOB LAPRADE, SAVE THE CHILDREN: Being able to hire those people locally that understand the culture and the language and other things are very important to -- to implementing good quality programs that help children.
ZARRELLA: Children like 8-year-old Yuda (ph) in Banda Aceh who's entire family was swept away. At least aid organizations say the countries hit have well-established banking systems which makes it easier to get help to victims like Yuda (ph) who need it most.
John Zarrella, CNN, Miami.
(END VIDEOTAPE)
LIN: Victims caught in the frenzy of the tsunami had to make some quick decisions. In case you just missed it in the last hour, one mother was even forced to choose between the lives of her two children.
Well, Australian Jillian Cyril (ph) managed to survive the tsunami with her 2-year-old. She had let her 5-year-old drift in the water in order to save her younger son's life. That 5-year-old is now alive. But it was an agonizing decision.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: I knew I had to let go of one of them, and I just thought I'd better let go of the one that's the oldest. A lady grabbed hold of him for a moment, but she said that she had to let him go because she was going under.
And I was screaming trying to find him. And we thought he was dead.
He clung to a door. He said it just swept him into a barrel or something, and he said he was hold on to a door.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Does he know how to swim?
UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: No, he can't swim.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: How did he keep his head above water?
UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: He said he was doggie paddling in the water. And he said that the door kept him up. It was just horrible, and I'm just so thankful that I've still got my two kids with me.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
LIN: Every time I see that story, I get chills. The mother and her children are now safe at home, safe and sound in Australia.
Well, right here in the United States, a San Francisco family is back from Thailand after having to literally outrun the tsunami. Mom, dad and the kids told their incredible story to CNN's Rusty Dornin.
(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)
RUSTY DORNIN, CNN CORRESPONDENT (voice-over): The fears and anxieties...
UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: There they are.
DORNIN: ... finally erased as the Firmage family comes home. James, Vivian, Caitlin, 10, and 7-year-old Makayla (ph), outran a wall of water on Phi Phi Island in Thailand. They were on the beach and noticed the water behaving strangely.
VIVIAN FIRMAGE, TSUNAMI SURVIVOR: It really sucked really far back out, and then you could just see this ridge of water. And then one of the locals tapped my little one and said, "Start to run."
DORNIN: So they ran for their lives. Caitlin couldn't see what was coming, but she could hear it.
CAITLIN FIRMAGE, TSUNAMI SURVIVOR: The sound was just horrible. It sounded like a jet engine just right maybe five feet behind you. People screaming as maybe the water hit them. And the trees cracking in half, floating. It was just so horrible.
DORNIN: Their hotel was leveled, their belongings sucked out to sea. They spent the night on a hill with about 200 other survivors, awed by their survival and the kindness of the local people.
JAMES FIRMAGE, TSUNAMI SURVIVOR: They were so generous. They were missing their village, they were missing their families, and they would -- they brought up food and supplies. And we all sort of camped out on top of this jungle.
DORNIN: So much death and devastation. The Firmages said they tried to hide their girls from much of it, but the images won't be forgotten. Seven-year-old Makayla (ph) was keeping a journal.
UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: I don't know if I really want to write about it because it was pretty scary.
DORNIN: Both James and Vivian didn't think they would make it out alive, let alone make it home.
V. FIRMAGE: I can't describe it. I just -- I'm just so glad to be home. I just want to go home.
DORNIN: And that they did.
Rusty Dornin, CNN, San Francisco.
(END VIDEOTAPE)
O'BRIEN: A U.S. aircraft carrier, cargo planes being deployed to help people affected by the tsunami. Ahead, a look at some of the risks the U.S. military takes by getting involved. And is the military well suited for the task?
Also ahead, several incidents to tell you about involving laser beams in airline cockpits raising some concerns about safety in the sky.
And thousands of people took to the streets while the whole world watched. CNN reporter Jill Dougherty had a front-row seat for all of this. She's sitting right beside me now. She's give us an inside story of the Ukrainian election, the poisoning, the reelection, and now what's headed to the supreme court there. It's quite a saga.
(COMMERCIAL BREAK)
LIN: News "Across America" right now.
Pilots are being advised to touch their planes' wings before takeoff. The National Transportation Safety Board says it is a simple way to ensure a plane's wings are free of ice. The board says even a light dusting of frost could prevent the plane from taking off.
And California continues to bear the brunt of relentless and brutal storms pushing in from the Pacific Ocean. And forecasters warn the weather is about to get worse. Predictions for northern California and the Sierra Nevada mountains include snowfall, accumulations up to five feet by Friday night.
And Democrat Christine Gregoire is Washington State's official governor-elect. The results were certified today. She has rejected her rival's call for a re-vote. Republicans have until January 22 to contest the election in court.
O'BRIEN: In Ukraine, another victory for opposition leader Viktor Yushchenko. The Ukrainian Election Commission has rejected an appeal of his win in the country's presidential re-vote.
CNN's Jill Dougherty just back from Ukraine. She joins us here. It's a great honor to have her here.
JILL DOUGHERTY, CNN MOSCOW BUREAU CHIEF: Thanks.
O'BRIEN: Jill, great job on the frontlines there. It was really -- it must have been such a remarkable story to cover and to be there in the front row. You know, it seems like Woodstock for a while. I though, uh, oh, I hope this doesn't turn into Tiananmen Square.
DOUGHERTY: Absolutely.
O'BRIEN: It didn't go that way. And it is -- well, the forces of freedom, without getting too pollyanna about it, are they alive and well?
DOUGHERTY: I think so. I think that the people actually had a feeling that they surprised themselves.
You know, we were on the streets, initially you're right. There was a lot of fear, especially one night that there would be a crackdown, the military would come out with batons and that would be it.
But as time went on -- and it went on for -- you know, they were on the streets for more than a month -- I think people grew -- the understanding of what they were accomplishing really grew. And it's not -- it was basically young people. But I'd have to say there were older people, everybody else in between, who really got out there and made it happen and stayed in those streets in freezing temperatures.
O'BRIEN: It's so impressive to watch an upswell like that and see that it really can still have an impact in this way. The people, young people. You must have a million stories to tell. Do you have a few favorites about what it was like just being among them?
DOUGHERTY: Absolutely. Well, you know, to describe the scene, it was really like a revolution/party. And that's what I think all of us went -- you know, we went in with flak jackets and we were ready for like, you know, batons and danger.
And what happened was it turned into a party. And you would be out there, you know, doing live shots at 2:00 a.m. and what would be going by would be seas of people and cars, you know, honking their horns, bop, bop, bop, which was, "Yushchenko! Yushchenko!" And people yelling.
And then, actually true, they'd get out of their cars. The kids would get out of the cars, open the car doors, play their rap song, you know, groove to the rap song, and then go on for the rest of the night.
O'BRIEN: We have a little piece of tape, I believe, which shows the rap song. Let's play it if we have it.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
(MUSIC)
(END VIDEO CLIP)
O'BRIEN: And can you do it, by the way?
DOUGHERTY: The part that's coming up, because this is going to take off on the other one. Yes, I know it by heart.
O'BRIEN: And roughly translated, they're saying what?
DOUGHERTY: Well, actually, it's probably the first rap song that ever got the word "falsification" in. And basically there's a line that says, "We're not a herd of sheep." You know, "No to falsification. No to vote fraud," et cetera.
It's a great -- it's a great song. It's great dance music, I'll tell you.
O'BRIEN: In this language you've got to be careful how you say that. But was it difficult at some points to take it all very seriously and wonder where it would lead if it was -- had that sort of carnival almost Woodstock atmosphere?
DOUGHERTY: It did, but there was always, especially in the beginning, that feeling that it could turn bloody. And that -- that was very serious. And the stakes were very high because, after all, what you had here was an entrenched government, 10 years -- you know, President Kuchma was in there -- very big power structures, lots of money. There is still a lot of money in Ukraine and a lot of powerful interests that didn't want that to happen.
O'BRIEN: It will be interesting to see this -- if other former Soviet republics follow suit here.
DOUGHERTY: Yes.
O'BRIEN: You know, begin something.
The poisoning, we have to have a word or two about that.
DOUGHERTY: Oh, yes.
O'BRIEN: We've seen the before and after pictures. Still worth pointing out. There's that obvious degeneration, if you will, as a result of the dioxin poisoning. Bring us up to ate on what we know and what we don't know about that poisoning.
DOUGHERTY: Well, we know that he was definitely poisoned. This didn't just happen by accident.
It is still under question when it happened. He believes -- and I talked to his wife just the other day. They still both believe that it happened the night that he had a dinner with the secret service. The Ukraine's like the KGB, the former KGB of Ukraine. They deny that, by the way, the...
O'BRIEN: Well, yes. I've read some things that, you know, lay some -- some skeptic -- it's very skeptical account of that in the sense that dioxin takes much longer to take hold than one night. But nevertheless, she is an interesting character as an American. Give me a little of her story.
(CROSSTALK)
DOUGHERTY: She's an American citizen -- American citizen. Grew up in Chicago. Her name is Katia, Katarina (ph). And grew up in Chicago, and she actually worked with the State Department in the human rights area for quite awhile.
And then came over to Ukraine. Her parents are Ukrainians. In fact, prisoners of war from World War II.
O'BRIEN: Wow.
DOUGHERTY: Came to Chicago, made a better life. She went back and met Viktor, Viktor her husband, in 1993 basically in an airport when he was coming to the states to study the banking system. And she's -- they've got three kids, including a 9-month-old little boy. O'BRIEN: Wow.
DOUGHERTY: Yes.
O'BRIEN: It's such a fascinating story. I know -- it's probably hard to leave it. I know you deserve the leave and allll, but it must have been tough to walk away.
It's good that you can leave it with this note to it, sort of button it up with the fact that the reelection went the way it did.
DOUGHERTY: Right.
O'BRIEN: Jill Dougherty, great job out there.
DOUGHERTY: Thank you, Miles.
O'BRIEN: Enjoy your time off. We look forward to seeing you back in the streets of Kiev and elsewhere.
DOUGHERTY: Happy New Year to you.
O'BRIEN: All right. Same to you.
DOUGHERTY: OK.
O'BRIEN: All right -- Carol.
LIN: Boy, it's wonderful having the international correspondents in town, because we get a side of the story...
O'BRIEN: Get the whole scoop, yes.
LIN: Yes, that you don't normally get a chance to talk about on the air.
O'BRIEN: There's not as much time for it.
LIN: Especially seeing Jill Dougherty rapping.
DOUGHERTY: I didn't really do that.
O'BRIEN: Worth the price of admission right there.
LIN: All right. Good to see you, Jill.
In the meantime, we are talking about the oncoming -- our coverage of the tsunami. And people around the world are reaching deep into their pockets to help the victims.
O'BRIEN: Ahead on LIVE FROM, we'll talk with the man in charge of the United Nations food program about plans to get supplies to those most in need. Plus, we'll see what role the Pentagon is playing in the relief effort.
DAVID HAFFENREFFER, CNN CORRESPONDENT: I'm David Haffenreffer at the New York Stock Exchange. After all the fuss they caused during the holiday season, you may think iPod was the number one search term on eBay. You'd be way off.
What was it really? That's all coming up next on LIVE FROM.
(COMMERCIAL BREAK)
LIN: Well, it seems that death and destruction is all you see in parts of Thailand. Hundreds of corpses waiting to be identified and buried. Survivors desperately searching for missing loved ones. And more terrifying images of the moment the tsunami hit.
Here's ITN's Adrian Britton.
(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)
ADRIAN BRITTON, REPORTER, ITN (voice-over): It was not a dramatic crash of waves which killed so many. But this latest video shows the tsunami was a mighty push of sea, a constant force consuming every object and person in its path.
A man climbs to safety onto what was a few seconds before a first-floor balcony. And a family at the hotel in Kamala Bay looked dazed as they struggled to stay together.
Five days on and they've come to collect their dead. This is an outdoor mortuary in Krabi where the victims both Thai and foreign tourists are laid out for identification by relatives. Outside, westerners wearing masks to hide the stench of death, few photographs of diseased, many severely disfigured.
(on camera): It is nothing short of horrific for friends and relatives to see. Some of the bodies behind me have been laid out in the open heat for several days. Visual identification is now virtually impossible. It will have to be done forensically.
(voice-over): British missing and presumed dead. Lincoln Abraham who was on Phi Phi Beach. Today his friends viewed the mortuary photographs on a computer, an agonizing duty.
Yesterday, we told you of the search for Pierce Simon (ph) from Somerset. Today his brother Luke heard that one of the bodies at the Krabi morgue was wearing similar shorts.
LUKE SIMON, BROTHER MISSING: At the moment, we can't distinguish of his sort of bodily features on this -- on this body in the morgue. So I have to go down and double check.
BRITTON: There have been several false trails, but every possibility of finding his brother alive or dead must be pursued.
Where recognition of corpses is impossible, close family have to give DNA samples to establish identity. This young man believes he may have found the body of his younger sister. It is a necessary forensic formality so the body can be released. But in their grief, it is one more unbearable task to go through before they can take their loved ones home.
Adrian Britton, ITV News, Thailand.
(END VIDEOTAPE)
(COMMERCIAL BREAK)
O'BRIEN: Are you big on eBay?
LIN: You know, I hate to admit it, but I just discovered it this year.
O'BRIEN: Oh.
LIN: You can find anything.
O'BRIEN: It's a guilty pleasure. You can find it all on eBay.
LIN: Well, you know, I don't have -- a new mom, I don't have a lot of time. So if I'm looking for something...
O'BRIEN: It's a good way to do it.
LIN: ... there you go. Not meaning it to be an ad or anything.
O'BRIEN: Yes, but it does work. Sandy (ph) has become an addict, too.
The question is, what do most people look for? Apparently there's a list out.
LIN: Really?
O'BRIEN: David Haffenreffer has this and much more for us.
(STOCK MARKET REPORT)
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