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Dennis Deluge; Rescue Revelations; More London Bombing Victims Identified

Aired July 11, 2005 - 14:00   ET

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

KYRA PHILLILPS, CNN ANCHOR: Dennis deluge. Remnants of the hurricane wash across the southern U.S., leaving behind billions of dollars of damage.
WOLF BLITZER, CNN ANCHOR: Rescue revelations. The amazing story of how a note helped save the life of a Navy SEAL caught behind enemy lines.

PHILLIPS: Terror investigation. Who was behind the British bombings? We're live from London with a new development.

From the CNN Center in Atlanta, I'm Kyra Phillips.

BLITZER: And I'm Wolf Blitzer. This hour of CNN's LIVE FROM starts right now.

PHILLIPS: Ten months after Hurricane Ivan, folks on the Florida Panhandle can finally say something good about it. It made Hurricane Dennis seem like a downpour, and that's really more of a testament to Ivan's wrath and Dennis' weakness. Both storms were Category 3.

Dennis packing 120-mile-an-hour winds when it came ashore on a panhandle barrier island this time yesterday. Navarre Beach took much of the brunt. And for miles around, what the wind didn't damage high water did.

Twenty-four hours later, high water still is a rising concern in several states. Around Atlanta, we've had six inches of rain and are bracing for several more. That's because Dennis, now a mere depression, has basically stalled in the southern Ohio Valley. It's running out of steam, but still overflowing with rain.

When it was still a mighty wind, it knocked out power to hundreds of thousands of people. More than 570,000 in Florida alone. And when all the insurance files are filed and tallied, well, they're expected to reach in the billions, though probably not the level seen after Ivan.

BLITZER: We've got correspondents and crews throughout Dennis' wake, including Dan Lothian in Pensacola, Beach, Randi Kaye in Navarre, on the other end of the Santa Rosa Island. And watching from afar, our meteorologist, Jacqui Jeras, at the CNN weather center.

Dan, you start us off.

DAN LOTHIAN, CNN CORRESPONDENT: Well, Wolf, since the last time that we spoke, we have seen all the folks, a lot of the residents who are from this area, who were forced to evacuate have been returning to this area. It's kind of a staging area where we're at in a parking lot right along Pensacola Beach.

They had to park here and walk to their homes. Some of them have to walk a couple of miles. We were talking to some folks earlier. They were not very happy about that. But officials don't want their cars out there on the roadway because it is still -- as they describe, it's still very crowded with a lot of debris.

There are power lines that are down. They say it's still too dangerous. So there are areas that they feel that people can walk, but they don't want the cars driving down the street.

I'm standing right in front of a building that was heavily damaged during Hurricane Ivan that is right here to my right, screen left. They were rebuilding that building, repairing it, were not that far away from having it fixed, and then, of course, Dennis comes roaring through here.

They had all the scaffolding here all the way up to the top floor, as you can see there. Almost to the top floor. They had that in place.

There was a woman at the visitors center below who said she had expressed some concern about that scaffolding, fearing that with the high winds and the rain that it would snap off and perhaps come down and land on the visitors bureau, visitors center here in town, and, in fact, that's exactly what happened, hitting the rear end of that, causing some damage to that visitors center.

We had a chance earlier as we were driving in to also for the first time to get a sense of the damage in this area that was heavily impacted, took a brunt of the hit from Hurricane Dennis. And as we were driving in, we saw a lot of debris out on the street.

One lane, inbound lane, was completely blocked with a lot of debris that had been washed up onto that lane. We saw wave runners, a couple of wave runners. There was a construction trailer that was turned over on its side. And, of course, you see a lot of trees that have been knocked down, power lines that are down, power poles that have been snapped.

One of the shots that we got, as well, was of some small sailboats that were piled on top of each other. There was a dock, as well, that had been destroyed.

So there is a lot of damage here, but the sense that you get from anyone here is that it wasn't as bad as it could have been. In fact, I was talking to a law enforcement official here earlier, and he told me on a scale of one to 10, Hurricane Ivan being a 10, he thought that this was only a three -- Wolf.

BLITZER: Dan Lothian on Pensacola Beach for us. Dan, thanks very much -- Kyra. PHILLIPS: Well, amid the sighs of relief that Hurricane Dennis wasn't as bad as anticipated, there are sighs of resignation as waterlogged residents begin cleaning up again.

CNN's Randi Kaye tracking the damage east of Pensacola aboard CNN's mobile hurricane tracker, Hurricane One.

And Randi, you said the elements you had today or I guess in this live hit are far more powerful than what we saw in the last hour.

RANDI KAYE, CNN CORRESPONDENT: Absolutely, Kyra. We're just on our way out of Navarre Beach. I just want to tell you where we are. You can get a look at the scene here.

We have been waiting in line here at this gas station just to get some gas. Our Hurricane One has been on empty since this morning, and we could not find an open gas station anywhere. We finally just found one, again, waiting in line about a half an hour now since our last live hit with you. So we are getting gas.

And I want to take you to the more important video, which is the destruction at Navarre Beach. Let's show you some of that.

The winds there were measuring up to 120 mils per hour, sustained 120-mile-an-hour winds. This is the worst hit area from Hurricane Dennis.

The power lines are down. You can see that throughout the video that we took just a short time ago. This was the first time that they were letting folks in to the Navarre Beach area. Many of the homeowners there won't be able to get back for days.

They were doing a search and rescue. The search and rescue teams were there. They go door to door, they mark the doors if they visited the home, and they make sure there's nobody inside, there's no fatalities. They just put some orange paint on the door to show that it's been visited.

The road is absolutely flooded. Half the road -- the pictures are really something. Half the road is actually gone.

I went down into where the water was, and you could see just where the yellow line would divide the right and left side of the road. One half of the road, the right side, is now all water.

So we have that to show you. And also, the homes are completely gone.

We walked along the beach, and where there were homes yesterday morning, as you walk along, you see that there's just the pieces from what was holding a home in place. And homes are completely gone. They were either washed out to sea or just blown to bits and blown into the land.

So it is really something to see, as I'm sure you can tell from the video. PHILLIPS: All right. Randi Kaye there with Hurricane One. Pretty amazing pictures coming in there from Navarre Beach. First time we're getting to see that amount of pictures from that area that was hit by the hurricane yesterday -- Wolf.

BLITZER: Ordinarily, the Florida town of St. Marks sits a few miles north of Apalachee Bay. When Dennis blew through, though, the town and the bay became pretty much inseparable. St. Marks' mayor estimates a surge of some 10 feet on top of the normal high tide. He says the most water he says he's ever seen before.

We'll hear from a long-time St. Marks' shopkeeper later. That's coming up on LIVE FROM.

PHILLIPS: And what remains of Dennis is soaking much of the South today. Even parts of the Midwest. Jacqui Jeras brings us up to the moment from the CNN weather center -- Jacqui.

(WEATHER REPORT)

BLITZER: And we're still tracking Dennis and the damage left behind thanks to our dedicated band of our CNN citizen journalists. They continue to email us photos and video from the impact zone. We'll bring you some of the newest images a little bit later. That's coming up on LIVE FROM.

With violence on the rise in Afghanistan, the U.S. military is sending in reinforcements. With that story, plus word of the fate of a missing Navy SEAL, let's bring in our Pentagon correspondent, Barbara Starr.

What's going on, Barbara?

BARBARA STARR, CNN PENTAGON CORRESPONDENT: Wolf, well, it had been expected, but now it's official. Seven hundred troops from the 82nd Airborne Division will be shipping out within the next couple of weeks for Afghanistan.

They will go to the eastern and southern areas of the country where violence has been on the rise. They will be in place, at least through those September parliamentary elections, trying to cool things down.

The violence in these areas has been on the rise and, of course, the latest situation was that -- the fate of that four-man SEAL reconnaissance team in eastern Afghanistan. Now over the weekend, the U.S. military reporting they did recover the body of the fourth SEAL, the last man to be accounted for in that team.

They say that they recovered his body, essentially, shall we say, intact. In other words, what they are telling us is the Taliban claims they had captured the man and beheaded him. That was the Taliban public claim -- simply were not true.

Now, it is the fate of the one SEAL that was rescued alive that has become most interesting. Riveting details now slowly coming out, being pieced together.

What we have learned is this SEAL survived back on June 28, wounded but alive. He made his way through three or four kilometers, we are told, of this very rough mountain territory.

He then was rescued, essentially, by an Afghan man who found him in the mountains, took him to an Afghan village and sheltered him. Hid the American, even refusing to turn him over to the Taliban.

What we are told is the American Navy SEAL wrote a note identifying himself and his location. That note was taken by the Afghans down the mountains to U.S. forces. U.S. forces then were able to launch a rescue, go to this village and get the American SEAL, certain that they were not walking into an ambush.

More details coming out slowly, but it appears the rescue of this man was quite a riveting tale -- Wolf.

BLITZER: It sounds like it could be a major motion picture, at least a TV movie at some point down the road. Barbara Starr reporting for us. Barbara, thanks very much -- Kyra.

PHILLIPS: Well, some have called for its closure, while the White House insists that it protects America from terror. The military prison at Gitmo. Just ahead on LIVE FROM, our cameras go inside its walls. And we'll explain what we were and were not allowed to show you.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: So how much blood must be spilled? How many tears shall we cry? How many mothers' hands must be maimed?

(END VIDEO CLIP)

PHILLIPS: A mother speaks out in her grief. Her son presumed a victim in the London bombings. We're going to have the latest on the investigation straight ahead.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

BLITZER: London is still a city on heightened alert. Since Thursday's string of bombings, any suspicious package found abandoned has prompted evacuations. There was another one today at the King's Cross underground station, a site of one of last week's attacks.

For more on that and the terror investigation let's go to that King's Cross station. Jim Clancy is standing by with details -- Jim.

JIM CLANCY, CNN CORRESPONDENT: Well, London defies the bombers. That's the way that the headline reads today after the turnout of commuters this day here at King's Cross station, of course one of those most severely affected in all of this.

One of the train routes here is completely shut down. That has affected other train routes that go through King's Cross station as well, the underground tunnel routes.

You can see behind me a lot of commuters. This is the end of the commute for most Londoners this day. Many of these people, though, still on their way to other destinations.

Let me show you what it looked like a little bit earlier. The commuters were back on the buses, they were back on the underground in large numbers this day. Still, it was a day that was not without problems.

This was the scene just about three, four hours ago here at King's Cross station. We had a security alert. Police moved in. They backed people up. They told them they had to leave this area because of the security alert. That lasted about 15 minutes before the situation was defused and people were able to get on with their commutes.

Meantime, the first person identified as a victim in all of this, at least officially, 53-year-old Susan Levy (ph) was identified. There's a lot of frustration over the fact that people have not been learning the identities of those who were killed in this attack.

Still, Tony Blair, the British prime minister, went before the House of Commons this day. He talked there. He got a lot of support from other members, even the opposition in the House of Commons. And at this point in time, he says there was no intelligence that could have prevented this.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

TONY BLAIR, BRITISH PRIME MINISTER: I know of no intelligence specific enough to have allowed them to prevent last Thursday's attacks. By that very nature, people callous enough to kill completely innocent civilians in this way are hard to stop. But our services and police do a heroic job for this country day in, day out. And I can say that over the past years, as this particular type of new and awful terrorist threat has grown, they have done their utmost to keep this country and its people safe.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

CLANCY: But not all of the people in Britain are very happy at this moment, particularly relatives of those that are still missing. They want answers. The police say they're working as fast as they can, but there are a lot of frustrations that are building up. You can hear it in the voice of Marie Williams, who is looking for her son.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

MARIE FATAYI-WILLIAMS, SON MISSING SINCE ATTACKS: My only son, the head of my family. African society, they hold on to sons.

He has dreams and hopes. And I, his mother, must fight to protect them. This is now the fifth day, five days on, five days on, and we are waiting to know what happened to him. And I am his mother. I need to know what happened to Anthony.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

CLANCY: People want answers. In the meantime, as we noted, life is getting back to normal here in London for many of the other people who must make the commute. But I've got to tell you, Wolf, that right now a lot of these commuters are pausing and taking bouquets of flowers.

They're taking them over to a shrine that's here at King's Cross station, not only to the missing, but those that have lost their lives as a result of this, and those that still remain hospitalized, about 10 of them. Two of them still in critical condition.

Back to you.

BLITZER: All right. Jim Clancy on the scene for us in London. Jim, thank you very much -- Kyra.

PHILLIPS: Well, President Bush sounding a note of solidarity for his friend Tony Blair today. Speaking to a crowd at the FBI Academy in Quantico, Virginia, Mr. Bush promised the U.S. would stand firm with Britain in the wake of last week's deadly bombings. He says the attacks give new urgency to the war on terrorism, and he called Iraq the "front lines."

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

GEORGE W. BUSH, PRESIDENT OF THE UNITED STATES: We will keep the terrorists on the run until they have no place left to hide. And the war on terror in Iraq is now central front. The terrorists fight in Iraq because they know that the survival of their hateful ideology is at stake.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

PHILLIPS: President Bush warns that the fight against terrorism is far from over and there will be more difficult moments ahead.

A lifetime of hard work swept away in a matter of minutes. Imagine watching as floodwaters rush into your home or your business. Well, we're going to talk with a survivor of Hurricane Dennis trying to see just how bad that damage is.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

BLITZER: Let's check some news "Across America" right now.

Los Angeles police say they did everything they could to avoid a shootout that killed a 19-month-old baby. Police say a man involved in an hour's long standoff yesterday was using the child as a shield and came out shooting at officers. Gunfire also killed the suspect, and a police officer was shot in the shoulder.

Nine-year-old Dylan Groene's father says a public memorial service will be held for his son in the next few days. DNA testing confirms human remains found last week in Montana are those of the missing Idaho boy. Groene and his sister Shasta were kidnapped in May from the house where their mother, brother and the mother's boyfriend were found beaten to death.

And a fast-growing wildfire is threatening about 300 homes in south Colorado's St. Isabelle National Forest. More than 400 firefighters are struggling to get a handle on the lightning-sparked fire which has scorched 8,000 acres since Wednesday -- Kyra.

PHILLIPS: Insurance companies busy crunching the insured losses by Hurricane Dennis. Kathleen Hays has the latest estimates and all the economic damage live from the New York Stock Exchange.

(STOCK MARKET REPORT)

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

PHILLIPS: "Now in the News," an Amber Alert in Arizona for two young children. They're missing from their home near Phoenix where authorities found the bodies of their uncle and two grandparents. Bryan Cervantes is a year-and-a-half old. His sister Jennifer three- and-a-half. Authorities believe they were taken by their father. Thirty-four-year-old Rodrigo Cervantes Civala (ph).

Three climbers have died in the North Cascades of Washington State. Authorities say that a six-person party was on its way down from the summit when rockslides hit, killing the team's leader and two others. One climber was injured. The other two escaped unharmed.

Amtrak reinstates high-speed service between New York City and Washington. That service was sidelined in April when a safety inspection turned up cracks on the brake rotors of all 20 high-speed trains. The express service is being phased back in as the -- or phased back in, rather, as the train's Canadian maker completes repairs.

And a tragic anniversary in the former Yugoslavia. Hundreds of coffins were buried today in the town of Srebrenica. They contained the remains of some of the 8,000 Muslims who were hauled away and slaughtered by Bosnian-Serbs in a weeklong massacre launched 10 years ago today. A decade later, bodies still are being identified.

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