Return to Transcripts main page

American Morning

Sad Farewell to Musician Who Put 'L' in TLC

Aired May 02, 2002 - 09:36   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.
JACK CAFFERTY, CNN ANCHOR: This morning, a sad farewell to a musician who put the "L" in TLC. Thousands are gathering for the funeral of Lisa "Left Eye" Lopes, the Grammy Award winning artist who died in a car crash while vacationing in Honduras last week.

CNN's Kendis Gibson is in Lithonia, Georgia, and he joins us now.

Good morning, Kendis.

KENDIS GIBSON, CNN CORRESPONDENT: Hello. Anderson, we are still a couple of hours away from start of service, but already, there's a lot of activity here. And take a look at this, they are expecting upwards of 30,000 people to come here and mourn Lisa "Left Eye" Lopes now.

As far down as you can see the camera pan. Double the number of people that you see there, because people who are lined up around this parking lot, all here to mourn the R&B superstar.

Of course, you know Lisa "Left Eye" Lopes one third of the group TLC, known for such hits as "Waterfall," "No Scrubs," by far the biggest selling female group of all time, more so than The Supremes, Destiny's Child, and other group that you can name, so you can understand, perhaps, why so many people were here.

She of course was killed one week ago while in Honduras, a place that she went often. She was driving in her car and swerved into the wrong lane and got into a car crash and was killed a week ago this Thursday.

Now of course many of the folks have been mourning, including this young man, here, Scott.

Scott got here a little bit earlier here today.

Scott, what made you want to come here?

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Well, first of all I'm a number one fan of hers. And my heart just went out when she had the accident, because I was in a car accident, and I wasn't as fortunate as her. So I just wanted to be here for her.

GIBSON: Thank you.

Now a lot of folks here really did not know Lisa "Left Eye" Lopes, and they are among the thousands that will come here.

Blair here actually did know her, and I can't imagine. I see you're in tears, but I can't imagine your grief right now.

UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: I didn't know her like that. I knew her brother and I knew her heart, you know what I'm saying, all her fans did. And there's some people here that were in her video. You know, that's how sweet she was, she opened her video for fans to come down and be in it.

You have someone over there who tot a tattoo. I'm jealous. I want one.

GIBSON: What it is about that made so many people come here, I think?

UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: She was so special. She was so Outspoken. If you ever watched any, any TLC interview, I mean, you see Lisa outspoken, always the one making the jokes, making everybody laugh. I mean...

GIBSON: All right, thank you.

UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: All right, so there you have it. Many of the folks starting gathering there around 6:00 this morning. The service takes place in just a little more than two hours from now. That's the latest from Lithonia, Georgia.

I'm Kendis Gibson. Anderson, let's go back to you.

COOPER: Kendis, thanks very much. No doubt we will be following that story all morning long.

Kendis Gibson in Lithonia, Georgia.

TO ORDER A VIDEO OF THIS TRANSCRIPT, PLEASE CALL 800-CNN-NEWS OR USE OUR SECURE ONLINE ORDER FORM LOCATED AT www.fdch.com