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CNN Sunday Morning
Southern Asia Rocked by Earthquake; Father Battles Yahoo for Release of Son's E-mail Account
Aired December 26, 2004 - 09:00 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.
TONY HARRIS, CNN ANCHOR: And, good morning everyone. It is December 26th. This is CNN SUNDAY MORNING. I'm Tony Harris.
BETTY NGUYEN, CNN ANCHOR: And, good morning, I'm Betty Nguyen. It is 9:00 a.m. here on the East Coast, 6:00 a.m. out West. We want to thank you for starting your day with us.
(NEWSBREAK)
HARRIS: Much more to come on CNN SUNDAY MORNING.
We'll bring you the story of an American Marine killed in war. Now his father is waging a battle to see his final messages.
Also ahead, you made your New Year's resolutions or have you already broken them? Now there's a way the Internet can help you keep your promises.
And, he's tickled the ivories for some legendary bands but these days Chuck Leavell has been focusing more on wood. He'll join us to explain.
Now, here's more of what's happening this hour.
NGUYEN: The most powerful earthquake in 40 years triggered tidal waves across southern Asia today. The quake was centered off the Indonesian island of Sumatra and the damage and loss of life well they are devastating. The island nation of Sri Lanka was one of the hardest hit. The confirmed death toll has reached more than 1,700 from tidal waves that swallowed that area.
The earthquake also sent huge waves to resort islands off the southern coast of Thailand. It's believed those waves killed nearly 250 people. At least 1,000 people were killed in southern India, 700 of them in one province alone. Communications problems have delayed and damaged and we have casualty reports from islands off of India's coast.
We've got a lot to tell you about this morning, including authorities in Thailand now say that the tsunamis have killed 248 people in their country, most of them on resort islands off the coast.
CNN Correspondent Aneesh Raman is in one of those islands and we have him on the phone. What's the latest from your area? ANEESH RAMAN, CNN CORRESPONDENT (by telephone): Betty, good morning. That toll is presumed. It is far from confirmed as officials just begin to get into this devastated area. Walls of water, some 30-feet high are what eyewitnesses are recounting took place this morning as they slammed into this island, two within mere moments of each other, others throughout the day, catching people as they were in a restive holiday mood turning an eerie transition from tranquility to just utter devastation.
The forefront of what is now the massive rescue and relief efforts remain the island where we stand Phuket. It would have been the hardest hit of Thailand. It was the closest to the epicenter of this earthquake.
It is one of the region's most visited tourist destinations, especially by western tourists and this is the peak of that season. Some five million tourists come here throughout the year. It makes up about 40 percent of this country's tourism budget, so it gives you a sense of the scale and how many people were here from how many countries.
Tourism officials are telling us that the entire western coast of this island has been hit pretty severely within moments of the first two and a few hours later the rest. The tidal waves, though, there is fear the will continue to come. No one has a clear sense as to when this could end.
So, right now everyone trying to desperately get to higher ground. I can tell you though right now we're standing at the airport and there are about maybe 100 to 200 people along with us obviously that are completely stranded. There are no cars available.
The vast majority of hotels, if not completely knocked down or power knocked out remain filled to capacity, so just getting around this area will be incredibly difficult.
Moments ago the Thai prime minister talked in (UNINTELLIGIBLE), came to give a much needed ingredient of stability to the scene. I spoke with him. He says that the situation is under control. Relief and rescue efforts will continue through the night.
I asked him if any international help had been asked for or offered. He said no and he is very confident that the government, which has said earlier today has never dealt with anything at this scale ever before in its history, will be able to pull through with the help of the military.
Those lucky enough to have survived are giving us the chilling details of what took place. People that I have spoken to it's just hours after these tidal waves hit describe tales of survival as they basically ran after seeing the first wave coming, hearing people screaming, seeing the streets suddenly flooded, getting to higher ground within the hotel, realizing another one could be coming, running in between these near simultaneous tidal waves and just utter chaos as well. So, the people who are now just beginning to grapple with what's taken place, just beginning to deal with the incredible tragedy that has become their holidays are now trying to reconnect. Telephone lines are incredibly difficult. So, just trying to navigate your way around this, if you were lucky enough to have made it through, remains incredibly, incredibly difficult -- Betty.
NGUYEN: Aneesh, one witness said that the beach area is literally gone there. As we were watching and looking at this video, was there any kind of warning system in place for those tourists and those residents in that area?
RAMAN: Well, that will be a key question as we go forward but there's about I think in terms of my calculations a two-hour lag between the time that this earthquake actually took place and the first tidal wave hitting the island.
But, as the Thai prime minister has told me, this is something the country has never dealt with before. There were some security issues in this region, especially in these tourist destinations in terms of terrorism, so security was heightened but that could do nothing to try and combat 30-foot waves.
But the government really will be pressed in terms of when it knew, what it knew, but really no one expecting that they could have done much more. I mean the devastation and what took place is just beyond comprehension at some level. And so now every effort is being placed onto trying to find anyone who is alive, anyone perhaps caught under rubble in any sort of structural damage.
These waves came up to the third floor in some of these hotels, so right now they're really concentrating on that but those questions will undoubtedly come in the week ahead -- Betty.
NGUYEN: A lot to be sorted out there. Aneesh Raman in Phuket, Thailand, thank you Aneesh -- Tony.
HARRIS: And we'll have much more on the deadly quake and the tsunamis later this hour, including a live report from hard hit India.
Meanwhile, thousands of air travelers are hoping for the best today. Because of Christmas Day, airline delays could not have been much worse, like these unfortunate folks waiting, waiting and waiting some more at Cincinnati's regional airport. And delays in one airport, as you know, cause a domino effect on others.
Gary Nuremberg is live at Reagan National Airport near Washington, good morning Gary.
GARY NUREMBERG, CNN CORRESPONDENT: Good morning, Tony. You know if you spent the night anywhere other than an airport you're ahead of the game, at least ahead of tens of thousands of passengers who yesterday had to deal with flight cancellations primarily on the Delta subsidiary Com Air. Com Air had computer problems keeping up with its crews, knowing exactly where they were and, as a result, yesterday chose to cancel 1,160 flights stranding 30,000 passengers.
Com Air tried to put them on Delta, tried to put them on busses, tried to get them to where they wanted to go and then last night canceled all of Sunday's flights, 1,160 of them adding another 30,000 passengers to the mix. The Associated Press reports, however, that Com Air does intend to have a limited schedule later today as it tries to catch up.
That's not the only problem this weekend. US Air has separated passengers from luggage on the East Coast. Chris Chimes is an executive vice president of US Air. Mr. Chimes, you have thousands of people who didn't get their luggage, didn't get their Christmas presents in time. What's being done to help them?
CHRIS CHIMES, US AIRWAYS SPOKESMAN: Well, this certainly wasn't our finest hour but our employees have been working double overtime from Friday trying to get caught up. The backlog in Philadelphia is being cleared out so we expect by the end of the day today that it will be pretty close to normal as far as operations. So, we're trying to catch up and get people to where they need to go.
NUREMBERG: In addition to the luggage problem, you've canceled 29 flights today. How much of this is a direct result of labor trouble that you may be having with the different unions you're dealing with, as you do all these bankruptcy issues?
CHIMES: There's certainly some of that. I wouldn't say it's organized but we just have had a lot of people who we didn't plan to call in sick, calling in sick. We started off Thursday with bad weather in the Midwest that put us in a hole, exacerbated by elevated sick calls both Friday and Saturday. Today, it looks to be pretty normal and that's where we're trying to get to.
NUREMBERG: Mr. Chimes thank you for joining us this morning, Chris Chimes, the Executive Vice President of US Air.
Tony, we will keep on top of this through the morning and bring you updates as we try to determine whether passengers throughout the country are actually able to get to where they want to go.
HARRIS: Gary, that's very good. You moved that story along for us this morning. We have a better understanding of it. Thank you.
NGUYEN: And we want to hear from you this morning as well.
Finish this sentence for us: "'Tis the season to be..." and tell us why. We are at wam@cnn.com.
In today's "Soldier's Story" the importance of last words from a loved one at war, why one man is fighting to keep his son's e-mails.
HARRIS: Plus, how the Internet can help you keep your New Year's resolutions. That's today's "Best of the Web." NGUYEN: And good morning Chicago. Look at this live picture we have from WPLG. We will have the weather forecast there a little bit later this hour kind of a shaky day, maybe it's windy there. We'll see.
(COMMERCIAL BREAK)
HARRIS: Officials in Sri Lanka expect the death toll to climb above 2,000 by tomorrow.
CNN's Satinder Bindra is in the Sri Lankan capital of Colombo and he joins us by telephone -- Satinder.
SATINDER BINDRA, CNN CORRESPONDENT (by telephone): Tony, night has fallen here in Colombo and the Sri Lankan cabinet is meeting in an emergency session. On Sri Lankan TV right now politicians are appealing for calm because with every passing moment the death count is rising.
As you mentioned, right now the death count over 2,000, and officials are saying that by tomorrow morning this number could rise perhaps by a few more thousand. That's not being confirmed as of yet though.
The biggest fear in people's minds is that there could be greater and bigger tidal waves, so those people whose homes have been destroyed are trying to flee to safer areas. There are some minor law and order problems here as people are trying to commandeer vehicles even.
Now, the worst affected area in Sri Lanka is the eastern part. We have reports from there of about 1,500 people killed. Also affected the tourist resort of (UNINTELLIGIBLE) on the southern tip of Sri Lanka. We have reports from there of about 200 to 300 people dead.
But Sri Lanka has declared a state of national emergency. The country's president is actually at the moment on a private trip to London, England but she's canceling those plans and she's returning back to her country to try and seize this opportunity to help her people as much as she can -- back to you Tony.
HARRIS: Satinder, just a quick question. A state of national emergency what does that mean in terms of evacuations? What does that mean in terms of the police presence there? For example, is the airport open? What can you tell us about what the state of national emergency really means on the ground?
BINDRA: On the ground, Tony, what this means is there's a large police presence in some of the worst affected neighborhoods here. Everything in sight has been destroyed. Concrete homes, wooden homes, everything gone.
People are scared of looters, so the police have moved in force into these neighborhoods where I am at the moment and they've imposed a state of curfew. The airport is indeed open and Sri Lanka is now appealing to the international community to offer all possible assistance.
People here will (UNINTELLIGIBLE). The worst part about this tragedy is thousands have been affected. In fact, the number is more like a million people who have been displaced. These people have no insurance, so it will take them a lot of time to gather their wits and to rebuild their lives again.
HARRIS: So, it is a growing tragedy in Sri Lanka and other parts of southeast Asia. Satinder Bindra thank you. We appreciate it.
More CNN SUNDAY MORNING right after a quick break.
(COMMERCIAL BREAK)
NGUYEN: In our "Soldier's Story" this morning, a fallen Marine's final messages. Lance Corporal Justin Ellsworth was killed in Iraq. Now his father, John Ellsworth is pleading with Internet service provider Yahoo for access to his e-mails but he's not getting what he wants.
In a statement, Yahoo says:
"Our hearts go out to the Ellsworths and any family that suffers from a tremendous loss such as this. The commitment we've made to every person who signs up for a Yahoo mail account is to treat their e-mail as a private communication and to treat the content of their messages as confidential."
John Ellsworth joins us now from Farmington Hills, Michigan, good morning to you.
JOHN ELLSWORTH, FATHER OF FALLEN SOLDIER: Good morning.
NGUYEN: Well, before we get to the e-mail issue, tell us a little bit about your son and what happened to him.
ELLSWORTH: My son was a great kid. He was assigned to the 2nd Recon Battalion in Camp Falluja, Iraq. He was on a foot patrol with a recon unit when his unit was struck by a roadside IED, improvised explosive device, and was killed along with four others and two others were injured.
NGUYEN: Now, did you communicate a lot by e-mail? We're trying to just put a handle on why you want access to his e-mail account.
ELLSWORTH: Well, me and Justin had spoke. We spoke a couple times a week. We e-mailed almost daily. We had had conversations about all the support that he was getting through his e-mail account because I had had a group of people that I would publish a weekly up- to-date or to keep them up to date, kind of a friends and family notice I would put out on my e-mail regarding Justin's accomplishments over there and what was going on just to keep everybody up to date.
And we had talked about publishing or actually printing out the e- mails and placing them in a scrapbook for future generations, kind of like a letters from home type thing because he was getting so much support.
NGUYEN: So, in essence, those were his letters to home that you see it as that and you'd like to put it in a scrapbook.
Well, I want to read you a statement from Yahoo which says: "You agree that your Yahoo account is non-transferable and any rights to your Yahoo I.D. or contents within your account terminate upon your death."
Do you understand by gaining access to his e-mail account their argument is that not all the e-mails were sent to you so you're being able to see other people's e-mails and that could be a violation of privacy.
ELLSWORTH: Correct. We're looking at this kind of like a bank and a safety deposit box. The bank does own the safety deposit box and Yahoo owns the account. However, the bank or Yahoo in this case does not own the contents of the account.
We believe it's part of his personal estate and we're in the process right now of appointing a representative of Justin's estate and once the court authorizes that we are going to then ask Yahoo to turn over Justin's property, which is the contents of the e-mail account.
NGUYEN: So, this could be new legal territory. What are you hoping to accomplish through all of this? You've acquired an attorney.
ELLSWORTH: Yes, we've retained Daly & Stern (ph) out of Farmington Hills who is very knowledgeable in this area. What we hope to do or what I've been hoping to do all along right now is to inform the public that this may be a problem of the future and we need to address it.
This is all uncharted waters and what we need to do is make sure people out there are aware. Now, every other Internet provider that I've spoken with has an avenue to travel to be able to recover such information from the accounts.
Yahoo has been steadfast and I understand that their agreements are -- that is what their policy is. That's what they want to stick with. But in this case, I think, number one, I need to get the people informed that this is a problem and it needs to be addressed.
NGUYEN: All right. Well we, of course, will continue to follow it. John Ellsworth we appreciate your time this morning.
ELLSWORTH: Thank you.
NGUYEN: Thank you -- Tony.
HARRIS: And checking our top stories this Sunday morning, we're following a still growing aftermath of a massive earthquake off Indonesia's coast. The quake spawned tsunamis that left thousands of people dead or missing in Sri Lanka, India, Thailand and elsewhere. NGUYEN: Do you know already that you are going to need a little help keeping those New Year's resolutions? Well, the web might be the place to turn to and today's "Best of the Web" can show you how when we come back.
(COMMERCIAL BREAK)
HARRIS: Hey, we want to show you the real Chicago. We showed you the fake Chicago a couple of minutes ago. It wasn't the real Chicago. We were wondering in that last shot where was all the snow? All we've been doing is talking about all the snow and the storms through the Midwest and there was no snow in Chicago. Actually that was (UNINTELLIGIBLE) that we showed you just a couple of minutes ago.
NGUYEN: A long ways away.
HARRIS: Good morning, Chicago, and get ready for "Mamma Mia" the musical based on the Abba song is -- I guess it's a bunch of songs from Abba, right?
NGUYEN: A lot of Abba songs, great musical too.
HARRIS: That's being performed at the Ford Center for Performing Arts. Hello, Chicago.
NGUYEN: Well you know what though, Tony, a lot of people probably singing the blues today as they're...
HARRIS: Why's that?
NGUYEN: ...stuck in airports across the nation.
HARRIS: Oh. Yes.
NGUYEN: Brad, can you help them out?
(WEATHER FORECAST)
HARRIS: OK, Brad, thank you.
NGUYEN: Thank you.
So, in less than a week you're going to pledge to stop smoking, exercise and maybe even get a new job, right? Right? So, we've got some help for you today.
Rebecca Hurd, Assistant Managing Editor of "Wired" magazine joins us from San Francisco with the "Best of the Web," good morning to you Rebecca.
REBECCA HURD, "WIRED" MAGAZINE: Good morning, Betty, how are you?
NGUYEN: I'm doing great. I don't now how great I'm going to be doing once I make those New Year's resolutions though, so if I need some help, I can turn to the web, correct? HURD: That's correct. That's correct. You know (UNINTELLIGIBLE) did a study and they found that 60 percent of Americans make resolutions but only ten percent of them keep them. So, I think some people out there do need some help and we've got some Web sites that will do it.
NGUYEN: I need lots of help. OK, for those who need help staying on that diet, getting in shape, losing weight, where can they go?
HURD: They can go to fitday.com and what I like about this site is that you get a lot of the tools that you have to pay for on other diet sites, like E-diet (ph) and Weight Watchers but here you get them for free and that includes things like a weight loss tracker, a calorie counter and various tools that you need to stick with your diet.
What I like most about it is that it has dietary guidelines, so whether you're following carb counting diets or calories counting diets or, even if you just want to reduce your sodium intake or increase your fiber intake, you can set up this site to achieve whatever dietary goals it is that you're trying to meet.
NGUYEN: Kind of a support system and it's all for free. We like that word here.
HURD: Yes.
NGUYEN: Free. OK, for those who want to quit smoking, advice?
HURD: Well, you know, at dinner last night my brother-in-law joked that all you have to do to quit smoking is move to California because they won't let you smoke anywhere anymore.
But, if that won't work for you or if you already live here and you need some help, the American Lung Association has a great site that has a smoking cessation program and it really is a step-by-step guide to quitting smoking that walks you through the process.
It has an online support group with other smokers that will help you out and it has downloadable handouts that you can follow that help you stay on the wagon, so to speak, or off the smoking. And it's led by a woman who is a cancer survivor and has worked at the lung association for over a decade.
NGUYEN: OK. I know you're not in this category but for those who want a new job for the new year where can they turn?
HURD: Well, they can go to Richard Boles' site. He is the author of "What Color is Your Parachute?" And, he's sort of the career guidance expert in the nation.
They just published a new edition of his book and this site was designed as a supplement to his book and it has all kinds of listings for where to find a job, where to get advice on writing a resume, how to get all the help that you need to change careers or just, you know, shop around and if you still need help when you're done, there's a new edition of his book that just came out.
NGUYEN: Oh, I thought you were going to say call you.
HURD: Oh, yes, call me. He also actually...
NGUYEN: We'll put your number up on the screen.
HURD: One other good thing about that site is he rates all of the links that he puts up on his site, he rates which ones he thinks are the best.
NGUYEN: OK, a little opinion.
HURD: And since he is sort of the leading expert in this field, it's really helpful if you don't want to check out every link on his site and you just want to go to the picks he recommends.
NGUYEN: All right. Well, Rebecca, I guess with all this information there's no excuse this time. We thank you today.
HURD: Thank you.
NGUYEN: Tony.
HARRIS: Well, he's played the keyboards for the Rolling Stones, Blues Traveler, the Allman Brothers Band and many more. Now, Chuck Leavell joins us here live on CNN SUNDAY MORNING.
(COMMERCIAL BREAK)
TO ORDER A VIDEO OF THIS TRANSCRIPT, PLEASE CALL 800-CNN-NEWS OR USE OUR SECURE ONLINE ORDER FORM LOCATED AT www.fdch.com
Aired December 26, 2004 - 09:00 ET
THIS IS A RUSH TRANSCRIPT. THIS COPY MAY NOT BE IN ITS FINAL FORM AND MAY BE UPDATED.
TONY HARRIS, CNN ANCHOR: And, good morning everyone. It is December 26th. This is CNN SUNDAY MORNING. I'm Tony Harris.
BETTY NGUYEN, CNN ANCHOR: And, good morning, I'm Betty Nguyen. It is 9:00 a.m. here on the East Coast, 6:00 a.m. out West. We want to thank you for starting your day with us.
(NEWSBREAK)
HARRIS: Much more to come on CNN SUNDAY MORNING.
We'll bring you the story of an American Marine killed in war. Now his father is waging a battle to see his final messages.
Also ahead, you made your New Year's resolutions or have you already broken them? Now there's a way the Internet can help you keep your promises.
And, he's tickled the ivories for some legendary bands but these days Chuck Leavell has been focusing more on wood. He'll join us to explain.
Now, here's more of what's happening this hour.
NGUYEN: The most powerful earthquake in 40 years triggered tidal waves across southern Asia today. The quake was centered off the Indonesian island of Sumatra and the damage and loss of life well they are devastating. The island nation of Sri Lanka was one of the hardest hit. The confirmed death toll has reached more than 1,700 from tidal waves that swallowed that area.
The earthquake also sent huge waves to resort islands off the southern coast of Thailand. It's believed those waves killed nearly 250 people. At least 1,000 people were killed in southern India, 700 of them in one province alone. Communications problems have delayed and damaged and we have casualty reports from islands off of India's coast.
We've got a lot to tell you about this morning, including authorities in Thailand now say that the tsunamis have killed 248 people in their country, most of them on resort islands off the coast.
CNN Correspondent Aneesh Raman is in one of those islands and we have him on the phone. What's the latest from your area? ANEESH RAMAN, CNN CORRESPONDENT (by telephone): Betty, good morning. That toll is presumed. It is far from confirmed as officials just begin to get into this devastated area. Walls of water, some 30-feet high are what eyewitnesses are recounting took place this morning as they slammed into this island, two within mere moments of each other, others throughout the day, catching people as they were in a restive holiday mood turning an eerie transition from tranquility to just utter devastation.
The forefront of what is now the massive rescue and relief efforts remain the island where we stand Phuket. It would have been the hardest hit of Thailand. It was the closest to the epicenter of this earthquake.
It is one of the region's most visited tourist destinations, especially by western tourists and this is the peak of that season. Some five million tourists come here throughout the year. It makes up about 40 percent of this country's tourism budget, so it gives you a sense of the scale and how many people were here from how many countries.
Tourism officials are telling us that the entire western coast of this island has been hit pretty severely within moments of the first two and a few hours later the rest. The tidal waves, though, there is fear the will continue to come. No one has a clear sense as to when this could end.
So, right now everyone trying to desperately get to higher ground. I can tell you though right now we're standing at the airport and there are about maybe 100 to 200 people along with us obviously that are completely stranded. There are no cars available.
The vast majority of hotels, if not completely knocked down or power knocked out remain filled to capacity, so just getting around this area will be incredibly difficult.
Moments ago the Thai prime minister talked in (UNINTELLIGIBLE), came to give a much needed ingredient of stability to the scene. I spoke with him. He says that the situation is under control. Relief and rescue efforts will continue through the night.
I asked him if any international help had been asked for or offered. He said no and he is very confident that the government, which has said earlier today has never dealt with anything at this scale ever before in its history, will be able to pull through with the help of the military.
Those lucky enough to have survived are giving us the chilling details of what took place. People that I have spoken to it's just hours after these tidal waves hit describe tales of survival as they basically ran after seeing the first wave coming, hearing people screaming, seeing the streets suddenly flooded, getting to higher ground within the hotel, realizing another one could be coming, running in between these near simultaneous tidal waves and just utter chaos as well. So, the people who are now just beginning to grapple with what's taken place, just beginning to deal with the incredible tragedy that has become their holidays are now trying to reconnect. Telephone lines are incredibly difficult. So, just trying to navigate your way around this, if you were lucky enough to have made it through, remains incredibly, incredibly difficult -- Betty.
NGUYEN: Aneesh, one witness said that the beach area is literally gone there. As we were watching and looking at this video, was there any kind of warning system in place for those tourists and those residents in that area?
RAMAN: Well, that will be a key question as we go forward but there's about I think in terms of my calculations a two-hour lag between the time that this earthquake actually took place and the first tidal wave hitting the island.
But, as the Thai prime minister has told me, this is something the country has never dealt with before. There were some security issues in this region, especially in these tourist destinations in terms of terrorism, so security was heightened but that could do nothing to try and combat 30-foot waves.
But the government really will be pressed in terms of when it knew, what it knew, but really no one expecting that they could have done much more. I mean the devastation and what took place is just beyond comprehension at some level. And so now every effort is being placed onto trying to find anyone who is alive, anyone perhaps caught under rubble in any sort of structural damage.
These waves came up to the third floor in some of these hotels, so right now they're really concentrating on that but those questions will undoubtedly come in the week ahead -- Betty.
NGUYEN: A lot to be sorted out there. Aneesh Raman in Phuket, Thailand, thank you Aneesh -- Tony.
HARRIS: And we'll have much more on the deadly quake and the tsunamis later this hour, including a live report from hard hit India.
Meanwhile, thousands of air travelers are hoping for the best today. Because of Christmas Day, airline delays could not have been much worse, like these unfortunate folks waiting, waiting and waiting some more at Cincinnati's regional airport. And delays in one airport, as you know, cause a domino effect on others.
Gary Nuremberg is live at Reagan National Airport near Washington, good morning Gary.
GARY NUREMBERG, CNN CORRESPONDENT: Good morning, Tony. You know if you spent the night anywhere other than an airport you're ahead of the game, at least ahead of tens of thousands of passengers who yesterday had to deal with flight cancellations primarily on the Delta subsidiary Com Air. Com Air had computer problems keeping up with its crews, knowing exactly where they were and, as a result, yesterday chose to cancel 1,160 flights stranding 30,000 passengers.
Com Air tried to put them on Delta, tried to put them on busses, tried to get them to where they wanted to go and then last night canceled all of Sunday's flights, 1,160 of them adding another 30,000 passengers to the mix. The Associated Press reports, however, that Com Air does intend to have a limited schedule later today as it tries to catch up.
That's not the only problem this weekend. US Air has separated passengers from luggage on the East Coast. Chris Chimes is an executive vice president of US Air. Mr. Chimes, you have thousands of people who didn't get their luggage, didn't get their Christmas presents in time. What's being done to help them?
CHRIS CHIMES, US AIRWAYS SPOKESMAN: Well, this certainly wasn't our finest hour but our employees have been working double overtime from Friday trying to get caught up. The backlog in Philadelphia is being cleared out so we expect by the end of the day today that it will be pretty close to normal as far as operations. So, we're trying to catch up and get people to where they need to go.
NUREMBERG: In addition to the luggage problem, you've canceled 29 flights today. How much of this is a direct result of labor trouble that you may be having with the different unions you're dealing with, as you do all these bankruptcy issues?
CHIMES: There's certainly some of that. I wouldn't say it's organized but we just have had a lot of people who we didn't plan to call in sick, calling in sick. We started off Thursday with bad weather in the Midwest that put us in a hole, exacerbated by elevated sick calls both Friday and Saturday. Today, it looks to be pretty normal and that's where we're trying to get to.
NUREMBERG: Mr. Chimes thank you for joining us this morning, Chris Chimes, the Executive Vice President of US Air.
Tony, we will keep on top of this through the morning and bring you updates as we try to determine whether passengers throughout the country are actually able to get to where they want to go.
HARRIS: Gary, that's very good. You moved that story along for us this morning. We have a better understanding of it. Thank you.
NGUYEN: And we want to hear from you this morning as well.
Finish this sentence for us: "'Tis the season to be..." and tell us why. We are at wam@cnn.com.
In today's "Soldier's Story" the importance of last words from a loved one at war, why one man is fighting to keep his son's e-mails.
HARRIS: Plus, how the Internet can help you keep your New Year's resolutions. That's today's "Best of the Web." NGUYEN: And good morning Chicago. Look at this live picture we have from WPLG. We will have the weather forecast there a little bit later this hour kind of a shaky day, maybe it's windy there. We'll see.
(COMMERCIAL BREAK)
HARRIS: Officials in Sri Lanka expect the death toll to climb above 2,000 by tomorrow.
CNN's Satinder Bindra is in the Sri Lankan capital of Colombo and he joins us by telephone -- Satinder.
SATINDER BINDRA, CNN CORRESPONDENT (by telephone): Tony, night has fallen here in Colombo and the Sri Lankan cabinet is meeting in an emergency session. On Sri Lankan TV right now politicians are appealing for calm because with every passing moment the death count is rising.
As you mentioned, right now the death count over 2,000, and officials are saying that by tomorrow morning this number could rise perhaps by a few more thousand. That's not being confirmed as of yet though.
The biggest fear in people's minds is that there could be greater and bigger tidal waves, so those people whose homes have been destroyed are trying to flee to safer areas. There are some minor law and order problems here as people are trying to commandeer vehicles even.
Now, the worst affected area in Sri Lanka is the eastern part. We have reports from there of about 1,500 people killed. Also affected the tourist resort of (UNINTELLIGIBLE) on the southern tip of Sri Lanka. We have reports from there of about 200 to 300 people dead.
But Sri Lanka has declared a state of national emergency. The country's president is actually at the moment on a private trip to London, England but she's canceling those plans and she's returning back to her country to try and seize this opportunity to help her people as much as she can -- back to you Tony.
HARRIS: Satinder, just a quick question. A state of national emergency what does that mean in terms of evacuations? What does that mean in terms of the police presence there? For example, is the airport open? What can you tell us about what the state of national emergency really means on the ground?
BINDRA: On the ground, Tony, what this means is there's a large police presence in some of the worst affected neighborhoods here. Everything in sight has been destroyed. Concrete homes, wooden homes, everything gone.
People are scared of looters, so the police have moved in force into these neighborhoods where I am at the moment and they've imposed a state of curfew. The airport is indeed open and Sri Lanka is now appealing to the international community to offer all possible assistance.
People here will (UNINTELLIGIBLE). The worst part about this tragedy is thousands have been affected. In fact, the number is more like a million people who have been displaced. These people have no insurance, so it will take them a lot of time to gather their wits and to rebuild their lives again.
HARRIS: So, it is a growing tragedy in Sri Lanka and other parts of southeast Asia. Satinder Bindra thank you. We appreciate it.
More CNN SUNDAY MORNING right after a quick break.
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NGUYEN: In our "Soldier's Story" this morning, a fallen Marine's final messages. Lance Corporal Justin Ellsworth was killed in Iraq. Now his father, John Ellsworth is pleading with Internet service provider Yahoo for access to his e-mails but he's not getting what he wants.
In a statement, Yahoo says:
"Our hearts go out to the Ellsworths and any family that suffers from a tremendous loss such as this. The commitment we've made to every person who signs up for a Yahoo mail account is to treat their e-mail as a private communication and to treat the content of their messages as confidential."
John Ellsworth joins us now from Farmington Hills, Michigan, good morning to you.
JOHN ELLSWORTH, FATHER OF FALLEN SOLDIER: Good morning.
NGUYEN: Well, before we get to the e-mail issue, tell us a little bit about your son and what happened to him.
ELLSWORTH: My son was a great kid. He was assigned to the 2nd Recon Battalion in Camp Falluja, Iraq. He was on a foot patrol with a recon unit when his unit was struck by a roadside IED, improvised explosive device, and was killed along with four others and two others were injured.
NGUYEN: Now, did you communicate a lot by e-mail? We're trying to just put a handle on why you want access to his e-mail account.
ELLSWORTH: Well, me and Justin had spoke. We spoke a couple times a week. We e-mailed almost daily. We had had conversations about all the support that he was getting through his e-mail account because I had had a group of people that I would publish a weekly up- to-date or to keep them up to date, kind of a friends and family notice I would put out on my e-mail regarding Justin's accomplishments over there and what was going on just to keep everybody up to date.
And we had talked about publishing or actually printing out the e- mails and placing them in a scrapbook for future generations, kind of like a letters from home type thing because he was getting so much support.
NGUYEN: So, in essence, those were his letters to home that you see it as that and you'd like to put it in a scrapbook.
Well, I want to read you a statement from Yahoo which says: "You agree that your Yahoo account is non-transferable and any rights to your Yahoo I.D. or contents within your account terminate upon your death."
Do you understand by gaining access to his e-mail account their argument is that not all the e-mails were sent to you so you're being able to see other people's e-mails and that could be a violation of privacy.
ELLSWORTH: Correct. We're looking at this kind of like a bank and a safety deposit box. The bank does own the safety deposit box and Yahoo owns the account. However, the bank or Yahoo in this case does not own the contents of the account.
We believe it's part of his personal estate and we're in the process right now of appointing a representative of Justin's estate and once the court authorizes that we are going to then ask Yahoo to turn over Justin's property, which is the contents of the e-mail account.
NGUYEN: So, this could be new legal territory. What are you hoping to accomplish through all of this? You've acquired an attorney.
ELLSWORTH: Yes, we've retained Daly & Stern (ph) out of Farmington Hills who is very knowledgeable in this area. What we hope to do or what I've been hoping to do all along right now is to inform the public that this may be a problem of the future and we need to address it.
This is all uncharted waters and what we need to do is make sure people out there are aware. Now, every other Internet provider that I've spoken with has an avenue to travel to be able to recover such information from the accounts.
Yahoo has been steadfast and I understand that their agreements are -- that is what their policy is. That's what they want to stick with. But in this case, I think, number one, I need to get the people informed that this is a problem and it needs to be addressed.
NGUYEN: All right. Well we, of course, will continue to follow it. John Ellsworth we appreciate your time this morning.
ELLSWORTH: Thank you.
NGUYEN: Thank you -- Tony.
HARRIS: And checking our top stories this Sunday morning, we're following a still growing aftermath of a massive earthquake off Indonesia's coast. The quake spawned tsunamis that left thousands of people dead or missing in Sri Lanka, India, Thailand and elsewhere. NGUYEN: Do you know already that you are going to need a little help keeping those New Year's resolutions? Well, the web might be the place to turn to and today's "Best of the Web" can show you how when we come back.
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HARRIS: Hey, we want to show you the real Chicago. We showed you the fake Chicago a couple of minutes ago. It wasn't the real Chicago. We were wondering in that last shot where was all the snow? All we've been doing is talking about all the snow and the storms through the Midwest and there was no snow in Chicago. Actually that was (UNINTELLIGIBLE) that we showed you just a couple of minutes ago.
NGUYEN: A long ways away.
HARRIS: Good morning, Chicago, and get ready for "Mamma Mia" the musical based on the Abba song is -- I guess it's a bunch of songs from Abba, right?
NGUYEN: A lot of Abba songs, great musical too.
HARRIS: That's being performed at the Ford Center for Performing Arts. Hello, Chicago.
NGUYEN: Well you know what though, Tony, a lot of people probably singing the blues today as they're...
HARRIS: Why's that?
NGUYEN: ...stuck in airports across the nation.
HARRIS: Oh. Yes.
NGUYEN: Brad, can you help them out?
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HARRIS: OK, Brad, thank you.
NGUYEN: Thank you.
So, in less than a week you're going to pledge to stop smoking, exercise and maybe even get a new job, right? Right? So, we've got some help for you today.
Rebecca Hurd, Assistant Managing Editor of "Wired" magazine joins us from San Francisco with the "Best of the Web," good morning to you Rebecca.
REBECCA HURD, "WIRED" MAGAZINE: Good morning, Betty, how are you?
NGUYEN: I'm doing great. I don't now how great I'm going to be doing once I make those New Year's resolutions though, so if I need some help, I can turn to the web, correct? HURD: That's correct. That's correct. You know (UNINTELLIGIBLE) did a study and they found that 60 percent of Americans make resolutions but only ten percent of them keep them. So, I think some people out there do need some help and we've got some Web sites that will do it.
NGUYEN: I need lots of help. OK, for those who need help staying on that diet, getting in shape, losing weight, where can they go?
HURD: They can go to fitday.com and what I like about this site is that you get a lot of the tools that you have to pay for on other diet sites, like E-diet (ph) and Weight Watchers but here you get them for free and that includes things like a weight loss tracker, a calorie counter and various tools that you need to stick with your diet.
What I like most about it is that it has dietary guidelines, so whether you're following carb counting diets or calories counting diets or, even if you just want to reduce your sodium intake or increase your fiber intake, you can set up this site to achieve whatever dietary goals it is that you're trying to meet.
NGUYEN: Kind of a support system and it's all for free. We like that word here.
HURD: Yes.
NGUYEN: Free. OK, for those who want to quit smoking, advice?
HURD: Well, you know, at dinner last night my brother-in-law joked that all you have to do to quit smoking is move to California because they won't let you smoke anywhere anymore.
But, if that won't work for you or if you already live here and you need some help, the American Lung Association has a great site that has a smoking cessation program and it really is a step-by-step guide to quitting smoking that walks you through the process.
It has an online support group with other smokers that will help you out and it has downloadable handouts that you can follow that help you stay on the wagon, so to speak, or off the smoking. And it's led by a woman who is a cancer survivor and has worked at the lung association for over a decade.
NGUYEN: OK. I know you're not in this category but for those who want a new job for the new year where can they turn?
HURD: Well, they can go to Richard Boles' site. He is the author of "What Color is Your Parachute?" And, he's sort of the career guidance expert in the nation.
They just published a new edition of his book and this site was designed as a supplement to his book and it has all kinds of listings for where to find a job, where to get advice on writing a resume, how to get all the help that you need to change careers or just, you know, shop around and if you still need help when you're done, there's a new edition of his book that just came out.
NGUYEN: Oh, I thought you were going to say call you.
HURD: Oh, yes, call me. He also actually...
NGUYEN: We'll put your number up on the screen.
HURD: One other good thing about that site is he rates all of the links that he puts up on his site, he rates which ones he thinks are the best.
NGUYEN: OK, a little opinion.
HURD: And since he is sort of the leading expert in this field, it's really helpful if you don't want to check out every link on his site and you just want to go to the picks he recommends.
NGUYEN: All right. Well, Rebecca, I guess with all this information there's no excuse this time. We thank you today.
HURD: Thank you.
NGUYEN: Tony.
HARRIS: Well, he's played the keyboards for the Rolling Stones, Blues Traveler, the Allman Brothers Band and many more. Now, Chuck Leavell joins us here live on CNN SUNDAY MORNING.
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