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CNN Saturday Morning News

Discovery Shuttle to Lift Off Today; Weeks Ago Two NASA Officials Recommended Against Launching; Moose Car Accidents Can Be Dangerous

Aired July 01, 2006 - 11:30   ET

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

BETTY NGUYEN, CNN ANCHOR: Now in the news, more bloodshed in Baghdad. A car bomb kills at least 62 people and wounds 114. That blast happened this morning near a popular outdoor market. Now, it is believed to have targeted a police patrol.
All systems still go. The Shuttle Discovery is being prepared to today's launch. Forecasters at the Kennedy Space Center say there is a now a 60 percent chance of a liftoff. You can watch it live right here on CNN, 3:39 p.m. Eastern to be exact.

TONY HARRIS, CNN ANCHOR: Another message from Osama bin Laden is reportedly coming. That's the word today from an Arab language Web site. It says this time the terrorist leader will address the mujahideen in Iraq and Somalia. It will be his fifth statement this year. One was posted just yesterday. It was a eulogy to slain terrorist mastermind Abu Musab al-Zarqawi.

Attorney General Alberto Gonzalez says the Supreme Court has hampered the administration's ability to use a key anti-terror cool. His remarks today were in response to the court's ruling on military trials for detainees at Guantanamo Bay.

And it's apparently a good checkup day for Vice President Dick Cheney. Results have just been released from his annual physical in Washington. Doctors say the VP's high-tech pacemaker is working properly and his overall heart condition is stable. Cheney has a long history of heart problems.

NGUYEN: On the launch pad and counting down, it is a big day for the Space Shuttle Discovery and a critical time for NASA. Here's a live look right now. Lift-off of the shuttle Discovery is just over four hours away. It will be just the second shuttle launch since the Columbia disaster. Mike Cabbage of the "Orlando Sentinel" has written a book about the accident and joins us live from the Kennedy Space Center. Thanks for being with us today.

MIKE CABBAGE, "ORLANDO SENTINEL": My pleasure.

NGUYEN: Well, first of all, before we get to the big picture, let's talk about the problem at hand, this thruster, this issue with the thruster, how big of a problem is that?

CABBAGE: My understanding is that it's probably not going to be what they refer to as a show stopper down here at the cape. Mission managers are looking at it right now and there is an expectation that they should be able to get that resolved in time to launch at 3:48 this afternoon.

NGUYEN: But if it's not resolved, what are you hearing from the NASA folks? Will they fly with that problem?

CABBAGE: Apparently, the issue is with a thermostat that controls the heater on one of these so-called thruster jets that they use to keep the shuttle stable when it's docked to the space station or when it's in space and they are making inspections. My understanding is, that they are considering signing a waiver to fly with this problem if they can't get it fixed.

NGUYEN: I got you, OK. Let's get to some of the other concerns, the foam, the falling foam that we've seen on shuttles in the past. How big of a concern is this? Because the chief engineer and the chief safety officer both said, no, this is a no-go because of that. Yet the launch is still scheduled to take place, four hours and 16 minutes away. Is this go a big mistake?

CABBAGE: I'm not sure I would say that it's a big mistake, but clearly there has been a lot of dissension within NASA on whether or not they should be flying without making repairs to these so-called ice frost ramps. There's about three dozen of these foam ramps that stretch from the tip of the external fuel tank on the shuttle down to its base.

And while NASA engineers have already made a couple of changes to the shuttle's external tank to keep foam from coming off, they decided that this was one that they were going to go ahead and fly with and make a change two or three flights on down the road. That's one of the reasons that as you mentioned, the chief engineer and the chief of safety both said that they weren't going to fly with the shuttle the way that -- they were going to fly with the shuttle in that configuration.

NGUYEN: I understand that you kind are of the thinking that this whole foam issue is being overblown, but I have to ask you, in light of shuttle "Columbia," do you really feel that way?

CABBAGE: Again, I'm not sure I would say that the whole issue is overblown. But there are a lot of people who have been in the program for a long time that believe that foam will never do serious harm to another shuttle just like O rings which were the cause of the Challenger accident in 1986, probably will never cause another catastrophe either.

It's the main engines which generate an incredible amount of power every time that they are ignited at lift-off along with the two solid rocket boosters that most people who have been around the program still say is the thing that gives them concern.

NGUYEN: Let's look at the overall picture if we could just for a moment. All this other stuff aside, how important is it for NASA, for the space program, to get shuttle Discovery off the ground today?

CABBAGE: It's a big deal. This is a mission that a lot of the astronauts on the crew have been saying is going to get the shuttle program and the international space station program back on track. Ever since the Columbia accident, the station program has been almost in sort of a caretaker mode. They've only had a couple of astronauts on there. The amount of research they can do is limited.

And with this mission, they are going to return the crew size to three on the international space station and resume in earnest the assembly flights they are supposed to continue after this. It's critical that they get this mission up because they've got to fly 15 more after this before the shuttle's retirement in 2010 to finish assembling the international space station. They don't want to have a logjam of missions at the very end.

NGUYEN: And it's critical and we are four fours and 14 minutes away from launch. Mike Cabbage of the "Orlando Sentinel," we thank you for your time and insight today.

CABBAGE: Thank you.

HARRIS: When the shuttle Discovery blasts off, a lot of people will be crossing their fingers worried about the same problem that doomed the Columbia. A couple of weeks ago, two NASA officials recommended against launching, because of possible problems with foam flying off the external fuel tank. Susan Roesgen looked into the details for "THE SITUATION ROOM."

(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)

SUSAN ROESGEN, CNN GULF COAST CORRESPONDENT: This is where the external fuel tanks are made. In fact, you can see the nose of one of them being built here behind me. When they are finished, they are 15 stories tall. It's the external fuel tank that powers the shuttle into orbit and it's the protective foam on the tank that is the big concern.

(voice-over): The foam is sprayed on wet and when it dries, it's about as stiff as Styrofoam. That foam cover is critical because that's what keeps the tank from getting too hot or too cold. Here at the NASA Michoud assembly facility in New Orleans, workers not only spray the foam on the tanks, they are now scraping some foam off the tanks for future shuttle flights.

The foam on the tank attached to shuttle Discovery right now also has had large sections of foam removed. On most of the external fuel tanks, the foam is only about one inch thick, but before Columbia, there were some areas of foam that were as much as a foot thick and it's in one of those areas that some of the foam fell off, ultimately leading to the Columbia shuttle disaster.

These are two of the areas where large sections of foam have been removed from the tanks. NASA admits that some pieces of foam are still likely to fall off during the launch, but the hope is that any falling pieces will be too small to seriously damage the shuttle. NASA expects to make even more modifications after the upcoming launch and in fact, NASA has ordered more than a dozen external fuel tanks for flights that are supposed to go up between now and the year 2010.

Susan Roesgen, CNN, New Orleans.

(END VIDEOTAPE)

HARRIS: And that's a story that originally aired on "The Situation Room" You can catch Wolf Blitzer week nights in "The Situation Room" at 7:00 Eastern, 4:00 Pacific and be sure to join CNN for live coverage of today's launch of the Space Shuttle Discovery. It begins at 3:00 p.m. Eastern, that's 12:00 Pacific.

NGUYEN: "Going Global" now, Israel is again rejecting a demand by Palestinian militants holding an Israeli soldier hostage. The militants demand the release of 1,000 Arab prisoners from Israeli jails. Israel insists it will make no deals.

The Israeli soldier was kidnapped Sunday in a daring Palestinian raid that left two other soldiers dead. Israel has responded with a barrage of air and ground assaults on Gaza. In fact, I think we have some live video coming in right now that we want to get straight to dealing with the astronauts, preparing for today's big launch.

HARRIS: This is it. This is critical time. This is pictures right now of the astronauts being suited up right now, and boy, I don't know how long of a process this is. How much time it takes to get these astronauts suited up. Obviously, Miles would know all of this, but this is the crew room that you're looking at. Hey how are you? Is that your ...

NGUYEN: Stephanie Wilson. The longhorn going up in space.

HARRIS: So this is going on right now. You're looking inside the crew room right now as the seven-member crew of Discovery is suiting up.

NGUYEN: I really like it how they got him in these chairs, these recliners, as if they are just relaxing a bit. In fact, this may be the last time they get to do a little relaxation because they got a lot of work to do up in space, a lot of experiments that they're going to be doing.

Stephanie, in fact, will be moving one of the robotic arms as part of one of her missions up there. But it's a critical time for these astronauts, an exciting time, as they prepare to be launched into space. Look at that countdown, four hours and 10 minutes away. And they look like they are excited and ready for the mission ahead of them.

HARRIS: These shuttle astronauts, these crew members are aware of all of the controversy swirling around this mission but as we heard from Eileen Collins this morning with Miles O'Brien, these astronauts, this is what they do. The commander, mission commander Steve Lindsey, would not have this crew take off. He has promised his family personally, that look, if I have any reservations about this flight, I'm not going.

NGUYEN: There is just too much at risk. HARRIS: Exactly. So as you watch these pictures now of the crew, I think one of the things that we can read into this is that the problems that we've been talking about this morning with these thrusters, with this thermostat on the thrusters, that it is not a problem to the extent where the astronauts are being told, you know what?

NGUYEN: We're going to scrub this launch.

HARRIS: We're going to scrub it right now. It's still a go. So there you have it, a lot of pictures from inside. That was kind of cool.

NGUYEN: That was really neat getting a look inside the crew room, at the recliners. Who knew they had recliners back in there but they had their morning breakfast. They are getting suited up and as we mentioned, that countdown block is ticking, four hours and eight minutes away from launch and as you know, CNN will be there every step of the way. You're watching CNN SATURDAY MORNING.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

NGUYEN: Here's our top stories right now. We're waiting for what would be the first space shuttle flight in almost a year. We just saw the astronauts suiting up in the shuttle crew room. Discovery is scheduled to take off at 3:49 Eastern and CNN will cover it live starting at 3:00.

A car bomb explosion at a market in a Shiite neighborhood in Baghdad has killed 62 people and injured dozens. It's the deadliest insurgent attack in nearly three months and one day after a purported message from Osama bin Laden mourned the death of Abu Musab al- Zarqawi, another bin Laden tape is said to be on the way.

NGUYEN: They may weigh about 1,000 pounds, but they are hard to see at night. Coming up, the danger that moose pose to drivers. CNN SATURDAY MORNING rolls on.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

NGUYEN: It is a cautious countdown. Discovery is set to become NASA's first space shuttle to launch in almost a year and just the second since the Columbia disaster. We are about four hours until blast-off, exactly four hours and one minute to be a little bit closer to the exact countdown time.

We just saw the seven-member crew getting suited up for their 12- day mission to the international space station. Weather is a big worry. Storm clouds could cause authorities to scratch today's launch but so far, so good.

HARRIS: Is he relaxed or what?

NGUYEN: I think he's ready to go into space. That looks like a man ready...

HARRIS: Ready to go.

CNN LIVE SATURDAY coming up in just a couple of minutes. Fredricka Whitfield is here with a preview.

FREDRICKA WHITFIELD, CNN ANCHOR: I'm excited for the seven- member crew and nervous. You can't help but feel a little trepidation about it all, but it's a nice day.

HARRIS: And now we're in the crew room. We're seeing them all relaxed. It's like you're bonding, connecting with them. This had better go well.

NGUYEN: You see smiles, everyone is excited and yet the clock keeps ticking and you know it's coming.

WHITFIELD: They are the world's best. They have got to be relaxed. They have got that Zen thing going on. All right, well, we're going to carry the Zen thing into the noon hour for you guys. We've got a lot coming up. We're going to continue on the countdown to the launch of the Space Shuttle Discovery. Also, it looks like a scene from Iraq. Humvees, National Guardsmen on patrol, but this isn't Baghdad. It's much closer to home.

Also, what would you do with $1,000? Maybe pay some bills? Buy that new high-tech toy? What if Betty you could turn that $1,000 potentially into $1 million? We've got some ideas on our dollars and deals.

NGUYEN: Oh, I like that, $1,000 into a $1 million, both, that's a major return on your money.

WHITFIELD: No kidding. Two ideas, whether it's investing, managing and you've got to think about treating yourself, too. That's all about the investment.

NGUYEN: You only live once, got to treat yourself. Reynolds Wolf is treating himself to a little weather today. We're watching the skies especially with this launch going to happen in just about four hours from now. Reynolds, how is it looking outside?

(WEATHER REPORT)

HARRIS: Well, on many highways the biggest danger comes from other cars, but in some northern states there is another big danger on the road. Rob Marciano looked into the problem for "PAULA ZAHN NOW."

(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)

ROB MARCIANO, CNN CORRESPONDENT (voice-over): Imagine, your car plowing into a thousand pounds of dead weight at night and you never saw it's coming.

BERNICE CLAYTON-SECA, CRASH VICTIM: They are impossible to see. I had my high beams on and I constantly scan. From this shoulder to the road, from the shoulder to the road constantly scanning all the time and didn't see him. MARCIANO: A massive animal shot through Bernice's Clayton-Seca's Chevy Lumina like a missile. She's lucky to be alive.

CLAYTON-SECA: They are very, very dark. Their eyes don't reflect. Besides, your headlights aren't reflecting that high up. They are tall. They are very tall animals.

MARCIANO: Bernice escaped with a bump on the head and a broken hand. Amazingly minor injuries when you consider that a moose, easily half a ton, flew through her windshield at 60 miles per hour. The massive animal ended up in her back seat with its head and neck through the back glass resting on her trunk. Moose are found in northern states from New England to Washington and south into the Colorado Rockies.

In scenic areas where families vacation and take summer road trips, they are especially dangerous. Signs on Route 4 in Maine warn of the danger. Duane Brunell of Maine DOT says 80 percent of crashes happen at night. He says deer collisions are more common throughout the United States, but that most people don't realize moose pose a danger, too in unexpected places.

DUANE BRUNELL, MAINE TRANSPORTATION DEPT: So if you struck a moose and it had fairly spindly, skinny legs, you hit a moose and you click those legs out from underneath it, all that body weight is coming at the passenger compartment.

MARCIANO: Just 40 miles west of Boston, this enormous bull moose became an unwanted passenger, sitting in the front seat with its head sticking through the windshield. As incredible as it seems, the driver was OK. Emergency workers had to remove the roof of the car to extricate the moose which later died.

(on-camera): Late spring, early summer is prime time for moose on the roadways. Moose collisions here in Maine peak in the month of June. They come out to the roads because there is actually salt left over from when they cleared the roads during the winter months and the moose like the taste of that salt.

They like that nutrient. There's actually tracks that come across the road. Look at how fresh those tracks are and well defined are. They continue down into what's called a moose wallow where the moose actually hang out and feed.

(voice-over): Maine's wildlife biologist Eugene Dumont has studied the moose in their natural habitat for 34 years. He says when it comes to traffic, these animals have no fear.

GENE DUMONT, WILDLIFE BIOLOGIST: They have evolved to the point, because of their size, that they don't really fear other objects. In fact, their method of defense when they have a natural predator like a wolf, is to stand their ground so they will tend to stand their ground with a pickup truck or a car or a logging truck coming their way.

MARCIANO: Now that it's dusk, this is the time when the moose finally come out into the open. You can see this mature bull moose easily 1,000 pounds out in the wallow now taking in some nourishment. But the real danger comes when night falls and these animals begin to wander out into the road.

At night, the moose are tough to spot. You can see this one on the side of the road only after a high-powered flashlight is pointed directly at it. It's not just remote roads, deep in the wood that are dangerous. Busy highways can be deadly.

Cindy Lincoln wasn't in the car with her family 10 years ago. Her husband Steven was driving the kids home on Interstate 95 in Maine. Cindy's son Steve had been up front with his dad, while daughter Heidi was asleep in the back seat.

HEIDI LINCOLN, SURVIVED MOOSE COLLISION: When I woke up in a startle from the dream that I had, the moose was hitting the exact same time that it was all happening and I feel like, I looked at that moose straight in his eyes and I remember him flying over the car into the left side.

MARCIANO: The 1,300 pound animal crushed the driver's side and Cindy's husband died in the collision. His feet were still on the brake when police arrived.

STEVE LINCOLN JR., SURVIVED MOOSE COLLISION: It's just a speechless feeling. I look over and I see a very gruesome scene that I never want to see again in my entire life.

MARCIANO: Ten years later Cindy Lincoln has made a good life for her family.

CINDY LINCOLN, WIDOWED BY MOOSE COLLISION: Everything I've done, I think, Steve would be proud. I hope he would. I think I've done OK. But it certainly has not been easy, has not been easy. I miss my husband a lot.

MARCIANO: It's almost certain that there will be similar tragedies in the coming months and there is no sure fire way to avoid collisions with moose, but it helps to be alert, especially when driving at night, and of course, to slow down. Rob Marciano, CNN, Augusta, Maine.

(END VIDEOTAPE)

HARRIS: Brother, that story comes to us from "PAULA ZAHN NOW." Make sure you join Paula week nights 8:00 p.m. Eastern, 5:00 Pacific.

NGUYEN: A big day for NASA. We're going to be following it every step of the day. CNN LIVE SATURDAY with Fredricka Whitfield is up next right after this short break. Have a wonderful day, everybody.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

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