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CNN Saturday Morning News

Historic Outbreak of Tornadoes; Death Toll From Storms Now Above 300; $100 Starts Your Own Business; Surgeon Operates on Wrong Eye

Aired April 30, 2011 - 07:00   ET

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

T.J. HOLMES, CNN ANCHOR: Top of the hour here now. Take a look at that, folks. This is the destructive power of Mother Nature. A deadly tornado taking shape; more and more new video coming in to us from that outbreak this week. We're going to talk to the guy who followed this particular tornado and got these amazing pictures.

Also, a doctor operates on the wrong eye. What? How common, though, of a medical mistake is this? We may not really know the answer and you may not want to hear what we actually know right now.

Also, can you become an entrepreneur for only $100? It sounds unbelievable, right? Our Clyde Anderson will be here to show you how to start your own business at a bargain basement price.

But hello to you. From the CNN Center, I'm T.J. Holmes. This is your CNN SATURDAY MORNING. It's 7:00 a.m. here in Atlanta.

It's 6:00 a.m. in Tuscaloosa, Alabama -- that's where we need to start there and in communities across the South, where the death toll from this week's tornado outbreak actually just went up overnight. It now stands at 340 people killed. That makes this the second deadliest tornado event since records have been kept.

The toll could still rise, however. Hundreds of people are still unaccounted for. But, I want to stress and emergency officials want to stress that all of those people aren't necessarily missing.

Again, we say unaccounted for. Probably chalk some of that up to the fact there's a loss of power, people are staying in shelters and just families and friends haven't been able to connect. So, maybe just a lot are unaccounted for in that way.

Also, look at this, an iReport from Tuscaloosa. My goodness, seems like this is one of the most photographed events of all time. Reynolds will help me get some perspective on that. But it seems like we have so many different angles and different video of these storms this week.

In all, 211 tornadoes tore across six states in the South. That would make it the largest outbreak of tornadoes in history. Some of them measured as EF-5 tornadoes. That's the strongest category, with winds in excess of 200 miles an hour.

Well, the curfew in Tuscaloosa expired just moments ago. They had one in place trying to keep people off streets that are still littered with debris.

Our Reynolds Wolf is in Tuscaloosa for us this morning.

Reynolds, let's pick up on that EF-5 point there. These are rare, but just how rare to see a tornado this strong?

REYNOLDS WOLF, AMS METEOROLOGIST: Oh, my gosh. Well, T.J. -- let's see, since 2007, we've had basically two in that category. They just don't happen. I mean, that's measuring these things also with modern technology, with Doppler radar, only two of them.

And what's amazing is just not only how strong the thing happened to be, but the longevity of it. How it was on the ground for possibly 200 miles and weaving a huge path of destruction through two states. You want to talk about some of the amazing destruction. I want to show you something.

You look over here -- CNN's Jonathan Schaer is the man behind the camera.

Jonathan, get a shot of that building right there, that brick building.

It looks pretty nondescript. That's the Krispy Kreme Donut building here in Tuscaloosa. Now, obviously, Krispy Kreme Donuts, they make donuts. They also deliver them in trucks. Well, a truck from that facility actually went through the house or rather what's left of it behind me, was pushed through someone's living room and ends up right over here.

Take a look at what's left of that truck. I mean, just bits and pieces. You see basically the chassis, part of the cab -- I mean, just ripped to shreds all due to winds, possibly in excess of 300 miles per hour.

What's insane is this thing going through was actually like a giant projectile and certainly caused a lot of damage to the house. But at least, there are parts of the house still standing.

Other structures are not so lucky. Look over here, T.J.

Now, Jon, again, I'm not sure what kind of a vantage point you can get from, or what kind of view we can give our viewers, but on the other side of this debris, there's a slab of concrete wiped clean as if by a giant broom.

You know, T.J., we've often talked about where you should go during times of tornadoes -- the safest place is in the interior room in a middle of a home or maybe underground. Well, if you follow rule number one and you happen to be in this place, guess what? You're no longer in this planet. You're not longer alive. You're going to die in a situation like this.

Many people in a storm like this, safest place to be would be underground or in a storm cellar. Well, unfortunately, with this storm, that was not an option for many people. Many people here don't have that luxury having something underground. So, unfortunately, they were left to the mercy of the storm.

And I'll show you the randomness of all this. Although you have a slab wiped clean here, on the other side you see a bit of a house, the other is only suffering a bit of roof damage and then beyond that, on the top of the hill, you have the DCH Regional Medical Center which on the day of the tornado was about halfway filled to capacity. But now, to this point, is filled to the brim with people, trying to recover from injuries suffered from the same tornado -- T.J.

HOLMES: All right. And, Reynolds, one more thing to you here, we talked about people unaccounted for, not necessarily missing, maybe they just haven't been able to connect. But as far as the crews out there, the search crews and even rescue crews -- is there a chance, do they believe there's a possibility there could be people trapped in rubble?

WOLF: You know, what we often do in times like this, we compare one tragedy to another. A lot have been comparing this to Katrina. Some people have been comparing this to the issues we had with the earthquake in Haiti, where we had people that lived for days and days trapped underneath rubble.

In many ways, this is very similar it to Haiti. You look over here across the street -- Jonathan, I know we got lights here in the foreground, if we can see beyond that, we've got a little bit of a lump of some debris.

Is it possible someone could last under something like that for days on end? Sure, it's possible. But with every minute, every second, every hour, every day that passes, that number is going to drop exponentially.

There's certainly the hope, I know people are certainly wishing for the very best, but to be honest with you -- and it's a gruesome honesty -- as time passes, that opportunity is going to become less likely, T.J.

HOLMES: All right. Reynolds Wolf for us in Tuscaloosa this morning -- Reynolds, we appreciate you. We'll be checking in with you and the folks throughout the South this morning.

We have been seeing these pictures of all this damage that was left behind, but some of the most compelling pictures, just unreal, are of these twisters themselves. Take a look at one piece of video here. This is what it looked like for one person, a storm chaser, in the path of the storm.

This was shot actually by Rick Lipscomb. He's on the line with me now. He's on the phone from Moultrie, Georgia.

Rick, thank you for joining me. These pictures are unreal to many of us. We've seen tornado video over time. But still, it always amazes us.

How long have you been doing this?

RICK LIPSCOMB, STORM CHASER (via telephone): Good morning. I've been doing it right about 24 years right now.

HOLMES: Twenty-four years. And, Rick, how does this compare, this outbreak, and even size and scope of tornado you were looking at through your lens, how does that compare to stuff you've seen over the past 20 years?

LIPSCOMB: This is the largest tornado I have ever seen. And, obviously, the closest I've ever been to one -- little too close for comfort this time.

HOLMES: You say a little too close, give us an idea how close is this. We see some of this video. It's hard for us to get good perspective. But how far away would you say?

LIPSCOMB: In the initial video when it was touching down, I had to relocate to the far side of the overpass. And you'll see the bridge in the distance where I was actually has set up at. Approximately, maybe 800, 900 yards away, and I was getting 80 mile an hour inflow wind from that.

HOLMES: And, Rick, that was accident. You didn't mean to be that close?

LIPSCOMB: Initially, I was hoping it was going to swing a little further north of my location. But it basically hugged the interstate. It really wasn't planned that way.

HOLMES: How many did you actually see? So many people are talking about this one that could have been on the ground for literally hundreds of miles, a couple hundred miles at least, but still, this whole outbreak was about a little over 200, according to some of the estimates. But how many were you able to see? Was it just this big monster?

LIPSCOMB: We actually picked that same super cell up as it come out of Mississippi near Alabama, crossing the state line, it passed over us. And we were able to flank it and get ahead of it as it come into Tuscaloosa and caught up with it again as it churned through northern Birmingham, Alabama.

So, it was -- we had ample opportunities to photograph this one, but this is the only one besides trying to get through Dadeville, Alabama, at night, almost tangled with that one. But that was the only one we were able to deal with.

HOLMES: Rick, how rare is this for you? I was talking about this morning. It seems it was on the ground so long. And I kind of say it half jokingly that this may be the most photographed tornado in history. But how rare is it for you and what you've been doing over the past 20 years, to have access to a storm for this long?

LIPSCOMB: It was basically pick a storm and photograph it. In terms of super outbreak, mega outbreak -- I hope we don't see this again. This is a once -in-a-lifetime occurrence, we hope. This is unheard of. HOLMES: Wow. The pictures are unreal. And you said as far away as you were, maybe 800, 900 yards, you could still get 80 mile an hour winds possibly.

Rick Lipscomb, sir, I appreciate you sharing your video and sharing your story with us. But we are still getting as much perspective as we can, still trying to put in perspective just the scope of the disaster we saw -- and your words and your pictures certainly help us with that. Rick, you enjoy the rest of your day.

LIPSCOMB: You, too. Thank you.

HOLMES: All right. Got something else for you, an iReporter showing us now flooding -- Record flooding in Arkansas. Highways shut down. A major levee breaks and rivers are rising.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

HOLMES: Thirteen minutes past the hour now.

We are keeping a close eye on Arkansas this morning. The storms this week dumped so much rain, on the northeast part of the state, that the levees broke, roads flooded out, farm land as well, covered in water.

And we could, Bonnie Schneider, get more rain this weekend. What's going on in my home state?

BONNIE SCHNEIDER, AMS METEOROLOGIST: Unfortunately, for Arkansas, more rain, T.J. And you saw the video of the people trying to drive through.

HOLMES: Don't do that.

SCHNEIDER: Don't do it, even in the truck. You know, the guy probably thought, oh, I'm well above the ground. The problem is it only takes six inches of water to even dislodge an SUV especially when the water is moving, that's when it's particularly dangerous, that fast-moving water.

The flood threat is not just for Arkansas. It is all the way across Tennessee, parts of Alabama and Mississippi, and then northward. This is really a big area of concern, parts of Indiana, Illinois, Missouri and certainly up into the Great Lakes region -- because we're looking at an ongoing threat, meaning the rain will persist this weekend and linger.

I'll show you exactly what I mean on a radar picture now and you'll see that we have some heavy rain sweeping across Iowa right now, well into Minnesota. Some strong thunderstorms are popping up in Minneapolis.

And if you're wondering what this is right here in western North Dakota, well, you guessed it, it is snow. And this isn't just a light easy snowfall. We are talking about blowing and drifting snow -- meaning, a blizzard will be in effect, a blizzard warning is in effect for six to nine inches of snow in parts of North Dakota, also Montana looking at snow as well.

And these wind gusts could be as strong as 50 miles per hour. So, it's going to be a blustery, whiteout situation in the Northern Plains today.

Here's that front I was talking about across the Midwest. And what this will do is linger and become stationary for today and for tomorrow. And that will allow the rain to continue to persist across the Midwest.

Plus, we're looking at the threat of fire danger once again as we go through areas of the desert southwest. Temperatures for today will very warm in the region, climbing well into the 90s in parts of southwest Texas, T.J. So, it's going to be a hot one there, but very comfortable and mild across much of the Northeast.

HOLMES: All right. Bonnie Schneider, we appreciate you this morning. It's always good to have you here with us. Thanks so much.

Well, 15 minutes past the hour here now.

A lot of people use this excuse -- I don't have the money -- when it's time to start a business. Well, in three minutes, Clyde Anderson, our financial analyst, is here to tell you that you are all out of excuses. You only need $100.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

HOLMES: Eighteen past the hour.

This guy right here says with $100, he is going to get you a new business. Clyde Anderson, our financial analyst.

A lot of people know you can't do much with 100 bucks these days.

CLYDE ANDERSON, FINANCIAL ANALYST: Yes.

HOLMES: And what's the one thing you always hear when you say start your own business? What's the immediate answer you get?

ANDERSON: I need more money. I don't have enough money.

HOLMES: And you say you don't need it?

ANDERSON: You don't need a lot of money. Now, sometimes, don't get me wrong -- there's businesses that you have to have, a lot of capital to get started, big teams, do a lot of research. But a lot of times, we're already doing some of these things, we're just doing it for free.

Why not monetize it and turn it into a business, you know? And one of the biggest things is you got to have a plan. No matter how much there, you still have to have a plan. Your plan is your blueprint.

So, you got to have a plan, but it costs nothing for you to develop a business plan. SBA.gov gives you free business plans, a template that you can use. And you also got to have a marketing plan, know exactly who you're selling to and how you're going to sell it.

HOLMES: You got to plan, all right? Now, I got to get that plan, I got to put it in action. Where do I start?

ANDERSON: First, you got to start -- you know, we're in a digital age. You can sell anything online, but you got to have your store front, which is your Web site. So, you got to develop a Web site. But there were places out there that will give you a Web site for free. One in particular is Register.com.

HOLMES: OK.

ANDERSON: You know, $12.95, you got to get a domain name. So, you're going to buy a domain name. And what they'll do is bundle it and do your hosting for you. You can choose some templates, web templates, that all you do is plug-and-play.

HOLMES: OK. While this is up, are you paying for the domain name?

ANDERSON: And the hosting.

HOLMES: And the hosting. So, the domain name costs you what these days?

ANDERSON: Like $9.95.

HOLMES: OK. To get you started, but then you got to do the $12.95 a month.

ANDERSON: That's actually the bundle price with that one. They're going to give you the domain name and the hosting for $12.95 a month.

HOLMES: OK. So, you're getting all that. All right. So far, so good. So, we're just out about 13 bucks. Where are we going next?

ANDERSON: OK. Next, you got to have a phone. You want people to be able to contact you. You know, you always don't want to give out your cell phone number. So, what you can do is go to Web site like Phone.com. Phone.com will allow you to set up a phone number, and have it ring to any phone you like to.

So, you can set up a number and can have it go to two three, or four different cell phones if you like. You can set up a professional message and it will ring to wherever you need it to go.

HOLMES: So, you always need to have a business phone. Don't just start giving out your cell phone.

ANDERSON: And be professional, because now you can set a message on here and maybe we're partners in this business, I can have that number ring to your phone or ring to my phone.

HOLMES: So, you sound legit.

ANDERSON: There you.

HOLMES: What's next? You can go to these events, you shake some hands.

ANDERSON: You got to have a card.

HOLMES: You got to have a business card.

ANDERSON: You got to have a business card. Business card is crucial. That's your connection. This is telling people who I am.

Vistaprint.com -- Vistaprint gives you free business cards. They're free.

HOLMES: Why they're giving them to you for free?

ANDERSON: They advertise their logo. They're going to put their information. Their Web site is going to be on the bottom of the free cards. So, you do have an option where you can upgrade and get that without that. But for free, you can have a business card and could get them and now, you're going to pay shipping. So, we're talking about shipping for that.

HOLMES. All right. Now, I got to market myself. I got to get the word out.

ANDERSON: Got to get the word out.

HOLMES: Not just the shaking of the hands and hand out the free cards.

ANDERSON: There we go. You got to get the word out. There's Web sites like Constantcontact.com. ConstantContact is an e-marketing site where you can put all your contacts into a database, you can pretty templates and web messages that you can send to all your contacts and you can program them when to go out. So, you can send them out daily. You can send them out weekly. And you can put all your contacts in there.

For about 15 bucks a month, you can have this service, and you're sending it out, looks great, and you're contact all your people, staying in the forefront.

HOLMES: Now, you're sending messages out via e-mail?

ANDERSON: Via e-mail.

HOLMES: Via e-mail.

ANDERSON: And also, with the smartphones, can pull them on your phone. So, you got your message right there, contacting you wherever you are.

HOLMES: All right. We're doing all right, so far. ANDERSON: There you go.

HOLMES: Is that everything? My business started?

ANDERSON: No. Now, we got to do regular marketing. You still, you got your business cards out there, but you also need postcards. Overnight print has a great deal. We can get postcards starting at $5.95. You're going to pay that , plus some shipping, you can have postcards.

So, let's say, actually, with this one, $13.95, if you want to get about 100 postcards plus $4.95 for shipping. Colored postcards, two sided, coated. Nice postcards and they'll send them to you.

So, now, I can hand you my information. I can mail you my information as well. So, you're covering every aspect and you got your business out there. In less than 24 hours, you have a business for less than $100. I think we come to a grand total of $65.03.

HOLMES: To get the business started.

ANDERSON: Get the business started.

HOLMES: Sixty-five bucks all that we just added up here.

ANDERSON: That's it.

HOLMES: We still -- it's a monthly maintenance.

ANDERSON: Monthly, so you definitely have to take that into consideration. So, the goal here is now, you need to sell something.

HOLMES: Need to sell something.

ANDERSON: So, you've gotten the business, you got to sell something. We can tap into our gifts and talents and we can make a new way for ourselves.

HOLMES: You know, I should have talked to you beforehand and you should have challenged me to set up a business this weekend and by next weekend, we should come back in and see where do we get.

ANDERSON: I like that. I like that.

HOLMES: I don't know what I can sell, though.

(LAUGHTER)

HOLMES: Good to see you. Good stuff this morning as always.

All right. We're 22 past the hour, 90 seconds, we're going to have a look at the day's headlines.

Plus, this morning, a child goes in for surgery, and a doctor operates on the wrong eye. What you need to know to make sure it never happens to you. (COMMERCIAL BREAK)

HOLMES: Some of the stories making headlines right now:

We got a grim update overnight. The death toll from that tornado outbreak in the South has now climbed to 342. Hundreds of people still unaccounted for in Tuscaloosa alone. But not all have been officially reported missing.

President Obama visited there yesterday as you know. He promised the federal government will do everything it can to help people rebuild.

Also, early this morning, the body of one of nine U.S. personnel killed in Afghanistan this week arrived back on U.S. soil. Major Jeff Osbourne (ph) served in the Air Force for 19 years, a native of Alabama. An Afghan pilot opened fire at Kabul International Airport on Wednesday, killing eight U.S. service members and one American contractor.

Also in Libya, Moammar Gadhafi is asking NATO to stop the airstrikes. He claimed the coalition is killing civilians, scaring kids and destroying infrastructure so it can take over the country's oil. Gadhafi's forces have been shelling the city of Misrata. NATO claims his soldiers are trying to put mines in the city's harbor. Other countries have used that harbor to get humanitarian aid into the city and to get the wounded out.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

HOLMES: Heal, not harm -- but sometimes doctors inadvertently stray from that Hippocratic Oath.

Here now is CNN's senior medical correspondent Elizabeth Cohen.

(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)

ELIZABETH COHEN, CNN SENIOR MEDICAL CORRESPONDENT: T.J., doctors call them never events, they are things that are never supposed to happen in the hospital, but unfortunately, sometimes they do.

You may have heard the story of Jesse Matlock. Just a few days before his 4th birthday, he went in for surgery to correct a lazy eye. And the surgery was supposed to be on his right eye, but instead, the surgeon did it on his left eye.

She realized her mistake quite quickly and she came out and told the family what had happened and she explained that she had become, in her words, disoriented. The hospital now is investigating the situation and it's not quite known what's going to happen to Jesse's eye, both the one that was supposed to be operated on and the one that did end up getting operated on.

Here at the "Empowered Patient," we have a few tips so that this kind of thing doesn't happen to you or someone you love. First of all, before you go in for surgery, ask your surgeon what are your strategies for making sure that a wrong-sided surgery doesn't happen. They should have specific things that they do to prevent these kinds of mistakes.

Also, request a time-out, just before anesthesia. Now, surgeons should be familiar with the term time-out. What it means is that all of the action stops, and the surgical team openly discusses what is the name of this patient, what kind of surgery is the patient here to have, what side of the body is being operated on, so that everyone is absolutely sure that they're doing the right thing.

Now, here at the "Empowered Patient," we have several pieces of advice to make sure you have safe surgery. Go to CNN.com/Empowered Patient --T.J.

(END VIDEOTAPE)

HOLMES: All right. And I will be back with you here, folks at the top of the hour with more live news. Of course, we are covering what's happening to our friends in the South, still trying to recover from the devastating and now historic tornado outbreak that we saw this week.

But, right now, could sugar be toxic to the body? That's one of the topics this morning in "SANJAY GUPTA, M.D." right now.