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CNN STUDENT NEWS for June 20, 2002

Aired June 20, 2002 - 04:00   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.
ANNOUNCER: You're watching CNN STUDENT NEWS seen in schools around the world because learning never stops and neither does the news.

MICHAEL MCMANUS, CO-HOST: Confusion at European airports, air traffic controllers aren't pushing tin, instead, they're toting picket signs. Find out why in our "Lead Story." The baseball season's in full swing but we take a look back at what some say is the best part. From sports to science, exploring jaws. Is it safe to get in the water? Find out in "Perspectives." And from sea to space as Student Bureau gives us a timeline of the International Space Station.

And it's Thursday, June 20. It's 4:00 a.m. I'm Michael McManus. Welcome to the show.

Flying the friendly skies is turning out to be anything but a reliable experience in Europe this week. A major air traffic controller strike in France and other countries has crippled airline service across the continent. The controllers are upset over a plan for a single sky in Europe. It's a plan for all European air traffic controllers to work under centralized supervision. The one-day walk out forced major carriers to cancel nearly 8,000 flights either in or out of France yesterday leaving thousands of passengers stranded.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

UNIDENTIFIED MALE (through translator): We've been told they will have another go at the flights tomorrow, but we wait. We wait, that's all.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE (through translator): The next departure is on Sunday. If we're trying to get to work, they don't care. If we don't have anything to eat, they don't care. We don't have a hotel. All the hotels in the area are full. Do it yourself, they say. They don't care. We're being treated worse than animals.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

MCMANUS: So why are the air traffic controllers so upset at the single sky idea? Tony Campion (ph) explains. (BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)

TONY CAMPION, CNN CORRESPONDENT (voice-over): At the moment European air traffic control is arranged by country. It stems from the days when there was far less EU integration, travel was more difficult and other countries seemed like they were a long way off. In some cases, the way the countries interact comes from the same era.

DANIEL SOLON, AVMARK INTERNATIONAL: Somebody has to pick up a telephone in one of the control centers and ring across the border to the next outfit and say hey, we have Flight 387 of Airline X on its way across to you. Well in this day and age that's archaic. It's like going back to hand crank telephones or silent films, it's just unrealistic.

CAMPION: So the European Commission is trying to replace the national zones with a single continent wide air traffic area. The idea is for all of Europe's flights, say over 10,000 feet, to be handled by one team of operators on one computer system removing possible errors when information is passed between zones. Centralizing systems would reduce overheads and make for a more efficient and consequently cheaper set up to run. And that's where the argument starts. Air traffic controllers say the so-called single sky initiative would be another step towards putting profits first and towards privatization.

SOPHIE COPPAIN, FRENCH AIRCRAFT CONTROL UNION: We think that if you want to make more money and reduce costs, maybe you won't go and watch and increase safety. And maybe you will increase capacity, of course, but we are already all ways together working to increase capacity.

CAMPION: As well as being profit led, some controllers think it'd mean ceding controller flights above their own countries to potentially less well trained controllers from elsewhere. And of course not last on their list, jobs would go.

Most in the airline industry agree though the single control area will come though not necessarily by 2004 as the EC wants.

CHRIS PARTRIDGE, DEUTSCHE BANK: This new system has always been planned. It has been off there in the horizon. It's the timeframe in which this integrated solution comes about which is a sort of critical issue. The European Commission is to try and to drive it forward slightly quicker than I think the individual countries would prefer.

KEITH BETTON, ASSN. BRITISH TRAVEL AGENTS: If we're part of Europe then we have to think Europe and therefore an air traffic control system in Europe is probably the answer to many of the problems we experience today.

CAMPION: The consensus is that the existing fragmented arrangements no longer make sense. That single skies means safer skies is barely in dispute, unless that is, you're worried by air control coming under a private company.

Tony Campion, CNN, London.

(END VIDEOTAPE)

MCMANUS: And for more on the disruption of airline service in Europe, especially if you have any European vacation plans, head to our Web site, CNNSTUDENTNEWS.com.

Well a new debate is swirling around the idea of mass smallpox vaccinations. A government panel is considering whether to recommend the resumption of smallpox vaccines in the U.S. Routine smallpox shots were stopped in 1972 and the disease was eradicated around the world in 1980.

But in this age of terrorism, the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention is considering whether to bring the vaccines back. Government officials have been stockpiling it since the attacks of September 11. And they say they'll have enough for every American by the end of the year should they decide to use it.

CNN is following this story very closely, and we'll keep you up to date on the latest.

Meanwhile in Afghanistan, the new transitional government will take power Saturday with 14 key cabinet ministers in place. Interim leader Hamid Karzai was sworn in yesterday as the president of the nation's transitional government. He told delegates at the Loya Jirga, the traditional Afghan grand council, that he envisioned a positive future for the country.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

HAMID KARZAI, PRESIDENT OF AFGHANISTAN (through translator): We should be a country that finally eventually we should stand on our own foot (ph) and should (UNINTELLIGIBLE) the course of our own (UNINTELLIGIBLE) and (UNINTELLIGIBLE) ourself by ourself. Our only concession, the kind of concession of one (ph) country should be (UNINTELLIGIBLE) based on (UNINTELLIGIBLE) because eventually measure of Afghan should be a safe and loved and comfortable country.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

MCMANUS: Mr. Karzai has a tough job ahead of him as he tries to rehabilitate a nation that's spent decades struggling to survive through bloodshed and turmoil. The book "Afghanistan Lifting the Veil" looks at the country's struggle and provides a unique insight into the nation's culture and people.

CNN's Kimberly Abbott sat down with a contributor to that book, writer-senior photographer Jim Hollander, to help us understand more about Afghanistan's unseen story.

(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)

JIM HOLLANDER, WRITER-SENIOR PHOTOGRAPHER: I volunteered to take part in the war on terrorism whenever it started, whenever it got underway. I had a feeling it would -- wouldn't take too long. So I got a call in early October to go to the Arabian Gulf and photograph the U.S. warplanes on their bombing missions in Afghanistan, the beginning of the -- the beginning of the war.

KIMBERLY ABBOTT, CNN CORRESPONDENT: And those are some of the first pictures we see. You're onboard with the Marines in the Arabian Sea.

HOLLANDER: I was onboard the USS Carl Vinson, which is an atomic powered aircraft carrier. Huge, huge ship. It holds about 5,000 sailors and fliers and munitions people. It's a constant beehive of activity. It goes day in day out. And they were flying planes. They were shooting planes off. They were arming planes. Planes would then come back with no bombs. They would go on multiple missions. They would fly around the clock, and then you have an entire support staff who are working for those pilots and those jets.

ABBOTT: Loading the missiles?

HOLLANDER: Right.

ABBOTT: Here we see them loading the missiles.

HOLLANDER: Loading the missiles, maintaining the planes, changing whole engines, whatever needed to be done. Taking care of the planes 24 hours a day.

ABBOTT: There's a beautiful picture here of the sun setting behind a helicopter.

HOLLANDER: That was in Afghanistan at what was called Camp Rhino where the first U.S. Military soldiers to establish a presence on the ground in Afghanistan. So this picture was just taken one day walking around the perimeter as the sun was setting and I heard a noise. I was on the ground. Turned around quickly and see a helicopter flying very low. And it was just about sunset. You can almost see the desert here.

ABBOTT: Inside Afghanistan you stayed with the Marines. You were in the foxholes with them?

HOLLANDER: I spent a night out on the perimeter, yes, right with them. This is Charlie Company out on the northern perimeter of Camp Rhino. And they were -- actually between them -- north was Kandahar. So if there was going to be an action, an attack on the base, most likely it would come from the north. So this was a mortar position. There were about 25, 30 guys there, and they were dug in. And they sleep in these holes. They sleep right there. They were there at that point for about 10 days sleeping out and very cold at night.

This is Charlie Company. Right actually next to where that Marine is in the -- is in this hole, that's only about 15 feet away from here. And they had just set up these placards which they made themselves from boxes -- food boxes, actually. They tore them apart and wrote something on it, particularly like this one saying the Taliban is everywhere, you know, keep your guard up, be cautious, be alert, we could be attacked at any second. ABBOTT: These Marines you caught just before they went to Kandahar. And this was actually the first group to go in?

HOLLANDER: Right, yes.

ABBOTT: And they're studying some words here. Tell me about what they're studying.

HOLLANDER: Right. Well you sort of see the apprehension on their faces. They're -- it's like a half an hour rest before they're told OK pick up your packs, put on your face paint and you're going in, you know, to do an assault. So they're a little worried, apprehensive. And they had given them translation sheets of phrases like we are your friend, we're Americans, we've come here to help you, don't be afraid, how are you. Simple phrases but in Farsi which are pretty hard to learn quickly so.

ABBOTT: Let's look at some of the faces inside Afghanistan, at the Northern Alliance soldiers. And this is particularly striking I think because it's an anti-Taliban fighter. But how would you know in those early days of the war who was -- who was with the Taliban and who wasn't?

HOLLANDER: Yes. Yes, you really -- you really couldn't know. You just had to know by what side you were on. Well sometimes the Taliban would wear black head turbans so they would be identifiable in a way. But they're a very rugged people you see also, like that man. Even though covered in dust, you really don't know his age. He could be 40 years old or 60 years old.

ABBOTT: Let's look forward to some of the things that changed, some of the faces of hope you could say.

HOLLANDER: Yes.

ABBOTT: This is a picture here of a woman in a sea of burkas and she's unveiled.

HOLLANDER: This is right after the Taliban had fled Kabul and the photographer was wandering around and saw this woman. I think was rather shocked to see this, you know the difference in contrast between women all covered and her, an attractive woman who had taken her burka off, is wearing a red dress underneath.

ABBOTT: And for the men when they could finally shave their beards.

HOLLANDER: Yes.

ABBOTT: Tell me about some of the images that you saw of people embracing this change.

HOLLANDER: Well you see it in subtle ways. Not everybody is wearing a beard now. A lot of men have cut their beards off and some have short beards. The odd thing was that the Taliban said you must grow your beard and it has to be a certain length. And that length is long enough to grab it with your hand like this. It has to be a whole handful of beard. So a lot of men have cut their beards short -- to be shorter, but they still have beards because that's also a very Muslim thing for you to have a mustache or to have a beard.

ABBOTT: Let's look at some of the children. You were there when the schools were first open to girls. And here we see a couple of girls looking at this, may have been the first time that they were ever looking at a book.

HOLLANDER: Probably was. Well maybe not a book. They might have seen a pamphlet someplace, but a school book, yes, probably the first time. They were huddled outside the -- in the school yard, not in a classroom, and just talking about this amongst themselves. As soon as they saw me take this picture, they scattered away.

ABBOTT: What was the energy of the little girls who were experiencing this for the first time?

HOLLANDER: I would think totally spellbound, fascinated, a real yearning to learn. There's another picture where they're handing out school books. And like these two girls clutching their books, these are their prize possessions at this point.

ABBOTT: And what did it mean to them? They know that it's something big and important but what?

HOLLANDER: It means hope. It means hope for the future. Because during the Taliban era, I imagine a lot of these children's parents and brothers and sisters would talk about how bad things are, there's no food, we can't do this, we can't do that, the restrictions that they had on their -- on their life and the changes that happened when the Taliban came to power, came to rule. So I think you know hearing all that in the family environment and then you're given the opportunity to do something, these children knew that this was a grand opportunity and to make the most of it.

ABBOTT: You captured another sign of hope. It was a simple picture of a child flying a kite. And this was something you saw quite often there. What was the significance?

HOLLANDER: I think just the -- probably an expression of freedom. Just the simple (UNINTELLIGIBLE) freedom that so many people take for granted, going out and riding a bicycle or flying a kite or playing tops or playing some game on the street, a lot of that was outlawed by the Taliban. The first picture I actually shot when I got to Kabul was this boy flying a kite from the building -- the roof of a building as the sun was setting. And it seems like a national pastime, lots of people fly kites.

ABBOTT: Really?

HOLLANDER: Yes, they like it. But they're all homemade kites, little bits of plastic and a little bit of wood and a string.

ABBOTT: Simple pleasures.

HOLLANDER: Yes. Yes, and they enjoy it.

(END VIDEOTAPE)

MCMANUS: Well Major League Baseball is slugging it out and you're probably cheering on your favorite team. But remember that exciting prelude to the baseball season, spring training. When else can you check out your favorite players, spend a day at the ballpark on a budget and learn quite a bit about the game and life by just watching.

Take a look.

(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Just like in Little League too, right guys? What do we talk about, the same -- they do the same thing at the Major League level that they do at the Minor League -- at Little League level, right? They do their drills, they warm up.

It just gives them a chance to appreciate how special these -- the players are or the abilities, the talents that they have. Becoming a Major League Baseball player, chances are it won't happen for any of these boys, but they learn about it, they can learn from watching these players about discipline. Dills that like you apply on a baseball field apply in school, apply to everything in life.

See the wind? A fly ball's going to do different things in the wind, right?

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Seems like it's pulling it farther back.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Pull -- it can pull it back if the wind shift stays. It can pull to the left. So these -- the guys, the outfielder's got to be ready for those different situations.

If it's very sunny out, yes, they -- how do they do it? What do they do with the glove? What did you learn in Little League about the glove? How do you put the glove on a fly ball? You've got to put it up to shade the -- to shade the sun, right?

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: To shade the sun.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: There's more than one field and you got to see the players, get up close with them. Sometimes you get to meet them. They're nice to you.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Turn. One motion, you see that? Step, turn, throw.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Stars are made in practice, right, they just get to showoff in the games, right? Keep working hard and follow your dreams and you just never know some day.

(END VIDEOTAPE)

ANNOUNCER: Exploring our world, here now is CNN STUDENT NEWS "Perspectives."

The first call on a portable cell phone was made in 1973.

MCMANUS: So you're at church or a restaurant or how about the movies? All places you've probably been when this has gone off. It's annoying, right? Well be careful what you wish for. If you thought getting a signal was hard enough, it will be nearly impossible in certain buildings if the Mute Tone becomes commonplace.

Let's go to Hong Kong now for a look at this cell phone jammer.

(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)

KRISTIE LU STOUT, CNN CORRESPONDENT (voice-over): Want to strike a conversation with a Hong Konger? Just ask him about his mobile phone.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: At the moment, I use it a lot here (UNINTELLIGIBLE).

UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: I don't even know. I think it's a Simmon's (ph).

UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: Nokia.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: I'm using Nokia (UNINTELLIGIBLE).

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Nokia.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: I have a Samsung.

STOUT: With almost eight out of ten people owning a cell phone, Hong Kong has a bona fide case of mobile mania, so severe that social taboos about where and when to take a call have fallen by the wayside.

Do you ever use your mobile phone in a restaurant or during a meeting?

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Always.

STOUT: And is there a time when you think you have to turn off your mobile phone?

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Not really.

STOUT: Why?

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Why? I have to try to keep in touch.

STOUT: Keeping in touch, often at the expense of peace and quiet.

But one company says it has the answer to those annoying cell phone rings: a mobile jammer called the Mute Tone.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: It can only stop mobile phones. It will not jam up other radio frequencies, within a confined area.

So you can define an area, say this room, we're going to have a conference. When we have a conference, we don't want people to talk on the mobile phone, so you can switch this device on so that people cannot be using a mobile phone to talk.

STOUT: The device sells for around $1,600. Not a hefty price to pay for mobile free theaters, places of worship and restaurants.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: We receive hundreds of e-mail from different customers, a lot in American, saying how come it took you so long to come up with that device. We never have a quiet dinner anymore, with my wife, in any restaurant, since the introduction of the mobile phone.

STOUT: Demand is huge. Trouble is, mobile jammers are illegal in many parts of the world, on fears that places outside the intended area would be effected.

In Hong Kong, authorities are exploring whether the Mute Tone could be an accepted technology.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: The (UNINTELLIGIBLE) is to have a public consultation, and to see what is the response of the people, and if the public opinion is for the use of a device like this to stop people talking on the mobile phone in places where they are not welcome. I think this will happen.

STOUT: But it may not be easy to take away someone's right to a dial tone.

If a company said, OK, we've installed a mobile jammer, so if anyone tries to make a phone call, you can't answer your phone call, how would you feel about that?

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: I wouldn't go to that kind of place.

STOUT: You would take your business elsewhere?

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Yeah.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: You've got your choice. You've got your freedom.

STOUT: So the issue is about freedom, personal freedom?

Champion Technology is confident that the Mute Tone will gain legal status in Hong Kong, good news for those of us who do miss the sweet sound of silence.

Kristie Lu Stout, CNN, Hong Kong.

(END VIDEOTAPE)

MCMANUS: Well have you ever seen the movie "Jaws?" It's a pretty powerful piece of fiction, but scientists say there's no need to worry about being attacked by a great white. You actually stand a greater chance of being struck by lightning.

Mark Potter has more.

(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)

MARK POTTER, CNN CORRESPONDENT (voice-over): At the Mote Marine Laboratory in Sarasota, Florida, scientists struggle with the carcass of a nearly 200-pound mako shark caught by fishermen in Brazil. Researchers are trying to learn more about sharks, hoping to better understand and protect the ocean predators that have drawn so much public attention, and inspired so much fear, especially last summer.

Last year, many swimmers thought twice about entering the surf. It all began in July, with the attack on eight--year-old Jessie Arbogast, whose arm was severed by a bull shark near Pensacola. The story of his uncle wrestling the shark to shore to retrieve the arm flashed around the world. Virtually every shark bite since then received widespread coverage. "Time" Magazine trumpeted the summer of the shark.

SAMUEL GRUBER, UNIVERSITY OF MIAMI: It was really a media generated event. Actually, the shark attacks were down a bit, but the numbers are not significant, so your odds went from about one in 4,300,000, to one in 4,297,000. There's no difference between those odds, of course.

POTTER: According to the International Shark Attack file, worldwide, there were 76 unprovoked shark attacks last year, down from 85 the year before. The five shark attack fatalities worldwide were down from 12 in the year 2000. Surfers, many in Florida, suffered nearly half the shark bite total, bites that may have been accidental.

JOSE CASTRO, MOTE MARINE LABORATORY: Well most cases are probably mistaken identity. They perceive the person to be a fish, and they grab it, you know they grab a hand or a foot that flashes in front of them. The cases of sharks deliberately feeding on people, attacking and feeding on people are very, very rare. They may involve, you know, bull sharks or tiger sharks, but those are rather rare.

POTTER (on camera): Now when the mistake occurs, it's usually one bite?

CASTRO: Most of the time, with small sharks, it's usually a one bite affair. You know the shark grabs a hand or a foot, realizes it's not the small fish it's looking for and it lets go and it sees, you know, it sees a large animal.

POTTER (voice-over): Over the years reported shark attacks have increased. Scientists say it's not that sharks are more aggressive, but that millions more people are entering the water. Fear of the sea, they argue, is unwarranted, although some caution is in order.

(on camera): Shark experts advise swimmers to use common sense. For example, don't swim at night or at dawn, or dusk, when sharks are more active and have a sensory advantage. Don't swim alone or in areas where there are fishermen and a lot of baitfish. Beware of murky water and, of course, if you see a shark, don't mess with it.

(voice-over): Inevitably more shark attacks on humans will occur, but scientists hope these relatively rare events can be kept in perspective. The biggest victims, they claim, are the sharks themselves, important predators killed by the millions every year around the world.

Mark Potter, CNN, Miami.

(END VIDEOTAPE)

MCMANUS: The space shuttle Endeavour is back on terra firma. Bad weather in Florida forced the shuttle to land, as you can see here behind me, in California at Edwards Air Force Base yesterday. It was a record setting stay in space for two American crew members of Expedition Four. They spent six-and-a-half months aboard the International Space Station, a new U.S. endurance record.

Our Student Bureau has more on the cooperation between people on Earth for the good of a project in the sky.

(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)

YVETTE JOHNSON, CNN STUDENT BUREAU (voice-over): The idea of an orbiting city in space has always been a concept of science fiction. But in the new millennium, sci-fi has become sci-fact as the International Space Station enters a second year of having a continuous international crew onboard.

BILL SHEPHERD, NASA ASTRONAUT: I really think it's the blueprint for how big expeditions will go in space in the future.

JOHNSON: Captain William Shepherd served as the very first long- term space station commander. He, Russian Air Force Colonel Yuri Gidzenko and civilian flight engineer Sergai (ph) Krikalev comprised the first crew of Expedition One which launched from Kazakhstan on a Russian Soyuz booster in the year 2000.

Today, the International Space Station is the largest, most sophisticated, most powerful spacecraft ever built. Construction started in 1993 with hundreds of thousands of contributors and the concentrated effort of 16 nations. Today it is an engineering, scientific and technological marvel.

SHEPHERD: Well space station has been on the drawing board for 20 years. It's designed to be a laboratory in space where people hopefully can develop and invent things that can't be discovered or produced here on the earth.

JOHNSON: This space station holds six land modules and will weigh almost one million pounds when it is ultimately completed.

The United States and Russia became partners in the space station project after conducting (UNINTELLIGIBLE) shuttle (UNINTELLIGIBLE) docking. The experience provided valuable insights and teamwork necessary for building and maintaining the International Space Station.

SHEPHERD: The major part of what we're doing with Russia is trying to establish the ability to take a former enemy and work together with them, trying to use what both countries have to offer that's good -- that's teamwork.

JOHNSON: Many nation, some once bitter enemies working together to reach a common goal through the space station.

Yvette Johnson, CNN Student News Bureau, Houston, Texas.

(END VIDEOTAPE)

"Where in the World" home of Kennedy Space Center, oldest permanent city in the U.S. located here, Ponce de Leon named this state? Can you name this state? Florida.

MCMANUS: The news continues here on CNN, but my time is up. I'll see you right back here tomorrow.

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