Transcripts For CNN American Morning 20100811

intact enabling four other passengers to survive the crash. rescuers were kept at bay for 12 critical hours. ted stevens body is back home this morning, the longest serving republican in u.s. senate history being remembered as the man who literally put alaska on the map. casey wian is live in anchorage for us this morning with the very latest. >> reporter: good morning, john. we're at the hospital in anchorage where those four su vifrs of that horrific plane crash have been taken. we have new information about their condition. sean o'keefe, the former nasa administrator, one of the survivors, is listed in critical condition this morning. his teenage son, kevin o'keefe, is in serious condition. and another passenger, jim morhard, also listed in serious condition. there was a young 13-year-old, minor, male, whose condition has not been disclosed. his father who's been of the victims who died in that crash. the crash that they survived, one of the pilots that we spoke with yesterday, he flew over the area, said that when he first came upon that scene he didn't think that there was going to be any survivors because of the condition of the plane. as i believe you showed earlier, we're now getting the first pictures of that scene, what the pilot described to us as a plane that looked like it had basically just flown straight -- almost straight into that mountain. it had skidded, maybe 100 yards up the mountain. there is some speculation that maybe the plane was trying to climb. but the weather was really bad at the time and investigators are still looking into obviously what caused that crash. we have cnn earlier spoke with that pilot who was one of the first folks who discovered the crash. here's what he had to say. >> the main fuselage in the tail was in one piece but the wings were off and the -- i couldn't see the engine. >> do you think anybody could have survived that? >> i didn't think it was survivable. >> reporter: and when rescuers finally reached, hours later, the crash site, one of the victims was walking outside, one of the survivors was actually walking outside the fuselage of the plane. no one was ejected from the plane on impact. there was no fire. we are going to be hearing, as you mentioned, later today more information from the ntsb as they gather it, but they're having a difficult time reaching that side. john? kiran? >> as we talked about, because of that, because of the remote location, 12 agonizing hours before there could be any type of professional help for the people that actually survived. tell us more about the heroic efforts, some of the volunteers that i understand reached the site earlier than the rescuers. >> reporter: yeah. because the weather was so bad as it was described by some of the folks, clouds were almost down right on top of the crash site, the weather was bad, there was rain, they just couldn't get to this steep terrain. a doctor, female doctor, was actually airlifted 1,000 feet away from the crash site and she had to hike through this we are, dense, wet, slippery brush to reach those survivors and provide some care and comfort overnight. she was equipped with a satellite phone so she was able to stay in touch with rescuers and provide some aid to those victims at the national transportation safety board's briefing late yesterday, the chief of the ntsb talk about the heroic efforts of those volunteers. here's what she had to say. >> there were a lot of people who were applying their skills and also supporting those individuals who were trapped on the hillside. obviously we don't know what would have happened if they had not been there, but we do thank the lord that they were there. >> reporter: some of the things that the ntsb is going to be looking at today and in the days ahead are the experience of the pilot who was flying that plane who was killed in the crash. he had 29,000 hours of flying time. but they don't know how much experience he had actually flying this one remote route. they're legislation going to obviously look at the weather. they still don't know what kind of avionics were on that plane, what kind of crash avoidance systems were on that plane. all of those questions they're going to be answering over the next couple of days. >> casey wian for us this morning in anchorage, thanks so much. we'll get the latest on the investigation when the chairman of the ntsb joins us live from anchorage at 7:10 eastern this morning. no you to politics and two marquee primary races. one in colorado where incumbent senator michael bennett held off the challenger andrew romanoff to capture the democratic nominati nomination. president obama backed bennett, and former president bill clinton supported romanoff. bennett had zero political experience before his appointment to fill a vacant senate seat last year. he'll now face the republican candidate and tea party favorite ken buck in november. perhaps money can buy you love. former wrestling executive linda mcmahon who spent $22 million of her own fortune, won the republican senate primary in connecticut, biting former congressman ron simmons. it sets up a race between mcmahon and democrat richard blumenthal the state's attorney general in november. coming up a the 8:10 either, we'll talk with linda mcmahon about the primary victory an the general election campaign ahead which many people think is going to be one of the most negative and shall we say smack-downish types we've ever seen. >> it is so surreal seeing the people hugging her. one of the wrestling champs, he's her son-in-law. he's up there hugging her. >> i think wwe and the whole wrestling arena is going to factor very heavily into this race. >> all right, well she pulled out the primary win. meanwhile, do you remember the giant ice chunk that we talk about breaking off of a glasher in greenland last week? scientists are now worried that it could actually drift into north atlantic shipping lanes an perhaps even threaten oil platforms off of canada. the ice island is estimated to be about 100 square miles, four times bigger than manhattan. experts say there's not really much they can do to stop something that big from going where it is going to go. 7 1/2 minutes past the hour. we get a check of this morning's weather headlines. rob marciano's in the extreme wlesht for weather center for us. i guess the best hope is the weather will get told enough and at least cause it to stop. >> there is some hope that it gets caught in one of those channels and actually helps build up more sea ice than it would normally. but it is worrisome that if it slides into the shipping lanes we might have more issues. another thing we don't are control of, but we certainly can prepare for, are our tropical systems. we have this tropical depression that we talked about yesterday. it is forecast to become a tropical storm. here's the latest. satellite imagery not looking that impressive. 35-mile-an-hour winds at the moment, gusting to 45 miles per hour. it is out there in the southeastern gulf of mexico, heading towards the northwest. here are the tropical storm warnings that are posted. tropical storm conditions are expected within the next 36 hours. central louisiana all the way back through destin, florida. they could start to see tropical storm-force winds as early as this evening. forecast for this thing is to bring some rain with it, certainly a light storm surge but at the moment the forecast is not to bring it to hurricane strength. we hope that certainly verifies. the other big weather story is going to be the heat. we'll keep our eye on tropical depression number five and let you know if it becomes a tropical storm here. that could happen as early as before the end of this show. >> wow. all right, thanks. >> getting more active out there. steven slater's wild ride, pittsburgh to new york city, down a slide right into jail. now bailed out and talking. >> tell me about rude passengers. talk about that for a second. >> there's a lot of wonderful people out there. >> reporter: we'll have more in his own words. more of what happened on that plane that led to his now-famous meltdown on the tarmac. nine minutes after the hour. imagine if it were this easy to spot the good guys. you know, the guys who always do a super job. well, it is. just get the superpagesmobile app on your phone. and look for a business with the superguarantee®. you'll get the job done right, or we'll step in and help make it right. so, protect yourself. use your phone to find a business with the superguarantee®. only from superpages.com®. and let the good guys come to the rescue. basic.? preferred. okay. at meineke i have options, and 50% off brake pads and shoes. my money. my choice. my meineke. 12 minutes after the hour. welcome back to the most news in the morning. the jetblue flight attendant who grabbed a couple beers, slid down the escape route and on and on has been released from jail to a crush of media. he was in the bronx. he still had had a smile on his face. said he wanted a shower. >> is that scar on your head from the suitcase falling? is it? tell me about what you think about all the support you've gotten. >> it's been very, very appreciated and it seems like something here has resonated with a few people and that's kind of neat. >> you going to lose your job? >> more than likely. >> do you care about that anymore? >> no comment at this time. >> how about this? tell me about rude passengers. talk about that for a second. >> there's a lot of wonderful people out there. >> love the -- are you going to lose your job? "more than likely." >> his rage is resonating with lots of people, people who have sat in hours of traffic or got stuck working the weekend or were told we'll just sit on the runway for another hour while we wait for a gate to open up. or got the automated menu on a customer service call. >> yeah, there is a lot of frustrating things that happen in every day life. for a society that at times can be mad as hell, steven slater's now a folk hero. allan chernoff has more on his 15 minutes. >> reporter: john, kiran, steven slater has gone viral. his facebook page has been gaining tens of thousands of fans and thousands more are also fans of the "free steven slater" facebook page. slater now on forced believe from jetblue appeared in court tuesday to face felony charges. reckless endangerment and criminal mischief. all this after monday's incident in which he suffered a bruise on the head during an altercation with a passenger who also cursed him. he responded by getting on the plane's public address system, cursing the passenger, he then activated the emergency slide, grabbed his luggage, a few beers, and slid on down. >> were you trying to do your best to provide safety for passengers and you have rudeness and lack of civility among the traveling public. >> reporter: his lawyer adds that mr. slater has been dealing with extra stress away from work since he's been caring for his mother who's fighting cancer. mr. slater's actions landed him in hot water, but in today's world, some might wonder whether this could possibly lead to a reality television show for him. he certainly has struck a chord with many air travelers. john? kiran? >> always comes back to should they get a reality tv show? >> no. i don't think he should. it is an interesting story to talk about. >> sometimes it is best to leave it there. >> exactly. >> but who knows? maybe he will. so many people out there wish that they could do what steven slater did, then they think of the bills, the kids, their mortgage. their friends who can't find a job. coming up at 6:40, we'll talk about why people snap with a collin cam psychologist, jeff gardere. also an anger management counselor, janet pfeifer will join us. to a topic really hitting home at the kitchen table for so many people, is america's economic recovery on the ropes? the fed issues a bleak outlook at its latest meeting. we'll talk about what it means for you and your family next. 16 minutes after the hour. my subaru saved my life. i won't ever forget that. love. it's what makes a subaru, a subaru. love. hey, it's great to see you're back after that accident. well...i couldn't have gotten by without aflac! is that different from health insurance? well yeah... ...aflac pays you cash to help with the bills that health insurance doesn't cover. really? well, if you're hurt and can't work, who's going to help pay for gas? ..the mortgage, all kinds of expenses? aflacccccccccc! it's the protection you need to stay ahead of the game... exactly! aflac. we've got you under our wing. aflac, aflac, aflac... aflac, aflac, aflac 18 1/2 minutes after the hour. the federal reserve warning that america's economic recovery is losing steam as a result, the fed is buying up long-term debt and keeping its key interest rate near 0% where it's been since december of 2008. but what does all that really mean for your bottom line? "minding your business" this morning, joined by electilex ha managing editor of cnnmoney.com. what does buying up lon-term debt by the fed signal its perception of where the economy is? >> what the fed did yesterday was it did two really significant things. ben bernanke, fed chairman, came out and first he said, we're a little bit more scared than we were just two months ago and the second big thing, probably a little bit more important, was what you were just talking about, it said we're prepared do something about it and that's this idea of buying up long-term assets. >> joshua shapiro, the chief u.s. economist at mfr, says that the fed's announcement "appears to be mainly designed to provide itself with political cover against a backdrop of a gut-wrenching economic correction that shows no sign of ending any time soon." is this just cover, do you think? is this the fed saying, hey, we're doing everything we could possibly think of here so if the economy goes bust again, don't blame us? >> well, that might be a little bit unfair. first of all, they're not up for re-election, they don't have to deal with the mid-terms or getting votes through congress. they really do want the economy to recover. they've done a lot and what they're basically signaling is we're prepared to do more. >> but when you look at what they're doing compared to the overall scope of the problems, is it really going to make a difference? >> no. i mean yesterday's was a very modest move but in the world of the fed, even little symbolic gestures are a big deal. just a month ago people were worried the fed was going to start undoing all the things that it's done over the past -- over the past year-and-a-half, and yesterday they say, no, we're really watching -- >> so it is a confidence booster more than anything. >> absolutely. but it might not even go that far. you saw the stock market recover yesterday. already this morning we're seeing those gains just start to pull back a little bit. >> the market goes up, the market goes down. what's this mean though around kitchen tables though in america? is there going to do anything to create more jobs, ease the unemployment situation? we are talking with a guest in our next hour who is going to talk about food insecurity. as many as 15% of american homes at some point during the month don't have enough food to put on the table. >> yeah. the scariest part of yesterday was, the requested that two months ago ben bernanke was saying, hey, the recovery's proceeding along and yesterday they said it is going to be a lot more modest. at biggest part of his statement was it's all about jobs. jobs, jobs, jobs. unemployment rate is not expected to come down for the foreseeable future. even the white house is saying that. you would expect them to have a rosier outlook. >> basically the pain is going to continue? >> yes, but there are some signs of -- i mean at last things are a little bit more stable than they were. i hate to say the pain will continue but it's the getting out of the hole that's going to take a little bit while yet. >> lex haris from cnn dot money.com, thanks so much. we continue with our special series "addicted." abusive painkillers spiraling out of control and in some cases it is putting doctors' lives at risk. carol sk carol costello has an "a.m. original" ahead. 22 minutes past the hour. welcome back to the most news in the morning. 24 minutes past the hour. our continuing series "addicted." something you'll see only on "american morning." we're talking about prescription drugs. heath ledger, michael jackson, the tragic death of these stars, of course, made headlines, but america's problem with prescription pill addiction goes much deeper and much further from the hollywood spotlight. it can be deadly not just for theed a ikt abusing the prescription drugs but for the doctor who comes between them and a fix. our carol costello has the story from washington this morning. good morning, carol. >> good morning, kiran. it is easy to sit back and shake your head when you hear stories about people addicted to prescription drugs. it's sad but it won't touch my life. well, that's not exactly true. prescription drug abuse is so pervasive and so dangerous for doctors, he may refuse to write you a prescription. no matter how much you're hurting. small town america with a big problem -- pill poppers. >> i didn't really realize how bad it was getting until after i had gotten out of college. >> reporter: danielle grew up in eastern kentucky. her father was a doctor who, like other doctors in this part of the country, watched prescription drug abuse spiral out of control. in december things came to a head here in kentucky, where the population is 792 in this town. in this clinic, danielle's father refused to prescribe painkillers for a man he suspected was an addict. police say that man left angry and came back with a gun. >> my dad was writing in the chart at the nurse's station and someone heard my dad say, "you don't want to do this. i take care of a lot of elderly people." and he said, "well you didn't help me." and that's when he shot him. >> reporter: the doctor's murder didn't come as a shock to dr. david greene. he works at a family practice clinic. addicts often come to his clinic to shop for doctors. they use every trick in the book to get him to prescribe prour l f powerful pain medication. it can get ugly. have you had people come in and scream at you? >> yeah. >> physically push you? >> i have less of a problem because i'm male and i'm taller. so -- but one of the things we have to do in our office, because i'm the only male doctor, is i'm sort of on call for situations like that that involve anybody else and i'll deal with them. >> reporter: but some doctors do refuse to deal with it. they no longer write prescriptions for pain medication -- for anyone, regardless of need. detectives in louisville can understand that. they arrest two or three suspects a day who routinely call in fraudulent prescriptions to pharmacists. >> this is a forged prescription that you went and picked up, not just once but a bunch of times. do you know whose calling this in? i know. >> yeah. >> is it you? >> it wasn't in the beginning, but yeah. >> reporter: it's become an old, tired story. >> that's actually her at the pharmacy. >> reporter: detective steve watts is dedicated to fighting just one of drug crime -- illegal prescription drug use. he's looking at surveillance tape of a woman who allegedly used a doctor's name to call in a prescription for xanax. >> there she is with the same distinctive bag. her walmart bag walking out. >> reporter: we rode along with detective watts. wasn't long before she appeared. along with her father, and that purse. >> if i can make this her worst day of her life so that tomorrow she will seek treatment, then i will. >> reporter: back here there are no winners. the doctor's alleged killer has yet to face trial. he says he's not guilty. >> he has to see what he's done. he has to look at my family and know what he did. it's somebody's life. it's the lives of his patients, that community. it's everybody. >> it is. danielle is working with a number of groups to make it safe for doctors to practice medicine. dr. greene is working, too. his clinic has informed every pharmacist in barea, kentucky they're no longer calling in prescriptions. of course the biggest problem for doctors is trying to figure out who's really in pain. many times the only way to find out is to ask "are you in pain?" and as we now know, patients will lie to get their hands on those pills. >> they talk about other solutions, computerizing the records a little bit more, just it's a little bit ironic when you talk about this abuse, a lot of people say it is really down in florida as well with these pill mills, as they call it, which could be changinging as well because of legislation. >> i hope so. but it's been a long time coming. in the meantime, doctors are aren't prescribing medication for pain and that's not a good thing for any of us. >> carol, thanks so much. it is time for this morning's top stories. investigators in alaska converging on the scene of a deadly plane crash that killed former senator ted stevens and four other passengers. they are trying to figure out why the plane went down monday afternoon near the bering sea. four others survived the crash including former nasa administer sean o'keefe and his son. steven slater faces felony charges and may be out of a job but he's become a hero across the country. jetblue says slater's been suspended pending investigation. tropical storm warnings forced bp crews to suspend drilling that relief well in the gulf when they were so close to getting it done. but federal officials have re-opened more than 5,000 square miles of the coast of the waters off the florida panhandle for fishing. officials say they'll continue testing fish caught. more than 1,300 people have been killed in the devastating flooding in pakistan. officials say there will likely be many more victims. >> the united nations special envoy is calling this the biggest disaster pakistan has ever faced. it says the country will need billions of dollars to recover. reza sayah has been tracking the story since the floods first started. he's in islamabad for us live this morning. just amazing scenes, tragic scenes of destruction and still so much suffering going on. >> reporter: yeah. i think the international community, john, is starting to understand the scope of this disaster. this is day two of the floods and the affected areas seem to grow by the day. these floods of course can create a host of other problems. among them are landslides. officials telling cnn that a deadly landslide taking place in northern pakistan, 44 people killed in that landslide. more than 50 people missing. also reports of severe food shortage in that area. meantime, international aid continues to come in. the u.s. contributing another $25 million in addition to the $35 million that they had already pledged. the u.s. also chipping in with a number of military helicopters, donating prefabricated bridges, water filtration systems, and 90,000 pounds of foods. also later today in new york city, the u.n. set to announce another $400 million in aid. so the relief work, john and kiran, seems to be picking up some momentum but there's a lot more work left to be done here. >> we also understand the taliban is urging the pakistani government not to accept aid from the united states? what's the latest on that? >> reporter: yeah, that is right. remember, many of these regions, especially northwest pakistan, that were ravaged by these floods, are regions that were plagued, and in some cases still plagued, by the taliban. the u.s. doing much of its work in the swat valley, for example. in a phone call to cnn, a spokesperson for the taliban said this -- for the same of god, don't accept donations from the u.s. because they are our enemies. whatever amount the u.s. will give us, we will give pakistan more. the taliban also asking the pakistani government not to be the puppet of washington. when asked, where is the taliban going to get all this money to help the flood victims? the spokesperson for the taliban said, "god is the one who gives money." obviously there's no chance the pakistani government is going to reject u.s. and international aid. even so, you can look for the mouthpiece of the taliban to continue to denounce the u.s. even as the u.s. is helping a lot of flood victims who desperately need that help. >> reza sayah for us this morning, thanks. couple of things that we've seen over the last couple of days. first there was flight attendant steven slater who quit his job, shall we say, in spectacular fashion. then there was the woman who drove up to the drive-through of mcdonald's trying to order mcnukts at 6:00 in the morning and didn't like the answer she got from the attendant. why do people snap? we'll find out next. we'll find out next. 34 minutes after the hour. rheumatoid arthritis going? they're discovering the first self-injectable ra medicine 37 minutes after the hour. he's become a working class hero. the jetblue flight attendant to flipped out and became famous overnight. he's out on bail now and he's talking. we'll hear from him a little bit later obviously. something that many of us have thought about doing, even we've played it out in our heads sometimes, thinking what would i do if i had the opportunity to do this. what makes some people ignore the consequences, maybe even the safety of others, and finally lose it? joining us to talk about that, clinical psychologist jeff gardere and anger management counselor janet pfeifer. first of all, are you surprised, both of you, that this guy has become somewhat after folk hero? he has a facebook fan page created right after this incident went public. he has 85,000 fans. people are looking at him saying, wow, i wish i could do that myself. >> i think that's part of it. a lot of people have this fantasy in their head that they just love to say to an employer or someone who's been rude to them, take this and shove it! and we play it out all the time. but we don't say it. we don't do it because there are consequences. i'm not surprised. we're kind of anti-government these days, kind of anti-corporation, and we know the abuse that flight attendants get each and every day. it's a tough job but it was totally inappropriate and as you said, he flipped out. and i don't trust someone on an airline that i'd be riding with who could flip out in that way. >> what is it about people that they look at him, and they say, yeah, i've had that fantasy before. what is it about people who want to go out in a big way like that and maybe can't keep a lid on the anger as they might every day? >> well, there's a part of me that feels like had he this planned because he wanted that 15 minutes of fame. and that really distressed me. >> really. >> oh, yeah. that distressed me a lot because in this country we do tend to glorify bad behavior and we reward it. so i'm concerned about the consequences that this is going to have on the rest of society as well. we all are frustrated. we're all dealing with a lot of stress and anxiety in our day to day lives. but as adults it becomes our responsibility to understand what we're really dealing with and learn effective ways of expressing that and resolving those issues. >> do you agree, jeff, this guy might have been planning this? or do you think he just kind of lost it? because his father recently died. he's been dealing with a mother who's battling cancer. there's some talk about maybe alcohol problems in his life as well. >> yes. respectfully i disagree. i think this is a guy that just was the tipping point for him. after all, he doesn't like being this bag nazi, as he calls it. he knows his job is a very difficult one. the bag hit his bag. he got cut. he got into an argument with this passenger. so i think it was all of these things and what you've said, the issues of alcohol, father dying, and i think that put him over the edge. i don't think he planned it but i think he was playing this out in his head for a very long time and wanting to do this and probably never thought he would, and that was it. the straw that broke the camel's back and he let it fly. >> i think there are a lot of people across the america who are probably playing this stuff out on their head, not on a daily basis but once in a while, thinking, boy, would i like to. but when people feel that rage welling up inside, that uncontrollable volcano that's about to blow, is there any way to put a lid on it? >> i don't recommend they put a lid on it but i would recommend that they process it and release it safely. i developed a very simple three-step process people can implement. >> so what should steven sla en have done? >> it is called the s.w.a.t. strategy. stop, walk and talk. stop what you're doing at that moment. as soon as we get emotional we very rarely make good decisions. stop what you're doing. second, walk away. physically put some distance between you an the other person. kind of out of sight, out of mind. the third thing is self-talk. what you say to yourself at that moment is either going to allow you to calm your emotions down or cause you to become more angry and frustrated. if i say things like, oh, god! i can't stand this job! i just want to choke somebody! i'm actually fueling my own anger. but if i say, all right, this is not that important. my job is more important to me than what happened here. i can deal with this. i'm just grateful to be employed, then i'm actually calming myself down and then i can go back and address the situation. >> as you said, that fantasy that people play out in their heads all the time, it's healthy. it's healthy to have that fantasy. are you in a car, you have road rage. >> talk about being in a car and having road rage, let's roll this videotape. this was new year's morning, a woman driving up to a mcdonald's drive-through window at 6:30 in the morning demanding "i want my mcnuggets." she's told "we don't have mcnuggets." she gets out of the car, what? we'll just let this play out. the fact that it was 6:30 in the morning on new year's and the fact that she had a half-open beer she was able to throw through the glass might explain it. >> but i think these are folks that have extreme anger issues. this is not an isolated case, what this woman did. you talk about that half-open can of beer. she had been drinking and we know that's a deadly combination. that's why we don't like people to drink and drive. we know when people leave a party and they've just been a little bit tipsy they tend to act out their rage. instead of going through the fantasy. so this guy is a folk hero. let's live vicariously through him. but for heaven's sakes, folks, don't repeat what he did because it is bad behavior. >> are you worried that this may, because of this guy's popularity and fame now, inspire some copy cats? >> yes, absolutely. we've seen that. look what happened back in columbine. i think that was 2000? right? then what happened, we had all these copycat incidents of other kids acting out the same kind of behavior. unless somebody stem cells in and says this is inappropriate and we're not going to tolerate it and there are heavy consequences for this man, that is a very big concern. >> what is the next step? what is the next person going to do? they're going to up the game a little bit. now they see bad behaviors being rewarded. we need to call a spade a spade in this particular case. >> there you go. there is the clinical analysis and advice -- think about it, feel free to think about it, just don't act on it. jeff gardere, janet pfeifer, great to see you this morning. still to come on the most news in the morning, rob tracking a storm that's headed for the gulf coast. he'll give us more details on that and the morning's travel forecast after the break. also in just ten minutes, amazing new tools helping the disable join the constantly growing community of online gamers. we'll take a look at how it is working in today's "edge of discovery." 43 minutes after the hour. i'm gonna take allison jenkins to the senior prom in this. one day, i'll park this in a spot reserved for me. it's got 26,000 miles on it now, but i'm gonna take it to a thousand million. 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[ male announcer ] hurry in to your authorized mercedes-benz dealer for 1.99% financing during our certified pre-owned sales event through august 31st. imagination and reality have merged. because of one word, a new generation-- a fifth generation-- of fighter aircraft has been born. because of one word, america's air dominance for the next forty years is assured. that one word... is how. 46 minutes past the hour. welcome back to the most news in the morning. video games already let us do things most of us will never really do like win a super bowl or visit alien worlds. but more and more gamers are actually playing together online, and new tools are letting the disabled get in on the fun, too. gary tuchman takes a look in this morning's "edge of discovery." >> reporter: steve is an avid gamer. he's also disabled. >> i have a form of muscular dystrophy that's kind spinal at. right now i can move my hands and that's about it. >> reporter: sometimes his gaming experience was limited so he looked online for help and came across an organization founded by mark. >> the ablegamers foundation is a non-profit that helps get disabled people into gaming. >> reporter: the website's forums encourage people to share game recommendations and useful tips. able-bodied people see the wheelchair and see the crutches and they don't always see the person. gaming allows you to shed all of that. >> reporter: the foundation also works with developers to create modified equipment. like this device that controls a game almost entirely by blowing in and out through a tube. >> i'm either -- or -- depending on what i'm doing. >> reporter: or this controller built with larger buttons for easier access. as for steve, he stays busy as associate editor of gablegamers d .com. >> for me it was a place that i fit. i found a place on ablegamers where i needed them and they needed me. >> great inventions getting everybody in the game. quick check of this morning's weather headlines. rob marciano's in the extreme weather center. big news down in the gulf of mexico today. >> yeah, tropical depression number five. doesn't look any better than it did yesterday afternoon. not a whole lot -- you don't see the typical cloud canopy that we would for a well defined tropical system. right now winds are 35 miles an hour. that's still tropical depression, gusts to 45. 100 east-southeast of new orleans. its movement is in that general direction at about 10 miles an hour, northwesterly moving it there. tropical storm warnings have been posted from destin, florida all the way back to just past central louisiana there for tropical storm conditions to possibly affect these areas as early as later on this evening. we don't expect it to be become a hurricane at this point. you saw how disorganized it is but if it slows down that would give it more time to develop. right now the forecast is to bring it anywhere from here to there some time tomorrow morning as a tropical storm. you can already start to see some of the rain showers and thunderstorms rolling towards the mouth of the mississippi. the other big story is the heat across the central part of the country. 105 to 115 heat indexes today. heat warnings out again for st. louis and kansas city. we are going to see a change in this weather pattern. it is not going to come today or tomorrow but towards the weekend and beginning of next week we'll see a bit of a change. georgetown yesterday, 99. d.c., 98 degrees. these were records, trenton, new jersey, 96. it was steamy in the i-95 corridor from washington, d.c. up to new york city. little bit cooler today and certainly cooler as we get closer towards the weekend. 89 in new york. 95 in st. louis. 103 in dallas. cooler out west. all eyes on trap cal depression number five, guys. we'll track it throughout the day today. >> you said it could become a named storm during our show this morning. >> that is possible. next advisory will come up at 8:00. probably won't happen but it's possible. maybe by noon. >> all right, rob. thanks. this morning's top stories just minutes away, including more americans going hungry. skimping on groceries, barely anything on the table by the end of the month. in a country with so much to eat, we'll talk about why this is happening and the effect it is having on families. from flight attendant to rock star, steven slater now out on bail and talking. we'll look at his amazing rise to fame on facebook and beyond. 50 minutes past the hour. live from low-earth orbit. astronauts getting ready to give plan b a go to fix the space station. we'll check in live. those stories and much more at the top of the hour. 54 minutes after the hour. time for the moos news in the morning. it is a short trip from obscure flight attendant to american mostly cloudy hero. just a quick ride down a slide. steven slater's meltdown on a jetblue flight has made him a celebrity. >> if you took a straw poll, slater's someone many people can identify with. here's jeanne moos. >> reporter: fasten your seatbelts, steven slater. faster than a cross-country flight, he went from flight attendant to -- >> steven slater is an american hero. >> reporter: with his own bald. ♪ i got irate ♪ won't you get irater ♪ well my friends we have a hero now ♪ ♪ steven slater. >> reporter: he made us smile when he went blallistic on the airplane intercom. >> to the blanking blank-hole who told me to f-off. >> reporter: he's even swearing in taiwanese. >> what the [ bleep ] [ bleep ]. what the [ bleep ] [ bleep ]. >> reporter: already immortalized in an animation. his name flitted around twitter, "my hero." "free steven slater." "the slide don't glide, then give steven slater a free ride." it was at if "network" met jerry maguire. >> i'm as mad as hell. >> i'm not going do what you all think i'm going to do which is -- just flip out! >> reporter: on a double bill playing aboard "airplane 2." >> we're also out of coffee. >> reporter: but in slater's case, it was grabbing beer on the way out that captivated everyone and had morning hosts fantasizing in song. ♪ take this job an shove it >> reporter: and "the daily piece" called slater the new sally. when reporters asked his attorneys why slater took the slide, the answer -- because it was right there. even his ex-wife came to his defense. >> he definitely has the joan of arc of the flight world right now. >> you sound like you like him a lot for an ex-wife. >> oh, he's fantastic. he's wonderful. >> reporter: but even wonderful people snap. like in the nocoderm commercial. >> stop it! stop it! stop it! stop it! >> the last time i tried to quit smoking -- >> only two carry-on items! >> reporter: passengers seeking a moment of zen from the indignities of flying might appreciate this pillow flight aboard a lufthansa flight. it's been a long time since flying felt light as a feather. ♪ and that's steven slater >> reporter: jeanne moos, cnn, new york. >> there you. 15 minutes and ticking. >> i think it might be a little bit longer than that. >> probably. quick break, our top stories in three minutes. 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what about the iceberg in greenland? nasa scientist tom wagner is going to tackle those questions for us in the next half-hour. extreme weather may have caused a deadly plane crash that killed former alaska senator ted stevens and four others on monday night. investigators plan to examine the crash site today. >> we have some of the first pictures from the scene, the wreckage from a single engine turboprop plane, scattered on a remote mountain side near the bering sea. >> four people on-board did manage to survive including the former administrator of nasa and his teenage son. they were rescued to rushed to providence hospital in anchorage. that's where our casey wian is standing by live with the very latest. good morning, casey. >> reporter: good morning, john, kiran. 36 hours now almost since that crash happened. we don't have the exact time. we know it was monday night. we know that the survivors of that crash were up in that remote area for around 12 hours before help was able to reach them. as you said, they're now here at providence hospital. former nasa administrator sean o'keefe is listed in critical condition. his son kevin is listed in serious condition. one of the other survivors, gentleman named jim morhard is also in serious condition and a 13-year-old boy whose father perished in the crash. we have no information on his condition. now we have been speaking with pilots who came across that crash scene monday night and described what they said was a horrific scene with a plane that had gone into a steep mountain, rugged terrain. the plane sustained significant damage, though there was no fire and some of those folks who were first on the scene expressed surprise that anyone survived. here's what one had to say. >> there were a lot of people who were applying their skills and also supporting those individuals who were trapped on the hillside. obviously we don't know what would have happened if they had not been there, but we do thank the lord that they were there. >> reporter: that was actually the chief of the national transportation safety board, not one of those pilots. they held a press briefing late yesterday and some of their investigators were able to reach the scene and what they were talking about there was the fact that so many volunteers deployed rapidly to this crash scene where official rescuers could not reach. there was one physician who was airlifted in to the area. she could only get to within about 1,000 feet of the crash scene in that airlift. she cut through brush, slippery terrain, she had a satellite phone with her and was able to reach that scene and provide some aid to those survivors until help actually arrived and they were able to get those folks off of that mountain about 12 hours later. john? kiran? >> casey wian for us with the latest update from anchorage, alaska, thanks. also we are going to get the latest on the crash investigation when deborah hersman, chairman of the national transportation safety board joins us in just about eight minutes. big night in politics last night. several key races posting results late into the night. primaries in four states last night to tell you about. big win for michael bennett, the incumbent senator in colorado. he was facing a strong challenge from andrew romanoff, who was bill clinton's chosen candidate. bennett comes away with the win there. he was supported by the white house. that was in the state of colorado. a race was too close to call going on in georgia right now. nathan ddel and handel. looks like there is going to be a recount. i'm sorry, these things just are not cooperating. state of minnesota -- having problems with the magic wall this morning. state of minnesota, former senator mark dayton, the democrat, goes up tom emery, the republican. if this thing wants to cooperate -- it doesn't. linda mcmahon, the former ceo of world wrestling entertainment i'm going to pull a steven slater in about three, two, one! she is going to go up against the former lieutenant governor blumenthal in the election in november and linda mcmahon going to be joining us in our next hour to talk about her win and what it means to the republican establishment because certainly she didn't have them behind her. really blumenthal's kind of an anti-establishment candidate as well. this is a state that has not voted in a republican senator since prescott bush left in 1963. so it will be obviously a clal length f challenge for her but she's got $28 million behind her. a lot of cash to throw around in this race. we'll take this in and get it serviced and see if we can wrap this thing up again next hour. >> all right, john, thanks. the developer of a controversial mosque and islamic center in lower manhattan has reportedly rejected an offer from new york governor david paterson. paterson offered to be a mediator and try to find a new location for the center. the governor says he's "very sensitive" to those who are against the center being so close to ground zero but the developer toll our affiliate, new york one, "this has always been about serving lower manhattan." meantime, early government tests into the sudden acceleration of toyota vehicles finding no evidence of bad electronics. so far federal regulators have tested 58 of the vehicles that crashed. they say it is still early and they haven't reached any conclusions yet. toyota has claimed that the drivers mistakenly pressed the gas pedal of the brake in all of those cases. also new this morning, the jetblue flight attendant who grabbed a couple of beers and slid down the escape chute lass been has been released from jail. this is him walking out of jail last night and into the media frenzy. >> that scar on your head, is that from the suitcase falling? is it? >> you going to lose your job. >> more than likely. >> do you care about that anymore? >> no comment at this time. >> tell me about rude passengers. talk about that for a second. >> there's a lot of wonderful people out there. >> tell me about the wmagic wal. >> a lot of wonderful people out there. apparently the ones who are now facebook friends. tens of thousands of them fans he didn't have just 48 hours ago. we'll take a look at his meteoric rise to fame later this hour. even talk after reality show already and as the anchor management special the that you had pointed out, this is in some ways rewarding bad behavior. you flip out -- >> which is why i didn't pull the escape slide on the magic wall a few minutes ago. rob marciano is checking out the weather forecast across the country for us this morning with a particular eye on the gulf of mexico. >> we have our own magic wall down here. i know the feeling, john. i think it is maybe pulling more of a mcdonald's chicken mcnugget thing when you actually break the glass. yeah, we're looking at this tropical depression that's developed but hasn't gotten terribly organized in the last 12 hours. not doing a whole lot, though the last few frames do indicate some strength -- or at least some convective activity around the center. as far as what we're looking at for tropical storm warnings, meaning tropical storm conditions in the next 36 hours, anywhere from the central louisiana coastline all the way to destin, florida. that's where frorm warnintropic warnings are posted for now. winds 40, 50 miles an hour possibly, then obviously rain showers and the like. we'll monitor this and talk about just how strong it is going to get and talk more about that in the next 30 minutes and also the heat. another hot day. that heat wave continues but there is some relief in sight. john? kiran? back up to you. >> rob, thanks so much. still ahead, former alaska senator ted stevens among five people killed when their plane crashed into a mountain in southwest alaska. this morning the search for answers continues. what caused that tragic accident. we're going to get the latest on the investigation when the chair of the national transportation safety board joins us live. after the break. it's ten minutes past the hour. 12 minutes past the hour right now. we get the latest on the investigation into the alaska plane crash that happened yesterday. we now have our first pictures of the wreckage of the plane that killed former senator ted stevens and four others on monday. this is the single engine tur turboprop plane, it slammed into a mountain near the bering sea. there were clearly visibility problems at the time thee pictures were taken leading the ntsb to determine whether the same kind of weather could have been a factor in bringing the plane down. joining us on the phone to discuss the investigation, chair woman for the ntsb, deborah hersman. thanks for joining us. just an update on what you've learned so far with this crash. >> well, we're in the very early stages of our investigation so we're really putting a lot of the factual information together right now. did have an opportunity to talk with a physician who spent the night on that hillside with the survivors -- the emergency responders that tried to get in early. actually get weathered in and they ended up spending the evening on the mountain before they could get rescued the next day. there were many challenges certainly that they were facing, but what we're trying to figure out what exactly what happened leading up to the accident. what time they left, what time the accident occurred, when they realized that they were missing and how the search and rescue operations worked. we're certainly looking at weather but everything is on the table right now and we haven't ruled anything out. >> you have a bit of a unique situation here in that there were four people who survived. tragically five people lost their lives, but have you been able to talk to any of the survivors of the crash to get a better time line? >> we have not yet talk to any of the survivors. we were in dillingham when they were being transported to anchorage. right now our first priority is to make sure that they get the medical attention that they need and certainly we'd like to talk to them and will do that if, and when, it's kind of appropriate for them as far as their health goes. they'll be able to give us a good picture, but we have a number of interviews that we need to conduct, both at the lodge where they departed and people who might have communicated with them before they left to understand what their decision was and what they might have been facing. >> some of the witnesses described the wing still attached to the fuselage. we can see these pictures, they're taken at a bit of a distance though. they say the front of the aircraft was pretty heavily damaged. it didn't catch fire though and no one was ejected. describe what rescuers or investigators saw when they arrived on the scene. >> well, our investigators haven't been able to get to the site because of the weather. because those first responders who were on scene did share some observations with us. some of them that you relate i think are very important. there was no post crash fire. i think that contributed to the survivability of the accident for those four survivors. but definitely a lot of challenges. it was very slippery, very wet, muddy. the terrain was very challenging for the responders and the survivors and the people who were trying to evacuate them off the mountain, it was a real challenge for them. i know a lot of work still to do. >> i heard you say in a prior press conference yesterday, thank the lord that those rescuers were there because they were able to reach them, the volunteers, before the actual rescuers were able to get there. do you have any idea from people who were able to see the scene how is it that four people were able to survive, yet five others lost their lives? were they in different parts of the plane? was it and amount of luck perhaps? >> well, there are many accidents where we see people survive. sometimes we lose the whole aircraft and the people on-board, and sometimes everyone surviv survives, such as the miracle on the hudson or in denver we had a crash where everyone walk away even though the airplane was a complete loss. there are many accidents that are survivable and it really does depend on a lot of factors. where people are seated. if they're using their restraints. what the damage to the aircraft in the vicinity is. and so we're going to build that picture. we need to talk to people first and certainly talk to the survivors. they'll help us determine that. >> do you have any indication, quickly, whether or not the five -- any of the five who eventually died survived the initial crash or died waiting to be rescued? >> we don't know that information at this point and it's going to be up to the medical examiner to determine the cause of death. >> deborah hersman for us, chairman of the ntsb, thanks so much for your time. i know it is early on in the investigation and you still have a lot of work ahead. thanks. a dramatic rise in food insecurity in this country. almost 50 million americans, 17 million children, are fighting a daily battle with hunger. what can be done about it? we'll find out. 17 minutes after the hour. 20 minutes after the hour. mindi"minding your business." the numbers are staggering. nearly 15% of american households have experienced food insecurity at some point according to the latest government data. why are so many people having trouble putting food on the table and what can be done to reverse that trend. david beckman is the president of bread for the world, and he joins us now. first, how would you define food insecurity. >> those figures are collected by the seb census bureau. it means either you are hungry or on the edge of being hungry. >> so we're not talking about starvation here. >> no. what we're talking about a lot of families, 50 million people as households, 1 in 4 kids in our country in a household sometimes runs out of food, eats crummy food. >> those numbers are staggering. what's the net effect on that to people? >> the damage is huge. especially the damage to small children. because that kind of hunger keeps kids from concentrating. so little kids are supposed to be learning machines but they really can't pay attention when any go to kindergarten. they wiggle and they're naughty. so the long-term damage of widespread hunger, especially among little children, is huge. >> so is this a daily thing? is this as a family gets toward the end of the month and money starts to run out they start cutting back? >> it's that. it's mainly intermittent hunger. it's when they run out of food stamps or they run out of the wage check. but then also all month long they don't have quite enough so they have to skimp and eat cheaper foods which are often crummy foods. >> when it comes to the food assistance program as well, it's run into some hard times. this new state aid bill, the $26 billion. they're taking money away from the stood stamp program to pay for some of those. other bill, the hunger-free kids act is also paring away money from the assistance program. it's kind of robbing peter to pay paul here but you want to make sure the kids get good nutrition in school. >> exactly. what ko what congress did yesterday was pass this aid to states act which is a good bill but they paid for it by making deep cuts if food stamps. $12 billion. that's a lot of food. lot of us are involved in trying to help food banks, food charities. what the congress did yesterday was took away twice as much food as all the charities in the country will mobilize over the coming year. so it's big decision. they're also working on this child nutrition bill which will set policies regarding school lunches and programs that help low-income kids with food. they ought to do a better job. ironically the senate's proposing to take money for -- more money from food stamps to pay for school lunches. >> maybe you get relief for schools when this bill passes, but when you look at the unemployment rate or number of people who are suffering from food insecurity, a large number of people, increased pressure, what do you do about it? >> well, hunger is a fixable problem. this is not that hard to do. but to fix it, part of the solution is the national nutrition programs. instead of cutting those programs, we should be strengthening those programs. >> david beckman, great to see you this morning. thanks for dropping by. appreciate it. >> thank you. still ahead, down a slide and into the spotlight. the flight attendant who flipped out and then became an overnight sensation. he's now out on bail. he's talking. we'll have more on what happened on that plane and on his rise to fame. he's become a folk hero, especially on the internet. now snapple's got healthy green tea, tasty black tea, real sugar, what's our slogan? bester stuff! - stuffy stuff! - good stuff for bettering stuff! guys? the best stuff on earth just got better. - good stuff, craig. - we're dating. [ announcer ] snapple. the best stuff on earth just got better. welcome back to the most news in the morning. 25 minutes past the hour. in our continuing series "addicted," something you'll see only on "american morning," we're taking a look at prescription pill addiction, an epidemic in this country. it can be deadly not just for the addict abusing prescription drugs but for the doctors that come between them and the fix. carol costello has this a.m. original for us this washington. good morning. it is easy to sit back and shake your head when you hear stories of people addicted to prescription drugs. it's sat but it don't touch me life. but that's not exactly true. prescription drug abuse is so pervasive and dangerous for doctors he may refuse to write you a prescription no matter how much you're hurting. small town america with a big problem -- pill poppers. >> i didn't really realize how bad it was gettingful after i had gotten out of college. >> reporter: danielle grew up in eastern kentucky. her father was a doctor who like other doctors in this part of the country watched prescription drug abuse spiral out of control. in december, things came to a head here in kentucky in this town where the population is 792. in this clinic, danielle's father refused to prescribe painkillers for a man he suspected was an addict. police say that man, john combes, left angry and came back with a gun. >> my dad was writing in a chart at the nurse's station and they -- someone heard my dad say, "you don't want to do this, i take care of a lot of elderly people." and he said, "well you didn't help me" and that's when he shot him. >> reporter: the doctor's murder didn't come as a shock to this doctor. david greene. he works at a family practice clinic. addicts often come to his clinic to shop for doctors. they use every trick in the book to try to get him to prescribe powerful pain medication. it can get ugly. have you had people come in and scream at you? >> yeah. >> physically push you or touch you? >> i have less of a problem because i'm male and i'm taller. but one of the things we have to do in our office, because i'm the only male doctor, is i'm sort of on call for situations like that that involve anybody else. and i'll deal with them. >> reporter: but some doors taurus do refuse to deal with it. they no longer write prescriptions for pain medication for anyone, regardless of need. detectives in louisville can understand that. they arrest two or three suspects a day who routinely call in fraudulent prescriptions to pharmacists. >> this is a forged prescription that you went and picked up. not just once but a bunch of times. do you know who's calling these in? i know. >> yeah. >> is it you? claiming to be in this -- >> it wasn't in the beginning. but yeah. >> reporter: it's become an old, tired story. >> that's actually her at the pharmacy. >> reporter: detective steve watts is dedicated to fighting just one kind of drug crime -- illegal prescription drug use. he's looking at surveillance tape after woman who allegedly used a doctor's name to call in a prescription for xanax. >> there she is with the same distinctive bag. her walmart bag. walking out. >> reporter: we rode along with detective watts. wasn't long before "she" appeared. along with her father, and that purse. >> if i could make this her worst day of her life so that tomorrow she will seek treatment, then i've won. >> reporter: back here, there are no winners. the doctor's alleged killer has yet to face trial. he says he's not guilty. >> he has to see what he's done. he has to look at my family and know what he did. it's somebody's life. it's the lives of his patients, that community. you know, it's everybody. >> it is everybody's problem. danielle is working with a number of groups to make it safer for doctors to practice medicine. dr. greene is working, too. his clinic has informed every pharmacist in barea, kentucky they are no longer calling in prescriptions. kiran, they're going to do it via computer. it seems to be safer that way. >> it is just a shame to see how explosive this problem has become. we've seen it grow exponentially just in the past decade. >> it's true. and the difficult part for doctors -- let's say you go to a doctor and you say i'm suffering, i'm in pain, i need a prescription, there's really no way for the doctor to tell if you're telling the truth. he just has to trust you. and they arein lies the problem. if you're addicted to prescription drugs, you can be a pretty good actor. as you well know from the stories you've done the past two days, kiran. >> they figure out how to game the system, unfortunately. and it ends up affecting everyone and their lives as well. carol costello, great story this morning. thank you. crossing the half-hour now, time for this morning's top stories. investigators in alaska heading to the scene of a deadly plane crash that killed former senator ted stevens and four other passengers. four of the passengers did survive the crash, including former nasa administrator sean o'keefe and his teenage son. their plane went down monday afternoon near the bering sea. toyota has stopped shipping cars to iran. the company says that the move came after more sanctions were imposed on iran in june to put an end to its nuclear program. toyota says it will continue to monitor the international situation and has not decided when exports will resume. a big decision here. hundreds of lawsuits filed against bp and other companies over the gulf oil spill will be heard in new orleans. a judicial panel saying that is the geographic and psychological center of gravity of the disaster. bp had asked for the cases to be heard in houston where its headquarters is located. the jetblue flight attendant who became enraged, then bailed out down the escape chute, has how to been released on bail. steven slater, certainly ready for his close-up, smiling for the mob of media and cameras waiting for him when he was finally released. >> no doubt his rage is resonating with a lot of people who now see him as their working class hero. our allan chernoff joins us now with more on steven slater's 15 minutes. when his name becomes a verb you know he's made it. i'm going to go slaiter on you. >> he's there. steven slater has gone viral. his facebook page, more than 95,000 fans. yesterday it was growing by the tens of thousands. some hours we had more than 10,000 people joining up. it was simply incredible. he certainly has struck a chord with americans. last night he did get out of jail. he had been held in the south bronx, posted $2,500 in bail. and he told me, boy, he's really appreciative. >> very, very appreciated and it seems like something here has resonated with a few people. that's kind of neat. >> reporter: you going to lose your job? >> more than likely. >> reporter: do you care about that anymore? >> no comment at this time. >> reporter: how about this? tell me about rude passengers. talk about that for a second. >> there's a lot of wonderful people out there. >> all of this, of course, after what happened on monday. mr. slater, flight attendant for jetblue, had been on a flight. he was hit by some luggage and was engaged in an argument with a passenger. didn't want to sit down, that passenger didn't, and he was then cursed out. well, mr. slater responded by getting on the public address system, repeated that curse to the entire plane, and then he set off the slide, that basically allowed him to jump out of the plane. he grabbed some beers, grabbed his luggage, and then slid down that emergency slide. of course you're not supposed to do that. not supposed to ignite that slide. but he, nonetheless, walk away and drove home and shortly afterwards the police showed up at his door. but i think what he did there really is a fantasy, maybe -- i don't know -- hundreds of thousands, maybe millions of people would just love to say "take this job and shove it." he did it his way. >> there was a long about that, wasn't there? >> yes, there was. >> yesterday at this time when we you on, we hadn't heard from him yet. was it everything you hoped for and more when he finally talked? >> that was late at night. he was taken away first in a van, then our affiliate channel 7 caught up with him. i can assure you, you will be seeing more of him in the media. and frampk nkly, you have to wo is this the beginning of yet another reality tv program. >> he had a great line though, are you going to lose your job over this? "more than likely." he >> he is on leave from jetblue. they are investigating the incident. >> he can't be fired because he quit. right? >> there you go. that's it. heat waves across america. we've been talking about them all summer. also these deadly floods. first in china, pakistan, wildfires ravaging russia as they deal with heat 30 degrees higher than normal. the summer of 2010 setting records for extreme weather. could all of these events be connected? nasa scientist -- ice scientist tom wagner will be tackling that question next. 35 minutes past the hour. >> on it, dad. >> nobody move!! >> hrmmm? ♪ priceline negotiator >> i'm calling a family meeting. >> there's no time... we're searching hundreds of sites for the cheapest flight. >> what you're doing is setting a bad example for the kids. on priceline, you can shop all these flights, and get the best price guaranteed. and if you add a hotel or car, you save even more. >> shut it down, people! >> a family that saves together, stays together. over a thousand people a day switch to chevrolet. let's find out why. this malibu is sharp, has great mileage and offers onstar. the hundred thousand mile powertrain warranty caught my attention. it's the chevrolet summer event, which means the only thing left to decide is who drives it home. me! her. me! qualified lessees now get a low mileage lease on this malibu ls, a consumers digest best buy, for around $199 a month. call for details. the switch begins at chevydealer.com. welcome back to the most news in the morning. it's been a summer of painful extremes when it comes to weather. we have another heat wave now suffocating temperatures for millions of americans. 16 states had a heat warning or advisory in effect yesterday, for example. over in russia, they're also fighting scorching temperatures. they have wildfires spreading out of control there to you as they deal with heat way higher than normal this time of year. in pakistan, two weeks of flooding killing 1,500 people and impacting some 14 million more. and take a look at the before and after picture. this is a massive iceberg. it broke away from a glacier in greenland. before on the left, then after. that chunk that broke away is four times bigger than manhattan. it is raising concerns for scientists about the world's warming oceans. nasa scientist tom wagner joins us this morning from washington. thanks so much for being here. a lot of people are wondering are these freak weather conditions, just a coincidence or are they somehow linked? what's your take? >> the take is this -- all these things are the kinds of thangs we would expect to happen as the planet warms up. what we're seeing is that overall the planet's warming about .35 degrees per decade and places like greenland are warming up even faster, like 3 1/2 degrees per decade. all of these events from heat waves to stronger monsoons to loss of ice from around the world, they're all consistent with that. where it gets a little bit tricky though is assigning any one specific event is to say the cause of this event is definitely global warming. that's kind of where we get to the edge of the research. >> but when you take a look at the combined global land and ocean average surface temperature for june 2010 was the warmest on record. before that the record was june i think 2005. is there a larger conclusion to be drawn or is this part of a cycle? >> oh, no, there a definitely a larger conclusion to be drawn. we're seeing things that haven't really ever happened on this planet before like warming at this specific rate. we think it is very well tied to increasing carbon dioxide in the atmosphere since the late 1800s caused by humans. one of the best places to look for information on this, go to climate.nasa.gov and see the graphs for yourself that show the correlation between these things. remember it is not a just the last ten years or last few years now, we have satellite records that go back now 50 years. we combine that with weather stations around the world, we have a good record going back to the late 1880s that tells us all about how the planet is warming up. on top of that, too, it is not just evidence from that. we have evidence from the geologic record, sediment numbers from the ocean floor. >> when you take this information and talk about this increase, .35 degrees per decade, what does that tell us about what eventually is going to happen? can this be reversed? can this cycle be reversed? >> yeah. and those are really the million dollar questions right now, what is it that we can do about climate change. one of the things we have to think about is the planet is going to change and we have to deal with that. for example, we look at satellite studies, ice around antiashth ka and greenland, we're losing all that ice. sea level is rising at 3 millimeters a year. if you extrapolate those for the next 100 years, we'll get at least a foot of sea level rise. but there is the possibility that we'll get more than that. these are the things we need to really think about and come up with mitigation strategies to deal with it. we're doing research to try to nail down these questions more tightly, trying to understand just how much is sea level going to rise, just how much is temperatures going to go up and weather patterns change. >> let's look at this ice loss from the peterman glacier, you largest such event in nearly 50 years. the chunk that broke off looks small on that picture but four times the size of manhattan. there are concerns it could make its way into some of the shipping ports in the north. what's the impact for folks at home that this has broken off up in greenland? >> this is a very, very interesting event. there were some cracks that formed last year and people thought it might break off last year but it took until this year. this flash glacier has been thi for some time. but now that this glacier has broken out, it's receded further back than it's ever been. we've got data from explorers that were there back in the 1920s to tell us what's gone on. but also too, recent studies have said we used to just be losing ice from the southern part of greenland. the warmer part. peterman is actually on the northern part of greenland, the colder part and that area is known to be losing lots of ice right now, too. in terms of implications, this big iceberg flows into the maris strait, an area where ice and water is exported from the arctic ocean to the south so it may block that up. there's also now people talking about this massive iceberg, what's going to happen as it gets further south, gets into shipping lanes and gets around oil rigs and other things. >> certainly a lot of implications there. tom wagner, thanks so much for joining us this morning. we appreciate it. quickly, just want to bring in our rob marciano as well. i know you've done a lot of stories on climate change and covered your share of individual events. when you take a look at earth, we know it is dynamic, we know we've gone through natural warming and cooling periods. but when we talk about the hottest record set for the warmest time ever in the history since they've been keeping records, june 2010, has a lot of people scratching their heads. >> it certainly does. in 1998 we had one of the warmest years as well, fresh off an el nino. i got to say i appreciate tom's enthusiasm and plain speak. it is good to see a climate scientist who can connect with every day people. i'll just add this, that it's -- the earth, the land, the water and the air, it is a complex system. very complicated. and there's layers and layers and layers of feedback systems. certainly when you warm the polar regions, that's probably the worst feedback system there is when it comes to global warming and climate change. but as far as every day weather, it's the circulations and the longer-term oscillations to really control our every day weather. remember last summer we started off really cold, this past winter was pretty harsh as well. what climate change does to those every day circulations and longer term oscillations is still yet to be seen. it is going to be interesting in years to come. >> it's certainly gotten the attention of a lot of folks. tom wagner, rob marciano, our thanks to both of you. 44 minutes past the hour. quick break. how's your shave? 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[ male announcer ] now, fusion proglide has been engineered with gillette's thinnest blades ever so it glides for less tug and pull. turns shaving into gliding. and skeptics into believers. new fusion proglide. and warm up before you shave for incredible comfort with new proseries thermal scrub. time for a check of the weather now. 47 minutes after the hour. rob marciano is in atlanta with all eyes on the gulf of mexico and whether or not we're going to have another tropical storm. good morning, rob. >> good morning, guys. the name would be danielle. it is yet to be named because it doesn't have winds of 39 miles an hour or more, actually. looks like it's down to 30. this 8:00 update must have snuck up on me. it is not strengthened at all in the last 12 hours. we can see the satellite imagery here, doesn't look all that impressive. that's certainly good news. the tropical storm warnings though are in place because the forecast is for it to become a tropical storm here later today or tonight. then make landfall somewhere between destin, florida and appalachia bay, louisiana. tropical storm-force winds may be interacting with the coastline here as early as later on tonight regardless of whether or not it becomes a tropical storm. there's the depression itself. you can see the rotation, you can see the showers and thunderstorms already beginning to swirl into the mouth of the mississippi. it is about 250 miles east-southeast of the mouth of the mississippi river. the other big weather story of course is the heat. we talk about that in the last segment. hot again across central part of the country. 105 to 115-degree heat indexes in this area. i think this will be the last couple of days, then we'll see an overall pattern shift that will bring slightly cooler air into this area later on this weekend and next week. you'll take it in delaware and in d.c. almost 100 degrees there yesterday. trenton, new jersey, seeing 96. hazy, hot and humid conditions. a little bit cooler for you folks today and certainly cool out west. but the tropical depression we'll have to watch more carefully. look at that, 103 in dallas. 99 kansas city. we'll see a little bit less of that deep, deep red i think come next week. but until then, folks are going to be sweating it out again. >> up until you reminded me in that last segment, i forgot last summer was off to a cool start. that's a distant memory. >> it was the summer without a summer last year. right? >> at least in the beginning. yeah, it warmed up toward the end. i remember you guys complaining about it not being beach weather. >> but we complain so much we can't remember day to day what we complain about. last year is a distant memory. >> you haven't heard me complain about the heat. as long as you stay in the shade, you're okay. >> thanks, guys. this morning's top stories a few minutes away, including the former first lady of the wwe now a republican nominee for senate. linda mcmahon will join us live. the dream team in south beach. chris bosh tells us about playing with lebron james and dwyane wade. are the only things that can stop them themselves? at 50 minutes past the hour, something none of us here know anything about. dr. sanjay gupta goes inside the brain for the secrets of how to get a sound sleep? what the heck is that? those stories and much more coming up at the top of the hour. very day you check the ♪ check the wife check the kids check your email messages ♪ check the news online ♪ ♪ check the money in the bank check the gas in the tank ♪ ♪ check the hottie walking by... ♪ ♪ ...wait that's a dude, no thanks ♪ ♪ check the new hairdo check the mic one two ♪ ♪ 'cause i'm about to drop some knowledge right on top of you ♪ ♪ you check a lot of things already why not add one more ♪ ♪ that can help your situation for sure ♪ ♪ check your credit score ♪ free-credit-score-dot-com free-credit-score ♪ ♪ you won't regret it at all vo: offer applies with enrollment in triple advantage. to finish what you started today. for the aches and sleeplessness in between, there's new motrin pm. no other medicine, not even advil pm, is more effective for pain and sleeplessness. new motrin pm. 52 minutes past the hour. your a.m. house call. stories about your health and possibility of a breakthrough and the fight against alzheimer's. it is bringing a huge buzz in the medical world. >> new study shows a spinal fluid test can diagnose the disease with near 100% accuracy. we talked about it yesterday. there's still a lot of questions to be answered. let's bring in the man who can answer these questions. our chief medical correspondent dr. sanjay gupta who just happens to be -- we have him as a neurosurgeon. have you done hundreds of spinal tap procedures yourself. show us how it works. >> yeah. this is the procedure people are talking about with regard to trying to do this test for alzheimer's disease. let me show you. i have a model over this. it is a model of the spine. this is the front of the spine over here. you see the -- hip bones over here. when you do a spinal tap and women will note what this feels like if they had an epidural during labor. a needle is placed in between a couple of the bones in this area, lower part of the spine. a couple of choices over here. you put that needle right through and in front of the bones and that's where the spinal sack is. that needle opens up that spinal sack and that's where you get that fluid. that cerebral spinal fluid people are talking about. that's a spinal tap and called a lumbar puncture, typically takes 10 to 15 minutes or so. and costs anywhere between $300 and $500. that's what happens. lot of times you don't have to be at rest for a little bit after the procedure. send that fluid off and that's how you get the test results. >> you explained it is a little bit more of an involved procedure than getting a blood test. so people were weighing in about that with questions. nate wrote on our blog saying that's all well and good. are you going to conduct a spinal tap ovary middle-aged person that complains of mild memory loss. who may be at risk at get thing procedure. >> it is a very fair point. it is one point, we are obviously reporting this as it is happening. this is a very important study that was conducted. and it is going to need to be duplicated. you know alet of people have a lot of faith in the results so far. after it is duplicated, it may become a more widely available screening test. we are not there yet. this is literal will you unfolding now for the last couple of days. right now, people wanted to get this test, they can probably go to their doctor and get the spinal tap that i just showed. those tests that -- type of testing is actually pretty readily available in most hospitals. testing for the specific proteins. if you wanted to go to a research center, conducting research because you have some sort of family history, may be able to get it done that way as well. as things stand now it is not a widely available screening test by any means and think over the next several years if those studies pan out. >> another viewer writes and asks this question. is your insurance going to pay? now they get to note have you a pre-existing condition. great. >> both good points. first of all, with regard -- we did digging. i spoke to lot of folks. including folks at the alzheimer's association. spinal taps, lumbar punctured procedures are covered for certain things. like trying to rule out meningitis, for example. for this, we are trying to figure out if you have the proteins that might indicate alzheimer's disease, it is probably not going to be covered. the cost about $300 to $500. if it becomes a more widely available screening test, those guidelines may change. and you have a family history or some sort of risk factor, you may be able to get it covered. as far as pre-existing conditions go, you know, we talk about this a lot over the last year or so with regard to health care reform. the way that health care reform is set up by the year 2014, people should not -- adults should not be discriminated against based on pre-existing conditions. you know, if that holds, we get a test like this that comes back positive, it should not be discrimination to get further health insurance or get the costs covered. >> all right. sanjay, a lot of good info. i know this is the time people care very much about and you are coming to explore as well new research becomes available. thanks for joining us this morning. >> any time. thanks. >> we are going to take a quick break. , all right? i don't want you going out on those yet. and leave your phone in your purse, i don't want you texting. >> daddy... ok! ok, here you go. be careful. >> thanks dad. >> and call me--but not while you're driving. we knew this day was coming. that's why we bought a subaru. i'm from the gulf coast. my family spends a lot of time here. i have a personal interest in ensuring that we get this job done right. i'm keith seilhan. i'm in charge of bp's cleanup on the gulf coast. bp has taken full responsibility for the cleanup and that includes keeping you informed. you may have heard that oil is no longer flowing into the gulf. there's less oil coming ashore every day, but we still have thousands of people ready to clean it up if it does. we're going to be here as long as it takes to make this right. good morning. thanks so much for being with us on this "american morning" for this wednesday, august 11th. i'm kiran chetry. >> good morning. i'm john roberts. lots to talk about. investigators in alaska trying to figure out why a plane carrying nine people, including former alaska governor ted stevens, crashed into a mountain on monday. stevens and four others were killed on their way to a fishing camp. four of the passengers survived. we are getting our first look this morning at the wreckage. >> the next step, november. former wrestling executive linda mcmahon easily winning the republican race for senate in connecticut. she spent $22 million in the primary and now faces a general election fight that should be tougher and probably dirtier. connecticut's newly minted gop nominee will join us live just ahead. potential tropical storm now forming in the gulf coast. it could hit the gulf coast in the next 36 hours. bp forced to suspend drilling on the final 50 feet of the relief well waiting for the system to pass. rob marciano is tracking the storm from the extreme weather center. >> the a.m. fix blog up and running this morning. join the live conversation. cnn.com/amfix. a tragic plane crash that killed former senator ted steve sxens four of his friends. four passengers managed to survive. waiting 12 agonizing hours for researchers to reach them because of treacherous weather. >> the body of ted stevest, longest serving republican senator in u.s. history, was back home this morning. he's being remembered as a man that single-handedly won statehood for alaska. casey, you know, it is quite ironic. stevens always said he hated to fly ever since he survived another plane crash in 1978 that killed his first wife. >> reporter: he called it an occupational hazard of being in alaska politics. the towns are so far apart, such vast, rough terrain. to get to all of these places you have to fly off nen small planes, often in bad weather. very difficult conditions. he was afraid that he might actually lose his life the way he ultimately did. he told that to "the washington post" in 1979 about a year after he survived that plane crash that killed his first wife. as to the survivors of this plane crash, most recent one that killed senator stevens, we are getting more information now about their condition. former nasa administrator sean o'keefe is at providence hospital where i am in critical condition. his son is in serious condition. one other passenger also in serious condition. and we have no word about the condition of the 13-year-old boy who survived the crash. his father was one of those who was killed. we are also hearing stories from some of the first responders to the crash scene. the international guard folks who 'arrived some 12 hours after the crash. they had a very difficult time getting survivors out of the wreckage of that plane because of the terrain. they said they were dealing with multiple fractures, lower leg fractures, of those -- some of those who survived. one of the survivors actually was ambulatory and taking cover from the elements under the broken wing. the fatalities were all still inside the fuselage of that aircraft. we also spoke yesterday with one of the first pilots that overflew the crash scene. he talked to cnn. here is what he saw. >> the main fuselage and tail was in one piece. the wings were off. i couldn't see the engine. >> reporter: do you think anybody could have survived that? >> i didn't think it was survivable. >> reporter: pretty clear the reason that there were survivors is -- what you can describe as hero yoyk rescue efforts of some of the volunteers who were able to get to the crash scene. there was a -- press briefing by the national transportation safety board yesterday. and the chief of the ntsb spoke about some of the rescue efforts in the early hours after the crash. >> there were a lot of people who were applying their skills and also supporting those individuals who were trapped on the hillside. obviously, we don't know what would have happened if they had not been there but we do thank lord they were there. >> reporter: the ntsb investigators were heading back to the crash scene later today to try to gather more information about exactly what happened. clearly the weather was a factor. it is clear the rocky terrain was a factor. beyond that we don't know much more. >> casey wian for thus morning in anchorage. thanks so much. space walk and an important repair mission under way now at the international space station. we have a live look as astronauts perform their second space walk in five days to replace a pump and to fix the cooling system on the issi. we are supposed to having a live picture. that's the -- >> i was about to mime it. >> do you have washers in your pocket? nasa says without it the temperature of the station's sun-facing side would soar to 250 degrees. we are complain being the heat here. thermometers on the dark side plunged to negative 250. there is a backup system for now at least keeping things stable. >> you mentioned a couple of people with screwdrivers in their hands flying high above the air. after an unprecedented recall involving 9 million cars, government investigators can't seem to find anything wrong with all of those toyotas. tests on 58 vehicles that crashed uncovering no evidence of flawed electronics. the preliminary findings support toyota's claim the drivers mistakenly hit the gas pedal instead of the brake. the jetblue flight attendant who went on the intercom system and went off, decided to leave the plane after some pretty rude comments from a passenger, grabbed a couple of beers, slid down the chute, out on bail and talking. this is video of him walking out of jail last night amid the crush of cameras and microphones. >> the scar from your head, is that from the suitcase falling? is it? tell me what you think about all of the support have you gotten. >> it has been very, very appreciated. it seems like it is something here that's resonated with a few people. that's kind of neat. >> reporter: are you going to lose your job? >> more than likely. >> reporter: do you care about that anymore? >> no comment at this time. >> reporter: how about this? tell me about rude passengers. talk about that. >> there's a lot of wonderful people out there. >> slater already has tens of thousands of facebook fans. i think 94,000 or more. he didn't have them 48 hours ago. he will look to his rise to fame later this hour. talk now of a reality show. >> if he is not a flight attendant anymore, what part does he play in a reality show? in the face of an embarrassing public trial for ethics violation, charlie rangel told his constituents, i'm staying. >> i am not going away. i am here. and i do recognize that -- [ applause ] >> he did apologized but insisted he is not corrupt. rangel is celebrating his 80th birthday at the plaza hotel. the democrats turned congress, quote, into a three-ring circus. desiree rogers landing a new gig. she is taking over of johnson company in chicago. rogers, you may remember, lost her job after the -- remember the party crashers situation that happened at the obama's first state dinner last year? johnson publishing is an african-american owned and operated business that includes "ebony" and "jet" magazines. the system expected to strengthen into tropical storm danielle sometime in the next 24 hours. it could hit the region in 36 hours. forcing bp to suspend drilling on the final 50 feet of the relief well until the storm passes over. the relief well, the final step to kill bp's ruptured well permanently. rob marciano in the hurricane head quarters and tracking the system for us. now another disruption in the final kill procedure. again, because of weather. >> yes. this one looking more and more like bonnie. remember that thing. just kind of petered out and did nothing. but likely will strengthen more than it has over the last 12 hours. weakened since our last update. down to 30-mile-an-hour winds and still about 250 miles away from the mouth of the mississippi river and heading in that general direction. as john mentioned we have tropical storm warnings to destin, florida. rain bands already getting rain. maybe winds as early as this evening. official landfall likely tomorrow morning sometime as a tropical storm. heat indexes, 105 to 115. broken record on this end of the story. central part of the country, heat wave continuing the second week. i think next week will be a little more comfortable. but meantime, they are sweating it out. talk more about this and update what might be danielle in the next 30 minutes of the show. >> looking forward to it. rob, thanks so much. it is a victory open it is door to a whole slew of new election year cliches. linda mcmahon, former ceo of world wrestling entertainment, wins the connecticut senate primary for the republican party. she's live coming up next. hot tickets. lebron james, dwyane wade, chris bosh. the team to beat, chris bosh joins us live to weigh in. what's it like with his two new teammates playing in south beach? also offering up a little wager, i guess you could say, giving money to kids for every rebound. [ male announcer ] presenting the cadillac "summer's best" sales event. a fantastic opportunity to get 0% apr financing on every new 2010 cadillac model. like the cts sport sedan. the most acclaimed vehicle in its class and a "car and driver" 10 best, three years in a row. or the all new cadillac srx luxury crossover. and even the most acclaimed luxury suv ever, the cadillac escalade. summer brings out the best in all of us. hurry in to get 0% apr financing on every new 2010 cadillac during cadillac's "summer's best" sales event, going on now at your cadillac dealer. ♪ ♪ the voters have spoken in several major primary races. in colorado's democratic senate primary, michael bennett, the man president obama backed, beat former president clinton's candidate. there is still no winner in the governor gubernatorial runoff in georgia. in connecticut, former wrestling executive linda mcmahon won the gop nomination for senate. she will face democrat richard blumenthal in november. one will succeed chris dodd. fresh off of last night's victory linda mcmahon joins us this morning from cromwell, connecticut. thanks so much for joining us. what does your victory say about the mood of republican voters in 2010? >> what i am finding all across connecticut is i have traveled across the state and talked to the people of con is they want a change and they don't want to send the same politicians to washington and get the same politics out of washington. they want someone that's an outsider who had real life business experience. i hope that someone who has built the business the and created jobs and understands the impact of taxes and regulations on small businesses can have more of an impact on the economy. >> do you spend a tremendous amount of money on this victory. $22 million of your own money. another $28 million that you are planning on putting towards the general election campaign. your oep, by comparison, has $2.1 million in the bank. political analysts point out that even with $22 million, candidates who work really that much competition for you, you didn't crack 50%. what do you say about that? >> well, i can tell you that i think it is very important to spend the right amount of money so that the people of connecticut know who i am and what my message is. that was my commitment to do it. i started out as -- and continue to be an underdog in this race against opponents that have great name recognition. attorney general richard blumenthal has been part of the connecticut scene for 20 years with, you know, newspaper, television coverage on a weekly basis for sure. it is very important for the voters of connecticut to know me. but it is not just about spending money. i have crisscrossed this state and done over, i think, 660 events now. and main street walking tours and meeting the people of connecticut and letting them kick the tires with me. as i do that, i'm really making an impress and my message is resonating with them. >> there are early indications that your campaign may redefine the word negative there in the state of connecticut beginning with fliers pointed at your democratic opponent richard blumenthal and the statements he made about his vietnam record where he said he wanted -- you mentioned this, the fact he's been so handedly elected so many times over the last 20 years, do you think that negative campaigning can be the key to upsetting him? >> john, i really believe that this campaign is going to be -- this election is going to be won on the issues when it comes down to it because the -- voters -- >> okay. so if that's the case, why the negative campaigning? >> i think it is important to point out if someone has -- you know, a history of not telling the truth about issues, i think that negative campaigni ining h been pointed towards me. this campaign will be determine order the issues. people of connecticut will speak their voice to who they think can represent them better in washington and and whether they want to send a career politician to washington or someone with fresh ideas and ability to create jobs. >> here is what eric schultz from the democratic senatorial campaign told "the new york times." linda mcmahon made millions running the wwe where she peddled violent, sexually explicit material to kids, used lobbyists to grow her profits, and embraced widespread steroid abo abuse. your history will play prominently heavily in this campaign. can they convince the voters you are not the right person because of your history in business? >> they will certainly try. i think that the -- that's what we have seen since i entered this campaign last september. those have been the negative attacks me. as my opponents talked more and more about wwe and issues that my have been relative to programming content at an era when it was tv 14 instead of focusing on the issues -- i talked about tissues and continued to gain momentum. you know, the nominee coming out of the convention just won the primary, and if -- my opponents con to talk about soap opera content instead of focusing on issues, i will win again in november. >> soap opera content is one thing. there was a darker side that has been addressed to some degree since then. that's the whole controversy over steroids. democrats zeroing in on this when they were talking. chris benoit's murder's rampage in 2007. that put a lot of focus on this. a congressional committee said of wwe it had not taken adequate steps to address steroid use among its wrestlers. how are you going to answer those questions when your opponents try to paint you as the queen of steroid abuse in the wwe? >> i thought it very interesting one time when we did have a democratic congressional committee looking at that when -- really did no look at all the evidence that had been presented and looked at the absolute change over the course of time with wwe and the enhancements and wellness policy that includes not only annual physicals and impact testing for concussions and a very comprehensive drug policy. the men and women that perform at wwe really are the primary assets of wwe. and we want to protect them at all costs. doctors that travel with them. let me finish. trainers that travel with them. we have a very comprehensive drug testing program. let's look at where wwe is today. >> devil raysing the steroid issue, did you do enough soon enough? >> i think you have to look at where we have come. continue to make progress throughout the time of wwe. and i mean, you have to look at the olympics. you have to look at all of the impacts of different drug tests and how they evolved and wwe has evolved and will continue the evolve. it will always continue to improve and get better. >> certainly your presence in the race is going to make this a very interesting one as we head into the fall campaign. we here at cnn will do our best to avoid the wrestling cliches when talking about it. great to talk to you this morning. thanks. >> thank you, john. it is a pleasure to be here. the best political team on television has you covered 24/7. follow it all at cnn.com/politics. still ahead, the indian government is threatening to ban blackberries. 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[ male announcer ] the star safety system. standard. because we know, there's nothing more important to you than your safety. all our new safety features are at toyota.com/safety. than your safety. like more and more people today, kaufman. ♪ welcome back to the most news of the morning there is a growing list of countries craig ban on blackberries. it started with the threat after shutdown on e-mail, meat and instant messaging on the smartphones in the united arab emirates. >> the reason the government said it was a security concern. other countries are also considering a ban, saudi arabia, indonesia a india as well. minding your business this morning, let's bringing in sarah sider in who is live in new delhi. they are thinking of reigning in blackberry communications? >> reporter: in a word, absolutely. basically what's happening here is india has been fighting the fight for longer than a lot of people know and have been up to this for about two years. almost two years now. looking at how they can get more access to some of the services blackberry offers. the problem is that the company is not happy with that. some of the customers aren't either. they don't necessarily want to allow the government to be able to deencrypt some of the secure messages. you about the big thing is that will are a million customers here in india and none of them want to see blackberry go away. indian exporter is on the go. his clients spread out across the globe so he's never without his prize electronic assistant, his blackberry. no matter where he is, what time it is, saluja's fingers are fast at work on the instant messenger because it is super fast and time is money. can you live without it? >> no. blackberry is the key to business. all business today. it helps you in business and helps you in connecting to friends and anybody throughout the world. especially with the blackberry, it is a fantastic feature. >> reporter: the world's largest democracy is one of several countries threatening to ban that and one other feature due to security concerns. blackberry's super secure encryption methods make it nearly impossible for intelligence to tap-in to the real-type messages. the government wants the ability to peer into all the blackber blackberries to make sure there's no terror tach being hatched under their noses. >> from all sources necessary. there's no -- no two ways about it. >> reporter: bik r >> reporter: he points out india is one of the most attacked nations in the world. he says the country needs every tool available to try to avoid another attack. if month, he says -- >> completely blindsided. you don't know what's going to happen. what do you do? >> reporter: react after the fact. >> if you react after the fact the explosion has taken place, terrorist act has taken place. 150 people have died. now who is libable for that? isn't it better to share. >> reporter: that's a question that's pitting big business against the government. decision is expected thursday. there is a lot at stake for research in motion, owner of blackberry as well. it face it is possibility of losing out on one of the world's fastest growing telecommunication markets, potential 600 million-plus customers. he can't imagine a world without blackberry. and doesn't think he will have to. he is confident a deal will be made. considering saudi arabia was able to hatch a deal over the same issues. now here's something to think about as well. you know the u.s. and diplomats, many of them use blackberry. there is a concern from the u.s. itself in some of these countries as to what is going to happen. they are in talks with some of the countries including india about blackberry and considering that so many people are on this and so many people use it, there's definitely a lot of interest here and everyone is watching to see what's going to happen tomorrow as the government is expected to make some sort of an announce many about what it is going to do and if it will ban blackberry services. >> if research in motion was willing to work something out with saudi arabia, that's not a universal agreement then with other nations. they have to do it piece meal? >> reporter: that's what we are hearing. and we are also hearing from many people who are familiar with what's going on. and that they believe that this will be sorted out. but you really are getting conflicting comments from different people. some of the telecom operators saying we will work this out. we are having talks with the government. and we will figure something out. but if the government does decide that things like blackberry messenger are just too encrypted and can't get into it, that service could very well go away affecting a lot of people here. >> very interesting story. we will continue to follow it. thanks. >> great to see you. jetblue flight attendant steven slater pops the door, grabs a beer, and bugs out right into the bask of a new celebrity status. allan chernoff with the latest on the flight attendant coming up. 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[ animals calling ], the rock you can rely on. ♪ [ pop ] [ man ] ♪ well, we get along ♪ yeah, we really do - ♪ and there's nothing wrong - [ bird squawks ] ♪ with what i feel for you ♪ i could hang around till the leaves are brown and the summer's gone ♪ [ announcer ] when you're not worried about potential dangers, the world can be a far less threatening place. take the scary out of life with travelers insurance... and see the world in a different light. crossing the half hour. investigators in alaska heading to the scene after deadly plane crash that killed former senator steve sxens four other passengers monday. four people survived the crash including former nasa administration o'keefe and his teenage son. also in the wake of the worst flooding in pakistan's history, the taliban is telling the pakistani government don't take money from america. the taliban is planning to give more than anything the u.s. sends. so far washington committed $55 million in aid. aid the pakistani government is not planning on turning down. the pentagon already has chop others the ground helping with the rescue along with food, aid, vital water filtration systems. the developer of a controversial mosque and islamic center in lower manhattan reportedly rejected an offer from new york governor patder son. paterson offered to be a mediator and try to find a new location for the center. the governor says that he's very sensitive to those who are against the center being so close to ground zero. the developer told our affiliate, new york 1, quote, this has always been about serving lower manhattan. the jetblue flight attendant who flipped out, bailed out, down tess cape chute, is now out on bail. >> steven slater was ready for his close-up when he emerged and a mob of media waiting for him at the gate of the corrections center. allan chernoff joins us now with more on the clock running on slater's 15 minutes of fame. good morning. >> i think that those 15 minutes are going to be expanded because this story is -- it could be a long time. >> 15 episodes of a reality show. >> i think that's exactly where we are headed. this is definitely resonating. right now his facebook page has more than 100,000 fans and growing very, very rapidly. by the way, there are more than 25,000 fans for the free steven slater page. well, he is free. he got out of jail yesterday. late yesterday. ing in fact, he was in jail in the south bronx but posted bail of $2,500. remember, he's facing two felonies. criminal mischief and reckless endangerment for having activated that slide, emergency slide, from the plane. and bailing out. let's have a listen to what he said last night. >> very, very appreciated. it seems like something resonated with a few people and that's kind of neat. >> reporter: are you going to lose your job? >> more than likely. >> reporter: do you care about that anymore? >> no comment at this time. >> reporter: how about this? tell me about rude passengers. talk about that for second. >> there's a lot of wonderful people out there. >> you see that bump on his forehead, that came courtesy of an unruly passenger on the flight from pittsburgh. he then got into an altercation with the passenger. the passenger cursed him out and mr. slater took to the system and used the four letter word and activated the slide, grab ad few beers, his luggage, and out he went. by the time he got home shortly afterwards, the police were there to arrest him. but this story has become legendary. this is, i think, the way a lot of people would maybe like to say take this job and shove it. >> you are right. one of the people on twitter wrote on behalf of all of us thinking of creative ways to leave our jobs, blank you, steven slater, for setting the bar ridiculously high. >> the truth is, he says that he absolutely loves being a flight attendant. done it since he was 19 years old. and he's worked for quite a few. he worked for twa, delta. he's a real veteran of this industry. i think that -- another reason this is resonating so many people realize that flying these days is really tough. and people know how hard it is for the flight attendants and what they have to put up with. >> no question. >> did they catch up with the unruly passenger? >> i don't think so. the police were not called for a good 20, 25 minutes. the passengers had plenty of time to disyours if the unruly passenger is out there, give us a call. we want to talk to you. hot ticket from miami heat trio lebron james, wade and chris bosh. are they the team to beat this year? chris bosh live coming up on the most news of the morning. hi, may i help you? yes, i hear progressive has lots of discounts on car insurance. can i get in on that? are you a safe driver? yes. discount! do you own a home? yes. discount! are you going to buy online? yes! discount! isn't getting discounts great? yes! there's no discount for agreeing with me. yeah, i got carried away. happens to me all the time. helping you save money -- now, that's progressive. call or click today. time to face the pollen that used to make me sneeze... my eyes water. but now zyrtec®, the fastest 24-hour allergy relief, comes in a new liquid gel. new zyrtec® liquid gels work fast, so i can love the air®. my subaru saved my life. i won't ever forget that. love. it's what makes a subaru, a subaru. ♪ welcome back for the most mousse of the morning. the next guest is one of biggest things to hit south beach since snooki. just i had kidding. nba star chris bosh, went from raptor to rapture when he signed with the miami heat. >> maybe you heard about it. bosch is teaming up with dwyane wade and lebron james. a triple threat. everyone has something to say about the decision. >> what is this? a sponsored party? >> no. good tequila. check it out. >> trust me, margarita, change your life. enjoy it. >> i will give you a thousand bucks to give me vodka. >> from the set of "entourage," chris bosh joins us this morning. thanks for stopping by. i mean, sports book has you 8:00 to 5:00, highest odds. is anything less than a championship given this lineup going to be seen as failure? >> i think so. coming into this, i think we all expected to win championships. before we even got to this free agency period, our number one goal as individuals, i think, everybody would say is to win a championship. and to make this move and to assemble these kind of players we have in miami, i think that nothing less would be a little bit of a failure. >> there you go. >> no pressure. >> all the talk of you how guys came together during the free agency period was the stuff of legend. a lot of rumors, talk of meetings taking place between you star players. how did that go down? how did you all end up -- how did it all come together and all of you end up playing for the heated? >> i think not trying to get into intermixed with each other, i think that helped because we were able to go with our own, hang with our families, just go through all the emotions that come with the -- came with the free agency period. >> it wasn't planned? >> no. we couldn't plan it. i can't ask lebron to go to miami. he has his own family. dewayne has his own family and issues and his life. i think that -- it was best that we just kept it separate in everything and everything worked out well. >> confluence of forces that brought you together. >> yeah. >> you know, so here -- you are a bona fide star with the toronto raptors. now you are going down there to join the triple threat in miami which is going to be the biggest thing since scottie pippen and michael jordan. when you look at where you came from, hutchins, texas. you were out in the yard picking pecans, making money off of that. how far are you from those days and how do you keep things in perspective? >> it is so strange. it is funny you ask that question. like i kind of struggle with it every day. i feel like i'm -- regular guy trapped in a famous guy's body or something. you know. because i go places and -- people talk to me and they want to take pictures with me and it is still kind of strange for me because the way i grew up, it is different. my dad told me, man, you know what, if your grandpa would have lived to see the money you are making, that probably would have killed him itself. >> that's a good way to put it. >> deep inside you are still that young kid picking pecans. >> yeah. i mean, you know, i'm hard worker. i feel extremely lucky to be doing this. i get to do what i love for a living. my dad told me you want to do a job you love. there's nothing like having a job you don't love. trust me. okay. you know. i listened to that and i go to live my dream. >> that's great. >> you know, it is also interesting because, of course, a lot of controversy surrounding lebron james leaving cleveland. a lot of anger. the unprecedented angry posts on the blog from the gm of cleveland. things are easier for you leaving toronto. people were still upset. what's it going to be like now that the schedule is set and you know when you are returning to your former home field. and the same with lebron. are you the least bit nervous about that? >> yes. i mean, that's the place -- i'm not used to it. it is funny. i worked out at the heat facility and everything is so new and different. that place, i know like the back of my hand. just to come back the as an opponent sitting on the other side of the bench, you know, just -- it is going to be different. i'm looking forward to it. i think -- you know, sometimes the -- awkwardness of the situation, you have to embrace it because it is going to happen a lot. >> when you get into a position like you are, get the -- huge nba salary, everybody talks about giving back, you are giving back. this is after the all-stars perhaps. what's that about? >> well, i mean, it is -- it is pretty much what it sounds like. after-school program. there are programs all over the states. and they keep kids, you know, out of the streets. i think that's -- that's a very important thing because we all know after school, that's the biggest time to get in trouble. i think that just keeping the kids occupied and making sure that they are learning something and getting some kind of education or recreational value is important. >> you are putting your money where your mouth is. you are offering 20 bucks for every rebound you make. are you getting other players onboard with that? based on points. >> lebron participating as well. hopefully we can arrange a lot of money from the heat's perspective. >> we also see you wear a milk mustache these days because you are involved with the got milk program. this is a new one talking about mill section a great thing to drink after a tough workout. there's some evidence to support that. it is a refuel america program. obviously they paid you to be involved here. but do you believe in it? >> i think -- you know, i believe in science. if, you know, approved and everything, i think it is -- it is worth looking at. >> the science was if you use skim mill to recover after a hard workout, you get all the protein you need plus weight zblos and building muscle. not that you need that. >> healthy. the thing to be healthy right now. everybody -- i think just being aware of your body and being aware of what you need to do to stay healthy. i think that's very important. >> it is going to be hard on south beach with the fun to be had, all the restaurants. what are you looking forward to the most about your new home? >> just the weather. i think it will really hit me like in, you know, december, february, bone-chilling month. >> when i left toronto in 1989, i went to miami, too. i was so sick and tired of winter. chris, it is great to see you. >> thank you very much. >> thanks for stopping by and good luck to you. >> good luck. change-up or failure. >> pretty much. >> thanks. >> the extreme heat continues. we are talking about tropical depression number five. could become the next named storm in the gulf of mexico. we will check in with rob marciano next. i can take one airline out... and another home. so with more flight options, i can find the combination that gets me there and back quickest. where you book matters. expedia. [ but aleve can last 12 hours. tylenol 8 hour lasts 8 hours. and aleve was proven to work better on pain than tylenol 8 hour. so why am i still thinking about this? how are you? good, how are you? [ male announcer ] aleve. proven better on pain. can be unsettling. but what if there were a different story? of one financial company that grew stronger through the crisis. when some lost their way, this company led the way. by protecting clients and turning uncertainty into confidence. what if that story were true? it is. ♪ welcome back. i'm rob mars yciano. tropical depression number five, winds of 30 on miles per hour. it doesn't look like a lot. we are starting to see convection flare-up around the center. tropical storm warnings from destin florida, to the swamp there. could see tropical storm force winds as early as later tonight or tomorrow morning. as this thing begins to approach the soar lines. here is the forecast track. forecast to become a tropical storm. winds as high as 50 miles an hour. and then scoot across the mountains of the mississippi and river and get up into mississippi. it has been skimming further to the right. movement now northwesterly at 12 miles an hour. and they have halted some of the drilling operations because of that. there is the rotation. you see the showers and storms. other thing about the story is the heat, dangerous heat across the midsection of the country. things will begin to cool down this weekend. that's a quick check on weather. tdd# 1-800-345-2550 what if every atm was free? tdd# 1-800-345-2550 no more $2, $3 fees. tdd# 1-800-345-2550 no more paying to access your own money. tdd# 1-800-345-2550 it'd be like every atm in the world was your atm. tdd# 1-800-345-2550 the schwab bank high yield investor checking(tm) account. tdd# 1-800-345-2550 zero atm fees. tdd# 1-800-345-2550 a great interest rate. tdd# 1-800-345-2550 no minimums. tdd# 1-800-345-2550 and it's fdic-insured. tdd# 1-800-345-2550 the schwab bank high yield investor checking(tm) account. tdd# 1-800-345-2550 the biggest thing in checking since checks. tdd# 1-800-345-2550 open an account at 1-800-4schwab or schwab.com. ♪ ♪ i'm going to give all my secrets away ♪ snow. time for your "a.m. house call." stories about your health. a medical mystery. why do some people wake up every night from the slightest noise and others can sleep through anything? >> the answer is inside your mind. so who better to explain this than our chief medical correspondent dr. is an gentleman gupta. why is sleep such a unique thing for each individual, sanjay? >> we are so fascinated by things we just simply don't get enough of. sleep in this case turns out. it is interesting. for a long time researchers have known about this characteristic, brain pattern in the brain. when you go to sleep your brain doesn't go to sleep completely. one of the waves is known as sleep spindles. they don't know quite how it works. that's the focus of the new study. it is fascinating. let me give you an idea what we are talking about here. animation of the brain. let's say you are sleeping and some sort of loud noise happens in the middle of the night. thunderclaper for example. some people stay asleep and some people wake up. the question for a long time has been why. here is the ear over here. the sound will travel from the ear. closer to the center of the brain. area known as the balance. this is important. and from there, oftentimes it is going to go to the cortex, the brain, where this disturbance is sort of recognized by the individual. they feel and it may wake up by it. someone that has a lot of sleep spindles, think of those as blocking this. the moys is still getting into the brain, the disturbance. it is not not ever getting to the point you become where. people that have more sleep spindles will not have more disturbances throughout the night. that's basically how they are saying this works. >> one of the other questions a lot of people want to know if you sleep more soundly, is that better than if you wake up or able goat yourself back to sleep again? >> if you sleep more soundly, obviously that's going to be better. the question has been who -- can you sort of determine who is going to sleep more soundly or not. in this study, what they did is studied people that were in a completely quiet environment. everyone makes these sleep spindles as they sleep. people that had the most sleep spindles were getting most sleep. what's interesting as well, a lot of times people who have fewer sleep spindles wake up 20, 30 times throughout the night and they would say they only woke up once or wise. that's all they would remember. the point their quality of sleep was deeply diminished. >> for light sleepers out there, is there anything that could be done to help them? i think that -- >> why do you ask, john? >> join. maybe because -- i actually don't suffer from that problem. a cannon can go off. i slept in israel when there was artillery going off. we hear about people that move in next to a railroad track and after a while, you know, they don't even know that it is there anymore. is there anything they can do, science can do, to help people that suffer from the problem? >> it is interesting because there's all sorts of different ways to get better sleep. there's sleep aids, for example. ways to change your environment. certainly if you are very tired, you are likely to sleep more soundly. the interesting thing is these spindles, you have a certain number of them. it seems very hard to increase those numbers. they seem to decrease as we get older. that's where -- exactly where researchers started focusing their attention next. they want to get more spindles. why? it gives you -- allows you to not be distracted as whch you sleep. it seems to be the best quality of sleep as well. better than a sleep aid. >> wouldn't that be nice. we need spindles here. >> take care. 55 minutes past the hour. today in our building of america series making sure a very tragic moment in history does not repeat itself. so many people were left to suffer in new orleans after hurricane katrina because they couldn't get out. >> some were simply too old to able to get themselves out. other cases, too poor. tom foreman shows us a new effort to make sure no one is left behind next time. >> reporter: in the wake of katrina, tens of thousands of new orleanian were stranded because they lacked transportation, information or the inclination to evacuate before the storm. beverly mitchell with a clunker of an old car was one of them. >> i didn't believe katrina was going to be devastating. >> reporter: you found out otherwise. >> i sure did. yes, i did. >> reporter: she wound up in the superdome's heat, squalor, darkness for days. now in the shadow of that same building, a growing group is building up their plan to avoid a repeat of that calamity. >> we need this to save lives. >> reporter: volunteers from all over town who are training to help their fellow citizens get out when a big storm comes in. robert fogerty is the founder. >> if year not preparing our vulnerable residents for way to leave and have them feel safe in that process, you know, we are not doing the best we can. >> reporter: about 30,000 residents lack reliable transportation. so when an evacuation is called, 700 people man collection points all over, offering information, assistance with bags, help with paperwork, and getting those people on to buses and on their way. what's the number one sort of mission for you? >> for me personally, it is to get every person in this city somewhere safe if there is a storm coming. >> we are here to make sure that the -- you know, bridge between the gears and people are calmed down. >> evacuteer.org is about taking care of my extended family and hopefully the rest of everybody feels like we are family. >> reporter: hurricane gustav tested their skills two years ago and say it went well. but they keep improving. always mindful of the chaos of katrina. >> i think our organization exists to reduce and never have happen what happened five years ago. that just can't happen. >> reporter: beverly mitch sell counting on that. >> there are people here that don't have transportation. there are people that have medical problems, people that have financial problems, people that have questions,

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