well, you know, there s excitement to hear that the young man seemingly is okay from all indications, and there s also like an eerie quiet around here because of the passing of mr. dykes as we have heard. so, you know, you hear the good and you hear the bad. we hate there had to be any blood shed but our hearts are thankful that from all indications will be okay. reporter: how difficult has it been to see the standoff go on for 140 hours and to wait okay. martin, i m going to throw it back to you. from what we understand, the press conference is starting now. sheriff wally olson, colonel hugh mccall with the alabama bureau of investigation, major neil tu chief of the alabama bureau of investigation. at approximately 3:12 this
hugh mccall, h-u-g-h, mccall m-c-c-a-l-l. thank you. so we re just hearing from what appears to be a public relations spokesperson explaining that in five minutes a press conference will be taking place. gabe gutierrez is our correspondent on the ground. gabe, go ahead. reporter: hi, martin. how are you? certainly a lot of excitement here as people await this news conference. i was able to confirm with local law enforcement that the child is alive and the suspect is dead at this point. and right now i am joined by michael, one of the local pastors that really has been so involved in this entire ordeal and comforting so many people in this community. pastor, tell me what have you heard and what is the sentiment around here right now?
they re looking for a sign that the individual dykes has some hope for the future, some thought of clint, we ve got to go. the press conference, i believe, is about to begin. so the we re going right there now. steve richardson, who is the special agent in charge of the fbi s mobile division along with dale county sheriff wally olson as well as hugh mccall, we re going to give a briefing on the development that took place in this investigation and this will not be an opportunity for they will not entertain questions. we will have opportunities later for that. this is just a general briefing to discuss the development of what happened here today. so should be in five minutes. steve richardson, the spelling richards richardson. sure you all know wally olson o-l-s-o-n.
but we begin in new orleans. a city deeply embarrassed by the power blackout that interrupted potentially could have changed the course of the super bowl. this is much more than a sports story. it s raising very serious questions about the city s readiness to host big events. cnn s brian todd is in new orleans for us. he s got the very latest on this investigation on what happened during that blackout. brian, what are you learning? reporter: wolf, learning se incremental things about the investigation. how it s proceeding, how they re looking into it. and what s interesting is the two entries responsible for handling the power and electricity to the superdome, they re the ones handling it. at various times over the past less than 24 hours since this happened, both of them have said they essentially didn t do anything wrong. this was a dramatic event. starting right as the third quarter got under way in the superdome last night. we ve got video of the lights going out. we ve
0 come down that dirt road before, and it was around the same time we heard that boom, when we heard that activity, and, you know, we re just really waiting to find out, and certainly if that is true, that this child made it out, that would be an incredible relief for this community. midland city, alabama, is a small town, about 2,400 people, and they have just been rocked by this standoff the past few days. about 140 hours at this point, and people here are tired because they ve been praying for the past few days. they ve been watching this unfold and really hoping that this would turn have a peaceful resolution, and they ve been putting up ribbons, holding prayer vigils every night, praying for 5-year-old e ethan to survive that horrible ordeal. gabe, do stay with us, because we will come to you if this press conference occurs in the next few minutes. joining us now is former fbi profiler clint van zandt. clint, are you on the line with negotiations, and should mr. dykes be decea