happening now in the newsroom just four days until we go over the so-called fiscal cliff. why that deadline could hit unemployed americans hard. training teachers to defend themselves and their students. hundreds of educators attend a free gun class in utah. it s the latest response to the newtown school massacre that s attracting a lot of attention this morning. thousands of dockworkers could put the u.s. economy at risk if they go on strike on sunday. we ll take you inside the crisis some are calling the container cliff. and sea world taking its water act all the way to wall street. why investors could soon own a peace of shamu. newsroom starts right now. good morning. i m victor blackwell. carol has the morning off. with the nation still reeling from the shooting massacre in newtown, connecticut, and engaged in a national debate on gun control, chicago suffered a grim milestone last night, a man was killed in a shooting on chicago s dangerous west side. this scene
captions by vitac www.vitac.com good morning. i m alison kosik. and i m christi paul. it is 8:00 on the east coast. 5:00 for all you early birds out west, obviously. and it s early. yes. start with negotiations going on this weekend to try and keep going off the fiscal cliff. the deadline is now just three days away. president obama is modestly optimistic. our chief white house correspondent jessica yellin has more on what needs to happen in order to make a deal. reporter: alison, christi, hi. the good news is things could have been worse. it doesn t seem to those of us watching from the sidelines as though time is running out, but congress does some of its best or at least its speediest work when the nation s back is against the wall. after a rare oval office meeting with top congressional leaders, the president said he s modestly optimistic a deal can come together. emphasis on modestly. the american people are watching what we do here. obviously, their
miraculously, the damage to people was minor, mostly cuts from splintered glass. michael garnett, a canadian goalie who plays for chelyabinsk in the russian hockey league hasas felt a few bangs in his time but nothing like this. reporter: 70 miles outside of town a meteor-shaped hole in the ice of a lake indicates the visitor nameless visitor s last resting place. meteorite fragments were sc scattered around likerstellar c interstellar calling cards. as if anyone would ever forget. chelyabinsk has made history before for not being in the news. it was part of the old soviet union s nuclear weapons program and wa and was a closed zone, forbiddenground for ground for foreigners. now it s famous as the place where heaven and earth met withen and e a bang, anthony. mason: mark phillips. thanks, mark. derrick pitts is chief astronomer at the franklin institute in philadelphia. derrick, what caused this huge explosion and sonic boom that s associated with this meteor? asso and w
captured here and here. some of the explosions are the sonic boom caused by a space object the size of a large bus moving through the air at what the russian academy of science said was 33,000 miles an hour. if you were in your apartment you suspected something was up. and then you were sure. if you thought you were safe in a classroom, you weren t. it caused widespread damage to buildings, blew out thousands of windows, knocked down walls. miraculously, the damage to people was minor, mostly cuts from splintered glass. michael garnett a canadian goalie who plays for chelyabinsk in the russian hockey league has felt a few bangs in his time, but nothing like this. i was terrified. i had just hit the snooze bar on my iphone for another nine minutes of sleep and all of a sudden, you know, i fell back asleep and i hear this loud bang! i live in a 24-story building on the 23rd floor and all of a sudden i look up and the lights are shaking and i hear car alarms going off and it w
these kids, it was her mission. captioning sponsored by cbs this is the cbs evening news with scott pelley. mason: scott is on assignment. i m anthony mason. it happened in a flash and without warning. a meteor weighing 15 million pounds streaked across the sky over russia today causing a shock wave with a force equivalent to a small atomic bomb. the biggest meteor blast in more than a century. more than a thousand people were hurt, most from flying glass, when windows were blown out. that streak of light could be seen for hundreds of miles. the city of chelyabinsk 900 miles east of moscow bore the brunt. mark phillips begins our coverage. reporter: thi reporter: i m outer space may have been happening since the dawn of time but never before in the age of the dashboard video camera. on a highway outside of chelyabinsk in central russia a flash of light emerges out of a clear blue sky. it becomes a streak, then foreboding glow. it leaves a trail and other cameras are