hello again. i'm ana cabrera. thank you for staying with us as we follow breaking news at this hour. a strong earthquake has caused dozens of injuries and significant damage in napa, california, and the surrounding communities. here's what we know right now. governor jerry brown declared a state of emergency after the 6.0 magnitude quake hit nine hours ago. it was at 3:20 a.m. local time centered about six miles from napa and roughly 50 miles from san francisco between two major

fault systems. it struck just six miles deep which is why so many people felt it and at least 90 people have been hurt. most of them have just minor injuries, cuts, laceration, bruises. but we do know at least three people suffered critical injuries including a child who was hit by a falling fireplace. emergency crews have been scrambling to contain fires that broke out after this quake hit. five mobile homes were destroyed in these flames and napa officials say rescue teams were deployed after some people became trapped in their homes and now the governor has sent three urban rescue crews to the region in order to make sure no one else is trapped. several buildings, particularly in the downtown napa area, did suffer damage and that includes many historic buildings like the napa county courthouse. the usgs estimates more than 1 million people experienced some kind of shaking ranging from moderate to severe. those are people who would likely have felt the most and experienced maybe the most

damage but even more people could have felt the quake including one family who caught rumbling on their in-home security camera. watch this. >> it's an earthquake. >> you see that stuff just flying off the walls and a child running up the stairs to her parents. shocked clearly. these are more images of some of the damage that happened. the earthquake cracking and buckling roads knocking out power to at least 15,000 people. there have been 50 to 100 gas main breaks officials tell us and 30 water main leaks. we hope to have even more information. the update on their response to those breaks coming up in just a moment. this is the strongest earthquake

to hit this area since 1989. it was a big one. the white house even says president obama has been briefed on this quake. and federal officials are in touch with the state and the local responders in this area in case more resources are needed. we know there have now been 60 aftershocks felt in the napa area since the quake hit. all of them fairly minor. there were a couple. one that was a 2.5 magnitude and 3.6 magnitude aftershock and there's potential for 5.0 magnitude aftershock. let's go live right now to a press conference with new information. this is in napa county. >> this is the 12:00 briefing as promised. i had hoped this afternoon that we would have more information to share with you in terms of details. we're finding that our people in the field are struggling to get out and do necessary work and get back and report so we'll probably have more detail for you in a few hours.

a couple of the questions that came up this morning we did look into. one of the questions was the extent of damage that occurred and were they unreinforced masonry buildings or not. of those that had major damage, the three buildings on brown street, address is 816 to 820, were unreinforced masonry buildings that had not been brought up to standards even though we have been working with them for number of years to bring them up to code. most of the others, only one other building is unreinforced and that's the oldest building in town. we have not done an inspection of that building yet. we don't have any reports there was damage there. most of the other buildings that have been damaged either weren't masonry or had damage given

circumstances that exist. we have 15 to 16 buildings that have been red tagged. in other words, occupancy will not be allowed until they've been repaired and we've had inspections. there are numerous buildings that have been yellow tagged, which means that we are providing limited access to people can make them habitable. most of those cases are broken windows, glass, dangerous conditions that exist and we are letting people in for limited access so they can get their businesses up and running. we are putting a list together of the specifics in terms of what those businesses are and where they are so that we can share that with you as soon as we have it. as far as the injury report, we don't have any additional information from what we gave you earlier in the day. about 87 people have either been

taken to or went to the hospital with injuries. three critical conditions. one was a minor that was air lifted to another hospital and two are adults that are in critical. the rest i believe are at various injuries that are not listed as dangerous. we don't have anymore detail. we don't know if there have been any other people that have been brought to the hospital or driven in on their own. i will ask the fire chief if he has any additional information to share. my name is mike parness, city manager and this is mike randolph. >> randolph.

the majority of what we've been doing for the last several hours assessing the damage of a lot of our buildings in the downtown area making sure that there was no imminent rescue and happy to say that there has not been. so we have currently four type one strike teams in the city. we have two task force in the city and one strike team of water tenders. what we're also simultaneously addressing is a bunch of calls like over 100 calls of the smell of natural gas so that's our primary attention right now. and that's it for fire. jack, do you have an update?

jack is our public works director. >> just as an update, we have identified 60 water main breaks. 20 of those have been isolated and shut off. and we are now in more of a recovery mode to go through and fix those issues. we will have five crews working in two shifts, 12-hour shifts, for however long it takes us to repair those. we do have some mutual aid and folks coming in who will be able to provide not only equipment but also any kind of repair kits that we need for water mains. the good news is that none of our larger transmission mains appear to have been damaged. that is really good news. so it's just more of the distribution lines that are causing the problem. other than that, that's pretty

much it for the public works update. >> we will you take questions? >> sure. >> how far do you imagine power being -- until it's restored? >> power, that i don't know about. i'm just talking about water mains. you have to talk to pg&e on that. i don't know if there's anyone here from -- >> how many people are affected from the water issues right now? >> we're in the process of identifying all of those folks and to get a number. we don't know exactly the number quite yet. we are looking at all of the affected areas and to get a good and accurate count for you. when we get that information, perhaps at the next briefing. >> any word on when it will be restored? >> we think it may take a full week to get everything restored. we're going to go as quickly as possible to restore things. it may take us that long. >> do you have a ballpark number of how many people? >> i do not.

i'm sorry. >> when you say that you have shut 20 of the 60, does that mean you have 40 water mains that are still leaking? >> yes. >> a lot of water? a dangerous amount of water? >> no. no. both water treatment plants are on feeding water through the leaks. so like i said earlier, the water pressure is still pretty good. there are some areas that water pressure is lower but we have good water pressure for the most part and we're not concerned about is that. if one of our water transmission lines would have broken, that would have been another story. we are fortunate. >> how many water mains are there in the city roughly? >> well, we have 200 plus miles of streets and i'm not sure of the number but we have at least that many miles of water mains plus all of our transmission lines that go up and down the valley. our main water treatment plant is at jameson canyon so we have

large transmission water line that comes down across the river and up on the west side and east side of the river. and then we have another reservoir that we've opened up and that's feeding from the north. fortunately we have both of those facilities online feeding water. >> what are the condition of the roads at this point? >> the roads aren't too bad. we do have a few locations, a handful that we've had some buckling streets but nothing that's really serious enough to cause us to close a road. our bridges are in pretty good shape. we assessed the downtown bridges, the ones over the river. those seem to be all doing pretty well. >> for people that are complaining about not having water, why is that? >> could you repeat the question? >> a lot of people are complaining they don't have

water. is that due to the break? >> yes. >> so it is causing a lot of people to be without water? >> and there's going to be a point where we'll have to shut down the water lines so that we can -- when we do the repair, it has to be dry. we can't have pressurized water while we do repair. when we isolated those lines to shut off the leak, it causes -- it will cause a few people on that particular line to be without water. we're trying to restore that as quickly as possible. >> what should they do? >> you know, we're going to be providing some water stations around. if there are some real issues give us a call and we'll try to deal with this as best we can. >> do you mean water trucks? >> well, we'll try to bring some -- i don't think we'll have

water trucks. we'll have places for people to get water if they need water. >> are you saying these repairs are not a big deal and shouldn't take a lot of time is that why nobody should be concerned setting up water stations? >> well, we're just doing that for convenience of folks to get water. it could be a week or so before we get everything buttoned up because we have a lot of -- there are 60 breaks out there. you have to realize we can't just start digging to repair a water line. we have to call the utility companies to make sure where we dig we don't hit another gas line or electrical line or some other line so there's a process that we have to go through before we even start the repair. >> so some people may be without water for a week? >> some people may. we'll try to get that fixed as quickly as possible. >> could we get the gentleman who spoke with the number of questions rather than getting

one at a time because i'm not certain who would be the right person to answer this, gas line breaks or smelling of gas, what's being done about that? and then if someone could address how many people are displaced from their homes and what sort of emergency shelter has been set up. don't know who to direct that to. >> let me address a question that came up earlier about the number of people impacted by power outages. it's my understanding that there are as many as 20,000 individuals without power. we have almost 80,000 people in the city. it gives you an idea of the scale. more and more are coming back online as we speak and we're working closely with pg&e to try to keep track of that. i will let -- mike, can you answer that? >> the question regarding the evacuation center is at crossroads community church. that's right off first street.

and was there another question? >> how many fires did firefighters respond to with the gas lines? >> well, the fires that we had initially this morning, it certainly -- it's more than probable that ruptured gas lines had something to do with those fires this morning. the other part of your question, what are we doing about the gas leaks? well, let me be very clear that this is a smell of natural gas that's being reported through 911 and between our crews, law enforcement, and pg&e gas, we're out hitting each of those to see if it's something that we need to secure the gas or not. >> there was a request for a coroner at the river front property. do you have information on that and whether it was related to anything earthquake? >> i'll let the police department address that. >> the answer to that question

is it was not related to the earthquake. we do realize that with 20,000 people out of 80,000 in town being affected, it's important to remember too that a lot of areas were not impacted or they did not suffer damage. there are a lot of stores, restaurants that are still open serving the needs of the community. if you could get that message out there too, we would appreciate that. >> how many people have been displaced? how many people are without a home? >> i don't have a number. >> are you getting resources now that you didn't have earlier this morning? are you gotten calls from the state? >> we've had great cooperation from the county and the state and our congressman mike thompson is here and he may want to talk a little bit about how the process works and the kind of support that he's been

bringing. i don't have -- we've only had a couple hours since getting all of these numbers so we're doing our best to try to find how many people -- how many have been displaced and how many need shelter are two different stories. vast majority of the people have other places to go staying with family or have been able to transition from their homes. many of those people will be able to move back into their homes as soon as we have a chance to check them out. i appreciate the comments that have been made by the police department. most of the valley is operating as normal. i've been getting a lot of calls from people from outside the area that were planning on coming here that are worried about it for fear that this is some kind of a disaster area which means they can't come here and enjoy the valley. the damage is in isolated locations. issues are significant. we're on it and it's getting better. i think it's going to get -- the conditions will be vastly improved over the next few days

as we get on top of this. [ inaudible question ] >> we encourage people to call in advance and check with their lodging partners on condition of where they are staying and make a judgment. most of the places in the valley have not been impacted. [ inaudible question ] >> no. don't have a ballpark. really haven't gotten -- right now we're in the initial response mode where we are trying to figure out what the conditions are. once we have that identified, then we'll start putting numbers to it and try to get a better handle on it. we really can't do that now. it's only been a few hours. >> what's the message to people walking around town? >> we're trying to close the areas off to the public where there are buildings that have had debris falling and there are hazardous conditions.

we have closed off most of the streets where those conditions exist and we're trying to keep pedestrians out as well. once we get inspectors in and check things out and see if they're safe, we'll make it more assessable. we would ask people to be patient and stay away if possible and let us do our jobs. >> can you tell us the addresses that were unreinforced? >> 816 through 820. >> do you have a list of the ten buildings that have not had retrofitting? >> i think the only other one that i'm aware of is the old odobe restaurant. oldest building in the city. my understanding is there have been no reports of damage there. we're going to check that out. >> you're saying that only four buildings total in the city of napa that have not been

reinforced? >> i believe so. there were a couple that had not been reinforced that were on our list but they haven't experienced the kind of damage we're talking about. >> there are others? >> there are one or two others. i think a total of six, i'm not positive. i think a total of six. three of those were heavily damaged and they are red tagged and won't be occupied until they are brought under compliance. >> is there a possibility of aftershocks that could exacerbate the situation? >> we're aware of the potential for aftershocks. we're being careful but we're not -- we're in no position to alter the way we respond to the situation because it might happen. >> this is the biggest quake since 1989 yet it also could have been a lot bigger. how do you feel about napa's preparations for a bigger event and earthquakes in general after

seeing what happened this morning? >> i'm pleased with the amount of work that took place between '89 and now. i'm pleased with the emergency response training and resources that we've had. we had a lot of practice with floods in the old days. we have a team that knows how to respond to these. i'm pleased with the coordination and cooperation from other entities that have come forward and offered their support and help since this may move on through many days i think that will really come in handy as we start rotating the first responding crew through and bringing in backup. a lot of positive things are happening in a very difficult circumstances. >> do you have the manpower you need now? >> we have the manpower we need to do the initial response. we know that we're going to be probably rotating people out in about 12-hour shifts so we can continue to work over the next days or weeks as necessary. that will require that we bring in resources in beyond what we

have on staff. >> do you have any detail as to what is taking so long to get to buildings that have been damaged and not retrofitted, why they were behind and what issues were? >> i don't have specifics about why it took so long for those particular buildings. >> we bring in outside law enforcement -- you have so many buildings vulnerable. any discussion of curfew or anything like that? what sort of security plan do you have for damaged buildings? >> we've had many of our local merchants step up and offer plywood and resources so people can secure their buildings. police are working with them. we have great community that come together during this type of circumstances. we're not seeing those conflicts. we see people come together and helping us secure buildings and get people back online as soon as possible. no need for a curfew at this time. security will be a priority.

we're watching closely and we'll be on the streets. it's not been an issue. [ inaudible question ] >> i have not heard that. can you tell me where that was? >> no. >> okay. >> on a related question, we also heard reports that because of the lack of water pressure, you did have a difficult time fighting the fire in the mobile home park. is that true? can you confirm that? >> you know what, at 3:30 this morning when we initially startedostart started our firefighting activities, there was a delay in obtaining water. i can only imagine it was due to water main breaks. but we're able to use fortunately the majority of our engines carry 500 gallons of water on each of them so we use

that water to extinguish. >> how many agencies are working together with you guys in all aspects? >> oh my gosh. definitely over 20 and less than 200. >> one more question on the damaged buildings. were there any majorly damaged buildings that had been retrofitted that it was not as effective as you had hoped? >> there were buildings that had been retrofitted that were damaged and buildings that -- masonry buildings that were damaged. the reinforcement that takes flakes in those buildings is intended to hold up the walls but there are some features on buildings and improvements and those type of things that can still come off in an earthquake and in fact even if they are built to the highest standards, a strong earthquake will cause damage to buildings. it's not a guarantee.

some of the buildings that were damaged had recently been completely upgraded or recently built so it just depends on where they are and what conditions are. i don't have addresses off the top of my head. we can get some information for you in the future. >> is the department of justice one of the buildings that's been red tagged and others like it? >> the county is handling their own review of their facilities. i understand that they closed off access to the administration building. i don't know whether that was because of damage or safety concerns and they moved their operations to the eoc operations to the sheriff's department. that's really something they look at. similarly, the school district is taking a look at the conditions of their schools and since they are a state operation, they have the ability to make their own declarations and determine -- >> when you say you have 15 to 16 red tagged unhabitable

buildings, those are not county buildings or not federal building like the post office? >> we did -- i can't remember whether it was yellow tag or red tag. we are looking at the buildings like the post office because there was damage there. they are government buildings but not ours, we work with them and identified what we think should be done but it's outside of our jurisdiction to enforce it. i will have that available to you as we move forward. >> will you have additional briefin briefings? >> i think maybe if we come back early this evening, 5:00 or -- let's make it 5:00. does that work better for your schedules? we can come back at 5:00 and i hope to have details. before i close, however, we do have congressman mike thompson,

council member pete mott and they may want to say words. i'm throwing this at you. i didn't talk to any of you ahead of time. if you have an interest to say something, you're welcome. congressman? >> i don't have to say anything. >> we're going to break away from this press conference. a live update on the status of the situation there in napa, california, after that earthquake hit early this morning. it was a 6.0 magnitude. so considered a strong earthquake that rocked the region really but really did affect that community there in napa since it was just six miles from the center of that earthquake that now hit about nine hours ago. as we heard from the napa city manager, they are having trouble accessing all of the areas to

make sure they have a good breath of exactly what they are having to deal with as they continue to pick up the pieces and to secure buildings, to go through and make sure people are safe. we did hear that they do not believe anybody else may be trapped or need to be rescued. the injuries still stand around 89 according to the hospital spokesperson and that was confirmed at this latest news conference that most of those injuries were minor but three people were critically injured including a child who had to be air lifted to a hospital after a fire system fell on top of her. several homes were damaged in fires because of gas main breaks. we know there are still gas lines that have to be repaired. there are still water lines that have to be repaired and in fact some 60 water main breaks and now people do not have water in certain parts of the area. also, 20,000 people is the estimate who do not have power because power lines are down. so the cleanup continues there.

we now know at least 15 or 16 buildings just in the heart of downtown napa have some significant damage and enough that they are uninhabitable so they are of course bringing in their structural engineers to continue to assess the damage. we'll continue to follow this story as we learn new information and we'll pass it along here on cnn. we're also following more breaking news today. the release of an american held hostage in syria. we'll have an update on that situation when we come back.

we have breaking news on two fronts. an american held hostage has been released in syria. also, people in northern california are cleaning up after a strong earthquake this morning. let's start with the hostage situation. law enforcement sources telling us that american peter theo curtis held hostage by islamic

rebels since 2012 was release dad in syria. the united nations is responding saying it facilitated the hand ov over. our evan perez is live and we'll start with you. >> we know the u.s. government will try to reunite him with his family. he crossed over from syria in the last four hours or so. obviously this has been a long time coming. he's been held hostage since 2012 according to officials i have talked to by this group, an islamic group fighting the assad government. this is a separate group from the isis group that beheaded an american journalist and released that information earlier this week. so this is obviously very good news for this family in massachusetts that is looking forward to a very happy reunion. >> you mentioned that this has

been ongoing since 2012 when he was initially captured. why has it been so quiet about his capture? why haven't we heard much from authorities before now? >> reporter: the fbi has been investigating the case. one of the things they try to do often is to keep it quiet because they try to figure out who has the hostage and sometimes other groups might try to grab the hostage from the group that's holding him so there is a risk that he might be transferred into hands of someone more dangerous and sometimes the family becomes a target of ransom demands. a lot of them are false. this is something that the fbi tries to work in secret at least for a period until they can work out the leads. >> we still don't know what kind of deal was made here. erin mcpike is at the white house. i want to bring her into the conversation. what are you learning about the

release of peter theo curtis? >> reporter: we also just got an alert from the united nations that they have turned curtis over to the u.s. government. however, we are still working to hear more updates from the u.s. government on that particular point. we have gotten some statements in from two high ranking officials, both secretary of state john kerry as well as national security adviser susan rice and in john kerry's statement he points out that they worked closely with his mother in massachusetts who worked tirelessly for his return and u.s. worked with more than two dozen countries trying to get help, military tools, information, leverage, anything they could get from other countries in trying to secure his release. i want to read part of susan rice's statement to you. she goes onto make another point. she says "just as we celebrate theo's freedom, we hold in our thoughts and prayers the americans who remain in captivity in syria

notwithstanding today's welcome news the events of the past week shocked the conscious of the world as president obama said, we have and will continue to use all of the tools at our disposal to see that the remaining american hostages are freed." john kerry in his statement makes mention of that as well. he says they will use any diplomatic intelligence and military tools to make sure that they get the americans who are still being held hostage in syria and in another parts of the world, which is obviously a very important point as the united states continues its mission and decides the way forward in syria. >> we know there are multiple groups now holding americans hostage in syria or iraq in that region. do we know how many americans are currently being held hostage? >> reporter: we don't. that's one thing that the u.s. government specifically has been keeping close to the vest because for their safety, they don't want to give out specific numbers. >> all right. erin mcpike, thank you. nick paton walsh, i know you are learning more about peter curtis

and his capture and captivity. what can you tell us? >> an interesting point to talk about first is where peter curtis was handed over from syria. he was given to the u.n. peacekeepers working in a disputed part between israel and syria. it's really confusing place for him to end up given he was held north of syria for some time. to make a journey there he would have to travel all of the way around damascus in syria and then around again through complicated territory west to finally make an exit there. a very complicated point of release. as you mentioned, we know more about the actual captivity of peter theo curtis because i spoke last year to the man who was in his cell, another american, matthew schrier. they shared a time for some time. we understand they were held by

a radical group who were also prescribed as a terrorist organization by the united states. these two americans sharing a cell hatched an escape plan and part of that plan because they only had a window and top of the cell to get out of to escape to freedom, that plan involved one standing on the back of another. as it turned out when they came to execute that plan, theo was the one who pushed matthew schrier up but matt had this agonizing choice to go back in and try this again or do i run and he knew guards were close by and he had little chance. he chose to run and live with that decision for the months afterwards. when i spoke to him in august last year, he was racked by that call he had to make. today i spoke to him and he said it was the happiest day of his life when he learned theo had been released. in tears when i spoke to him but another american relieved today. >> it sounds like peter theo

curtis was a hero in his own right helping someone else get free when he couldn't get free himself. do you know anymore about the conditions he was living in or how he was treateded by alp nusrah. >> talking about hunger and they had personal information taken out of him. matt found that his credit card was ransacked and things were bought on ebay using his own personal information. they were beaten. they were given fake executions. a terrifying experience that matt went through. theo wasn't spared from that too so that just compounds how relieved everyone is that they are now both safe. >> nick paton walsh, evan perez and erin mcpike, thanks to all of you. another breaking news story we're following today. that huge earthquake that hit northern california. it was a 6.0. the strongest to hit this region in the past 25 years. just as we were talking to nick

paton walsh there, we have learned that 120 people now have sustained injuries. this coming just into us in the last few minutes from this earthquake. in fact, they have received several heart attack patients at one of the hospitals in napa we're told and have at least three people in orthopedic surgery right now. we're gathering more details on the earthquake and we'll bring those to you straight ahead. et n negatively impact good bacteria? even if you're healthy and active. phillips digestive health support is a duo-probiotic that helps supplement good bacteria found in two parts of your digestive tract. i'm doubly impressed! phillips' digestive health. a daily probiotic.

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it's very much not the big one. for us, it's an extremely interesting earthquake. we haven't had an earthquake this size in 25 years. it's on -- we're not certain of the actual fault it's on but what happens in the bay area is the strain from the san andreas fault is diffused on a number of structures to the east. these are smaller faults. we're still trying to put together how all of those pieces behave and this is very, very interesting event and i use that warily because it damaged napa and we're worried about all of the people injured there. >> jack, it's chad myers.

i have a question for you. can you, for our viewers, describe what a seven-mile deep earthquake feels like compared to a 100-mile deep earthquake? what does the shake feel like? how is it different? >> well, the seven-mile deep earthquake is an earthquake that's occurring in the crust of the earth. so those are sort of our characteristic run of the mill earthquakes. i can just tell you for myself at 3:20 in the morning, i felt about five or six seconds of rolling shaking but that's because i live in san francisco, not up in napa. so what the earth does is it does a very good job of tracking the energy in the crust and for

most of the people in the region, that's what you feel. the energy that's trapped in the crust. >> jack, this is ana again. when you talk about a 6.0 earthquake, is what we're seeing in terms of the effects, the damage that we've heard about there in napa of buildings that have some destruction but maybe aren't completely flattened, not collapsed, is this what you would expect or are we seeing less damage because of great engineering in the california region in general? >> we're seeing about what we expect in napa although saying that i don't think i have a great idea of how much damage there is and i'm sure we're going to find there's more

damage. the problem for napa is similar to the problem for a lot of communities in the bay area, there are a combination of old and new buildings and the older buildings, which were built before the building codes really came up to their modern standard in 1975 are more vulnerable. they're masonry buildings and that's probably what we'll see the damage to. fortunately no collapses. the earthquake wasn't strong enough for that. >> the downtown area of napa where the older buildings reside is where we see the most significant damage with 15 or 16 buildings red tagged as we were told by the napa county manager. thank you for being part of this conversation. we appreciate it. also want to mention that we've now learned that the napa schools are closed tomorrow because of the earthquake and one of those schools, the high

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thanks for staying with us. back to the other big storey great news we've learned, an

american held hostage in syria has been released talking about peter theo curtis, abducted in 2012, held in syria, and u.s. officials say he was released today. he is safe. and now hearing from his family. erin mcpike live at the white house. what exactly is the family saying. >> reporter: this statement comes from his family but specifically from his mother, nancy curtis. i want to read part of statement to you that we are just getting in. we are so relieved u.s. is healthy and safe and he's finally headed home after his ordeal but deeply saddened by the terrible, unjustified killing last week of his fellow journalist james foley at the hand of the islamic state of iraq and syria, isis. she got to know the foley family during this time. she goes on to say, we appeal to the captors of the remaining hostages to release them in the same humanitarian spirit that prompted theo's release. the family is not privy to the exact terms that were negotiated, we were repeatedly told by representatives of the

qatari government that they were mediating for theo's release on a humanitarian basis without the payment of money. he wrote under theo pados and wrote a book "under cover muslim," he's 45. the family's asking for privacy. but nancy curtis says she's relieved he will be able to tell his own story. >> good news. erin mcpike, thank you. just in to us, he's headed to tel aviv. he's already in the custody of u.s. authorities. and that a u.s. senior official reiterating that the u.s. does not negotiate with terrorists and there was no ransom paid in this case. thank you, erin mcpike. another story we're watching, more good news to share. chicago's little league team is now in the little league world series championship. it's the jackie robinson west squad, which is composed entirely of african-americans. now, taking on the south korean

team. however, there is within team you may not have heard of, which has a strong connection to those chicago boys. here's our jim sciutto. >> reporter: there's just something about baseball this time of year, the crack of the bat, the playful laughter, and those smells, anyone who loves the game knows the freshly cut grass, the dirt flying up in the air, the warm sun drenching the field. this is little league baseball at its finest. but in the summer of 1955, the cannon ymca team, the only african-american little league team out of charleston, south carolina, found themselves center stage in the national little league tournament in williams port, pennsylvania. advancing to the big game after all 60 white teams boycotted the local and state tournaments. >> we went on and checked into a

dormitory, which was where all of the players stayed from around the country. and we had fun that night, of course. that night was like away from home, for the first time. >> reporter: but on game day, they were denied the right to play, only practice. little league baseball telling the cannon all-stars they were ineligible because they advanced only after the other teams had forfeited. as the team left the field, the chant "let them play" came over the crowd. the group of boys sat in their seats and watched their dream fade right in front of their very eyes. >> the fans just went into a big chant, roar, and we all now say that it's haunting, you know? we remember that to today, that the chant of "let them play," just stays with you even now. >> reporter: john rivers, one of the original players, says the

decision was littered with bigotry and prejudice. >> it's bigger than baseball. it's bigger than us. it's really the beginning of the civil rights movement. we were in the midst of that. of course we were the kids, but the adults were using this opportunity to move the racial agenda forward. >> it's important to understand that this is happening at the time of brown versus board of education, that the entire south is crumbling, and in absolute panic over this, and that the day that the cannon all-stars got back from charleston, twhent up to williams port and got to watch the world series. the day they got back, the day that emmett till was murdered in mississippi and a company days later when rosa parks refused to give up her seat to a white man in montgomery, alabama. >> it's over! chicago wins the united states

championship! >> reporter: nearly 60 years later the world's getting to see an achievement in stark contrast to events of 1955. the jackie robinson west team, all-fridge american club made to the little league world series in 1933. 31 years later doing it again and going for the championship. >> we hear so much about the negativity that goes on. it's refreshing to be out here to support something that's great. >> it's been hard, though. we've been getting stopped a lot. >> reporter: not asked for autographs. >> yes. >> odd, isn't it? >> well -- >> reporter: it's cool. >> the message, let kids play. let -- we -- let's got take away their dreams. let's allow them, you know, let kids live their dreams and see what happens. amazing things happen to the kids and to all of us when all given, you know, on equal

opportunity. >> reporter: jim sciutto, cnn, washington. i'm so glad we got to end the hour on that feel-good story. thank you for joining me. i'm ana cabrera here in atlanta. jim sciutto continues coverage in new york. good luck to the jackie robinson team.

hello, i'm jim sciutto in new york, thanks for joining us today. following two major stories today. first, freedom for an american abducted by islamic militants in syria. peter curtis, the times we've seen him in the past, chilling. >> theo curtis, july 18.