rescued late last night. if you're like me, there's not much i can tell you, the pictures speak for themselves, the pick interests you have seen all night and morning. but some of you were asleep or dealing with your busy lives and have not been able to follow this incredible, unfolding story. 33 miners have been trapped below the earth since august the 5th. they were down there, for 17 days before anyone even realized that they were alive. the miners, who had been eating their lunch in a 500 square-foot shelter when a cave-incurred, attached a note to a search and rescue drill bit that had penetrated the roof of their shelter. the note said "we are fine in the shelter. the 33 of us." last night, the end of their ordeal began. the extraction has been under way for 14 hours now. we are now past the halfway point in what will go down as one of the most spectacular rescues in history. 17 miners have been rescued, all safe, apparently healthy. they're still being checked out. 16 more to go.

never before have men who had been trapped so deep for so long been rescued alive. nothing about this story has a parallel in history. right now, miner number 18 is being pulled up. the 2,300 feet from their living room-sized quarters. and let me tell you about this new miner. esteban rojas. he is 44 years old. he's aer carrier pigeon handler. he asked his wife of 25 years to renew their vous with him, this time in a traditional church ceremony. he did this from underneath the ground. he sent that message up to his wife. his wife always wanted a traditional catholic wedding. he never thought that was important. now he says i want to marry you in a church. the story cannot but move you. may have seen some of these pictures, but there are probably pictures you haven't seen, like this one. brand-new video. look at this. this is the camera on top of that fenix capsule, as the miners get pulled out of it. this is the view that they see.

it's incredible. it's dark. it's narrow. 28 inches. they only have 22 inches in that fenix capsule called fenix, because fenix rose from its own ashes. this capsule rises from the ground. check out these live pictures from deep underground from where the men were trapped for 69 days. i think we've got those to show you. we are still showing you the tunnel. we may have more pictures. there we go. these are not live pictures, these are pictures from earlier. we keep getting these -- the chilean government is controlling the feed. but this is the area in which they were trapped. this is the can capsule. you can even see from this picture, it's not a straight ride to the top, it's at an angle. you'll also note the men all wear sunglasses as they emerge as they're pulled out of the ground. they put the sunglasses on when they're in that capsule, as they come out, they keep those sunglasses on, because they have been in the dark for more than two months. some of the most emotional moments have come from the miners themselves. i don't know what i expected. maybe i expected them to be more

subdued. but they cheer, they cry, creating their families, even their rescuers, hugging everyone to be seen, including the president of chile. one even hand ed out what appeared to be rocks to rescue officials. and call out chi, chi, chi, but it's modified a little bit. have a listen. [ chanting ] chi chi chi, lay lay lay! >> chile's president sebastian pinera has been on hand all night. it's taking 45 minutes per miner to get to the top. he's hoping tonight will be a huge celebration around the world once all of the miners are out. can you imagine what it's going to feel like when the last miner gets out? listen to him. >> translator: and i hope that

tonight is going to be an explosion of happiness and joy. i know that tonight there are going to be tears of happiness in all chilean homes. and i also know, as i have been able to see with my own eyes that the whole world is going to share this joy of these 33 miners, and the 33 million chilea chileans. we're going to have an unforgettable night. >> president obama is watching the chile jb miners' rescue, as well. robert gibbs asked the president what he was thinking when he was watching. the president said it was, quote, a tremendously inspirational story. okay, we're at the site. cnn has had teams there since we first discovered those men were underground. karl penhaul, one of our team members at the site. he's got the latest right now. let's go right to him. karl, what's the latest that we are hearing? we are on rescue 18, we understand. >> reporter: rescue 18.

and we have now been in this rescue mission 14 hours and 4 minutes. that means the rescuers are a little bit ahead of schedule. initially the mines minister calculated it would take a total of one hour to extract each miner. so we're a little bit ahead. but still with the rate that they're going, it still looks like we're going well into tonight, possibly until the wee small hours of tomorrow morning with this rescue. let me tell you about miner 18. rojas, the man coming up next. and you said it a little bit before. but while he has been underground, he, like many of the other miners, had a lot of time to think. and he has been with his partner, jessica, for many years. 25 years, i believe. she told me. and in one of the first letters that he sent back up to the surface, he said, i've been rethinking this. he said we've been together for so long, let's do this properly. let's have a full catholic church wedding. and that's a great story in

itself, of course. but there's another element to that story. and it's just an example of how the story of the 33 miners has touched people around the world independent of their religion or race or even of their language. a lady in texas, her name is donna. i won't give you her full name, because i'm not sure how public she wantedo make this. it was just a jess tour gesture of solidarity. she said i feel helpless, 33 men underground, people suffering on top. she said i can do nothing practical, she said but what i do want to do is make a beautiful wedding dress for jessica. and over the last few weeks, she and jessica have been corresponding by e-mail. and donna is making the most beautiful wedding dress. it's going to be in a champagne color, i understand. it's going to have seaquins and beads on an outer layer, a

champagne -- sheer champagne layer underneath a lace jacket. it is going to be a beautiful affair. but beyond the dress itself, that's not what matters. what matters is that this story has touched so many people that an american lady in texas feels touched by a chilean miner and his bride-to-be that she wants to do something. not only is she doing that, but every night, donna tells me, she has made the priest at a local church absolutely sick, i think, that every night she goes down there and bangs on the church door that is shut at that time, and insists they light 33 candles, one for each of the miners. she has been doing that for more than two months. and been telling jessica and some of the other women here, and they're so grateful to think that their story has touched other people's hearts, but also they feel that with that kind of solidari solidarity, people are just doing what they can to help out. and really, the families here

have appreciated that. that kind of solidarity has helped them get through this ordeal, ali. >> i want to talk in a few minutes how this all changed. because initially when you first went down there, obviously everybody was surprised these miners were alive. but we were talking about christmastime as a time they would come out. and then some thought it might be mid december and then early december. boy, you talked about how 14 hours in we've got 17 miners out and that is moving faster. this whole operation has moved very quickly. have there been any glitches since this operation started late last night? >> reporter: really, no. and that is somewhat attested to the met particular allows way they have planned this operation. they have tended to underpromise and overdeliver. and that is why they didn't want to raise expectations. they gave us the worst-case scenario and above all gave the miners the worst-case scenario

when they were found alive it could take until christmas to drill down to them. and then they put a plan together, not only one plan, a plan a., but then they put two the aactive plans together to see if they could get down there further. and it was the plan b drill, a drill normally used for drilling water holes that made it down to the miners first. and then as well, the whole time line of the rescue itself has been telescoped. and last night we saw them tinkering with the rescue capsule, we thought there may be a glitch there, they were just making sure the wheels were running smoothly on the capsule. and since then, there hasn't been a hitch. they haven't suffered any damage to the fenix rescue capsule, everything is running fine and ahead of schedule. >> karl, we'll continue to check in with you, a good description of what's going on. karl is there with our team, and in the bottom right of the screen you can see the chilean mining minister giving an update. we will bring you any new information as it develops. we are getting new information.

we're waiting for miner number 18 to be extracted. i'll give you some details on him in a few minutes. but this rescue, as karl just said, happened much faster than we expected it to happen. the original time frame called for a late december rescue. what happened? karl just told us. plan b is what happened, came from a houston-based drilling company. you're going to meet the man behind that plan on the other side of this break. its great. i eat anything that i want.

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what we are looking at there, and you'll see a picture of this in a second. that is the chilean mining

minister, giving an update. and what he said is there five rescuers who went down with the capsule and other men came up. he said within the next couple hours, they'll send a sixth rescuer in. and he said he's going to replace some of them. i don't know whether that means that one is coming up or more than one rescuer is coming up. but he's going to send a sixth person down there within the next couple of hours. right now, what we are waiting for, though, is the rescue of the 18th miner. 17 have been rescued out of 33. the 18th one is expected. he is esteban alfonso rojas carrizo. he is 44 years old, he was the carrier pigeon handler. as you know, carer pigeons are used in mines, because they are more sensitive to air quality than humans. so they're a leading indicator, if you will, of things that might be going wrong if the air quality is deteriorating. there are also more modern ways of doing this. many carrier pigeons have been replaced by electronic methods. in late august, this is the guy -- i told you about. he's the one who asked his wife

of 25 years to renew their marriage vows, because they had not had a traditional catholic wedding. his wife had always wanted one. he had not thought that important. he sent a message up from underground saying he wanted to renew his vous and get married in a church. you heard karl penhaul talking about that story, a woman in texas wanting to do something has said she is going to make the wedding dress for esteban rojas' wife. so we're waiting for esteban rojas to come out. these rescues are taking anywhere from 45 minutes to a little bit longer in each case. to accepted send the fenix capsule down and get the guys rigged up. we'll stay on top of that for you. we talked about plan b. there was a plan a, b and c. initially plan a called for the minors to be rescued around christmastime, late december. plan b came about because greg hall is the owner of drilling

international. his rigs were already working in the area and he thought he could come up with a better plan than plan a, so he presented it to the officials down there, and they thought that sounded like a good idea. and wisely, they pursued a few different plans. greg's crew was specializing in drilling hard rock quickly, usually for water wells, and they felt they had the equipment and ability to do that. greg joins me now. greg, tell me how this all unfolded because you and your company are a big part of the equation, getting these guys out of mine fully two months earlier than some of us thought we were going to see them. >> well, when the collapse first happened, there was a number of the mineral exploration rigs around the site who immediately mobilized and started to try to drill to find the miners. the problem was, their normal component of equipment was only good down to 420 meters. so they called us, i have a company north of chile, we manufacturer all of the equipment they use. and we were able to send out

truckloads of equipment to allow all five of the rigs to drill down to the 800 meter depth. we got lucky in the sense my guys were out there on the service rig that actually punched through a void that i got a call into houston about 7:00 sunday morning from my guy on-site who said greg, we think we hear some noises, some beating on the pipe. at that time, we really thought that the drillers had not survived, because it had been 17 days. they pulled up the pipe, and on the end of our hammer was that famous note that the president showed saying all 33 of us are alive in the refuge. >> let me just ask you about this. you talk about the depth of that hole being a challenge. we wonder why we have a 28-inch hole, roughly with a capsule that only fit somebody who, you know, whose shoulders are 22 inches wide, which obviously is working for all of them. what's the issue there? why couldn't you have drilled a 35 inch hole? >> the problem we had, when looking at this plan, what resources did we have available

in-country, and what resources could i pull quickly from other places? is the t1-30 rig we're using was the biggest drill rig of this time in chile. the 7-inch pipe we're using that i manufacture was the biggest pipe we had. that limited us for as far as how big of a diameter we could go. you get in problem with torques and twisting, the last thing we wanted was the pipe to twist and broke and we had to start over. so we were limited by some of the equipment we were able to get on-site. >> greg, you're on record as saying that hole fought us to the last meter. what do you mean? >> well, it was a tremendously difficult hole. talking to my peers, in my opinion, it was the hardest hole we have been on in my life. and i've been told by people i respect it was an impossible hole to drill. but it fought us to the last meter. if you go back and look at the videos, you'll see that as we were coming down, we were in constant contact with the

miners. we actually got hung up in the roof bolts, the hardened roof bolts at the top of the roof as we were going in. and then we got hung up and stuck. and many people started clapping thinking we had finished. but we hadn't finished. and we were actually stuck. and then the last thing is, right before we finished, there was a loud explosion from the side of the rig. i thought that the air hose had blown. had the air hose blown, we would have lost the hole, and had to start over from square one. i don't know to this day exactly what that explosion was, but we were all looking at the gauges. we think now that it was some electrical connection for some of the video feed. but it fought us to the very last moment. >> i'm going to talk when we come back about how you got through to that hole in the end and the role that those fantastic miners had in doing that. what you're seeing on the screen right now, by the way, are pictures from the hospital. so what happens is these miners come out, get transported to a clinic on-site, and then get flown by helicopter 15 minutes

to a hospital nearby that's fully equipped to deal with them. these are the miners, you can see them in their green overalls and the sunglasses they are keeping on because their eyes have not adjusted to the light. there was some fear they would stop the rescues during the daylight because it might be too hard on their eyes. thankfully, they have not done that. those are chilean tv pictures from the hospital. those are new images coming in, and one that will make you very happy, miner number 18 coming out of the hole. we'll keep on covering this for you and be back in a moment.

let me bring you up to speed with some of the other top stories we are following here at cnn.

a federal judge in california has ordered the u.s. military to put a permanent worldwide halt to its don't ask, don't tell policy. effectively ending the ban on openly gay troops in the military. the justice department has 60 days to appeal the ruling. no word on whether it plans to do that. in mexico, the lead investigator in the falcon lake case has been killed. officials are telling cnn that his head was delivered to a mexican army garson after he failed to report home last night. members of a drug cartel are suspected. this it case began when the wife of american tourist david michael hartley said her husband was shot by pirates on the mexican side of the lake on september 30th. in southern afghanistan, four nato-led troops have been killed in a bombing attack today. two others died in separate incidents. it is the first time in more than a month that so many international troops have been killed in hostile incidents in afghanistan in a single day. the nationalities of the dead have not been released. back to the rescue in chile in a moment.

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mexican mining minister still delivering some comments. he has said just moments ago that they are going to send a sixth rescuer down. there are five rescuers in the mine right now. he's going to send a sixth one down to replace some of them. i don't know what he means by some of them. keep in mind, we have 17 -- we're looking for number 18 to come out. 17 miners have been rescued. we're looking for number 18. this could happen any moment now, and then the rest of them. but there are five others down there, as well. so that's going to extend the time it takes. i've been talking to greg hall,

who is the owner of drillers supply international. they are drillers. he was in chile with equipment, his team was in chile with equipment. they came up with plan b, which has resulted in getting these miners out almost two months earlier than initially predicted. greg has been telling us about how this came to happen. greg, the minors had a role in opening that hole on their side of things. explain to me how that happens. explain to me how they knew where it was that they were supposed to open up the hole and make it bigger. >> certainly. again, i want to make clear to everybody, this was a team effort. this was my company and geo tech's rig and center rock and the miners. when he video feed with them. one of the wonderful things about this is when you're drilling a hole like this, it's very important to try to ascertain the speeds that you're drilling at. if you're drilling this hard rock too fast, then you get big chunks, which can cause major problems. if you drill too slow, then you actually get little grindings,

and is you regrind your bits, and you really wear the metal out quicker. in this case, though, we were sending the cuttings down the hole, so we could call the drillers and have them take the cuttings and walk over to the video feed and show them to us. and that is way tremendous advantage to us. but it also helped them be helping in their own rescue. >> what have we learned? obviously there must be some lessons about the cave-in. i don't know if we know about the cave-in yet. are there things we have learned from this rescue that may mean that miners in the future can be rescued after this much time underground? >> well lesson i think the miners showed and we showed is don't ever give up. because if you don't give up, you don't lose. the other thing is brandon fischer, the owner center rock and myself would like to work to get some rapid response teams set up where we could have the right equipment, drillers and tooling, maybe on-site a little bit quicker. because the next time it may be that those few hours that we can

save may save the miners. >> that is a great idea. that would be a great take-away. greg hall, thank you for the role that you and your team have played in this america miraculous rescue. greg hall is the owner of drillers supply international. came up with plan b in conjunction with others to get these miners out today, not in december. 20 days until the midterm elections. it is debate day in delaware. you're going to want to watch this one. it's between democrat chris coons and tea party favorite republican candidate christine o'donnel o'donnell. we take you live to delaware for a preview. one word turns innovative design into revolutionary performance. one word makes the difference between defining the mission and accomplishing the mission. one word makes the difference in defending our nation and the cause of freedom. how... is the word that makes all the difference.

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take you right to that mine. take a look at that picture. that's a live shot in the shelter. 2,500 feet, half a mile underground. this is what happens, it goes down, up. they are now preparing, we assume, to put the 18th miner into that capsule for recovery. 17 of them have been taken to the surface, 33 in total. there were five rescuers underground. so hard to make out exactly whether anybody is getting in there just yet. but they are going to put the 18 person in there. his name is esteban alfonso rojas carrizzo, this is the man we knew about because on august 25th, he asked his -- in august, he asked his wife of 25 years to renew their vows when he got out in a traditional catholic ceremony. he is going to remarry his wife at some point, once they get to

the surface. beautiful story karl penhaul just told us about a woman in texas who has offered to make the wedding dress for his wife. so we are waiting for the rescue of esteban rojas, number 18. we are now past the halfway point in this rescue. what a remarkable thing. by the way, number 19, the next guy who comes after him, pablo rojas, 45 years old, also a carrier pigeon handler, is his cousin. so two cousins rescued back-to-back. that's an exciting day for me to watch this, because we have been involved in this for as long as we have known about it. hey another reason it's exciting to me is i first started at cnn, the first time -- i was away for a little while. i started here with my first job in the industry. i was an intern back in 1992 at the washington bureau of cnn. and my boss was a driven young man named sam feist. he has been with the company since then, he rejoined him many years later, but sam is now our

political director at cnn and part of our daily lives, because cnn has so much to do with politics. and there he is. in all of my time knowing sam, i have never had the honor of being on tv with him and interviewing him. sam is talking about the remarkable contest that we're going to have, this debate that we're going to have in newark, delaware. sam, good to see you. >> ali, nice to see you. and you pronounced it right. new-arc, delaware. don't say newark around here. >> this is not just a local delaware issue for voters. this debate -- this race in delaware has taken on national proportions for a number of reasons. >> yeah, i mean the debate tonight is between christine o'donnell, the republican candidate and chris coons. she has become the most talked about candidate for office in this midterm election, without a doubt. she is the one who came up with the surprising victory last month in the republican nomination fight here in delaware. and this will be their first and

only debate in this election. they're going to meet tonight here at the university of delaware. it will be broadcast live at 7:30 on cnn. and it's going to be a great debate. it's going to be interesting. wolf blitzer is working right now on what questions he's going to ask the candidates. and it ought to be fascinating. she is a fascinating woman, not your typical politician, and certainly not your typical candidate for senate in any state. >> sam, in so many of the congressional races across the country, the participants, the candidates, are trying to make it local. in some cases, republicans are trying to make it about the obama administration and democrats are trying to keep it local. in had particular case, is there going to be a lot of discussion about delaware in this debate, or is this all going to be about national politics, about how people feel about this administration and this government? >> i think it's going to be a little bit of both, probably more about national politics as this election year or referendum on the presidency of barack obama. of course, it's about the economy, which is -- which is struggling here in delaware, just as it is nationally.

although local issues and the backgrounds of the candidates are going to matter. chris coons is a county executive here in delaware and i'm pretty certain that christine o'donnell is going to point out that he raised taxes several times as county executive. so that's an issue. but i think for the most part, it will be more of a national conversation, a national debate about national issues, whether it's foreign policy, whether it's about domestic policy. and, of course, here in delaware, the backgrounds of these two candidates is going to be -- >> this is the thing, christine o'donnell may talk about coons and raising taxes. is chris coons going to talk about comments that christine o'donnell has made that led her to start her most recent commercial off with the words "i am not a witch." >> it's interesting. he has actually avoided the witchcraft comment as much as possible. he has tried to keep this on issues, and let the media for the most part talk about witchcraft. it will come up, i'm quite certain. she may point out, if not, maybe one of the questioners will point out that in college chris coons wrote a paper and referred

to himself as a bearded marxist. he says that media has taken that out of context. so their backgrounds will come up. i'm not sure if the candidate also bring it up or the questioners, but it's a big part of the campaign. >> how tight is the race in delaware right now, sam? >> the latest polls that came out last week showed that he is ahead in double digits. cnn has a new poll that will be released this afternoon at 5:00 with "time" magazine and we'll see what new numbers say. so it looks as if he is ahead, although she has surprised people. there aren't that many people who expected christine o'donnell to win the republican primary last month. anything can happen. right now, it looks like he's ahead in the polls, at least the ones that came out last week. >> sam feist, you look as good as you did 19 years ago. >> ali, you don't have as much hair as 19 years ago. otherwise about the same. >> good to see you, my friend. sam feist, one of the most important guys here at cnn, our political director.

we'll be sure to tune into the delaware debate tonight, coverage starts at 7:30 p.m. eastern with the best political team on television, wolf blitzer moderating that debate. it is going to be very interesting. the health conditions of the trapped miners, that has been a major concern throughout this ordeal, but especially now that they're being brought to the surface. we're going to have a live report from the hospital that they are being taken to. up next. [ j. weissman ] it was 1975. my professor at berkeley asked me if i wanted to change the world. i said "sure." "well, let's grow some algae." and that's what started it. exxonmobil and synthetic genomics have built a new facility to identify the most productive strains of algae. algae are amazing little critters. they secrete oil, which we could turn into biofuels. they also absorb co2. we're hoping to supplement the fuels

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want to bring you a couple of live pictures right now. the one on the right, of course, is chile. that is the mining minister, along with families of what we expect is the next person, the 18th person, to be rescued from that mine. esteban alfonso rojas carrizo. on the left, we are waiting for the president of the united states to make some comments shortly. he has another announcement to make, but we understand he has been watching, like most of us in the world have been watching, this mining rescue in chile. and he will have some comments about that at the top. we will bring the president to you as soon as he starts speaking. now, the miners, as they are rescued, each one of them, 17 have been rescued so far. we are waiting for the 18th. the only way we can tell what's going on if we don't see the capsule either on the bottom or top is to look at the winch wheel to see which way it's turning. if it's rotating clockwise, it's

coming up, counterclockwise, going down. we saw live pictures of the 18th miner, esteban rojas, being loaded into the capsule, the fenix, and we assume he's being raised to the top now, so it should be within minutes that we would assume those are his family members, sitting there waiting for him. his wife -- they have been married for 25 years, didn't have a catholic ceremony. he sent a message from the mine to say he would like to marry her in a traditional ceremony when he gets to the top. after the miners get there, they are moved to a nearby clinic, given some initial evaluation and then taken by helicopter on a 15-minute ride to a nearby hospital. copiapo regional hospital in chile. patrick oppmann is there with the latest. we have been seeing live pictures, patrick, of miners arriving at the hospital. many look to be very, very healthy. what is happening at the hospital? >> reporter: absolutely. and you know, as we have seen

these miners come in, as they have been brought in by helicopter, not surprisingly, ali, they are in good shape. you know, they have, of course, been helping out with their rescue. they have been moving tons of fallen-down earth as it fell down in the mine shaft while there was drilling going on. and you know, so they have been very active. still, though, officials want to make absolutely sure they're being taken care of, that they have no health problems, all is going well here. so they are going to keep them here a couple days at this copiapo regional hospital behind me. a number of reasons. one is just the barrage of medical tests. talking with them every day, looking at them through the video conference system, but never have been able to sit down and give a proper example. so we need to do that, ali. they're concerned about their eyes, concerned about possible exposure to any germs, because they have been in this isolation. and this is also a way to keep

them together for a few more days before they're released into families. and frankly, keep them away from the crush of the media. we have seen family members leaving here throughout the day. of course, they get swarmed by the media. but so far we hear they're doing very well. they're happy to be here, very comfortable. and they're in great spirits and great health. there will be a briefing in about two-and-a-half hours from officials here to give us the official word on how these miners are doing. but so far from what we're hearing here, everyone doing very, very well, happy to have some new surroundings around them, as you can guess, ali. >> i imagine some of them, if they're not suffering from anything particular are going to want to get back to their families as soon as possible. what's the earliest we will see people discharged? is it an individual thing, a case by case thing? are there some possibly ready to walk out today? >> that's -- we probably won't see them today. of course, if they insisted and said i don't want to be in the hospital, that's all right, they could walk out today. but i think the miners understand in talking to doctors

their situation is such a unique situation that they want to be looked over very, very carefully. you know, we have heard from some of the doctors here that again nasa has been in touch with, their doctors, team of doctors, because there's just so much information to be gained from these men in terms of isolation, in terms of their diet and how that affected them. all the things they went through. and you know, just data that you probably never would be able to get from any other source. you know, as well, ali, it's not just the physical health. it's the post traumatic, it's the mental health. and i talked with one of their doctors or one of the team of doctors last week and he said, you know, we expect some of them to suffer from post traumatic stress. they went through an ordeal here. and you know, as you know, post traumatic stress means you re-live these events again and again. so for some of these men, they may be free from the mine, but it will be a long time before they're free of the mine, ali. >> pa ri patrick, i heard someo

say something interesting this morning. we talked to every expert we could find about the condition of these miners and i heard one say if you survive underground for 68 or 69 days, and you're okay, maybe there is a less stress, maybe is there a sense of overconfidence, maybe there is a sense of nothing can touch me now, i went through more than most humans will ever go through. i wonder if some will come out better off than before? >> reporter: oh, absolutely. and victor just came up a few hours ago and wrote these long poetic letters in language his family said they weren't used to, he wasn't this kind of eloquent writer and one of the things he said again and again, ali is he is not being rescued, he's being reborn, he comes up above as a new man. and certainly other miners i'm sure share that sentiment of victor zamora. >> thank you very much. and what you're looking at on the right of the screen, by the way, is the top of the hole from

which we are going to see that capsule, that fenix capsule emerge any minute now, we hope, with esteban alfonso rojas carrizo on it, a 44-year-old carer pigeon handler. we'll show you, stay on that and show you as soon as he comes out. in the meantime, leroy chow is a name you will know. he is a former nasa astronaut who flew in space in four missions. he's in houston right now. leroy -- he's not. you're in china? >> yep, i'm in china. >> that's not anywhere near houston. but leroy, being ineen in space without the control to get back to earth, knowing the people were looking for you and trying to find you. you've had something akin to this experience. we can't find another human on earth who has been stuck a half mile below ground. but you've had it the other way around. tell us your story.

>> well, you know, i mean, i can't say that i've been through exactly what these folks have been, because they're obviously in the survival situation. you know, ever since their ordeal started. whereas i was in comfortable surroundings in the international space station. nonetheless, you're right, the similarity, we were up there for six and a half months, months at a time, where we couldn't just come back if we wanted to. we could have, of course, if there was some kind of an emergency. but, you know, in a sense, it was the same thing. we were out there, we were certainly at risk. i mean, there could have been a situation where we would have gotten into a survival situation. but fortunately for us, the mission didn't turn out that way. still, there are parallels to be drawn, and i am just overjoyed to be seeing this rescue operation under way, and to see half the miners now freed from their ordeal. >> leroy, we're looking at pictures right now of what appear to be the workers gathering around that hole. certainly had had the impression moments ago that that meant that the capsule was coming up.

they have removed the rig that sits at the top of that hole that sort of monitors the line. so i think what we're going to see there momentarily -- we're not controlling these pictures, by the way, which is why they change. that's the picture from the rig. that is the picture from the fenix, as it emerges with the 18th miner in it. you're going to see that break the surface at any moment now. you're watching the rescue of the 18th minor. esteban alfonso rojas carrizo. he is 44 years old. you'll see the top of the fenix rig. there it is. you are seeing a camera. there we go. there he is, 44-year-old esteban alfonso rojas carrizo, the 18th minor to be rescued, 44 years old, the carrier pigeon handler, testing the air quality in the mine. at this point, by the way, once they're trapped, there wasn't a whole lot he could do with that information. we don't know whatever happened to the carrier pigeons, but this is the man we know asked his wife to marry him.

let's listen to what we're hearing.

>> chi-le! chi-chi-chi-! le-le-le! >> esteban rojas, you saw -- let's listen in to the president. >> not only in chile but also from the united states around the world who are lending a hand in this rescue effort, from the nasa team that helped design the escape vehicle to american companies that manufactured and delivered part of the rescue drill to the american engineer who flew in from afghanistan to operate the drill. last night the whole world watched the scene at camp esperanza as the first miner was lifted out from under more than 2,000 feet of rock and then

embraced by his young son and family. and the tears they shed after so much time apart expressed not only their own relief, not only their own joy, but the joy of people everywhere. so it was a thrilling moment and we're hopeful that those celebrations duplicate themselves throughout the rest of today. behind me i've got the moon family, edward, kathleen and sarah. raise your hands. >> the president is making other comments about an unrelated matter. we will cover that and listen in to that. let's get back to esteban rojas, 44 years old. the story here and why you heard that extended clapping, first of all he got out. he offered prayers. then you saw his wife. this is the wife he asked to marry him again in a traditional catholic ceremony. this is what happens every time one of these miners come out. they greet their family. a limited number of family members are allowed present and then put on the stretcher and transported to a nearby medical

center. this is -- i don't know the exact distance. i think it's about 500 feet away. it's not far at all. they go through an initial evaluation there. you notice those sunglasses stay on them because their eyes are just not used to the light. they're then evaluated and flown by helicopter 15 minutes away to a hospital where we were just talking to patrick oppman and evaluated further there. no one has been released from that hospital yet. it may be some days before they do that. they're separated from their family. his wife who waited 69 days to see him will not spend any more time with him for a little while. they'll be reunited a little bit later. we're going to take a quick break. when i come back back to my conversation with leroy chow about what it's like to be trapped somewhere where you have no control over your situation. sorry i'm late fellas.

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okay. we are looking at live pictures now. that is the capsule. we are -- they're getting ready, we assume, to send it back down to get the 19th person who by the way is the cousin of the guy who just got rescued. esteban rojas. i don't know if we've got the pictures to show you of esteban rojas who just came out. they're sending it back down to get the next person. that's how they sit it back in and the winch just lowers it until it gets to the bottom of the mine, about 20 minutes it's taking roughly to get it down there. let's just watch while they put that in. you see a round of applause. it's going down to get another guy, the 19th miner.

15 more to go. we'll be on top of that for you every time it happens. this is one of the best things i have ever had the privilege of covering. it is now 20 days until the critical midterm elections. we want to get you updated on the latest news from the campaign trail. cnn political editor mark preston and deputy political editor paul steinhauser both part of the best political team on television. i don't see them. i just see me. much better looking than looking at me. there with the cnn political update. good to see you. >> hey, ali, how are you? >> great seeing you too. ali, let's start with michelle obama. we have live pictures if you could take those in atlanta. this is great stuff. michelle obama today. in wisconsin right now campaigning helping out russ feingold running for re-election facing a tough re-election. the first lady starts today like a seven or eight state swing over the next week where she'll be helping out democratic candidates who are fighting in the midterm elections. check these numbers out.

it's brand new and interesting from cnn research corporation. we asked do you approve or disapprove of how she's handling her duties as first lady. 65% giving her a thumbs up. nearly 2 out of 3. only one out of four disapprove. higher by her husband by a lot. go to the next board and you can see democrats giving her a thumbs up but even independents according to our numbers more than 6 out of 10 independents giving her a thumbs up. that's probably one of the reasons they -- being the democrats, want to get michelle obama out there to help. over to mark right now. >> ali, better late than never. that's what probably some supporters of carl paladino are saying today. viewers remember just a couple of days ago running for governor republican nominee up in new york came out with a very controversial statement. let me read it. he said he didn't want children to be brainwashed into thinking homosexual is an equally valid or successful option. after a couple of days of trying

to explain that remark he has come out and apologized. he says now that he have sincerely apologizes for any comment that may have offended the gay and lesbian community and said any reference to branding an entire community based on a small representation of them is wrong and if elected governor he will do his best to fight for all new yorkers. i should say that this race up in new york, he is down double digits to the democrat andrew cuomo but looks like mr. paladino, ali, is trying to get this behind him. paul. >> one more thing real quick. we always talk about former president bill clinton being the rock star for democrats on the campaign trail. where is he today? going home to arkansas and once again trying to help out senator blanche lincoln up for re-election. she faces a tough battle against the congressman john bozeman but the former president once again going home to help out a fellow democrat. >> paul, mark, good to talk to you. the next political update an hour away. back to the incredible mine

rescue in a moment. to do that so well. ♪ you ♪ where'd you learn to do that so well. ♪ the new cadillac srx. the cadillac of crossovers. cadillac. the new standard of the world. t adwiwiout food al t

right now there are two kinds of people in the world, people like me who have been glued to their tvs watching almost every frame of video since the first of the 33 miners in chile was rescued last night. there are other people who have been busy. they've been sleeping or working. that's why we're here, to tell you about what else is going on. 33 miners have been trapped below the earth since august 5th. they were down there for 17 days before anyone even realized that they were alive. the miners who had been eating their lunch in a 500 square food shelter when the cave-in occurred attached a note to a search and rescue drill bit that had penetrated their shelter. the note said, we are fine in the shelter the 33 of us. last night the end of the ordeal began and the extraction under way for 15 hours now. we're now past the halfway point that will go down as one of the most spectacular rescues in history. 18 miners rescued so far all

safe, apparently healthy. 15 more to go. one is on its way -- the shuttle is on the way to get the next one. never before have men who had been trapped so deep for so long been rescued alive. there's no parallel for this in history. miner 18 surfaced in just the last couple of minutes. esteban rojas was pulled up the 2300 feet from their living room sized quarters and immediately dropped to his knees in prayer, raised his hands to god. his wife joined him with tears streaming down her cheeks. president obama spoke right after esteban was pulled from the ground. now, you may have seen some of this. you may have been watching it along with us. but there are probably pictures you haven't seen. here's one that we've only started showing you a little while ago. this is new video from the capsule as the miners are being pulled from the ground. check out this video from deep underground where the men were trapped for 69 days. every now and then you see more pictures of this. this is the shelter they have lived in. all day we've seen that fenix

capsule, red, white and blue and picks up a miner and goes to the surface. all the men emerge with sunglasses. pulled out of the ground, they haven't been seeing light for the last 68 days, 69 days, so they have those sunglasses on to protect them. some of the most emotional moments from the miners themselves as they cheer and cry and greet their families and one handed out what appeared to be rocks to officials and rescue workers and keep hearing what you might have thought was chile's soccer chant. it's -- chi-chi-chi-! le-le-le! >> it's been modified. >> chi-chi-chi-! le-le-le! viva chile! >> chile president sebastian pineiro greeting the miners. the minister of mining is there. he hopes tonight will be a huge

celebration around the world once the miners are out. trrnls a >> translator: and i hope tonight will be an explosion of happiness and joy. i know that tonight there are going to be tears of happiness in all chilean homes and i also know, as i have been able to see with my own eyes, that the whole world is going to share this joy of these 33 miners and the 33 million chileans. we're going to have an unforgettable night. >> president obama is watching the chilean miners rescue as well. he spoke about it just a few moments ago. >> this rescue is a tribute not only to the determination of the rescue workers and the chilean government, but also the unity and resolve of the chilean people who have inspired the world. and i want to express the hopes of the american people that the miners who are still trapped underground will be returned home safely as soon as possible. >> all right. let's go right to chile, to the

copiapo regional hospital in copiapo, chile where patrick oppman is and where the miners go right after first evaluated onsite. when they come out they are flown by helicopter about 15 minutes away from the mining site. that's where they've all come in. nobody has come out yet. what's the situation at that hospital? >> reporter: nobody has come out. we just had another helicopter land last half an hour or so. we're waiting for a briefing this afternoon to find out exactly how many miners there are here. there were five this morning. i think we just got another four or so. you want to hear a cool detail about this story. last night when they brought the first run in from the mines it was dark. the helicopter pilot turned to rescue officials and said we're concerned at flying low with the night vision goggles and there's a road that goes up to the mine. people have their brights on can be distracting as flying along with the night vision. officials said we'll close the road. that's important it is. closing this road from copiapo

up to the mayne. the road remains closed today because they could drive some of the men down by ambulance and want to keep that road clear. we've seen people gathering here all day today, just neighbors and friends of the miners wanted to come by and at least be close. others are family members who upon leaving the hospital said their loved ones in are in great shape and doing well and happy to be here and certainly happy to have someplace to come and visit them. behind me here, the hospital on the second and fourth floors, those are the floors reserved for the miners. on august 5th, ali, they thought they had a potential mining tragedy of really unprecedented proportions and they were told to prepare for that tragedy, thought they would be bringing hurt and injured miners in. now like the rest of us they waited two months and it's incredible stroke of luck for the miners in the hospital because they've prepared and brought in more equipment and more doctors and they've really redone this hospital. and i know you're a business guy, ali, so you'll probably

appreciate a local trying to do well. and all day long we've been seeing the first souvenirs of this story for just a mere $2 you can buy a flag with all the miners' names on it and it says, salimos vivos, we got out alive. so already the wheels of commerce are spinning. we've heard about books in the works, movies in the works. and on a much smaller scale the guy selling flags door to door live location to live location, making a little bit more money for his family today as a result of this just wonderful, wonderful story that's touched so many people. >> okay, patrick. i'd love to read the book. i'd love to see the movie. but i heard something about how these guys decided they have a vow of silence for everything that went on for the last 69 days. >> reporter: you know, we've heard that and i'm not sure -- mario sepulveda last night was

in on the vow because he was effusive when he got to the top. handing out rocks to the officials, talking on chilean national tv. we'll have to see because we heard as of yesterday they were taking lessons on talking to the media. so there's a lot of different information coming out about what's going to happen. they of course have not come out and talked to us. we're eager to hear the stories because from the people who have had -- the doctors who talked to them the last weeks over the video knch system they keep telling us, you haven't heard the half of it. we don't even know the story of it. the truth of what went on down in this mine, the heroism that -- in -- as he put it you ain't seen nothing yet. we're waiting for that day, waiting to hear the rest of the story. >> i want to know what was going on the other side of the picture. patrick, thanks a million. great reporting. we'll talk to you have later. patrick oppman part of our team in chile. we have a pretty strong team

there. there you go. that's a live picture. the capsule is back do you undergrounds. they are loading the 19th person or getting ready to, pablo rojas villacorta, 45 years old also a carrier pigeon handler and the cousin of the guy who just got rescued. we're going to talk about him when we come back.

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okay. i was talk sgto leroy chow a few minutes ago. we're looking at live pictures of the mine. the 19th guy. kelly, is he in the fenix yet? the government keeps changing the picture. they're doing a great job of it but we don't know. there is the capsule. looks like they are still getting pablo amadeus villacorta rojas in there. that is a little tight space. i know you probably all heard about it but in case you haven't let me show it to you. that capsule there that you're seeing on tv, we made a model of it here just to give you a sense of the scale and scope of it. as we talked to a gentleman an hour ago who is responsible for drilling, we found out that they had a drill onsite. that's why they got a hole that was 28 inches. they could have had a bigger hole but it would have taken longer to get it. this is the size of the hole. they had to make sure the guys got skinny enough to get into

it. this is 22 inches. this is 22 inch and i'm about as big a guy as can comfortably fit into this thing. this is what they sit in for up to 15 minutes as they get brought from the base of the mine to the top of it. i suppose after 69 days in that mine, 15 minutes in there isn't going to be the worst thing in the world for you. it would be the worst thing in the world for me because i'm a little bit claustrophobic. i can't imagine what that's like. leroy chow is with me, a former nasa astronaut in houston. he was telling us this story about how he got stuck in space for several months. they knew he was there. he knew they were coming to get him. but it was not in his control. he had a little more space to himself up there in the international space station. but leroy, your experts from nasa -- nasa experts were consultants to these -- to this rescue mission. what is it that people from nasa can help -- could have done? what did they help do with this mine rescue? >> well, of course, nasa flying

long duration missions is very interested in how to keep astronauts healthy both from a medical standpoint as well as from a psycho social standpoint. so they had a lot to offer -- advice on what to do. even though the situations were not totally the same. obviously, these guys were in a survival situation, an emergency situation. but there are a lot of similarities. one is you have to keep the crew busy. you have to have enough to do. when we were on the space station we were busy every minute of the day and it was a good thing because even though we were comfortable and it was a comfortable environment, you'd go a little stir crazy if you didn't have enough to do. same with the guys underground. they're in a survival situation. you have to keep them motivated. one of the first things they teach you in survival school is keep improving your environment, keep working on your shelter because you can make yourself more comfortable and also keep your mind from going places you don't want it to go. >> i guess that's what it is. when i feel claustrophobic

because i think about things that could happen even though not likely. we have a medical anthropologist at the university of southern california joining us from san diego. larry, tell me if we're making more than we should be or lest than we should be about what happens to these guys now that they're out. in my mind, the worst is definitely over for them. they may have certain issues they have to face but it can't be worse than being stuck in that shelter half a mile underground. >> -- aspect of this experience has been the last two months and most notably the first 18 days when there was absolutely no contact with the surface. they're actually moving into a new phase. initially what you're going to be seeing is elation, joy, all the wonderful scenes that you've been viewing over the screens being broadcast from chile. and that's likely to continue at least in the short term. however, eventually, all of that

attention and focus that's currently being given to them is going to gradually diminish and at that point they're going to be asking themselves, what now, where do i go from here? for some of them that have been experiencing post traumatic stress, there's going to be the need for long-term care and treatment and the ability to adjust is going to be compromised for these individuals. for others, the new phase will actually be substantially better than what they've been going through, because they'll have come out of this experience with the renewed or improved sense of self with a greater sense of confidence and ability to handle any situation, much less the ones they've been through. >> hey, leroy, when you were stuck in the space station, if i recall correctly from one of our previous conversations, you were the only american or the only english speaker. the other guys were russians. mission control was in russian. did you end up -- i mean, is it

like a stockholm syndrome thing? do you become buddies with the folks you were stuck with when maybe you weren't buddies with before? >> actually, the situation was that we had an american and russian on board. i was there with a russian crewmate. i had learned to speak russian and he had learned to speak english and we were working with the two control centers so we could all talk to each other. we became very close together in training. we trained together 3 1/2 years. we learned each other's languages. so in a sense, you're right, you do kind of bond with the person especially in an emergency situation, survival situation like these guys in the mine were or still are. >> guys on the right side of the picture what you're seeing, that's the top of the hole. we have just seen that shuttle, the capsule, fenix capsule go into the hole leaving the mine we're guessing 15 minutes or so before the next rescue. pablo rojas 45 years old. he's a carrier pigeon handler and he will be the 19th person

rescued from the mine. stay with us. i'll bring you some of the other stories we're working on. feels like this is the only story around but there's a lot going on in the world. fifty-eight different individuals are using,

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let me bring you up to speed with some of the stories we're covering. a federal judge in california has ordered the u.s. military to put a permanent worldwide halt on its "don't ask, don't tell" policy. that effectively ends the ban on openly gay troops in the military. now, we're not quite sure how that's going to work. the justice department has 60 days to appeal the ruling. there is no word yet on whether it plans to do that. in mexico, the lead investigator in the falcon lake case has been killed. officials are telling cnn that his head was delivered to a

mexican army garrison after he failed to report home last night. members of a drug cartel are suspected. it began when the wife of an american tourist said her husband was shot by pirates on the mexican side of the lake. in southern afghanistan four nato-led troops have been killed in a bombing attack today. two others died in separate incidents. it's the first time in more than a month so many international troops have been killed in hostile incidents in a single day in afghanistan. the nationalities of the dead have not been released. we're going to get you back to chile and ongoing mine rescues in a moment. we're waiting for miner number 19 to be rescued. if you haven't been following as closely as we have, we're going to bring you some of best moments so far. gecko: are you ready for your talk, sir?

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let me bring you up to speed with what we're looking at. we're following the rescue of the miners 33 trapped undergrounds for 69 days. that's the rig on top of it. see the wheel on top of that? that's the wheel of the winch. it's rotating clockwise, which means the capsule, the fenix capsule -- fenix of course a bird that rolse from its own ashes, is on the way up 2300 feet. we saw the 19th miner, pablo alfonso am day yas rojas. he got in it. he's a carrier pigeon handler like his cousin. he helps overcome the going and coming of packages to the mine. he's married for 21 years, got one son. he has two cousins by the way in the mine. they've both been rescued

already. segovia was rescued and esteban rojas was 18. he's the last of the family to get out there. i just got something on my facebook where somebody said how did they choose the order in which they go out. we had actually discussed this. the first few guys that got out had great technical knowledge so when they got to the top they could report back on any problems with the capsule. after that they took the sickest guys out most in need of help who had preexisting conditions and are working their way through the bottom. the last to come out number 33 is the guy who is the self-appointed captain or they appointed him sort of the leader of the group and like the captain he's last. there are also five rescuers down there. we heard the mining minister say he's going to send a sixth person down to relieve some of them, although that means that one of the rescuers is going to come up in place of one of the miners. we doesn't quite know exactly what's going on there.

we'll find out very shortly. the best moment -- one of the best moments here was the rescue of mario gomez. a lot of people call him super mario, the oldest. 63 years old. i don't know if we have that video. do we have that, kelly, that we can show? when he got out. he hugged his wife. he dropped to hills knees to pray. other miners turned to him as kind of their spiritual leader as the older guy. he had been a miner more than 50 years. he was thought to be the most in danger in terms of his health. he had persistent lung problems for years apparently from working in the mine and if i'm not mistaken he said there's no chance he's going into a mine again. another miner's wife said that often his behalf. she said, no more mining, we're done. i want to show you -- there's the mine. see, i showed you that wheel on the top. that's supposed to be turning clockwise. this is the first time i have seen it -- okay. there it goes. it's started moving again.

it looks like it might have stopped. remember this is not a straight hole. it's through rock. there was rock crumbling. there were pieces of rock crumbling. so there are chances that this thing can get stuck for a moment or two. you can see the family looking with great relief the wheel is moving again. that's the mining minister in the red shirt. the guy in the jacket is obviously a family member of pablo rojas. they're only allowing a couple of family members per person. there is pablo, the 19th miner to be rescued of 33, leaves 14 more. pablo rojas. he's a carrier pigeon handler. carrier pigeons will tell you if the air quality has deteriorated to the point that it is not usable. in many mines they don't use carrier pigeons but electronic means of monitoring the air. this guy and his cousin were carrier pigeon handlers.

married 21 years. he has one son. i think that's the son we were just looking at in the black jacket. he is the last of three cousins to be rescued from this mine. rescue number 15 was his cousin victor segovia. this is rescue number 19. let's listen in. [ speaking in foreign language ] >> pablo! >> pablo!

jshg speaking in foreign language ]

>> you saw pablo rojas embracing his son. he is the last of three cousins to be rescued there. that is the son, the gentleman in front of him in the red shirt is the mining minister who has been there along with the president the whole time. and we are seeing the son being congratulated. pablo rojas has been transported to the clinic where he'll be evaluated and then every few guys, they put them on a helicopter and ship them out to a hospital that's about 15 minutes' flight away from there. all right. so what we'll see shortly is they'll be lowering the capsule back down to go in for number 20. there are 14 miners left. and, kelly, i hear you saying something but i can't hear what it is. leroy chow is with us. leroy, you can't help when you -- but when you see these guys emerge, doesn't really matter whether you're not interested in this story or not

or think you know everything about it. that's just really remarkable to see that. tell me, what's the similar experience for you, for an astronaut? tell me what the emotion is when they get out there. i almost expected them to be more subdued, confused even, disoriented. they just seemed thrilled. >> absolutely. and i'm not surprised by that, because they've been looking forward to this for a long time and they've been in a survival situation. they've been in constant risk. there could have been more cave-ins, could have been more problems. really remarkable they're in as great a shape as they appear to be. but i'm not surprised by their reaction. there are a lot of similarities. actually, i was just thinking about it and you were talking a little bit earlier about how small that capsule is and the soyuz spacecraft that i flew on to go to the international space station is pretty small too. i remember climbing in there as you were describing the capsule and thinking, boy, it's a good thing i'm not claustrophobic because if i were, this would

bring it out. also, i noted that it takes about ten minutes to get the capsule up from the mine floor, up to the surface of the earth, which is about how long it took for us to get from the launch pad up into space. and like i said, it was almost exactly six years ago right now that i was getting suited up to go fly aboard that soyuz spacecraft. >> leroy, it's always get to get your input into this. as much as you get pointing out -- and you're very generous in doing so -- that your experience wasn't the same as these miners. there were distinct differences. there's the sim lartd and that's why nasa was involved because it's people trapped in isolation somewhere where they are -- for all their abilities and all they have prepared them for what they do, it's out of their control. the slight difference with astronauts, however, is astronauts are trained almost exclusively for everything that can go wrong as opposed to everything that can go right whereas miners have a primary job and that is mining with emergency training.

>> right. and i'm sure these guys have received some survival training, emergency procedure training naturally. but there's nothing like the real thing. you get this emergency cave-in, this survival situation. and they pull together as a team. and i'm very impressed with what i've seen as i've followed the stories over the last 69 days of the leadership that's come through and the teamwork, the way they've kind of structured themselves and seemed to have worked very well with the quote/unquote mission control center up on the surface. so the parallels are there. and they seem to have come through remarkably well. >> leroy, we will keep on checking in with you as this develops. a bit of a shout-out to my buddy chad myers and bob roberts who have covered this. i've expressed curiosity about why carrier pigeons are used. it's the nickname for the device that was used to -- to carry supplies in. you remember there were really

narrow tubes initially before they had the big hole. the carrier pigeons were the tunes that carried stuff from the surface to the bore holes. that's why there are all these carrier pigeon guys. nine in total. thanks to chad and john. at least i know a couple of guys watch me. for clearing that up for me. there are no real birds involved in these things. they do use electronic monitoring that i suspected that they did. i didn't think anybody still used pigeons to figure out what was going on in the mines. other big story we're following, 20 days until the midterm elections. debate day in delaware. it's a small state with a very big and influential political matchup. you might want to be watching that debate tonight because it's going to make a difference to the entire national government. [ male announcer ] it's luxury with fire in its veins. bold. daring. capable of moving your soul. ♪

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let's turn now to politics. 20 days until the election. cnn is hosting the delaware senate debate tonight. wolf blitzer and gloria borger join us from delaware. i know somebody is going to tweet me and say why do you call it new ark, delaware. >> newark, new jersey. new ark, delaware. we're here on the campus of the university of delaware. behind me, mitchell hall. that's where the debate will be tonight 7:30 p.m. eastern after "the situation room." gloria is sheer. it's elf citing. the campus is excited. two good candidates. we'll see what they have to say. christine o'donnell and chris coons. a lot of emotion going into this debate. a lot of people want a sense of who these two candidates are. >> wolf, you're going to have a bit of an issue on your hand in that this is -- senate debates

in a state are often about the state and senators are often national politicians. but in this case, this debate has two sides. one is the national politics of christine o'donnell winning this and the other is the local politics. she's going to be attacking chris coons on tax increases. is he going to touch her history of the strange things that she's said? >> reporter: that's a good question. let's bring gloria into this conversation as well. i think it's a sensitive issue, the whole witchcraft issue as county executive raising taxes and also when he was in college he called in one article a bearded marxist so there's a lot of history there. i know i'm going to deal with the substantive economic issues -- jobs, taxes, national security issues. but they have stiff challenges both of them. >> she has to reintroduce herself to the people of delaware. she's done the ad saying "i am not a witch." i think she has to get beyond

that and be more substantive and let them know more about her on policy and present herself as somebody who is really a credible candidate. and, you know, so far she's been introduced to the people of delaware in a very, very odd way. i think we would agree. and as for her opponent, he cannot attack her, nor does he have to attack her really on anything other than substance. her introduction has already been bad enough, quite honestly, in the state. he needs to hang back and deal with her on the serious policy issues and show their differences. and if i were coons, i would stick to policy and not the personal stuff. >> and ali, just to be precise here, chris coons, even though he's ahead in all of these polls -- and we're going to have a brand new cnn/"time" magazine poll at 5:30 eastern at the top of "the situation room" and see what the latest numbers are. even though he's way ahead in all of the polls, let's not forget she beat in a republican

primary mike castle who is a legend here in the state of delaware. no one thought she could do that. she beat him. so you can't simply write her off. she's got challenges ahead of her, but she's proven she can win these kinds of elections. >> right. and what both of them are going to try to do tonight, wolf, is appeal to the middle in this state because that's so important in this state. those moderate republicans, those moderate democrats, those independent swing voters which she, quite frankly, given the polls that we've seen so far -- she's behind double digits -- she's had problems attracting those independent voters. that's what she's got to do tonight. she's got to try and move a little bit more to the center and he's got to prove to independents that he's not a wild-eyed liberal. >> he's got to prove, ali, that he's not simply going to rubber stamp whatever the democratic leadership in the senate or what the president, president obama wants to do, that he has an independent streak as well. i think that's one of his goals tonight. we'll see how he does and see

how she does as well. it's going to be -- i'm sure it will be a good lively debate. >> she's gone from being an unknown to national figure in less than a month. >> in record time. >> that's what happens. >> both of you, thanks very much. gloria, great to see you. wolf, we'll be watching and we will be riveted to it. delaware, the senate debate tonight, cnn live coverage starts at 7:30 p.m. eastern with the best political team on television. hey, listen, if there's somebody that knows about being stuck in small, tight places, it is david blaine. he'll be on the phone with me on the other side. ♪ but i really love my bank ♪ i hate-- didn't quite catch that last bit. i said i really love my bank. right... is there a problem ? it's not really raging, man. uh, we were hoping for more raging ? well, you said write from the heart. yeah... don't do that. at ally, you'll love our online savings account. named the best of 2010 by money magazine.

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interesting story. we've been talking about how these guys have managed and managed underground and this trip up. to some of the guys that trip up in that tube that is 22 inches in diameter, that's got to be pretty tough. i wanted to talk to david blaine who joins me now on the phone. david blaine is an illusionist. he's an endurance artist. you've heard about him. he does crazy things where he'll suspend himself somewhere or put himself in something that lasts for a long time. why is he relevant to this? we know why leroy chow from nasa was relevant. david, because you choose to put yourself in these situations and it's a mind over matter thing. you have convinced yourself you can do something that's abnormal, and uncomfortable. how do you do that? >> just to start, i think there is no way to really quantify the different between voluntary and involuntary. and since most of the things i'm doing are voluntary, i can't speak for what these men have

actually been going through on any level. but what's always been amazing to me is the ability of the human organism to adapt for survival. basically, the instincts of what we've developed over hundreds of thousands and millions of years to be able to still be here today. so what i think is -- when you put yourself in a confined space with almost nothing, what happens is the body shifts. it's a complete different mode that you enter. and i looked into animals and their abilities to adapt for survival. the one that was the most interesting to me was a salamander that is starving to death and about to die and it loses its tail, because it needs its tail to survive, his body will quickly digest inner organs to help him grow a tail to run around and get food. >> wow!

you make a very good point about the difference between voluntary and involuntary confinement. involuntary con fimt, you are -- you've got to probably control your breathing, your psyche. you prep for it. in involuntary confinement, there's got to be a degree of adrenaline or survival instinct that is pushing you that way. in the end they're doing similar things to your body. >> yeah. but when it's voluntary, you kind of know your beginning and your ends and you get to prepare for the situation. so whether it's, okay, i'm not going to eat for the next month and a half but i'm going to bulk up so i have fat for my body to digest versus not having anything and any preparation and your body has to kick into that mode and figure out what it needs to do to make you survive for a length of time that it doesn't even know or can't anticipate is just absolutely mind-blowing. >> and so that we can understand, i'm fascinated as i see these miners come out. they look robust.

they look happy. obviously, they're thrilled to be out there. but they don't look disoriented or confused. what are the strangest things that the body can adjust to that we don't think is normal? i can't imagine how i would survive 69 days. it's fascinating what the mind and body can do. >> what i would imagine is going on is right now i think they're having this crazy adrenaline rush. they probably didn't even know that they were going to ever make it. it's been two months plus in a hole. and now they're coming out. and the world is receiving them and they're getting to see their loved ones and the people that they've been dreaming about. so right now, i'm assuming they have this amazing adrenaline rush running through their bodies making them capable of functioning. but my guess is they will suffer repercussions and their bodies will go through major changes and it's not going to be easy. but right now they're probably living off of pure adrenaline. >> when you are in your

voluntary confinement episodes, do you need to be thinking about the things that you've been dreaming about like these guys have been dreaming about their families or favorite meal or whatever it is? is that how you get through those things? >> i think that's kind o what keeps you alive. i think it's knowing what you're going to when you're done, knowing that you have loved ones that are waiting for you or that you're going to get to resume normal life. that's kind of the pleasure of the whole -- that's why i almost do these things is because i take everything away and i'm left with absolutely nothing. and then i realize that things that are important to me -- and when i come out for the next couple of weeks, i really appreciate life at the highest level. >> and whether -- again, whether it's voluntary -- and you make a distinction between voluntary and involuntary. these miners were involuntary confined. when you come out and smell the fresh air and see your loved ones and eat what you want to eat, that high, how long does it go on for?

how long before you get crabby again or wherever you were in life and not appreciate the beauty around you? >> for me it's right away. i have a short moment of a heightened sense of awareness where i'm truthfully living in the given moment and emotional and alive and all of a sudden the cell phone starts to ring and things come back to reality and i spend the next two years trying to figure out what's next. >> it's very hard for us because of what happens today doesn't have a parallel in history so we've reached out to different people, to astronauts, people like you to get a bit of an understanding opinion thank you for that. david blaine, illusionist and an artist and given us some sense of what it's like to deprive yourself of freedom and confine yourself even though in his case he points out it's voluntary and not like the miners have gone through. back to politics. senate majority leader harry reid fighting for his political life. we'll tell you how close that race is in nevada.

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it is now just 20days until the critical midterm elections. we want to get you updated on the latest news from the campaign trail with a cnn political update with my friend cnn political editor mark preston and deputy political director paul steinhauser. two important parts of the best political team on television. what have you got? >> not often you hear republicans say, thank you, mr. president, but there is a conservative group called american crossroads. has american crossroads gps. they are one of the groups out raising a lot of money and funding ads across the country to defeat democrats. the white house and democrats have gone after them and saying they're not disclosing their

donors and should disclose their donors. because of this in the past week a representative from american crossroads tells cnn they've raised $13 million from conservatives and republicans who are ned up with the white house and fed up with democrats and in fact in all they've raised $56 million this year. why is this morning? because not only are they trying to defeat senate candidates, senate democrats, now they'll put money into house races. no total up to 15 by election day. a lot of money spent by conservative groups certainly out there heading into the midterms. paul. >> out in nevada senate majority leader harry reid we know he's battling and fighting for his political life. i'm going to ask our cameraman to zoom in to the cnn political ticker. brand new. look at the numbers from suffolk university. harry reid 46%. sharron angle backed by members of the tea party at 43%. of course that is within the sampling error but most recent polls have angle a little ahead

of reid and this one reid a little ahead. we have more coming out in four states including delaware where wolf blitz ser moderating a debate. good news, bad news for governor charlie crist down in florida running that independent bid. marco rubio the republican nominee. two endorsement arnold schwarzenegger tweeted about it, said he thinks charlie crist is the right man at the right time. this morning robert f. kennedy endorsed him the big democrat from really the royalty of democratic politics came out and endorsed charlie crist. bad news a new poll from florida from quinnipiac shows charlie crist is right now is trailing rubio 44 to 30%. 14 points. a lot of room that charlie crist has to try to make up in the closing days to the midterms. >> all right, mark and paul, good to see you guys. busy days for you. thanks very much for joining us.

your next cnn political update is just an hour away. it's a little before the top of the hour. let me show you what you're looking at there. it's a close-up shot provided by the chilean government of the mechanism, the winch mechanism that pulls that capsule up, minor number 20 is in that capsule right now. and that is being pulled to the surface. that is going to happen any moment now, which means there will be 13 more guys to be rescued, plus the five rescuers who are underneath right now. we did hear the chilean mining minister, the gentleman in the white hat on the left, saying an hour ago he's going to send a sixth rescuer down there at some point but look like things are moving very smoothly down there. don lemon is going to take over for me in a couple of minutes. don, you're going to -- i just -- i'm rarely this fascinated by a story. and what a privilege to cover a story that has a great ending to it. >> it's amazing. and i'm getting comments from viewers. they're saying, i'm watching cnn

and every time they bring one of these guys up i well up with tears. >> i do too. >> it doesn't get old. each time is like the first time. you saw the second guy that came up and gave the cheers. it's amazing and it is a privilege to watch this. we provide a service for our viewers every single day. and this is definitely a service to be able to provide not only to the country but today world to see this good news. you know what i said this morning in the meeting, we complain about so much in this country. >> this is a good lesson. >> everybody is on and the depress ands. i don't remember one time they asked for an antidepressant or anti-anxiety drug. >> they should be a lesson to us all. >> before you go think about this. so it's august 5th. we didn't know it happened because it happened. it was in chile august 5th. they're down there. they don't even know if anyone believes they're alive, if anyone is coming to get them, not for two weeks. then the shift supervisor says you better stretch this out and they hear people coming for them. they doesn't know.