Obama To Meet Sarkozy, Pays Tribute to D-Day Fallen; Official: Missing Plane Sent 24 Error Messages
T.J. HOLMES, CNN ANCHOR: Well, 65 years ago today, thousands of Allied soldiers swarmed the shores in France. The liberation of Western Europe on that day at that place on the beaches of Normandy. The picture you're seeing here of the American Cemetery in Normandy. We will be taking you there live.</s>BETTY NGUYEN, CNN ANCHOR: And for many, this, too, is where it ended. Now the quiet, hallowed ground, as T.J. mentioned, the American Cemetery. Well, today, we do remember the heroes of D-Day.</s>HOLMES: And from the CNN Center, this is CNN SATURDAY MORNING for June the 6th. Hello to you all. I'm T.J. Holmes.</s>NGUYEN: Good morning, everybody. I'm Betty Nguyen. It's 6 a.m. here in Atlanta; noon in Paris, France, where we do begin our coverage.</s>HOLMES: Well, thousands of American veterans and active military men and women on hand for ceremonies happening today in France. CNN's Dan Lothian in Normandy for us. Dan, hello to you. A lot going on today. Give us the rundown of events that the Obamas will be participating in today.</s>DAN LOTHIAN, CNN WHITE HOUSE CORRESPONDENT: Well, yes. First of all, there will be an arrival ceremony that will be happening shortly. President Obama, Michelle Obama along as well meeting with the French President Sarkozy and his wife. After that arrival ceremony, then the two leaders will sit down, have a bilateral meeting, T.J., a chance to talk about a whole host of issues. But at the top of the agenda, Iran and their continued development of -- nuclear development there. That's a big issue in Europe, and also in the Middle East. So that's something that the two leaders will be talking about. But of course, the big focus, as you've been talking about, is the 65th anniversary of the D-Day landings here in Normandy. We're standing here at the American Cemetery, where about 9,400 or so U.S. personnel are buried. And this is why President Obama is here, to honor all of these soldiers who gave their lives in freeing Western Europe from the hands of the Nazis. Along with President Obama will be Prime Minister Brown as well as the Canadian prime minister. Also here today will be Mr. Obama's great uncle, Charlie Payne. We've heard a lot about him over the last few days or so because he was one of the soldiers who helped to liberate one of the camps at Buchenwald. He was not present there when President Obama was there yesterday. But he will be here at today's ceremonies. So certainly a big today with a lot on tap. President Obama, along with the other prime ministers, giving speeches here --</s>T.J. HOLMES: Yes, and Dan, as you kind of run down there, a -- a big day, big public event with high-profile leaders. Give us an idea of security there.</s>LOTHIAN: Well, security, obviously, very tight. We were escorted here on our buses. Everywhere along the highway as we were coming in, we saw police staking out the area. So, yes, security very tight here for this event, T.J. Obviously, when you have so many of these high-profile leaders here taking part in this event, it is -- security is very tight. And you know, Tony I wanted -- T.J., rather, I wanted to point out that this is a really an important anniversary because these World War II veterans, most of them 85-plus years, and they may not be able to make it back, at least so many of them would not be able to make it back for another major anniversary. So this is really an important day, as these veterans and also those who lost their lives and are buried here are remembered.</s>HOLMES: All right. Dan Lothian, keeping an eye on things for us there. We'll be checking back in with you again this morning. Thank you so much. As our coverage, of course, continues throughout the day, as Dan was mentioning, a lot of events, a lot of things going on with the president and other world leaders today to commemorate this day. We will continue to follow live events. I'm told this is now a live picture you see here, the French President Nicolas Sarkozy and his wife, Carla Bruni, making their way along the red carpet here. He's going to be meeting with the president, expected to have -- with President Obama, expected to have a lunch together, a working lunch, as we heard Dan mention there. But a -- a -- a big day. A lot of ceremonies, a lot of pomp, a lot of circumstance. But really, a day to remember what happened on this day some 65 years ago now. Again, a live picture here. Expecting -- we haven't seen the president, President Obama just yet arrive in this particular locale. But expecting him and the first lady, Michelle Obama, to arrive here as well as the Canadian prime minister and the British prime minister participating in these ceremonies today as well. You can stay here with us at CNN. We are keeping an eye on all the events happening in Normandy today. Our coverage will continue.</s>NGUYEN: We're also following this -- want to take you to Mexico now. Twenty-nine children are dead, more than 100 others injured after a fire swept through a state-run daycare center in Hermosillo. Officials say it started in the warehouse next door and quickly spread. Now, the children range in age from about 1 year to 5 years old. Some are being taken to Shriners Hospital in California today for treatment. Also, learning more on this this morning -- about the crash of Air France Flight 447. Well, a French investigation board held a news conference just two hours ago, and the head of the board says the plane's autopilot was not on when it disappeared. Brazilian officials say a debris field found near -- earlier this week was not from Flight 447. Some 228 people were on board on that plane. Well, CNN International correspondent Richard Quest has been following this story, and we are going to bring him up live very shortly, and to get the latest from that news conference. Hopefully we will learn some additional information as to what exactly happened when that flight went down. But as soon as we are able to get Richard Quest up live and available, we will bring that straight to you.</s>HOLMES: All right. Turning to a little weather here now, we're going to bring in our Reynolds Wolf, keeping an eye on these things for us. And Reynolds, we're talking about a tornado here, happened in Wyoming, we're told, yesterday. No reports of damage. We do have some video we can share with our viewers here though. But explain to me -- you take me through this video here, Reynolds.</s>REYNOLDS WOLF, CNN METEOROLOGIST: Well, let -- let's first tell our viewers, these are the greatest tornadoes that you're ever going to deal with. These are happy tornadoes. And the reason why I say these are happy tornadoes is that -- that -- they're occurring in the middle of nowhere. No one's going to be hurt by these. They're just fun to watch. It's a great thing to see. Beautiful, beautiful system. And actually -- I mean, some storm chasers were able to cap -- capture this. This is being brought to you through the compliments of KGWN. One of several that touched down just yesterday. And now the same storm system that spawned that tornado is now moving through parts of the Central Plains. Could bring a -- a little bit rough weather into the afternoon, possibly into the Midwest and into parts of the Mississippi Valley. Now, one other big weather story that we were dealing with was heavy rainfall yesterday in parts of Florida, southeast, down near Miami -- anywhere from seven to nine inches of rainfall. So certainly some rough stuff there. They had about 10,000 people without power, and as we speak at this time, the storm system...</s>HOLMES: Hey, Reynolds, I'm going to jump in here right quick, buddy.</s>WOLF: Sure.</s>HOLMES: We're keeping an eye on things. We're going to take this live picture because we have it now. This is President Obama arriving, as you see here. Take a listen to the reception. Let's just listen to the reception from people greeting him in France right now.</s>HOLMES: And again, what you're seeing here -- and you're going be seeing this throughout the day. You can stay with CNN, because we will continue to bring you live pictures as they happen. Really, a busy day for the president and the first lady over in France. And what you see is an arrival here. He's going to be meeting with the French president, expected to have a working lunch, essentially, but there really to commemorate the D-Day that happened on this day some 65 years ago. The president here -- this is just one of those moments. The ground has gathered outside where he was stopping. Sometimes you -- you don't know if the president is going to stop and shake hands, or what he's in the mood for. But apparently in the mood to -- I guess just to greet the folks who have gathered there to -- to see him. You see the first lady Michelle Obama there as well. Nicolas Sarkozy right there with his hand on the president's shoulder and Carla Bruni. These -- these two couples, essentially, have formed a relationship, if you will. This is not the first time they've meet. Of course, the G-20 summit, spent some time together not too terribly long ago. But this -- another picture here we're going to see, the Canadian prime minister as well today and the British prime minister are going to be joining these two leaders as well as they commemorate over at the American Cemetery in Normandy what happened on this day some 65 years ago.</s>NGUYEN: We do want to take you back now to some new developments with the missing Air France Flight 447. CNN International correspondent Richard Quest is following the story, as we told you. He now joins us from London. Richard, there was a news conference a little bit earlier today about -- what? -- two hours ago. Any new information as to exactly what happened?</s>RICHARD QUEST, CNN INTERNATIONAL CORRESPONDENT: Still sifting through that, Betty. But there are headlines, from what I can gather at that moment, from that news conference. First of all, let's deal with the weather forecast. We now know that the -- the weather in the area where the plane went down was normal for this time of the year. Now that means there were cumulonimbus clouds. They did have some heavy storm activity. But the -- according to the weather experts in Paris, it was nothing out of the ordinary. Other aircraft were flying as expected, and so they at this point do not necessarily pin too much on this part of the -- of the -- the possibility. We also now know that the ACARS system -- this is the aircraft communication-and-reporting system -- the so-called automated messages. It sent 24 messages of -- of varying failures that were taking place on the plane, things like the autothrottle -- the autopilot was switched off. They don't know whether the pilot switched it off, or whether it failed. What the experts were very keen to say is, all these messages that so many people are talking about, they are designed for maintenance; they're not designed for investigation. But we do now have a -- getting a much better picture in that sense that there were inconsistencies in the speed reporting. The computers were telling them wrong information. And ultimately, the systems on the plane were failing.</s>NGUYEN: All right. CNN's Richard Quest joining us live from London with that. Thank you for that, Richard. We do now want to take you now live back to Caen, France, where you can see the president standing right there. Ceremonies taking place today to observe D-Day. Let's just take a listen for a moment as we watch this play out.