Ed McMahon Died at Age 86; Investigators Looking for a Cause After Two Metro Trains Collide in D.C.; The Guardian Council Ruled Out Annulling the Election Results as Protests Continue Throughout Iran
DEBORAH HERSMAN, NATL. TRANSPORTATION SAFETY BOARD: I can tell you that it is a scene of real devastation down there.</s>HEIDI COLLINS, CNN ANCHOR: Two trains collide on a Washington metro line. Today investigators are looking for a cause. And we are live at the scene. New threat to protesters in Iran. The regime says it will set an example of those it detains. And governors, get away. South Carolina's chief executive disappears without even telling his wife. We'll tell you where he wound up. It is Tuesday, June 23rd. I'm Heidi Collins and you are in the CNN NEWSROOM. This morning, Ed McMahon is dead at the age of 86. McMahon's publicist says America's favorite side kick was surrounded by loved ones at the end. He died in Los Angeles just after midnight. CNN's Brooke Anderson has more now on Ed McMahon we all got to know and love during his more than five decades in our living rooms.</s>ED MCMAHON, TV HOST: Here's Johnny!</s>BROOKE ANDERSON, CNN CORRESPONDENT (voice-over): For 30 years, Ed McMahon was a fixture in American households as Johnny Carson's "Tonight Show" side kick. In that role, he played announcer and Carson's set-up man.</s>MCMAHON: I hold in my hand the last envelope.</s>ANDERSON: He was a loyal source of laughs. And always knew his place.</s>MCMAHON: You had to know how to do that, how to be the second banana. To be in when you needed to be, out when you weren't needed.</s>ANDERSON: McMahon got his start in radio and in the early 1950s hosted a number of TV shows in Philadelphia. His long association with Carson began in the late '50s culminating with their final "Tonight Show" together in 1992.</s>JOHNNY CARSON, HOST, "TONIGHT SHOW": I want to thank the gentleman who shared this stage with me for 30 years, Mr. Ed McMahon.</s>ANDERSON: Even before Carson retired, McMahon had branched out with his own ventures, among them, hosting "Star Search." He co- hosted "TV's Bloopers and Practical Jokes with Dick Clark."</s>MCMAHON: We got a lot of things planned tonight.</s>ANDERSON: While always genial on air, McMahon's personal life was not as charmed. He went through two divorces and in 2002 he sued after toxic mold was found in his house. In 2007, he broke his neck in a fall leading to more lawsuits. With all of the money he had earned over a lucrative career, it came as stunning news in 2008 that a lender had started foreclosure proceedings on his house.</s>MCMAHON: You spend more money than you make, you know what happens. And it can happen. You know, like a couple of divorces flown in, a few things like that, and you know, things happen.</s>ANDERSON: Notoriety from his mortgage problems did lead to some commercial opportunities, including a 2009 Super Bowl ad.</s>MCMAHON: Now's the time to send your unwanted gold for cash.</s>ANDERSON: McMahon will forever be remembered for his work in late night which earned him a place in television history alongside Johnny Carson.</s>CARSON: Who did you take to high school prom?</s>MCMAHON: Madeline Mason (ph).</s>CARSON: You remember?</s>MCMAHON: Got to her before you did. All of a sudden you did 30 years and you kind of look back and you see this monument you created. And I helped put in some of those stones with him. It's wonderful.</s>ANDERSON: Brooke Anderson, CNN, Los Angeles.</s>COLLINS: You can post your thoughts and memories of Ed McMahon on our blog. Just go to CNN.com/newsroom and click on my picture.</s>UNIDENTIFIED MALE: It's still going on. I still can't believe it. I still can't believe it. I saw the terror in the folks' face in the back of the train here as they were beating on the windows trying to get out of the cars. Once the paramedics -- some got down there, they opened up some of the cars, and assisted some folks, and they just pretty much just plowed right out of there one after another.</s>COLLINS: The death toll rises and questions, of course, linger. What could have caused this crash? And could it actually happen in a major metro area near you? We're talking about that this morning. Also CNN's Jeanne Meserve is in Washington for us. She's looking more at the body count and also for clues as to what may have gone wrong there. Then to Iran. Our Ivan Watson has been monitoring the turmoil there. He'll be joining us to talk a little bit more about the government and an announcement it's going to be making. Protesters, meanwhile, are making their plans, as well. It is Washington's most deadly subway crash. Seven people confirmed dead now. And investigators want to know how this could have been prevented. Was it a failure of man or machine that caused one train to plow into the back of another? It happened during the evening rush hour. The trains have pulled out of the Takoma Park station, and were headed toward the Fort Totten station. CNN's Jeanne Meserve joining us now with the very latest. So, Jeanne, what are we able to learn from officials there this morning? I know there was a press conference, of course.</s>JEANNE MESERVE, CNN CORRESPONDENT: There was. Heidi, this is very much still a recovery operation. I was over on the bridge, which is over the crash scene just a few moments ago and you can see that they brought in a very tall crane and they'll be taking off the pieces of wreckage one by one, sort of deconstructing the sandwich, as it were. And when they take a level off, emergency medical personnel, firefighters will go in to see if there is anybody who was caught in that wreckage. The death toll, confirmed death toll at this point in time stands at seven, but the fire chief told me this morning that it's anybody's guess how many people may be entombed in that wreckage. They're hoping by 5:00 this afternoon to actually have a firmer number for us. Meanwhile, the investigation is underway. As you mentioned, one train was still when a second train came up behind it, rammed into it, The front car going up over the back end of the first train. That first train did have some recorders on it, and it was a newer version train, but there are significant questions about that second train that rammed into it. Here's a little bit of what the NTSB had to say this morning.</s>HERSMAN: Made recommendations in 2006 about the crashworthiness of the 1,000 series cars. We've recommended to WMATA to either retrofit those cars or to phase them out of the fleet. They have not been able to do that, and our recommendation was not addressed. So it has been closed in an unacceptable status. We have also made recommendations in the past about recorders and recommended that they equip all of their fleet with recorders, with event recorders. Again, that has not taken place on some of the older series of cars that WMATA was expecting to phase out.</s>MESERVE: Now, NTSB investigators are looking at a lot of other things, as well. They're looking at tracks, they're looking at signals, they're looking at the computerized system, which at rush hour should have been operating these trains and of course, they'll be looking at the possibility of operator error. But no conclusions yet as to what may have caused the crash.</s>COLLINS: Yes, understood.</s>MESERVE: Heidi, back to you.</s>COLLINS: Understood, Jeanne. I just wonder, though, from the press conference and from the spokesperson from the NTSB that we just heard, it sounds like this could be quite a process to be hearing more about recommendations NTSB is making and then the metro line not taking those recommendations, yes?</s>MESERVE: Yes, it's going to be interesting to see how this one plays out. Washington Metropolitan Transit Authority, that WMATA that you heard referred to...</s>COLLINS: Right.</s>MESERVE: ... hasn't yet provided us with their side of the argument on this. But the NTSB says pretty clearly we made the recommendations on the radios, on retrofitting or phasing them out, it didn't happen. It didn't happen. Now whether or not that was a causal factor here, we -- it seems dubious -- but it would perhaps have had something to do with the crash worthiness, how well these cars might have withstood the crash.</s>COLLINS: Sure. Sure, obviously a lot more investigation to be done there at a very tough recovery effort, as well. All right, Jeanne Meserve on the scene for us this morning. Jeanne, thank you. Quickly now, a rundown of Washington's subway system. The Metro is the second largest rail system in the U.S. and the fifth largest bus system. The rail and bus serves a population of 3.5 million passengers. Last year, more than 215 million rode on the rail, 133 million took the buses. The route includes trips from D.C. to Maryland and Virginia. Passengers aboard the second train say their afternoon commute was peacefully chugging along and then they felt a slight bump and the world was thrown into violence.</s>JASMINE GARSO, TRAIN CRASH SURVIVOR: I was on the train that was moving. And all of a sudden as we approached my station in D.C., it was like nothing I've ever felt before. It was like we hit a concrete wall. And almost immediately I fell off my seat. Another person, I don't know who, flew off their seat. And the lights went off and smoke started filling the train cart, the metro cart.</s>COLLINS: Here's another angle now of the crash shot by a CNN iReporter. As you can see the second train hit with such force it literally plowed right under the first train. We will continue to watch the story, of course, for you all day long here on CNN. Meanwhile, turning to Iran's disputed election now where the government is giving its strongest signal yet. It will not order a new vote. Here's what we know. The Guardian Council has ruled out the possibility of annulling the election results, saying irregularities were reported before the balloting not during or after. Iranian state-run media reports President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad will be sworn into a second term sometime between July 26th and August 19th. And a top Iranian judicial official said a special court has been set up to deal with detained protesters. Government restrictions on international media reporting from Iran remain in place. But we are still working to bring you the very latest news from the country, of course. CNN's Ivan Watson is at our Iran desk this morning. What are we able to get out of there this morning?</s>IVAN WATSON, CNN CORRESPONDENT: Heidi, the media crackdown continues in Iran. The "Washington Times" reporter working in Tehran, a man named Iason Athanasiadis, if I pronounced it correctly, he's a Greek-British man, has been arrested according to the Culture Ministry. And this follows a report by the Paris-based media watchdog reporter Sans Frontieres, which says 23 Iranian journalists have been arrested since June 14th from four different cities around the country. Many of them taken from their homes late at night making it, according to reporter Sans Frontieres, quote, "the world's largest prison for journalists." And as you mentioned, the Guardian Council deciding that the election on June 12th that triggered this crisis, that there is no possibility of an annulment to take place. This even after three of the opposition candidates have accused the government of rigging those elections. Again, Mahmoud Ahmadinejad to be sworn in between July 26th and August 19th. He's the incumbent president and the official winner of the election. Meanwhile, in the Iranian parliament, parliament members have summoned the interior minister to complain to him, to ask him why these night raids are happening in people's homes by security forces and why there was a raid on Tehran University, which has been criticized in Iran. Lawmakers accused the interior minister of, quote, "lacking crisis management in the last weeks consecutive days of nationwide turmoil." And let me bring you to a piece of video now. This is coming from the southeastern city of Kerman. We don't know exactly when it was shot. This comes from YouTube, but it is video of a protest taking place. The reason why this is important is, Heidi, because we've also seen evidence of protests taking place in several other cities outside of Tehran. Isfahan, Tabriz, Shiraz.</s>COLLINS: Right.</s>WATSON: In the northwest, the southwest -- that shows that this problem is bigger than just in the Iranian capital, Heidi.</s>COLLINS: All right, Ivan, we sure do appreciate that. And we will continue to get these stories coming into us the best that we can and try to offer the information out just as it comes in here. Ivan Watson for us over at the Iran desk. Thanks so much, Ivan. The latest tweets about Iran. People all over the world are using Twitter to share their views and information. In fact our Josh Levs is following it now minute by minute. This has really been pretty incredible, Josh.</s>JOSH LEVS, CNN CORRESPONDENT: Incredible. I was -- actually was looking at some numbers that I'm going to be showing you later this hour. It is incredible the way people are using Twitter. You know, as you said, one of the things they're doing is sharing their views. We have an example here. One of the latest twits that we just picked up, where it says, "My heart goes out to the Iranian people." A lot of people with messages like that. Others are using it to call for action. Let's look at the next one that just came through. This one talked about, "show support for democracy in Iran by adding a green overlay to your Twitter avatar." I know some strange words in there. We're going to tell you what it all means, what people are doing online to express their views today and the call for action. If you see something important on Twitter you want us to take a look at, here's how you can reach me. Look at this graphic. Twitter.com/JoshlevsCNN. Point it out to us. Let us know where you think we should be taking a look, what's the most significant. And Heidi, in a matter of minutes, we'll be here with the absolute latest twits for you.</s>COLLINS: Great. Very good. All right, Josh. Thank you. President Obama ready to talk about Iran today. Reacting to the dramatic events of the past two days in his first Rose Garden news conference coming up.</s>JACQUI JERAS, CNN METEOROLOGIST: And I'm CNN meteorologist Jacqui Jeras. It is hot out there from Minnesota to Mississippi. Everybody's sweating today. Find out when and if there will be a break in the heat and the latest on severe storms. It's coming up next with your forecast.