Ca nsored by cbs this is the cbs evening news with scott pelley. Pelley good evening. The rain keeps coming and the flood keeps rising. Colorado is inundated by the worst flooding in generations and we have just learned that at least four people have been killed and several towns are surrounded by water. This is whats left of highway 7 outside lyons, a raging river tore the road apart. Colorados Governor John Hickenlooper warned people to stay away from the water. He said the dirt and sand have turned it into what he calls liquid cement. In boulder, will pitner was rescued by emergency workers and a neighbor after his home filled with water. Barry petersen tells us there are scenes like that all over. Reporter it is a race to rescue the stranded before the next storm hits. This man made it to safety via a zip line amid cheers from relieved spectators. The National Guard sent helicopters to pluck these people from jamestown, one of several small mountain towns cut off by the floods. Part of a cliff broke away and knocked the house over, killed someone. Reporter to get to the small town of lyons, the National Guard sent in trucks to get people out on badly damaged roads. Steve flowers house was inundated. There was a river in the house, a river in back of the house now, propane tanks are floating down the highway, cars flipped upside down. Its a disaster. Reporter brian perez was driving his family away from the rising water when his truck got stuck. Neighbors rushed to help. Were you afraid you were going to get swept away . Absolutely. I think anybody would be, you know . But youve got five of your family members in the vehicle with you, you have to show the best face you can and i think everybody was very brave. Reporter with rivers carrying 100 times more water than normal, the floods are spreading, shutting down a 90 mile stretch of i 25, a major north south route in the west. Neighborhoods have been cut in half by new rivers. In denver, sewers have backed up creating this geyser of raw sewage. 15 inches of rain has fallen in a week. Thats what this area usually gets in six months. Nathan williams and abe morris took this video and then realized they had to make a run for it. Walking through that water was pretty extreme. I mean, it was up to my hip and just pushing through like constantly. I was like watching for logs to come through and propane tanks. Reporter as you can see, scott, the creek that runs through Downtown Boulder is already out of its banks. In fact, the National WeatherService Estimates that this city got five and a half billion gallons of water in that rainstorm. Put another way that would be 122 inches of snow about ten feet deep. Pelley barry peter in the middle of the flood zone. Barry, thanks very much. On the new jersey shore it wasnt a flood this time but flames. Dozens of Business Owners faced the prospect of rebuilding for the second time in a year after a sixalarm fire tore through the boardwalk. Three Police Officers were hurt when they fell off an emergency vehicle. Terrell brown is in seaside park. It was helpless. It was like a feeling of helplessness. Its just a feeling of im watching this happen and i cant do anything about it. Reporter 25yearold bubba demuro owns bubbas doghouse. He had just reopened his restaurant this summer after it was destroyed by superstorm sandy. As the wind blew, i didnt want to believe it but i knew. I knew that it was going to the whole thing was going to go off. I knew. I knew it. I could feel it. It was a bad feeling. Reporter what started as a small fire at 2 00 p. M. On the boardwalk grew to a 6alarm blaze. The wind whipped so quickly that in just a few hours the firefighting force grew to 400. There it goes. Reporter all thats left is four blocks of charred rubble. This summer, demuro says his business was down more than 60 and after rebuilding he wasnt able to afford insurance. This is the second time this has happened to me in an 11 month time span. Reporter whats the hardest part . The hardest part is my whole family works for me. My sisters work for me, my cousins, i have a kid thats been with me since he was 16 years old thats basically family. Not only do i not have a job, none of them do, either. Reporter the damage could have been worse if firefighters didnt act fast. They ripped up nearby businesses and parts of the board walk to dig a 20foot trench. Ocean county fire chief brian gabriel. The strategy is protect life and property as best as possible. Did we lose a lot of property . Yes. We had to lose a little to save a lot. Reporter demuro was one of 30 to lose his business but hes determined to come back. What happened to me in one year dont happen to people in 50 years. I realize that. Youve got to persevere, thats life. Reporter firefighters have turned the scene over to state and federal investigators. No word on a cause tonight, scott, but so far theres no sign of any suspicious activity. Pelley Terrell Brown in seaside park. Thanks, terrell. There is an important Late Breaking Development on syria. Our senior White House Correspondent bill plante is hearing from a senior official that the United States will not insist, after all, that a u. N. Security Council Resolution include a threat of force. The resolution being drafted demands that syria give up its chemical weapons, but russia said it would veto the resolution if it specified military action. This compromise by the Obama Administration could clear the way for a United International effort to dispose of syrias chemical arsenal. Secretary of state john kerry is in geneva tonight negotiating a resolution of the syria crisis with the Russian Foreign minister. It was russia that proposed this week that syria give up its chemical weapons in order to head off a u. S. Air strike. Margaret brennan, our state department correspondent, is covering the talks for us in geneva. Margaret, tell us about the progress today. Reporter well, scott, the u. S. And russia have agreed on the size of the syrian chemical arsenal but theyre still working on details like where the stockpile is and how to destroy it. But we do know that talks today are at a pivotal moment. Thats at least how one negotiator in the room described progress to me. And the russian delegation had originally planned to leave geneva tonight. They were going to fly out. Instead sergei lavrov, the Russian Foreign minister, and his team, stayed on, talks are going well into the night here and theyre expected to continue for a third day tomorrow. Pelley what will secretary kerry be doing next . Reporter well, secretary kerry will fly from geneva to israel then on to paris and hes going to meet there with the french and the Saudi Foreign ministers. Those two countries are key because theyre the only two whove publicly said that they support a u. S. Led military strike on syria. On the topic of how to disarm syria and peace talks will come up again at the u. N. In two weeks. Pelley and well be following it next week. Margaret, thank you. In another Big Development on this, secretary kerry said today he will try to expand these chemical weapons talks into comprehensive peace talks. The Syrian Civil War is in its third year. More than 100,000 people have been killed and at least four million have lost their homes. It all started as a Popular Uprising against the dictator Bashar Alassad. His family has ruled for 43 years. One of the most experienced reporters in the war is our Elizabeth Palmer and today she got back in touch with a family damascus. Reporter last november, sara, an opposition activist, showed us around her neighborhood, a shattered damascus suburb defended by rebel fighters from the syrian free army. And later her family gave us shelter when Syrian Military shells began to fall. Almost a year later, the shells are still falling. I could see them today from our hotel. But its impossible to get to the neighborhood now. The army has it completely sealed off. So instead we got through to sara on skype. Whats life like these days . Are you able to get enough to eat . Get enough to eat . Reporter on a meager diet mostly of rice sara says shes lost 20 pounds since we last saw her. Then, on the morning of august 21, rockets felled with poison gas landed less than a mile from her home and sara ran to help. Werent you afraid that you would get affected if you went toward the strike . Reporter so are the people who suffered through this relieved to hear Bashar Alassad has agreed to give up his chemical weapons . It makes no difference sara told me. To as if to prove it, she told us two weeks ago the family who welcomed us so warmly in their home were in the street when a shell landed. Saras brother, his wife, and their young son were killed. Pelley Elizabeth Palmer joins us again from the syrian capital damascus. Elizabeth, damascus is a city of nearly two Million People like houston or philadelphia. Are all the neighborhoods carved up like saras . Yes, they are. The rebelheld areas tend to be around the outside and the center of damascus is pretty firmly in government hands. As you saw, life in the rebel held area is very difficult. A lot of people have left. Thousands of people flooded into the center of the city here what where theres kind of a semblance of normality. People have jobs are going to work. There is food in the shops although its very expensive. But, of course, that theres thunder of the artillery all day long and military checkpoints every few blocks. Pelley Elizabeth Palmer in damascus again for us tonight. Liz, thanks very much. Now, coming back home, in california Illegal Immigrants will soon be able to get a drivers license. State lawmakers approved the bill late last night and governor jerry brown says hell sign it. But this is controversial so we asked carter evans to look into it. Reporter Californias Department of Motor Vehicles estimates nearly 1. 5 million Illegal Immigrants would apply for the new license. This woman is one of them. I have to drive, too, and i feel terrible because i dont have a drivers license but what can i do . I need a car. Reporter you dont like to si. ; . Pa its hard to think about it. Xo reporter the new licensezj permits her to drive but cannot be used to get work or public benefits. It will also feature a special mark to indicate its for driving only. Supporters of the law say roads will be safer because Illegal Immigrants will have to pass drivers tests and be properly insured. But opponents argue the license offers a privilege to people whove already broken the law. Illegal aliens bring a lot of problems to our state. Reporter lupe moreno is with the California Coalition for immigration reform, a group that lobbied against the licenses. We should not be giving them anything grasp on. We should not be giving them any hope. Were americans. We are we follow the laws. Reporter california joins ten other states that already offer drivers licenses to Illegal Immigrants. And once the governor signs the bill into law, scott, the California Department of Motor Vehicles will have until january 1, 2015, to determine how to implement the rules and begin issuing the new licenses. Pelley carter evans in our los angeles newsroom. Carter, thank you. An airline made a huge mistake. Will passengers get a free ride . Tortoises are making way for a new era in green energy. And the beatles are back. When the cbs evening news continues. Back. When t ening news continues. 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This weekend, the largest solar thermal plant in the world will hook up top the power grid and could start supplying electricity to california homes by the end of the year. More now from ben tracy. Reporter from a distance it looks like a shimmering blue lake in the mohave desert. But that mirage is really a mirror. 170,000 of them, theyre called helio stats. How much power do you get from each one . This project will fuel 140,000 california homes. So effectively one heliostat can power one california home. Reporter tom doyle is the c. E. O. Of n. R. G. , the Company Heading this massive solar project. In fact, this is the largest concentrated solar thermal project in the world. Reporter conventional solar panels capture the suns energy, but these mirrors reflect it on to a 450 foot tall tower. Inside is a boiler which heats to 1,000 degrees. Water is turned into steam that powers a turbine and creates electricity which will likely be sent to los angeles and san francisco. Were actually displacing 400,000 tons per year of c. O. 2 by using solar energy in lieu of fossil fuel capacity. Reporter so theres steam going into the sky but no c. O. 2. Youve got it. Thats right. Reporter the installation will help towards californias goal of getting onethird of electricity from renewable sources by 2020. But its not cheap. This project cost 2. 2 billion. Its privately funded by several Companies Including google which invested 168 million. The project is backed by a 1. 6 billion federal Loan Guarantee and they lease the land from the Government Land that was almost home to the desert tortoise, a protected species. It cost the projects backers 22 million to hire biologists, purchase Conservation Land and relocate about 200 tortoises into these pens on the property. But they feel its worth it because this type of solar plant could be replicated in the deserts in the american southwest. So its happening. Its real and this really is todays technology from an energy perspective. Reporter technology thats no longer elusive, even if it appears to be an illusion. Ben tracy, cbs news, in the mohave desert. Pelley well this appeared to be an illusion for a time yesterday. United airlines web site listed fares for zero dollars. Folks who spotted the free tickets snapped them up. Today united said it was all a big mistake, a human error but it will honor the tickets. Its not a beatles reunion exactly, but for fans it may be the next best thing. That story straight ahead. Ahead. Vietnam in 1972. [ all ] fort benning, georgia in 1999. [ male announcer ] usaa Auto Insurance is often handed down from generation to generation. Because it offers a superior level of protection and because usaas commitment to serve military members, veterans, and their families is without equal. Begin your legacy, get an Auto Insurance quote. Usaa. We know what it means to serve. 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