Backdraft. Two firefighters inside a burning home when it suddenly explodes, sending insulation everywhere. This morning, how they managed to escape with their lives. And girl power the nation set to honor the world cup champion u. S. Womens soccer team with an historic ticker tape parade in new york city. But not before they make their way to the plaza to see the hottest girl band around, fifth harmony, live in concert today, friday, july 10th, 2015. Announcer from nbc news, this is today with matt lauer and savannah guthrie. Live from studio 1a in rockefeller plaza. Welcome to a friday morning. Savannah comes back from vacation on monday. Were here with hoda kotb. On your last day, we brought out a big crowd. Can i just say, this is my kind of crowd. A crowd of young girls, their moms and a bunch of other people some of whom spent the night overnight but theyre ready for fifth harmony around so am i thats in our 8 30 halfhour. But lets start on a friday morning with history being made in South Carolina this morning. For the first time in more than half a century, the Confederate Flag will be removed from the State Capitol grounds. And with a big crowd expected security is very tight. Well talk exclusively to the states governor nikki haley in just a employment. But first, today National Correspondent craig melvin has the latest. Craig, good morning to you. Reporter matt good morning. That history that you just mentioned will be made about three hours from now behind me and for all of us who have grown up in the shadow of this confederate battle flag here in colombia it will be an emotional day after more than 50 years, the flag willtaken down in a short and solemn ceremony. This morning for the first time in more than 50 years, the confederate battle flag will no longer fly at South Carolinas State Capitol. I am surrounded by members of the emanuel nine family. Reporter Governor Haley acknowledged the nine killed in charleston three weeks ago using a separate pen for each victim. The history of the action that took place by everyone in South Carolina to get us to this moment is one that we can all be proud of. Reporter the church killings sparked a nationwide debate about the Confederate Flag. Sock arguing it represents South Carolinas heritage. Whether its right or whether its wrong, it is a part of american history. Reporter others that it is a painful reminder of slavery and racism. The heated controversy not letting up on social media. Taking down the Confederate Flag is almost taken do you go a part of american history. It is not a flag of racism it is a flag of culture. Another posting, now your entire state can unite and heal under one flag. The american flag. Formal come graham whose sister cynthia hurd was killed at the church removing the flag is bittersweet bittersweet. Were glad that the flag is coming down but we still are heartbroken by the loss of our sister and the eight others. Reporter state representative jenny horn a descendant of confederate president Jefferson Davis im very proud. Im proud of my state. Im proud of this body. And im proud of the governor. Reporter the flag itself will be taken down by a department of Public Safety honor guard, the same honor guard that was used at the funeral of South Carolina state senator Clementa Pinckney 1 of the 9 folks gunned down in that Church Basement in charleston more than three weeks ago. Matt . Craig melvin thank you very much. South carolinas governor nikki haley is with us now exclusively. Governor haley, good morning, thanks for being with us. Good morning, matt. It is a great day in South Carolina. Well lets talk about it. The events of yesterday and today would have seemed unthinkable five weeks ago in your state. So lets start this morning by just tell me about your emotions this morning. Personally. You know im proud. Im proud of the people of South Carolina that came together after a terrible tragedy. I think about the emanuel 9. I think about cynthia hurd whose life motto was be kinder than necessary. I think about Twanza Sanders whose last words before he stood in front of his aunt susie said we mean no harm to you. You dont need to do this. Sharonda left three children of her own. Im thinking of those nine people today. Youve talked about them and their grace and the forgiveness of their family members and you said that they started action all around this country. They made us think not of our differences but what our similarities are and yet there are still differences, governor. As that flag comes down today in your state, you know there are going to be an awful lot of people who are going to see it as a defeat theyre going to be angry and theyre going to think it is a piece of their heritage that is coming down. What do you say to those people this morning . I think weve gone through that debate. What weve said is that in South Carolina we honor tradition. We honor history. We hon more heritage. But there is a place for that flag and that flag needs to be in a museum where we will continue to make sure people can honor it appropriately. But the state house is an area that belongs to everyone and no one should ever drive by the state house and feel pain. No one should ever drive by the state house and feel like they dont belong. So i think this is a hopeful day for South Carolina. I think it is a day that we can all say that we have come together as a state. I think you can look at the way South Carolina responded to this tragedy, and i think we can all say that hopefully the emanuel nine are looking down at feeling proud today. You have faced relentless criticism over the last four or five weeks, governor. There are people who have brought up your Indian Heritage theyve called you an outsider theyre promised political retribution. Some have even promised personal retribution. As a result of the events of the last couple of weeks, are are you concerned for your personal safety . No. You know i have faith. I will tell you that ethyl lance used to sing a song and the song would be basically said one day sweet jesus. Thats all im asking of you. Give me the strength to do every day what i have to do. Thats all ive thought about every day. And weve gotten through a tough time in South Carolina. Were still grieving. It is going to be a while before the healing really starts to begin. But after the emotions come down after everybody looks back theyre going to look back to the fact that nine people accepted someone into a church that didnt look like them didnt sound like them and prayed with him for an hour. The love and the faith and the acceptance taught the entire state and country what love looks like. And those families taught us what forgiveness looks like. Theyve given us a path for the children as we go forward. Governor a lot of people have commented on the way youve handled these events and handled yourself over these last several weeks. Mitt romney tweeted yesterday, congratulations to nikki haley for real and symbolic leadership. From Philip Rucker the signing ceremony yesterday. If jeb bush was watching tv just now, i wonder if he was just thinking ive just found my vp. Big moment for nikki haley. Do you think this twoweek period or threeweek period has launched you into a different orbit in terms of National Politics . You know if i did my job right and that means i need to work harder, the people will talk about the lives of those nine people. What they taught South Carolina. What they taught the country. What their families taught us and how the people of South Carolina responded should show our country we can do this. We can do this and we can continue to move forward as a country in a way that unifies people and that shows what real love looks like. Thats what i want people to get out of this. I dont want this to go away quickly. I want people to remember what today feels like and know that anything is possible. So ill keep my focus on that. South carolina governor nikki haley, governor thanks for your time this morning. Well be watching today. Thank you, matt. Meantime federal officials sounded the alarm ahead of the holiday weekend. Now were learning about just how close we came to potential terror attacks. More than ten arrests in the past month alone. Sean henry, is former assistant executive director of the fbi now president of crowd strike services. Sean good morning. Nice to have you in the studio with us. Lots of people were enjoying barbecues and just enjoying the fourth. Can you quantify . How close were we to a potential terrorist attack . We know there are people here in the United States looking to harm americans. Listening to this jihadi rhetoric constantly barraged through social media of chants of attack america no matter where you are. I think the fbi recognizes they cant allow that to happen and they went out and caught some of these disruptions where they were able to actually go out and pull people off the street who may have been planning to attack. The fundamental differences between al qaeda and isis and isis related people theyve arrested, what can you tell us about their motives that makes those two groups different. Al qaeda looks to bigger attacks, like 9 11. The concern Law Enforcement has now with isis is this social media. People are reaching out from across the sea into peoples living rooms through twitter and through facebook and theyre causing them to rat callize, theyre helping them and conditioning them to launch these attacks. The fbi director called it like the devil on your shoulder. You can speak on this because you worked in Cyber Security weve had 21 Million People who were hacked in the government. When you heard those sheer numbers, what sounds so large, were you surprised by that . Its not even just the numbers. It is actually just the type of information that was stolen. Were talking about Peoples Mental Health records. Most Sensitive Data that people applying for government positions provide to get background checks done. This type of information in the hands of a foreign adversary is a coup intelligence wise. Can the u. S. Do anything to stop this now . From an intelligence perspective theres not a lot. Once that informations gone the horse is out of the barn youre not going to do anything to repair that. What the government needs to do is actually have conversations with those who may have stolen it and define what the red lines are, whats appropriate and whats not. Clearly in this case inappropriate. Sean henry, thanks for your expertise. Now to politics. A rare joint appearance is drawing a lot of attention this morning. Former president s bill clinton and george w. Bush sharing a stage while their loved ones are out there competing in the president ial race. Nbc White House CorrespondentKristin Welker has more on that. Hi kristin, good morning. Reporter good morning to you, matt. Thats right, former president s bill clinton and george w. Bush have always been a political odd couple of sorts, and they came together again thursday night in texas for the first graduation of their joint president ial Leadership Program but with their loved ones locked in a heated battle for the race for the white house, this lating meeting between 42 and 43 took on a whole new meaning. Appearing together in dallas youd never know former president s george w. Bush and bill clinton had a horse in the 2016 race. Instead, it was more palling around than political, trading stories about their grandkids. When i walked into her room she said oh theres your grand did. And she turned around and pointed at me. Last night my granddaughter spoke to me in mandarin. And joking about their age. Clinton and i are getting a little long in the tooth these days. This is the one month of the year when hes older than me. So speak for yourself. Reporter but the camaraderie between the democrat and republican commanders in chief comes as rhetoric heats up between their families Hillary Clinton and jeb bush trading barbs over immigration this week. As i said theyre on a spectrum of hostility which i think is really regrettable in a nation of immigrants like ours. My record as it relates to immigrants is pretty clear. Theres no hostility at all. Reporter will 2016 tax the relationship of these onetime political rivalsturnedfriends . Near 42 nor 43 has been a presence on the campaign trail and president bush indicated he plans to keep it that way. I know jeb and im confident secretary hillary will elevate the discourse. Im not going to be a surrogate. Reporter aides say president clinton will dive in but not for a while. I like to win. But the more important thing for america is that we know what the heck were deciding on and we make a pretty good decision. Reporter now both former leaders tried to keep the focus on bipartisanship even touting the decision to lower the Confederate Flag in South Carolina. Former president clinton suggesting its an indication that washington should also be able to work across the lines of divide. Back to you. Kristin welker at the white house, thanks very much. Fun watching them like that. Isnt it . Natalie is here with another road block in the iran nuclear talks. Good morning again. Iran is accusing the six world powers of backtracking on commitment after another deadline to reach a Nuclear Agreement expired with no deal. Iran says the world powers are changing their conditions and using pressure tactics. The comments follow a u. S. Warning that it is ready to walk away from the talks. The Obama Administration hoped to have a final deal to submit to congress yesterday. The deadline imposed by legislation. An update on a story we first told you about on wednesday after tom selleck reached a tentative deal with the California Water district that accused him of illegally moving water. Breaking rules taking water from a hydrant in one district and moving it to sellecks home in another district. Sellecks representative could not be reached for comment. Now to that video that we showed you there at the top of the show. An arkansas woman and her baby escaped their home just before a frightening explosion caught on camera. Texarkana firefighters were entering the home Late Wednesday night when a backdraft blew the insulation from the house. Thankfully the two firefighters were not injured in the blast. Investigators are calling the fire suspicious because there was no electric or gas connected to the house. And a terrifying moment on an Amusement Park ride before the ride even started. It happened on the catapult ride in Wisconsin Dells just seconds before the ride was supposed to launched a woman and a child into the air. One of the bungee cords snapped. The impact left a hole in the asphalt. Thankfully no one was injured but a very close call for that woman and her child. Scary moment for them no doubt. Frightening good thing it hadnt gotten into the air. Right. Dylans here. Youre talking about a tornado in pennsylvania . There is a possible tornado in pennsylvania. Crews will go out today to assess the damage. There really wasnt much damage in the area besides this school. Look at this school. This is Blue Mountain adventis elementary in washington township. We hear there was only one person inside during the tornado but that person was not injured. He got out safely but that area certainly dealing with some severe storms. This happened around 6 45 yesterday evening and it did wipe out that Elementary School. Fortunately, schools out of session right now so there was not any more injuries than we already saw with that one person. Also in montgomery county, pennsylvania we saw flash flooding again because of these heavy downpours. Weve had these rounds of storms that pop up producing a lot of lightning. The lightning caused tree damage and the flooding got some people trapped. Out west talking about monsoonal moisture producing more showers and storms lots of lightning and potential for heavier downpours. We also have a chance today for stronger storms in north texas and also into the midwest once again. The biggest threat is for hail damaging wind gusts hows it progressing with the prisoner . Hell tell us everything he knows very shortly, sir. As you were. Where were we . 13 serving 14 service if your boss stops by, you act like youre working. Its what you do. If you want to save fifteen percent or more on car insurance, you switch to geico. Its what you do. Good morning. Im meteorologist bill henley. Grab the sunglasses, bright sunshine, less humid conditions today. Temperatures in the 80s this afternoon. Typical summer weather that will continue this weekend. Just a bit warmer but the humidity stays low. Saturday morning, in fact cooler to start with 67 degrees. Near 90 on saturday. Sunday, up to 90 degrees. Then the mugginess returns next week with a chance of showers and thunderstorms for much of next week. Have a great day. And thats your latest forecast. Tornadoes. Scary. Where was that again . Blue mountain adventis school. History being made in new york this morning. Fresh off their world cup victory, the u. S. Womens soccer team getting a ticker tape parade. Natalies got the biggest smil