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New Day
Answering MH370 Questions. Aired 6:30-7a ET
Aired July 31, 2015 - 06:30 ET
THIS IS A RUSH TRANSCRIPT. THIS COPY MAY NOT BE IN ITS FINAL FORM AND MAY BE UPDATED.
(COMMERCIAL BREAK)
[06:34:59] MICHAELA PEREIRA, CNN ANCHOR: Good to have you back with us here on NEW DAY.
The latest now on the debris that could be part of MH370. Overnight, Australian search authorities saying they are, quote, "increasingly confident" the recovered debris is, in fact, from that missing plane. They expect confirmation could come in less than 24 hours.
The plane part is headed to France today for analysis. Teams from Malaysia, meanwhile, will be on site in Europe and on Reunion Island where that wing part was first discovered. Investigators are focusing also on how it came detached from the plane to try and get a sense of what caused the plane to apparently come down.
The U.S. is monitoring all of this, the investigation, in fact. Intelligence suggesting that actions within the cockpit deliberately took MH370 off its intended course. The big question now, is this wing from the - or part of the wing, rather, from the missing jet and how can it help search teams locate the fuselage?
We want to turn to two of our aviation experts to answer questions for us today. Many of you are asking them on Twitter using #mh370qs.
[06:35:04] David Gallo is director of special projects at Woods Hole Oceanographic Institution. He took part in the search for Air France Flight 447. CNN aviation analyst Les Abend is a 777 captain and contributing editor of "Flying" magazine.
Good to have you both here with us. I thought we'd ask a couple of questions from our viewers that have come in, and, Les, I'll put this one to you. @Tower_Air asks, "what kind of force would tear this from the wing?" What can we tell about when this part came off the plane and how it came down?
LES ABEND, CNN AVIATION ANALYST: Michaela, it's hard to tell exactly how much force. We can go back to say the Hudson River landing.
PEREIRA: Yes.
ABEND: Even - even as we know how - how well-done that was, it was still a pretty good impact under a controlled situation. One of the engines came off. There were - there was another bunch of small little pieces. So with this flaperon that we're talking about that potentially is - is Malaysia 370's, it's possible that even a controlled decent could have torn that - that off. However, you know, it is possible, there are theories out there, that it could have come off in flight with a - with a spiral situation. I personally doubt that.
PEREIRA: You don't see that?
ABEND: I see it impacting the water, especially with the damage just from the photographs indicates that - that it perhaps it was down slightly in some - so the trailing edge of it -
PEREIRA: Yes.
ABEND: As we see it there might have been impacted first because the rest of it goes to the - to the wing.
PEREIRA: Give us just a quick primer (ph) on this. What does this do? It -
ABEND: Well -
PEREIRA: You can see them on the wing. If you've ever flown over the wing -
ABEND: Correct.
PEREIRA: You can see them out the window.
ABEND: It's a - it's one of the smaller flight control devices. About six feet long or so, as you can tell in that. And it - and it combines an aleron (ph) with a flap. So the aleron -
PEREIRA: Newer technology puts the two of them together?
ABEND: Yes. And the aleron makes the airplane bank -
PEREIRA: Yes.
ABEND: And the flaps slow the airplane down at speeds that are approach - the delaying speeds.
PEREIRA: So this allows it to do both?
ABEND: Exactly right. Exactly right.
PEREIRA: OK, a little primer (ph) on that, wonderful.
We'll talk to David about this. We - you know, it's interesting to hear this U.S. military - or the U.S. intelligence assessment. And that word is so key here. This assessment from months ago, we're only learning about it now, suggesting that it was likely someone inside the cockpit that took down this plane, or at least to make the plane go off course. What was your gut reaction to hearing that, of the fact that, David, it was only released now. I'm going to get both of your reaction on this. Only released now even though it was done months ago and that it's an assessment. It's not from new information that's been gleamed. DAVID GALLO, DIR. OF SPECIAL PROJECTS, WOODS HOLE OCEANOGRAPHIC
INSTITUTION: Yes, I - I found it very peculiar. You know, why say anything and why now? I just - you know, as someone that would have been out there searching in the ocean having thought that we had heard everyone's opinion to - so that we could focus in on a search site to have some pipe up now and say, oh, by the way, months ago we came up with this notion, I just don't know what to make of it or where it really came from.
PEREIRA: And how about you, Les? I mean does it add to what we know to you or does it further just make you scratch your head?
ABEND: Well, I mean, I agree with David, it is peculiar. But for this - when we say it was a deliberate act, it may not have been a nefarious, deliberate act.
PEREIRA: Oh, that's a good point.
ABEND: I mean there's -- there's - there's a scenario that - that I've come up with that - and various other people, that it's possible we had a hypoxic situation on the airplane. We can go back to all these theories and that perhaps there was a flight attendant or another crew member that walked with a walk around bottle (ph), tried to steer the airplane with the auto pilot and what we call the remote (ph) control panel and tried to bring it back to a -
PEREIRA: Gosh, there's so many possibilities, aren't there?
ABEND: There really is a lot of possibilities.
PEREIRA: All right, David, your turn for a viewer question. This is @alldatjas from Twitter asks this question, and this is right up your alley. "Can the debris, time lapse and ocean current be fed into models to determine where they originated?"
GALLO: Sure. As a - yes, Michaela, as it turns out, to @alldatjas, this - understanding the currents of the ocean are very important to understanding climate change. So, people have been studying those currents. The challenge here, though, is it's been 500 days plus. It's been - it's over almost the width of the United States in terms of distance. It would be incredibly difficult. You'd have to have just the right model and know enough about the ocean systems, the winds, the storms, the monsoons, how - whether the item was floating, the wing bit, was floating above or below the water. So, you know, my hope is that it at least puts - I'm sure the models will be done. My hope is that it puts them somewhere around the present day search area, and not north of the equator someplace. So -
PEREIRA: But they - really quickly, just a final thought for you, should they be now looking off the coast of Madagascar or even off the coast of eastern Africa?
GALLO: For debris, I think it's worth doing that to see if there's more debris that's floated in that direction.
PEREIRA: OK. GALLO: But for the aircraft, no. I think they've got the right spot.
PEREIRA: All right, David Gallo, Les Abend, thanks for taking our viewer questions. For you at home, you can still send us questions about the debris, the search for MH370. You can tweet them to us using #mh370qs. We'll answer more in our 8:00 hour.
[06:40:12] Alisyn.
ALISYN CAMEROTA, CNN ANCHOR: OK, let's talk a little politics because 17 Republicans now running for president, but only 10 of those will make the cut for next week's first GOP debate. So how do the others plan to get their message out? We'll ask former New York Governor George Pataki when he joins us live straight ahead on NEW DAY.
(COMMERCIAL BREAK)
JOHN BERMAN, CNN ANCHOR: Increasing confidence this morning that plane debris that washed up on an island near Madagascar is from Malaysia Airlines Flight 370. The piece of wing will be sent to France today. Concrete identification could happen by tomorrow.
CAMEROTA: Former University of Cincinnati Police Officer Ray Tensing out of jail on bond this morning. He pleaded not guilty to murder and involuntary manslaughter in the death of Samuel DuBose during a traffic stop gone horribly wrong. The whole thing caught on Tensing's body camera. Two other campus officers now on paid leave as an internal investigation begins.
PEREIRA: A woman in now in jail after she interrupted a sentence hearing for James Holmes. A woman climbed over seats in court and yelled, "don't kill him!"
[06:45:09] (BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: He's wrong, 'cause mental illness is everything! I'm the biological mother; She's a surrogate. They took him away from me! And then (INAUDIBLE) cause I know they had mental illness (INAUDIBLE) my family's full of FBI! He's got (INAUDIBLE). Don't kill him! Don't kill him! It's not his fault!
(END VIDEO CLIP)
PEREIRA: Well, at the time the D.A. was making closing remarks to jurors who will decide if Holmes gets life or the death penalty. The judge ordering that woman to spend three weeks in jail for the outburst. Holmes was found guilty of killing 12 people in a Colorado movie theater in 2012.
CAMEROTA: Zimbabwe's environmental minister calling for Minnesota dentist Walter Palmer to be extradited for hunting down and killed Cecil the lion. He calls Palmer a foreign poacher. U.S. Fish and Wildlife officials say they have not been able to locate Palmer and he is not returning their calls. He is accused of luring the beloved 13- year-old lion out of a protected sanctuary in order to kill him. BERMAN: Some Jets fans took to the skies, poking fun at the Patriot's
Deflategate scandal. A plane flying a banner that reads, "cheaters look up!" It circled the practice field during the Super Bowl champion's first day of training camp on Thursday. The message was courtesy of the site nyjetsfans.com.
Now let me say this, I do not condone anything that went on with the New England Patriots. However, this is the closest that any Jets fan will get to the Super Bowl for some time.
PEREIRA: Oh!
CAMEROTA: Ouch!
BERMAN: OK. Let's just say that right there.
PEREIRA: (INAUDIBLE) Jet fan, Chris Cuomo is not here to defend himself.
BERMAN: Yes, he ran away. What does he do? He runs away at the first sign of conflict, like Jets fans.
PEREIRA: He ran away on assignment. Oh, yes.
CAMEROTA: But that was a good trick by - just if I looked up.
PEREIRA: Look up.
CAMEROTA: You know what I mean?
PEREIRA: I know. It happens all over.
CAMEROTA: They get you to look up.
PEREIRA: Every time.
BERMAN: You were tricked by a Jet's fan?
CAMEROTA: By a plane. Yes.
PEREIRA: All right. A promising development in the search for Flight 370. Airplane debris washing ashore in the Indian Ocean could be from the missing jet liner. How critical is this discovery and could it lead investigators to the rest of the plane?
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[06:51:07] CAMEROTA: The discovery of plane debris off Reunion Island in the Indian Ocean has reenergized the search for Malaysia Airlines Flight 370. Joining us now to discuss what's next is Tim Taylor. He's a sea operations and submersible specialist.
Tim, great to have you here.
TIM TAYLOR, SEA OPERATIONS AND SUBMERSIBLE SPECIALIST: Thank you.
CAMEROTA: We've put you on the map so that you can explain to us where and how people are looking.
TAYLOR: OK.
CAMEROTA: So we're standing right where the debris was found. This is off of Reunion Island. Does it still make sense to you that investigators are still searching for the black boxes off the west coast of Australia?
TAYLOR: Yes, that's their best lead and you can't abandon your best lead. This is where all the data is pointed to where it is.
CAMEROTA: Because that's where the plane dropped off last we know?
TAYLOR: That - that - that is where everything points to where it is. This is where everything drifted. And you can't - you can't run away and abandon all your data and your good, solid search area to chase, you know, leads that are thousands of miles away, which they should be. Let's -
CAMEROTA: Let's talk about that. About how it's thousands of miles away. The scope of this search is monumental. It is 2,300 miles from where they've been searching over to Reunion Island. And just to put that in some perspective, that's from West Virginia to California. How do they - I mean it's a needle in a haystack as people have likened it to.
TAYLOR: Yes, it is. It is. It's a - it's a big area to cover and to send someone out to look and comb this is a waste of time.
CAMEROTA: So how are they doing it?
TAYLOR: Let the beaches do the work. Let the beaches be the filter. They - they will eventually wash ashore and just make sure that people are aware in combing these beaches and reporting it because there's a - it's a media thing now. And so let people that are out there, that are - that are living on these - in these places to report things that they find.
CAMEROTA: So let's look at what happened here because as we've learned about these gyres, there's - there's this system in the middle of the ocean that churns from the western Australia coast and spits things out, it appears -
TAYLOR: Yes.
CAMEROTA: Over at Reunion Island. Now that one piece has been found -
TAYLOR: Right.
CAMEROTA: Do you expect other pieces? I mean, in other words, it - has those five - was this always going to be a 500 day cycle?
TAYLOR: Well, I don't know if it's a 500 day cycle. There were eddies and currents that could have gone around the gyre twice. I mean the current model that they say it probably hasn't, but there are tons of pieces out there. What has - what has changed in the last week is there's an awareness now that these things are coming ashore in this area of the world. So people looking, finding, can bring this to somebody and say, hey, we found something. It may or may not be something. Maybe post it online. Maybe - yes.
CAMEROTA: Like the suitcase -
TAYLOR: Exactly. Exactly.
CAMEROTA: That we don't know whether it's connected. But it is a suitcase.
TAYLOR: And - and a clearing house. Someplace to get these things to. But people will really be aware of this now and be looking.
CAMEROTA: Here's what's fascinating. The University of Western Australia created a computer model last year, as you know, that predicted that these currents and that gyre would carry wreckage -
TAYLOR: Yes.
CAMEROTA: To Reunion Island in about 18 months. They did figure out the time.
TAYLOR: Right.
CAMEROTA: And sure enough, low and behold, it pops up there 18 months later.
TAYLOR: But my question is, how long has this been sitting on the beach? Has it been there for six months or eight months? That has to be figured out. They -
CAMEROTA: And can we figure that out?
TAYLOR: Yes, with a - with an item, yes. With what's growing on it, yes. It has each - each item has a different buoyancy characteristic. So this was mainly under water. It's like an iceberg. Most of it is being driven by the current, not the wind. So little cushions, smaller things, will be driven more by the wind. So they can be in different places. If we get more debris that are different buoyancy characteristics, they can plug that into the model, they will have a much better model to track back. But they need more items. One item -
CAMEROTA: They need more data points.
TAYLOR: One item - yes exactly. More data points is the best way to put it.
CAMEROTA: Back to the vast scope of this, 21,000 square miles have been covered. And the depth of the ocean where we - around where we're standing is 15,000 or the height of 12 Empire State Buildings.
TAYLOR: Yes.
CAMEROTA: You are a submersibles expert. How far down can these submersibles and these drones try to search the seabed? [06:55:12] TAYLOR: Well, searching is not about - it's not about
depth, it's about massive space, OK, because we can get machines down there, it just takes time and the technology dependent on doing that is expensive and it's not a fast thing. So it's a matter of resolve and cash and capital that's going to end this or keep this going.
CAMEROTA: But just explain to us how it works. You map the ocean floor by sending out sonar and seeing if there's anomalies.
TAYLOR: Right. Correct.
CAMEROTA: And that is expensive -
TAYLOR: It's expensive.
CAMEROTA: And dangerous and difficult.
TAYLOR: It is. And even - even when you map it, it's no guarantee that you will see it. It could be over a ledge. If you're visually looking at something and it's over a ledge, sound can't - it's just taking a picture of the sound. That's what sonar is. So if you don't - if it's blinded by something, if it's behind a little crevice or something, they could miss it. They could go over it. not every bit of the ocean is flat - flat bottom. Stephen Fossett crashed his planes in the mountains of the United States and it took someone a year to find him in the United States in a mountain. So -
CAMEROTA: But you predict that because we have found this one piece that appears to be from MH370, that now, along the shores, over near Reunion Island, we may start seeing more debris.
TAYLOR: There should be more data points come out, more debris coming up that people will find it. It's just a matter of time and people - I mean the shoreline over there is not all inhabited. It's mangroves. It's deserted, rocky shoreline. So there's a lot of stuff that may never be found because people just aren't there to see it.
CAMEROTA: Tim Taylor, thanks so much for your time.
TAYLOR: You're welcome.
CAMEROTA: We're following a lot of news this morning. So let's get right to it.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
PEREIRA (voice-over): More than 16 months since MH370 vanished, we still do not know why.
UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: It looks like there was at least some deliberate movement from the cockpit.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: It's only a very small part of the aircraft, but it could be a very important piece.
UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: Not a single minute has passed without me thinking about them.
PEREIRA: One week before the first Republican presidential debate -
DONALD TRUMP (R), PRESIDENTIAL CANDIDATE: Well, these guys debate every night of their life. That's all they do.
SEN. PAUL RAND (R), PRESIDENTIAL CANDIDATE: Some people are hearing about one candidate all the time.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Candidates are desperately trying to figure out how they can get air time.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Dr. Palmer under a torrent of criticism. Now the dentist finds himself being taunted.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: I'm just - just so disgusted with that man. Just appalling.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
ANNOUNCER: This is NEW DAY with Chris Cuomo, Alisyn Camerota and Michaela Pereira.
PEREIRA: Well, good morning and welcome back to your NEW DAY. Chris is on assignment. John Berman joins us on this Friday.
We begin with breaking news. Officials are growing increasingly confident that the plane debris that washed up on Reunion Island near Madagascar is, in fact, from Malaysian Airlines Flight 370. The wing piece will be sent to France today so investigators can hopefully make a definitive identification.
CAMEROTA: Meanwhile, a U.S. intelligence assessment suggests that someone in the cockpit deliberately took the plane off course. So where does the MH370 investigation go from here? We have this story covered from every angle, the way only CNN can.
Let's begin with our global coverage with CNN's senior international correspondent Nima Elbagir. She is live on Reunion Island.
Nima.
NIMA ELBAGIR, CNN SENIOR INTERNATIONAL CORRESPONDENT: Hi, Alisyn.
Well, the focal point continues to be on that stretch of beach in Saint-Andre where much of the debris washed up. The hope is that if any more does turn up, that will allow investigators to try and map that counter current that could possibly have brought the debris from the initial search sight close to the - well, across the other side of the Indian Ocean, I should say, off the coast of Australia.
We actually headed down to that beach to take a look for ourselves. Have a look at this.
(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE) WARREN TRUSS, AUSTRALIAN DEPUTY PRIME MINISTER: The strong evidence to suggest that the wreckage found on Reunion Islands does come from a Boeing 777. That is not yet being confirmed.
ELBAGIR (voice-over): The wreckage discovered on this remote beach on Reunion Island may possibly belong to missing Malaysian Airliner MH370. Boeing investigators say they're confident the mysterious airplane part comes from a 777. Beach cleanup crews discovered the wreckage on Wednesday, locating the flaperon along the shore. A flaperon is part of an airplane wing and investigators say the photos match schematic draws from a Boeing 777. They say photos also show a stenciled number that corresponds to a 777 as well.
TRUSS: So only a very small part of the aircraft, but it could be a very important piece of evidence.
ELBAGIR: Also washing ashore, remnants of what appear to be a suitcase. Though there is skepticism that this piece of luggage may come from MH370, island police confirm it is being included in the investigation.
This wreckage discovered almost a year and a half after MH370 disappeared, located more than 2,300 nautical miles away from the current search zone off Australia's west coast.
[07:00:12] TRUSS: The fact that this wreckage was - it was sighted
