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New Developments, Theories On Missing Malaysia Airline Flight 370

Aired March 15, 2014 - 20:00   ET

THIS IS A RUSH TRANSCRIPT. THIS COPY MAY NOT BE IN ITS FINAL FORM AND MAY BE UPDATED.

DON LEMON, CNN ANCHOR: Good evening, everyone. Don Lemon at the top of the hour here. But we are going to begin with breaking news in the mystery of Malaysia Airlines flight 370.

A U.S. officials tell CNN that the U.S. intelligence community increasingly focus now on quote "those in the cockpit," the pilots of the Malaysia Airline flight as being deliberately responsible for the vanished aircraft. The U.S. official also telling CNN that the search for the missing jet is now focus in the southern Indian Ocean. We are following all the developments for you tonight.

To date, Malaysian police said they searched the pilots' home outside Kuala Lumpur. Police are also seeing leaving the home of a co-pilot carrying small shopping bags. We now know that last words communicated from flight 370, all right, goodnight. They were said after the plane systems already started to shutdown.

And tonight, ABC News is reporting that the abrupt left turn that flight 370 made off in its original flight path was actually pre- programmed. So was this a rogue pilot or a hijacker in that cockpit.

Joining now is our Pentagon correspondent Barbara Starr who has been breaking this news for us, CNN international's Jim Clancy in Kuala Lumpur, Andy Pasztor of "the Wall Street Journal."

Let me start with our Barbara Starr. You are reporting that those in the cockpit maybe be deliberately responsible for this missing plane. Tell us what you are hearing from your sources tonight, Barbara.

BARBARA STARR, CNN PENTAGON CORRESPONDENT: Don, good evening.

This is a working theory across the U.S. intelligence community, not a set of facts. There is not enough data yet for facts, for conclusion. But here is what they think is very possible.

Not a passenger from the passenger cabin getting up out of their seats and hijacking the plane. The key issue there, why would so many passengers, hundred, have stayed quiet in their seats for the four to five hours or more the plane flew on if somebody was hijacking that they saw get up from the seat. That is one day to point they are looking at.

So, that takes you right in to the cockpit. Two experienced pilots that we known have to turn that equipment off. They might, this is a theory, they might have gotten on the plane to intercom to seem and broadcast the message to the passengers saying everything is fine. We have been diverted because the passengers would have realized they were at sharp 90 degree turn as they came out of Kuala Lumpur. They are headed north across Vietnam into China but they don't go that way. They make a sharp turn out into the Indian Ocean. Somebody has to explain to the passengers what is going on or you might have panic. In the passenger cabin, people are going to get very upset. By all accounts, that didn't happen. There is no evidence of that. People stayed in their seats, it is believed. And so, this is the theory, this is the conclusion, preliminary that they come to. Other scenarios could emerge. That put their working off right now.

LEMON: Jim Clancy in Kuala Lumpur, you are there. The Malaysians have been criticized for how they have handled this investigation thus far. We are now hearing it was only in the last 24 to 36 hours that they search the pilots' home. They waited for technical analysis or radar and the satellite data. Why could not have been done a week ago, Jim?

JIM CLANCY, CNN INTERNATIONAL ANCHOR: Well, obviously, it could have been done a week ago. They have had a police presence outside their homes to ensure that nothing could have been removed. The Malaysians have tried to manage all of this. They been worried a lot about how they look up on the podium. They have been worried about how they come off as in control of this investigation. Perhaps they worried about that too much in our depart memo rivalries if you want to call it that.

But in the real terms, they have active now. It took them awhile, I think that Najib Razak, the prime minister yesterday gave us a clearance indication yet. You know, shortly after the plane has took off, that somebody switched off the ACARS system. They followed that by turning of the transponder. The best scenario yet that we have that the pilots might have had the main role play in all of this.

But, did both of the pilots take part? You know, we got our sources here in Kuala Lumpur say that after they made that turn, the altitude became very very erratic. Was there a struggle over the yolk of the airplane. There is a lot of facts yet to be sorted out. We will have to wait and see what the Malaysians have to say. They pointed the finger at the news media saying that they are causing pain for all of the families. So there is a lot of sides to the story -- Don.

LEMON: We will talk more about that. Stand by Jim Clancy.

Andy Pasztor, you have been covering the story for the "Wall Street Journal" from the very beginning. You reported that investigators are looking in to whether more than one person on board this plane may have been involved in its disappearance. What led officials to this new focus?

ANDY PASZTOR, REPORTER, "WALL STREET JOURNAL": Well, that is certainly one of the things they are looking at and that is because the last system that was either turned off on the plane are stop functioning because the plane crash. In order to change that system, you had to go down to the electronics bay underneath which was discussed just before on the program. So, one of the theories is that there had to be more than one person. One person to go down in to the bay and another person obviously to keep control of the aircraft.

But as this investigation pivots to a criminal direction, a lot of things will change. New people will be in-charge of it. The rules of evidence change. The goal really changes because now it is no longer to find out only what happened, but to punish people. But the fundamental problem stays the same.

There is no wreckage. There is no debris. And without that, even -- whether it is a criminal probe or safety probe, it will be very difficult to get to the bottom of what happened. And the searches that are now going on, the areas that they are covering are so vast, hundreds of thousands of square miles in the Indian Ocean. They dwarf all of the searches that they have been done before in this investigation, in other investigations. And I think from the people I talked to, aviation safety experts increasingly worried that there are simply won't -- they won't find it, the black box or the wreckage or it will take months or maybe years until they are found.

LEMON: Back now to Jim Clancy in Kuala Lumpur.

If this heads into a criminal investigation as Andy just mentioned, do you think that the Malaysians will let the U.S. get more involved now or will the U.S. fight to get more involved?

CLANCY: There are indications already that the Malaysians are bristling a bit at the way that the Americans have really led all of this. After all, at least U.S. experts did figure out a way to try to use the antenna on an in marked satellite in order to determine what would be the likely location of this plane's last handshake, if you will, with that satellite. And so, you know, I think there is going to be competition.

The Malaysians though are going to be caved to the Chinese will. The Chinese have said they want to come, they want to get involved in this. Now, the U.S. and the Chinese, are they going to work together? That could be a good scenario. It could also be a difficult one -- Don.

LEMON: OK. I want to ask you this, Barbara. We have heard about two possible paths that flight 370 could have taken. We have also heard the new information that you have been reporting. But one of these paths that we have been talking about to the north over western China and another towards southern Indian Ocean, why officials now focusing again on the Indian Ocean? And because of the new reporting that you had given, should we -- is this arc even -- I don't know, should we even be looking at that as possibility now? Is it substitute?

STARR: Well, you know, let's put the map off and show these two arcs that we are talking about. The northern arc, several U.S. officials tell me today they are beginning to rule out. It was put out there because it's technically possible. It could still prove to be true.

But this is going over countries with significant military capability, military radars, commercial air traffic control radars, and a lot of this ability on what is happening in their air space. You are talking about China, India, Thailand, Pakistan, Myanmar. These are countries that know what's going on in their air space. Nobody has reported a crash and if it had crashed, they would have reported it. That is an absolute given in the world aviation community. So they are beginning to rule that concept out given the data they have, that's the southern India Ocean.

LEMON: Barbara has been doing great reporting, so as Andy.

Andy, earlier this week, you reported that officials were looking into the possibility that the plane may have landed somewhere. Given all of these developments, do you still think that's a possibility?

PASZTOR: I think it is a possibility. You cannot rule it out. But I would say from the beginning it has not been the major strand of this investigation. I would say it's looking increasingly less likely. And particularly, if it happens, if there was a landing or attempted landing, finding the wreckage in those mountains with snow will be almost impossible. But I think investigators are increasingly looking at the scenario that the plane did not make land, that somehow it went into the water either because of lost fuel or for some other reason. It ran out of fuel or some other reason at this point, we really don't know.

LEMON: Andy, Jim, Barbara, appreciate all of you. Thank you. Stand by.

More on our breaking news into the disappearance of flight 370 as the investigation centers on what happened inside that cockpit. The latest theories, was it terrorism?

Plus, the last words heard from the cockpit -- all right, good night. Why the timing of those words has become so important in this investigation. One theory is it could have been pilot suicide. Why some are comparing flight 370 to silk air, the silk air crash of 1997.

More breaking news right after quick break.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

LEMON: Tonight, we are continuing our breaking news coverage of the disappearance of Malaysia air flight 370. U.S. officials now telling CNN that the U.S. intelligence community is leaning toward a theory that those in the cockpit, the pilots of that Malaysia airlines flight, were deliberately responsible for whatever happened to that vanished aircraft.

Now, given this new development, many are drawing parallels between the missing flight and silk air flight 185 that crashed back in 1997. The flight heading from Indonesia to Singapore suddenly dove vertically into a murky river, killing everyone on board. The national transportation safety board concluded the pilot committed suicide.

Kyung Lah with the story now.

(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE) KYUNG LAH, CNN CORRESPONDENT (voice-over): December 1997, the mysterious plane crash of silk air flight 185. The Boeing 737 with 104 people aboard suddenly nose-dived into this murky river. The entire drop happened in about one minute, breaking the speed of sound. Nearly all the bodies were torn to pieces. Adding to the grief of the families, the national transportation safety board would conclude all this was the act of one man, a pilot who wanted to commit suicide.

THOMAS ANTHONY, FORMER MEMBER OF FAA CIVIL AVIATION SECURITY DIVISION: It ended up crashing here in the river.

LAH: Thomas Anthony remembers silk air 185 clearly, because he was with the FAA civil aviation security division and was part of the silk air investigation. A pilot intentionally downing a passenger plane is still hard for him to think about.

How horrifying is that as someone who is investigating this?

ANTHONY: It's something that most of us should never consider, because it is so extremely rare, it is beyond -- almost beyond imagination.

LAH: And still disputed, Anthony points out. Indonesian investigators say the cause remains inconclusive. And in a civil trial, a Los Angeles jury decided the crash was caused by a failed part of the plane's rudder. The victim's families never got a clear answer, just like another crash, Egypt air flight 990. The NTSB ruled the pilot intentionally caused the 1999 crash. Egyptian authorities say it was caused by mechanical failure.

ANTHONY: It's like a jigsaw puzzle. A jigsaw puzzle in which there are thousands of pieces and not all those pieces are at the bottom of the ocean.

LAH: Could someone in the cockpit have done something to Malaysia airlines flight 370? These two young women say the co-pilot of the missing plane invited them to ride in the cockpit on a previous flight and did.

Retired American airlines pilot Mark Weiss believes based on prior history, someone, perhaps someone with the crew, intentionally caused this plane to vanish.

CAPTAIN MARK WEISS, (RET.) AMERICAN AIRLINES: Whether it was one of the pilots that maybe had a meltdown or wanted to do something nefarious to the airplane or an invited visitor or perhaps an uninvited visitor or another crew member that was bent on perhaps committing suicide or doing some destruction on the aircraft.

LAH: There is an intense focus on the wreckage because many of the answers lie there, but not all of them. In the case of silk air, about 75 percent of the wreckage was reassembled, was pulled out, yet three different entities, the civil court here in Los Angeles, U.S. authorities and Indonesian authorities all came up with different reasons for why this plane crashed. They were all looking, though, at the exact same piece of evidence. Kyung Lah, CNN, Los Angeles.

(END VIDEOTAPE)

LEMON: Kyung, thank you very much. Very interesting report.

CNN aviation analyst Jim Tilmon joins me now, retired American airlines pilot and president of the Tilmon Group, and also my former meteorologist in Chicago. He knows everything, weather conditions and all about aviation as well.

Such a pleasure to have you working with us, Jim. You know, you heard Kyung's piece there. Given the new developments tonight, do you think this could have been a pilot suicide like silk air back that took air flight?

JIM TILMON, CNN AVIATION ANALYST: I'm very puzzled by a lot of the things that we have been discovering. But look at this, Don. If the pilot was bent on suicide, why would he do all this flying in order to get there? He could have done that immediately, right after takeoff. Why would he fly for all those hours? Was he trying to make up his mind? My goodness.

I think more likely, this may have been something where there was a plan to take the airplane some place and land it, then as the time went on and one approach and another approach failed, they realized this is not working, then of course, the pilot or whoever was in charge, may have recognized I'm not going to get away with this, and then stuck it in the water.

LEMON: Yes. But let's talk about the new information that we have. Are you surprised that it took Malaysia officials so long to search these pilots' homes, that they needed to go over all this data, and we need something sufficient. When I said was a missing airplane, isn't that enough?

TILMON: Yes, that's more than enough. And I don't know what to blame that on. I don't know if it's a cultural thing or what it is. But it doesn't make any kind of sense to wait this long to find out what's in that house, because there may be some very important clues there on that flight simulator.

LEMON: Let's talk about some of the reports that have been out there. We told you about an ABC news report that says it appears it was preprogrammed. This NBC News report is that a simulator was taken from the pilot's house during the search. How important will this be for their investigation? Are they looking at the possibility that this pilot may have been doing some sort of training for nefarious reasons, do you think?

TILMON: I think that's one of the things that has been crossing my mind, that with that sophisticated simulator that he had, he could really practice all these things that have been going on all this time, the zigs, the zags, turning over this and pulling the circuit breaker there, all that sort of thing. When we talk about a deliberate act, I would have think this was very deliberate. I think that whoever was in charge, whether there was a third person who entered the cockpit or the pilot himself, this is not an accident. There is no accidental movement of this airplane all over the sky out there. That's why I'm saying if he did all that and had a plan, and the plan fell through, that would be very, very dangerous because then he could become very unstable and who knows what he would have done.

LEMON: Jim Tilmon, stand by. Lots to go over as we continue here.

More of our breaking news into the disappearance of flight 370. The latest in the investigation as the officials focus on what happened inside the cockpit. Was it a rogue pilot?

Plus, the conspiracy theories. Is it possible the plane landed somewhere and is intact?

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

LEMON: Breaking news here on CNN. I would like to welcome our viewers of course here in the United States and around the world. This is our special coverage of missing Malaysian airlines flight 370.

Tonight, U.S. officials tell CNN that the U.S. intelligence community is leaning towards a theory that quote, "those in the cockpit, the pilots of the Malaysia airlines flight, were deliberately responsible for whatever happened to the missing aircraft."

And now, the Malaysian government has finally searched the homes of the pilot and co-pilot, finally, seven days in or nine days in, I should say.

Joining me now, CNN's Richard Quest.

At least we got the video and word of it today. We don't know exactly when they did that search. Do you see any of today's developments, the searching of the homes, at least we know now, also that it appears everything to be deliberate and coming from the cockpit. What do you make of these developments?

RICHARD QUEST, CNN INTERNATIONAL ANCHOR: By far and away, the most important development was the prime minister's statement this morning, when he basically laid out the timeline and crucially said that the NTSB, the AAIB, the British equivalent and the FAA, all concurred with this idea that the plane had turned and had followed one of the two paths, up towards Kazakhstan and China or down into the south Indian Ocean. The prime minister saying that moved this entire incident into a different phase.

LEMON: And the prime minister talking about -- I guess the possibilities now with the prime minister, the prime minister talking about that it looks like it was deliberately, right, done. So that changes the realm of possibilities as to where this plane could have gone. Talk to us about that. QUEST: For those of us who are saying let's wait for the final, let's wait for information, today, we got that information. Today we got the nod --

LEMON: What's going on? You can stand up. The lighting is good. We can do that.

QUEST: That's right. Make sure I don't fall apart. Right.

Now, so we have got these two tracks that are now being moved up. One of them comes up this way. Now, if you follow it to its logical conclusion, you will see it coming up into China, out towards the region and then Kazakhstan, and that's one of the routes that they believe are relevant.

LEMON: Significant?

QUEST: Well, significant because look at the countries and all the various issues, the political issues, the geopolitical issues, the strategic issues, that would be down to the Uighur that we have been talking about earlier, all relevant in this part of the world. That's one of the paths they're looking at.

The other path, of course, is the southern path and that goes out towards the south Indian Ocean.

LEMON: Do we have that path? If we can find it now. But anyway, go ahead.

QUEST: That one of course becomes -- OK. There's the first one we just looked at. Now, bear in mind, if this is the one that will be chosen or perhaps would refer though, this is the one that finally turns out to be, the enormous number of questions, not least all these countries and their various radar --

LEMON: Pakistan, Afghanistan.

QUEST: India, all the radar network, why wasn't anything heard from any of them, why weren't any planes scrambled. This one, however, coming out to the south into the Indian Ocean raises a whole set of different questions, not least of which you've got the western coast of Australia, quite a long way off. But this one raises the very real question of how on earth you search this amount of water. And we know there have been probably six pings. We know there have been almost six signals. So you talk about one, two, three, four, five, six, a deep channel but you're still looking into an area that's fairly large along these parameters.

LEMON: Thank you, sir. Stand by, Richard Quest. We will have much, much more on this breaking news into the disappearance of flight 370.

Next, the last words heard from the cockpit, all right, good night. Why the timing of those words has become so important in this investigation. And as officials focus on what happened inside the cockpit, what is the likelihood, what is the likelihood that this was terrorism? (COMMERCIAL BREAK)

LEMON: I'm Don Lemon.

Breaking news tonight in the disappearance of Malaysia airlines flight 370. A U.S. official tells CNN the intelligence community has now increased its focus on those in the cockpit. We also know the last communication from the cockpit, someone saying all right, good night, came after some of the plane's systems had been shut down. All of that, leading investigators to take a closer look at the pilot and co- pilot. Today, searching both their homes.

CNN's Renee Marsh has a complete timeline of what we know so far.

(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)

RENE MARSH, CNN AVIATION AND GOVERNMENT REGULATION CORRESPONDENT (voice-over): Takeoff from Kuala Lumpur, 12:2:41 a.m. local time last Saturday. Flight 370 headed north along its planned route to Beijing. But then, two communications systems stopped working within minutes of each other, and investigators now believe someone almost surely turned them off.

At 1:07 a.m. near the east coast of Malaysia, the system known as ACARS stops transmitting information about the plane's operating condition. And that was before the last radio transmission, all right, good night, indicating everything was normal.

1:21 a.m., the transponder which identifies the aircraft on radar, stops transmitting. Was someone trying to hide the plane? We also now know blips then seen on Malaysian military radar were in fact flight 370 headed west and authorities say there is every indication someone was in control.

NAJIB RAZAK, MALAYSIAN PRIME MINISTER: Until the point at which it left military primary radar coverage, these movements are consistent with deliberate action by someone on the plane.

MARSH: Still unclear whether it was a pilot or hijacker. CNN has confirmed the plane made erratic changes in altitude and was flying what officials describe as a strange path. At one point, it appears to have climbed to 45,000 feet, well above its approved altitude, then descending to 23,000.

Now, a new analysis of satellite information shows the plane kept flying more than seven hours after takeoff, much longer than previously thought. A satellite searching for operational data from the plane detected the aircraft every hour in a so-called handshake. But no data was transmitted. Its last contact, 8:11 a.m., somewhere along this arc that stretches as far north as Kazakhstan and as far south as the Indian Ocean, west of Australia.

(END VIDEOTAPE)

MARSH: Now as you can see, their search crews have a general area but still haven't pin-pointed its exact location. Now, after more than eight hours in the air, it would have been close to running out of fuel. One other thing, you know, we haven't talked a lot about this but there is the possibility, we won't get all of the answers that we are looking for in this mystery.

The cockpit voice recorders, again, that is located in the rear area of the tail, in the rear area of the plane here. We know that it is only required to record the last two hours of the flight. So if the plane flew for hours, we may never know what happened at the very beginning. We do know, though, that the cockpit data recorder, they store information on the aircraft's systems, the entire systems here, so that may be captured. Of course, it will be because it records an entire flight, about 36 hours.

One other thing, Don, you know, a lot of people have asked this question, why didn't passengers text or call home. We do know that on this particular plane, there was no equipment on board to allow cell service -- Don.

LEMON: Very thorough report. Thank you, Rene Marsh. Appreciate that.

The U.S. intelligence community now increasingly focusing their investigation on those in the cockpit, the pilots as being responsible for the missing jet. Malaysian police today said they searched the pilots' home outside Kuala Lumpur. Police were also seen leaving the home of the co-pilot carrying small shopping bags.

David McKenzie live in Beijing, where the flight was scheduled to land last week.

And David, are tensions growing between China and the Malaysian government because of this?

DAVID MCKENZIE, CNN INTERNATIONAL CORRESPONDENT: Well, they definitely are growing, those tensions. There has been a whole lot of mudslinging between the two sides. Earlier this week, certainly from the Malaysian side, they criticized the Chinese for giving out mistaken information. And then now, the Chinese are saying that they need to step up their efforts on the search.

One state media editorial which is really a mouthpiece of the government here, Don, saying massive efforts have been squandered and numerous rumors have been spawned repeatedly wracking the nerves of the awaiting families. So Don, certainly from the Chinese side, they are pointing the finger at the Malaysians.

The Malaysian acting transport minister just spoke to Chinese media. He said though, if it takes two years or 20 years, he gives the assurance to the families stuck here in Beijing of those passengers that they will find this plane -- Don.

LEMON: So, imagine, you know, in all of this, the families, David, hanging on every word from the media, from officials, anything they can get. What are you hearing from the families of those who were on the jet as they await some answers here? MCKENZIE: Well, we are hearing this frustration, Don, this anger, this variety of emotions over the past few days and certainly now it's more than a week since this plane vanished when it was due to land here in Beijing. And that whole gamut of emotions we have seen at that hotel.

Right now, it seems really that the family members want answers like the rest of us. But for us, what is amazing mystery and intriguing for them has very real consequences, of course, because these are their loved ones. The majority of those on board were Chinese, more than 150 of them. They are mostly stuck in a hotel here in Beijing. It seems ironic in a way when that news came out from Malaysia that this might be a deliberate act, potentially even a hijacking, though that is looking unclear at this point. The families saw that as positive news, not as negative. Take a listen.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

UNIDENTIFIED MALE (through translator): I hope this is a hijacking, because they are our loved ones. I hope that they are alive no matter how small the chance is. I haven't slept for days. We are grateful for the help from so many countries.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

MCKENZIE: And their families honestly, what they are really telling me like all of us is what they need now is any kind of answer -- Don.

LEMON: David McKenzie in Beijing. Thank you very much, David.

U.S. intelligence officials, they believe the pilots were deliberately responsible for the missing jet, but could terror have been the motivation here?

Bob Baer is a CNN national security analyst and former CIA operative.

So could it be terror? If it was the pilots, right, they knew how to make this jet disappear, Bob. Is this knowledge of an airplane too advanced for what a terror group would know?

ROBERT BAER, CNN NATIONAL SECURITY ANALYST: I think absolutely that some professional pilot was involved in this, turning off the systems, changing course, taking it to a high altitude, flying in air corridors, evading radar, all the rest of it, flying seven hours. Doesn't sound like your average terrorist. This wasn't the 9/11 terrorists.

Whether it was the actual pilots or not, I can't tell you. But, you know, I find it interesting that they went for seven hours and if it were a simple pilot committing suicide which has happened in the past, wouldn't he take it into the ocean. So he had some motive to take this plane somewhere and that's the big mystery. And I think as they go through his house, if it indeed is this Malaysian pilot or the co- pilot as well, they will find connections that will be of high interest to U.S. intelligence. LEMON: All right, let's talk about the two paths. There's a northern path and southern path that they are looking into. The northern flight path, it takes a plane to western China and the Uighur region, an area that has had issues with China. Could the plane conceivably have been flown into this area without being detected?

BAER: I think so. You can get the (INAUDIBLE) stand for sure. I have been in those radar sites. They have fallen apart. There's not much there. You know, U.S. radar hoped to pick something up but the locals wouldn't necessarily see it. Kazakhstan's not much better. There are fields in Kazakhstan where you could land conceivably, abandoned military fields, put it in a warehouse. But that's so fantastic. I just would find it difficult to arrive at that conclusion. But, you know, you can't rule it out.

LEMON: Yes. So how significant, though, would it be if a group from the Uighurs, right, like the Uighurs, took control of this airplane?

BAER: Well, Don, they would go outside. They would find a pilot or recruit the Malay pilot in this case. I don't think they could do it on their own. I'm not aware of their interest in aviation. But they have a lot of sympathy. I mean, the Chinese are oppressing the Chinese Muslims. And they are knocking down a city of (INAUDIBLE). They would have a motivation to do this, not necessarily -- you know, I'm not saying they did but they would have the motivation to hijack a plane full of Chinese.

LEMON: Bob Baer, appreciate you. See you soon here on CNN.

More of our breaking news coverage into the disappearance of flight 370 as investigators center on what happened inside the cockpit.

Next, the conspiracy theories. Was it a rogue pilot or a hijacker?

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

LEMON: I'm Don Lemon. Back now with our breaking news coverage. I want to welcome our viewers around the world as well as here in the United States.

We are talking about that missing Malaysian airliner that disappeared nine days ago. Officials tell CNN that U.S. intelligence is increasingly focused on those in the cockpit, the pilots of flight 370, as being deliberately responsible for the missing passenger jet, the Boeing 777 vanished with 239 people on board. But we still don't know where it is.

Arthur Rosenberg is back with us. He is an aviation engineer and attorney. Evy Poumpouras is a security and threat assessment expert and then there is Jeff Wise. He is the author of "extreme fear."

You guys have been watching the coverage and watching the developments. I see you have in the NEWSROOM here paying close attention.

Evy, what stands out for you just within the last couple hours from this new reporting?

EVY POUMPOURAS, SECURITY AND THREAT ASSESSMENT EXPERT: Well, I want to know what's going on with the pilots. I want to know what the Malaysians know. Did they go in, did they do an assessment, did they interview, what's the communication, what's the forensic profile of these two pilots that everybody now is focused on. I think that's the big issue. And that's information we should have had again early on in the game, which is disturbing with this investigation. The route it's taking. It shouldn't take this long to get this plane. We should have been there day one.

LEMON: Jeff?

JEFF WISE, AUTHOR, EXTREME FEAR: You know, it's hard to not keep coming back to this idea of these two arcs, these two physical locations on the planet where this plane was at 8:10 that fateful morning. So the prime minister of Malaysia came out and made the point this is good data. The Malaysians have been working through it over the course of multiple days with Americans. This seems to be the one really solid thing we can hang our hat on right now.

LEMON: You said something very significant last time I spoke with you here, just within the last hour. You said this changes the game, especially when it comes to terrorism, and it almost you said 9/11 type way?

WISE: Well, I said if you look at where this is going, there is still a lot we don't know. The consensus seems to be forming around the idea that the pilots took control of the airplane. Now, that's not nailed down by any stretch of the imagination. But if that is the case, if we can no longer trust the pilots of the airplanes, there really is no one that we trust anymore. And that is going to change the psychology of how we approach air travel.

And you know, as I said before, this is definitely not an accident. You don't fly for eight hours and travel thousands of miles by accident, especially if you follow this kind of zigzag path that the pilot clearly did. This was a carefully planned, meticulously executed, ambitious, creative, and I talked about game changing.

One of the things that really changed the psychology of the whole world after 9/11 was that before that, we had never conceived of the possibility that hijackers could take a plane and be willing to die in it. That had never happened before. And I think the reason this week has been so baffling for us is that we have never before had to wrap our heads around the idea that maybe we can't trust our pilots. Maybe someone can try to steal a plane out from under the eyes of the entire global air traffic control system.

LEMON: People are actually taking control of the plane, right, the pilots, they're locked in there and no one can get to them. What stands out to you?

ARTHUR ROSENBERG, AVIATION ATTORNEY: Yes. The thing that stands out with me is that this was a well-conceived and executed plan --

LEMON: If it continues to go in the direction that it is, right?

ROSENBERG: Well, even before you get to that. I think from the moment that this plane left the runway at Kuala Lumpur, they had an agenda. And they executed that agenda, including flying out towards the end of the island until we get to that fork in the road, the northern route or the southern route. What stands out with me is why would you want to go south? The Indian Ocean is a black hole. There's nothing out there. You head north. And we know now through some of the great coverage on CNN that the radar in central Asia is less than optimum in many places. There are a whole host of airports up there, 10,000 foot runways, even longer. Where this plane could have been put down. So was it, that's a mystery that remains to be seen. But this plan seems to me to be a plan that was intended to head on the northern route.

LEMON: Stand by, Andy. I want to get you. But you also think because of what our Bob Baer said that the radar, as he said they're old, they are outdated. There are flaws. You find that interesting.

WISE: Well, I was astonished to your reporting, Reuters today, that indeed many of the countries, they don't feel particularly military threat. And India, for instance, apparently according to Reuters operates their military radar on an as-needed basis. Meaning, if someone feels maybe there's some potential threat, then they're turn it on. But on a day-to-day basis, why spend the money?

And so, so there's been a lot of concern. A lot of people are saying it has to be the southern track because there's too much military on the northern track. Point I would like to make, this plane got through Malaysian military radar without a hitch. Only when they went back and looked at the recorded data after the fact that they realized this track existed.

LEMON: Yes. Do you feel, Evy, listening to everything you say that the Malaysian government is withholding information here?

POUMPOURAS: Yes, I think from the beginning they were not -- yes, I think in the beginning they were not being forthcoming. And to me, that's logical because obviously, you want to deflect blame, don't want it to come on you. You want to try to control the situation. You're dealing with all these countries that you don't want to share intelligence.

I do want to point something out with what you said with the game changer, with not trusting your pilots, not trusting people. I have to say this, I was a criminal investigators. And I did polygraphs, I did interrogations on people. And the one thing I learned is that anybody is capable of anything at any given moment in time. Should certain things play out.

I don't trust anybody, pilot or not. And maybe I'm cynical due to the job that I had. But I think that is irrelevant because it's the human component, the being inside. That's what matters. You can be a pilot, you can be a cop, you can be whatever, a doctor. The title has nothing to do with it. LEMON: Right. Stand by. Hold that thought. We have much more. You guys are going to be here with us throughout the evening. We're on the air until 10:00 p.m. eastern in the United States. Continuing breaking news coverage into the disappearance of flight 370. As investigators center on what happened inside the cockpit, how familiar would you have to be with a Boeing 777 to disable it? More with our panel next.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

LEMON: I'm Don Lemon. Welcome back to our news, our viewers in the United States and around the world. We're live tonight with the latest on the breaking news on the disappearance of Malaysia air flight 370.

We've been telling you about this news that the U.S. intelligence community is increasingly focused on this being a deliberate act from inside the cockpit. But was it an act of terror or was it a suicide mission?

I want to get back to our panel of experts now. Arthur Rosenberg is an aviation engineer and an attorney. Evy Poumpouras is a security and threat assessment expert, and Jeff Wise is the author of "extreme fear."

So, thank you, guys, for joining us.

ABC is reporting about this abrupt left turning. They're saying that it has to be preprogrammed, right? The Malaysian military radar showed that the plane was brought up to 45,000 feet and then dropped to 23,000 feet. I mean, could this be a tactical maneuver to avoid being detected?

WISE: We have to look at that data with a grain of salt. You know, throughout this week we've seen all kinds of information come through. Some of it is always falling out. From what I've heard, 45,000 feet is a very difficult altitude for this plane to achieve.

LEMON: Have to really push it then it would possibly break apart.

WISE: No. It might be beyond its maximum altitude. It depends on conditions, weight, et cetera. But even "The New York Times" report where I first saw this indicated that the descent was physically impossible. Greatest descent was just it had to be anomalous data. So we know that at least some of this report is erroneous. It may be that the entire thing is erroneous.

ROSENBERG: Yes. I would just put -- I agree with that. I would put another angle on it that the farther you get away from the source of radar, the less accurate the altitude deviations are recorded by the radar. So while the radar is attributed to having the plane at 45,000 feet, I heard loss of altitude, 40,000 feet at the moment, which is physically impossible for the airplane. I'd attribute it to the inaccuracies of the radar that was monitoring that airplane.

But that being said, there may very well have been altitude excursions up and down gains and losses of altitude for a whole host of reasons. So I don't think you can discount the fact that the plane gained and lost altitude, but I think you can discount the amount or extent of the altitude --

LEMON: OK. With that said, remember the whole plane incident where the plane was flying around because of decompression. There are theories out there that whoever was flying or what have you, someone commandeered the aircraft, could have been inexperienced and had that situation where people on board were not conscious.

WISE: (INAUDIBLE). I mean, there has been speculations that -- one question people have been asking throughout this week is, OK, so say you abscond with this jet. What do you do with the passengers? You have 230-something people on there. And you know, many of them are carrying cell phones. How to you deal with them? And one of the -- you know, do you somehow depressurize the cockpit and let them go unconscious for hypoxia? I mean, that is pure speculation at this point. I mean, at this point, we just know where the plane was at certain times and we have to build everything from that.

LEMON: Evy, let's talk about the timeline here, about when the ACARS system was turned off, when the transponder was turned off just before Vietnamese airspace. And then when it turns and then say after all of these incidents had occurred, that's when it's all right, good night.

POUMPOURAS: Yes. Well, to me, it seems very clear, again, I don't know if it's the investigative thing or component of my background. But with all these red flags, I mean, from the beginning, it's very nefarious and the way it's kind of laid out. It just seems extremely calculated. There are some involvement there as far as people being, you know, put out or passed out or the pressure and all that. I don't -- I'm not -- I can't really say on that aspect or not, but I do feel that there is significant calculation here, that this was deliberate, that it was very likely these pilots considering some of the things that are coming out, especially with the one pilot having certain capabilities, having that simulation system at his house. That's odd behavior.

LEMON: Yes.

POUMPOURAS: That's not normal. That's a red flag.

LEMON: So what about this whole northern track now that we've been talking about? Then seven hours, you know, longer than we had thought -- Arthur?

ROSENBERG: Well, so, you have an airplane that got to the fork in the road. The inmorset (ph) radar, the imorset (ph) satellite which was out there basically pinging airplanes not for location, but to ask, are you out there? They got a ping back from this airplane saying, yes, I'm here, but because of the nature of the satellite, it's pointed at one point over the earth, it's called geosynchronous. You wouldn't know where that plane is in York. So, you have a plane that made a right turn which was deliberate, I think, is represented of an intended flight route by at least one skilled pilot.

LEMON: Much much more to talk about here on CNN. More of our breaking news coverage right now.