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Search for Flight 370; Altered Flight Plan?; Search Area Nearly Size of United States; Interview with the Former Malaysian Airlines Pilot

Aired March 18, 2014 - 09:00   ET

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

CAROL COSTELLO: NEWSROOM starts now.

(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)

COSTELLO: Happening now in the NEWSROOM, breaking overnight, the search expands again.

HISHAMMUDDIN HUSSEIN, MALAYSIAN TRANSPORTATION MINISTER: The search and rescue operations have taken on a new international dimension.

COSTELLO: 25 countries now looking at an area the size of the Lower 48.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: We're here at the military air base at Subang Airport. This is the center of the international search and rescue operation.

COSTELLO: Also developing this morning, the grief grows. Families demanding answers as suspicion grows around the pilots.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Someone on the plane put into the computer system that sits between the pilots a new direction for the plane to go in.

COSTELLO: How seven key strokes could have changed everything.

You're live in the CNN NEWSROOM.

Good morning. I'm Carol Costello. Thank you so much for joining me. For the first time, a foreign government is admitting its military radar picked up Malaysian Flight 370 both before and possibly after the plane's transponder was turned off.

We know at about 1:22 a.m., on March 8th, on Saturday, the missing plane's transponder was shut off. Six minutes later, at 1:28, the Thailand Air Force tells CNN the unknown signal popped up on their radar. That unknown signal was traveling in a different direction than Flight 370's original flight path. It was not sending out data and its signal was only broadcasting interminably.

That signal never entered Thai air space. And instead was heading back towards Kuala Lumpur. Once that signal turned into the Strait of Malacca, the signal was lost. This revelation from the Thai Air Force casts new light on what may have happened.

CNN's Tom Foreman joins me now from Washington to discuss this latest twist.

Tom, take it away.

TOM FOREMAN, CNN CORRESPONDENT: Latest twist is right where it isn't, Carol, because we just keep getting them day after day.

Let's bring in the map and get our bearings as we always do here. There's where the plane took off about a week and a half ago, a little more now from over there in Kuala Lumpur. Came up here off the coast. And here is where it disappeared. And since then we've seen the steady expansion of all the places that they might be looking for this including this wide expansion of some days back when the satellite suggested there could be these arcs, both northern and southern upon which this plane might be.

And it's the northern arc that still fits the mold of what we're hearing now out of Thailand right here. So what is the idea here? The idea that Thailand is suggesting is that the flight from down here would have come up this way and then made this turn. And the turn would have been over towards the Strait of Malacca over there.

So if this happening this way, does this fit the model of everything we've talked about so far? Kind of. There's this idea from the Malaysians that there was an immediate left turn at the time the plane disappeared. So that would have been more over in this area. And the Thai report would suggested that it had to come a little bit further and then turn but maybe they fit together?

Does this fit into other sightings or people saying they maybe saw something over towards the Strait of Malacca or on the coastal areas of Malaysia, it could fit a little but again like everything else, Carol, it's this piecemeal material coming in. And of course one of the big questions is here if the Thai had this information, good heavens, why didn't they really know about it until now -- Carol.

COSTELLO: Yes, that's one of the biggest questions out there. So much information is not being shared. It's actually quite shocking.

FOREMAN: Yes.

COSTELLO: Tom Foreman, many thanks to you.

I want to bring in Mary Schiavo now, former inspector general for the Department of Transportation, and now an attorney for transportation accident victims. She's only CNN's aviation analyst.

Good morning Mary.

MARY SCHIAVO, CNN AVIATION ANALYST: Good morning.

COSTELLO: All right. So let's talk about this. The Thai Air Force now says it was tracking Flight 370 on its normal flight pattern until 1:22 in the morning on Saturday and then it lost the signal. Minutes later, the Thai Air Force picks up an unknown aircraft heading roughly back toward Kuala Lumpur. Does this help prove that Flight 370 made a turn? SCHIAVO: Well, yes, it helps to prove that the flight did make the turn. I think which most people are agreeing on. But it also has the potential to give more clues. You know, did the plane take the northern route, did the plane take the southern route? You know, the United States has sent the sub-hunter planes down to the southern route. But maybe this, just maybe this could give them more clues as to where the plane went after it turned left.

Did it then go to the north up over the hump and to other countries like stans or down south towards the ocean? And that's why people are at least allowing themselves to have a little bit of optimism on the next clue.

COSTELLO: This Thai military official also told CNN the unknown aircraft signal was sending out intermittently, on and off. On and off. What does that tell you?

SCHIAVO: Well, it -- a couple of things. Like everything in this investigation, it can tell you one of two things. It can tell you that the plane was having problems. That the plane wasn't sending a clear signal because it didn't have a clear signal to send. Or it can say -- it can signal to some that maybe there was someone in the cockpit who did not know what he or she was doing. And, you know, it wasn't -- thought they had turned off everything but did not.

So we still have two different possibilities. But intermittent can also mean it was the ACARS, the system we've talked about, the aircraft systems reporting computer that sends out messages. That only reports out every 20 or 30 minutes.

COSTELLO: It's also interesting this plane did not penetrate Thai air space. It turned around before it hit land. Is that significant?

SCHIAVO: It can be. People who believe that the plane was trying to avoid radar would not want to come over land. Actually it's not that you wouldn't want to come over land. You wouldn't to get into the territorial waters So you'd want to turn even before that. But the radar can extend out into the waters. Ours certainly does. And so there's still the possibility that the radar would have seen more of what this plane did and give more clues. COSTELLO: Mary Schiavo, thanks as usual for your insight. We appreciate.

There is another big development this morning, the flight computer. The "New York Times" is reporting the aircraft's first turn to the west was carried out through a computer system that was most likely programmed by somebody in the cockpit. The person who programmed the change of course would have been somebody knowledgeable about airplane systems. The "Times" reported this sighting, unidentified American officials.

Joining us to talk more about this computer on board that plane, CNN's Martin Savidge and pilot Mitchell Casado.

Welcome back gentlemen. MARTIN SAVIDGE, CNN CORRESPONDENT: Good morning, Carol. We've been learning about various avionics on the aircraft and today we're focusing on the FMS, that's the Flight Management System. That is this computerized system here, there's one here, there's one up there, there's one here. But essentially this is the brain of the plane. It does a lot of things that assist the pilot and co-pilot in flying this aircraft.

But probably the biggest thing it does is really navigates the plane. Think of it as a really sophisticated GPS like you'd have in your car. You would program them before takeoff where you are headed. In this case for Flight 370 it was programmed to go from Kuala Lumpur all the way to Beijing and all the waypoints in between would be in it.

However, as Mitchell can show us, it's pretty easy if you know what you're doing to alter the flight. How would a turn be put in?

MITCHELL CASADO, PILOT TRAINER, 777 COCKPIT SIMULATOR: Very simple. So this magenta line here, this is showing our flight path. This is right (INAUDIBLE) does. We're on the course to Beijing right now. All you have to do if you want to change course, a couple of key strokes. If you know where you want to go, the waypoint, it's just a matter of punching it into the scratch pad here, which is just the little area below here.

And we punch it in, we put it in the flight plan. We execute that flight plan. And now you can see outside the airplane turning. Deviating from its course to the left, to the new route. And it's as simple as.

SAVIDGE: And we should point out, Carol, that, you know, even though you can see on the horizon that the plane is turning, if you're a passenger, you know, back in the passenger compartment, doesn't seem like a dramatic change. It certainly isn't violent in any way. And actually the aircraft is doing it very smoothly and consistently.

So if you didn't know better, you'd think this was just part of the standard course that you were on. But in fact you've deviated significantly.

CASADO: Yes.

COSTELLO: So Malaysian officials were asked about this scenario this morning. They said that the computer was programmed as usual to fly to Beijing. Now we don't know the computer was changed, but let's say it was changed after the plane took off, what kind of scenario would such a thing be needed, Mitchell?

CASADO: You know what, it's just as easy to change the course in the air as it is on the ground. You just have to -- on the ground actually it might be even easier because you're on the ground, you have less going on. In the air, like I said, it's very simple. Five to 10 seconds. But the thing is, you have to know physically easily but you have to know about the airspace. You have to know with the corridor that you're flying on. The waypoints, if those waypoints are covered by radar, if there (INAUDIBLE) waypoints. There's so much behind those key strokes. Tons and tons of knowledge that you have to have to know exactly, you know, where you're going and for purposes, for their objective.

(CROSSTALK)

COSTELLO: I guess -- I guess what I was asking is why would you change the computer in air?

CASADO: Because -- I mean, if the capability is there in case you need to deviate. Primarily for weather. If a volcano erupts, if there's a thunderstorm, if you need -- there's a sick passenger. You have to be able to change the flight plan. Why they did it in this case, who knows. But that's why the capability is there.

SAVIDGE: I mean, it would certainly imply that somebody was trying to do this plane (INAUDIBLE).

CASADO: Yes.

COSTELLO: All right. Thank you so much for helping us understand all of this.

Martin Savidge and pilot Mitchell Casado, thanks as always.

In the meantime Malaysian officials are asking for additional help in this search, including deep ocean detection equipment. The Indian Ocean which makes up the southern corridor of the search is the world's third largest ocean with average depths of two miles.

Still to come in the NEWSROOM, a search area the size of the United States. That's what crews face as they try to solve the mystery of Malaysia Airlines Flight 370. We'll head to Kuala Lumpur next.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

ANNOUNCER: This is CNN Breaking News.

COSTELLO: All right, A bit of breaking news to pass along to you this morning. In Russia, Vladimir Putin has signed a treaty officially making Crimea part of the Russian federation. Now the signing comes after an overwhelming vote in Crimea over the weekend where 97 percent of voters backed the referendum to leave Ukraine and join Russia.

Russian officials will reportedly begin ratification of the treaty in the next few days. Of course we'll continue to monitor this developing story throughout the morning.

Now, back to our big story of the day, that missing plane. Twenty-six nations scouring nearly 3 million square miles, or almost the size of the entire United States, in an effort to find clues in the disappearance of Malaysia Airlines Flight 370.

Kate Bolduan is in Kuala Lumpur.

Kate, the size of the search is astounding. I don't know where you begin. How are they splitting this up?

KATE BOLDUAN, CNN ANCHOR, NEW DAY: Well, I mean, that is the huge problem, Carol. We talked about it yesterday and it continues to happen again today. The search area is not narrowing. It is only expanding and we're 11 days in. And that is the big challenge, how do they break it up, how do they cover this whole area? They're trying their best.

At this point, that's the way we understand it. You've got corridors. You see it on your screen, the north and south. You now have China and Kazakhstan, they're taking the lead on covering the northern corridor. So, they can focus their assets there. Then you have Australia and Indonesia, they're taking lead on covering the southern corridor so they can take the lead there and they can focus their assets.

Announced today in the press conference with Malaysian officials also they've reached out looking for help in terms of actual assets. You had a lot of -- we talked about the USS Kidd, big Navy ships out there searching. It seems they're transitioning maybe a little less towards the big Navy ships that are out there, more towards aircraft. You've got the U.S., Australia, a huge list, New Zealand, South Korea, Japan and the UAE all offering up more aircraft to assist, to help in this search.

You might wonder why? They are continuing to put the focus on the water, on the ocean, especially the Indian Ocean? There really is a sense of urgency here when we understand that we're now 11 days in, Carol. And the black box that is so critical because it sends out a ping, it sends a bit of a message, that only lasts for 30 days.

Yes, they do have more time. Now we can all understand when you're covering an area the size of the continental U.S., you need a lot of help and you don't have a lot of time.

COSTELLO: I want to ask you what the mood is like in Kuala Lumpur, because certainly the international spotlight is on Malaysia and that spotlight has not been flattering.

What are people thinking about that in Kuala Lumpur?

BOLDUAN: You get a little bit -- we've talked -- you get a little from everybody. Number one, we've talked to everyday folks here in Malaysia. We actually spoke today to the next door neighbor of the co-pilot who has been a focus of this.

You and I will talk about that exclusive interview a little bit later, because it was very interesting to get his take on is the co-pilot, could that co-pilot possibly be behind this? But I also asked him in that consideration -- he's a taxi driver in this city. What he thought of the government's response. He himself says, he thinks, that the government is inexperienced, that the government has been slowed to respond. But we have heard over and over again, the one caveat that is the realization that they're dealing with an unprecedented crisis, a crisis that this country, maybe no country, could be prepared for. The fact there's so many nations now involved and there's such a mystery surrounding it. We even spoke to a former prime minister's daughter, she's a social activists, well known around here. She herself was critical of the government saying that they have not done a good job on speaking with one voice and giving clarity in their message, critical of the prime minister that he has not maybe done the best in taking the lead.

But she also says again, they're dealing with an unprecedented situation and they have been slow to get the information out. She believes they're trying to catch up and do better at this point.

COSTELLO: Kate Bolduan, reporting live from Kuala Lumpur, thanks so much.

Still to come in the NEWSROOM, the private life of the man in command of the now missing Malaysian Airlines flight faces more scrutiny. CNN talks with a former pilot who actually flew that now missing jet.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

COSTELLO: If that missing plane's computer was deliberately rerouted, the pilots will now be even more intensely investigated. We assume investigators are going through every single detail. But as far as we know, they turned up nothing.

Kyung Lah has more for us.

(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)

KYUNG LAH, CNN CORRESPONDENT (voice-over): The investigation continues to zero in on the two men in the cockpit. In particular, the most skilled pilot, the captain, Zaharie Ahmad Shah. So passionate about flying that he's what's known as a home simmer. He built his own simulator as seen on this YouTube video.

And he talked about it online, writing on a flight simulator chat side, "Looking for buddies to share this passion".

Curiously, Captain Zaharie also posted a series of do-it-yourself videos, like how to repair an icemaker.

Malaysia investigators are now combing to every part of the pilot's home and his life.

This YouTube video shows him as a loving father of three. He was also active in Malaysia's volatile politics.

Captain Zaharie was a public supporter of opposition party leader Anwar Ibrahim, and a thorn in the ruling party's side, a political party in control for over 50 years.

Zaharie attended Anwar's pro-democracy rallies and meetings, even wore a democracy is dead t-shirt, denouncing the one party rule in Malaysia. For the first time, Anwar told CNN that he did, in fact, know the pilot of the missing plane. (on camera): Can you describe how you knew the pilot?

ANWAR IBRAHIM, OPPOSITION PARTY LEADER: What, he attended some of the, I think, party meetings. I confirm only afterwards whether he's a card-carrying member of the party.

LAH (voice-over): Why is that important? Because just hours before Malaysia Airlines Flight 370 took off, the court after appeals ordered Anwar to prison on charges of sodomy, reversing the not guilty decision of a lower court. Anwar says the sentence is a political vendetta.

Local press not asking did Zaharie purposely down the plane to make a political statement?

(on camera): Is it possible that a supporter of yours would be willing to take this step in order to make a political statement on a global stage.

IBRAHIM: It cannot be conjecture. It's grossly unfair to him and his family. I'm open for a full investigation. I mean, they could investigate. There was nothing of that sort.

LAH (voice-over): Anwar says his political opponents are feeding that narrative to reporters.

IBRAHIM: In order to deflect that, their own failure, their own incompetence, they now choose to attack me.

LAH (on camera): Just to throw off the scent?

IBRAHIM: Yes. I think there's desperation of the part of the government, of the ruling leadership, particularly (INAUDIBLE), for the manner they manage the whole crisis, clearly incompetent, contradictory statements, poor management of crisis.

LAH (voice-over): But so far, there is no evidence to tie the plane's disappearance to the pilot or his politics. We could not reach the Malaysian government for comment on this.

HISHAMMUDDIN HUSSEIN, MALAYSIAN ACTING MINISTER OF TRANPORTATION: The fact that there are no distress signals, no ransom notes, there are no parties claiming to be responsible, there's always hope.

LAH: The transport minister did acknowledge that the captain and co- pilot did not ask to fly together. And that investigators are looking into pilot suicide as a possible cause. Officials also say it was the co-pilot not the captain, who gave the plane's last verbal message, "All right. Good night."

(END VIDEOTAPE)

COSTELLO: Kyung Lah joins us now live from Kuala Lumpur. In addition to the story you heard, she spoke to a former Malaysian Airlines pilot who actually flew that now missing plane.

So, Kyung, tell us about that.

LAH: It's very important to note he actually flew it, the missing plane. And that's what is so interesting because he's really the first person who have has intimate knowledge of the actual mechanics of the plane.

What he says is that he does not believe that it was any sort of catastrophic mechanical failure. He says that this particular plane is particularly sound and he also says that while we are talking about the pilot, while certainly there's scrutiny on the pilot, he has known this man 30 years and doesn't believe he was responsible.

Here's what he told us.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

NIK HUZLAN, RETIRED MALAYSIAN AIRLINES CAPTAIN: I know for sure. I flew this plane.

LAH: You flew the missing airline?

HUZLAN: How many times. Yes, how many times.

LAH: So, what do you think happened? Being someone who's actually been behind the controls?

HUZLAN: Yes, very, very strange. The lack of communication is the one that's really, really puzzling, the way pilots did not communicate if there was emergency. I think from the second or third day, I already come to my own private conclusion that there must be some form of unlawful human interference. It could be anyone on the airplane.

LAH: If you're convinced it's not the pilot, but does your attention turn to the co-pilot?

HUZLAN: Well, like I said, unlawful human interference means human is involved. We start going down. Personally, we start going down.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

LAH: What he's talking about is going down the actual list of name, passengers and crew. That's a process that's going to have to happen with the police and investigators, Carol.

COSTELLO: That's right, because right now, there are 239 suspects, right? That's what investigators are combing through, backgrounds of each and every person on board the plane.

I want to ask about the cockpit door and how it was fortified. Can you tell us that, Kyung?

LAH: What I can tell you is that this particular pilot who has flown the missing plane. He says that after 9/11, all the planes at Malaysia Airlines were changed because of the 9/11 attacks. The doors were strengthened. They're much thicker now, he says. He says there is protocol that when the doors open and we've seen this certainly, anyone who's flown in the United States has seen this, is that when you come in, there's a camera positioned so the pilot or co-pilot can see who's actually standing outside the door. It's a big GoPro camera.

So, he said that you can see all the way to business class. So, it's quite wide. And he pointed out that there is a key pad entry the pilot and co-pilot does have time and you have to know that keypad entry and it does change.

COSTELLO: Another question and I don't know if you asked him this or not -- can Malaysian pilots be armed? Are there weapons in the cockpit?

LAH: We did not touch on that subject. We have not heard anything about that particular topic at all, Carol.

COSTELLO: I was just curious. I was just curious.

Thank you, Kyung Lah. Thanks so much for fabulous reporting as usual.

It has been 11 days since that flight disappeared. And, of course, we've had lots of theories thrown around. Very few facts.

Joining me now, CNN law enforcement analyst and former FBI assistant director Tom Fuentes. Good morning, Tom.

TOM FUENTES, CNN LAW ENFORCEMENT ANALYST: Good morning, Carol.

COSTELLO: OK. So, 239 suspects, where do you begin?

FUENTES: Well, Carol, one additional group of people I'd like to see interviewed in this investigation are present and former -- especially the former -- flight attendants. Ask, find out from them, find someone that's flown with either or both of these pilots. And ask them, how often do they come out that cockpit to go to the bathroom, to get food, for whatever reason?