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Searching for Signs of Flight 370; Chinese Satellite Spots Floating Object; Floating Object Spotted By Chinese Satellite Is 74 Feet Long, 43 Feet Wide; Russian Troops Wait On Ukrainian Border; Are Plane Cockpits Safe Enough?; Flight 370: Front Page News Around The World

Aired March 22, 2014 - 11:00   ET

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

RANDI KAYE, CNN ANCHOR: Good morning to both of you. Thanks, guys. I'm Randi Kaye. The 11:00 hour of NEWSROOM starts right now.

There is a major new development in the hunt for Flight 370. Here is what we know right now. A new object has been spotted in the southern Indian Ocean. A Chinese satellite captured images of it just four days ago. It's about 74 feet by 43 feet. Right now China is sending ships to try to locate it and determine if its wreckage from the plane. The object was found about 75 miles from two other floating objects spotted by a commercial satellite a week ago.

Malaysia's Transportation Minister got word of a discovery right in the middle of his morning news conference. He acknowledged the emotional toll each new development each sighting of potential debris is taking on the families. And he issued this promise.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

HISHASMMUDDIN BIN HUSSEIN, ACTING MINISTER OF TRANSPORTATION: We will continue to engage with the families. We are working hard with Chinese authorities and the Chinese working group to create a more conducive environment for the briefings. I've instructed my team to do a review of both findings so that we can improve them. We appeal to all parties to be understanding during the extraordinary and difficult times. My pledge to all the families, wherever they are, is the same. We will do everything in our power to keep you informed.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

KAYE: Crews have been looking for the first two mystery objects for three days now but haven't been able to find them. Defense Secretary Chuck Hagel is ordering the Navy and policy experts to investigate whether U.S. military undersea technology could help find potential wreckage.

Malaysian officials are asking the Pentagon to contribute to equipment to that search operation.

So a lot of moving pieces today we're going to get you through it all. Andrew Stevens is live in Perth, Australia, where the search operation is based. Andrew, hello to you. Are resources now being diverted to find this new object? ANDREW STEVENS, CNN CORRESPONDENT: They will be Randi when the search starts tomorrow, no doubt. The search has well and truly ended for the day here. It's now 11:00 in the evening. All of the six aircraft that went out came back empty handed as it were, but that was well before we got this news about the Chinese picking up this object of interest. Not that far from where the satellite pictures were taken by the Australians of those two other objects.

Now, remember, that it's been six or seven days now since the pictures were taken of those objects still no news on that which does suggest that this still could be a long haul. But certainly the crews will be out early tomorrow.

And interestingly, Randi, there are two Chinese aircraft, military aircraft, right here at this Australian Air Force base just outside Perth. They're going to be joining the search tomorrow. Their capabilities is optical equipment so if they can establish where this large object is, they may well be able to identify, as well. There's a lot of observers on board these flights. The Australians are saying it's so important now for observers to actually get sort of vision, get actual line of sight on these objects, to get an idea of what they might be.

So that is going to be a focus. I should tell you that one of the last planes that came back today got a report earlier that there was some debris, some small bits of debris in the field that the search is centered on. The New Zealand military plane went out to investigate and couldn't find this debris but they dropped a marker buoy in and a ship -- a commercial ship is now heading towards that area. So we may get some news on that as well in the next 24 hours on whether the small bits of debris are of interest as well.

So yes, there are things, there are targets -- specific targets to look for tomorrow. It's going to be a busy day as this whole operation continues to ramp up.

KAYE: And Andrew, are you getting any sense of time and in terms of how long these teams, how many days these teams are committed to going out there and searching?

STEVENS: We got a very clear indication from the acting Prime Minister of Australia today, Warren Truss. He said this search will go on indefinitely. His words, not mine. He says that the Australian government owes it to the families of the people on board that flight, as all governments do, to any national who is on that flight. No sense at all that they're going to be stepping back, reeling it back in any shape or form in the foreseeable future.

KAYE: Andrew Stevens, thank you very much for the update from Perth.

The new satellite image from China was taken four days ago. And there's a concern that strong ocean currents could have pulled the debris pretty far from now. Jennifer Gray is live in the weather center with more on that and the conditions in that search region. Good morning Jennifer. JENNIFER GRAY, AMS METEOROLOGIST: And good morning to you. That's right. We are looking at conditions begin to deteriorate as we go through the next 24 to 48 hours. This red box is where the search area is. And you can see throughout most of the day they had clear skies but conditions will start to deteriorate just as I mentioned.

We are going to see a front very close to the area. And you can see a small band of rain. And this is Sunday 8:30 Eastern Time. So that would be 8:30 p.m. and along with this rain comes very strong winds. And so it just adds insult to injury. We're going to see the winds increase possibly 40 to 50 miles per hour.

So you can expect the seas will begin to get very, very rough as we go through the latter part of Sunday. Also the main concern are these currents. So we've been talking about these for the past couple of days. The ocean currents in these areas are very, very strong. That West Australian current can move one foot per second. And so you can imagine if any of these -- any of these objects start to drift to the south, to the West, they can get caught up in one of these currents.

Right now it's in an area with very low current the satellite image that spotted the object right there. Darker shades are weaker currents. Brighter shades are stronger currents. And you can see these little swirls all around that object, these are small eddies in these can definitely carry some of these objects as well. And so there's a lot of factors that play into this. If it does get caught in one of those stronger currents it can move very, very fast. So when the time is of the essence because you can imagine we're getting this information four days out sometimes and so no telling how far it can drift.

KAYE: Right. They just have to follow the line there in the water. Jennifer, thank you very much.

Earlier today Australia's acting Prime Minister said the satellite images are the best they have to go on right now but nothing is clear cut.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

WARREN TRUSS, ACTING AUSTRALIAN PRIME MINISTER: But we can't be sure at this stage whether the debris that's been sighted in the satellite imagery is related to the -- to the loss of the aircraft. It is the most promising lead that's available internationally, but there are any number of other explanations about what might have been sighted as a result of this satellite imagery.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

KAYE: I'm joined by CNN law enforcement analyst Tom Fuentes in Washington; Andrew Thomas, editor-in-chief of the Journal of Transportation Security live in Cleveland; and Bobbie Scholley a retired Navy captain and a Navy diver is with us from Washington. Good morning to you all.

Bobbie, let me start with you. If the images picked up on the satellite are not pieces of the plane, what might they be?

BOBBIE SCHOLLEY, RETIRED NAVY DIVER: Well, if those images are not pieces of the airplane they could be any possible thing. They could be the floating freighter containers. They could be masses of garbage that's just drifted together. They could be anything. And then we're just back to zero again.

KAYE: And I understand there is some difficulty obviously where this part of the ocean is in terms of the search efforts. I mean earlier this week I was looking at these underwater robots that may be used in this search. I mean is that something that you think could be deployed here? Would that help?

SCHOLLEY: Those underwater search systems can be deployed but not at this point. Until we actually have a higher probability of where the aircraft might be, we would not bring the systems in to the search at this time because they are designed to be used in a much smaller search area. So these systems are not going to be used at this point until we have a probability of where the aircraft would be.

KAYE: And Andrew, British newspaper, "The Daily Telegraph" have reported yesterday that it had the transcript from the cockpit communications. But listen to what officials in Malaysia said today at their believing.

All right. We don't have the sound bite. But I guess basically they're saying that there's nothing suspicious in the transcript. I mean what do you make of that, Andrew?

ANDREW THOMAS, EDITOR-IN-CHIEF, THE JOURNAL OF TRANSPORTATION SECURITY: Well this speaks to the bigger context I think that we should frame here and that is that the first 24, 48, 72 hours after this plane went missing the Malaysian government and Chinese government who both assumed responsibility for the -- for the investigation and research, rescue, recovery efforts were not transparent with themselves, were not transparent with each other or the rest of the world and we lost critical time.

And now here we are over two weeks later, this is cascaded to the point where we're still guessing. and this speaks to something I think that we need to know going forward and that is when these -- when these kinds of incidents happen and they will again when planes go missing or there's accidents or catastrophes, the government has got to -- has got to stand up and take accountability and respond in a way that enables all of the resources to be brought to bear and to ease the suffering of the people who probably have lost loved ones.

KAYE: And Tom, the more this search continues with no sign of the plane, do you think it's getting more or less likely that this might be related to terrorism or anything suspicious?

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

I don't think it makes enough of an indication one way or the other. And I think that's the problem with this whole thing, is that you really have two tracks investigation going on simultaneously. All of the technical research to try to look at what arc that plane took and whether it turned around or went up or down or was on fire or you have zombie pilot and crew. All of that is one thing. But that's the technical side.

The law enforcement side of this began the very night it went missing. And the FBI agents assigned full time in Kuala Lumpur were invited in the very night it went missing and have been in the command post ever since and have been part of this investigation on the law enforcement side, on the police and intelligence side of that.

So those aspects go on concurrently. It's not like one thing gets done and that didn't work out and now we're going to try something else. You know, that -- the police and Royal Malaysian police have 100,000 sworn officers and they've had all of these countries affected by this, offer additional resources if they need it. But they really can't use them in Malaysia right now until we have a crash site.

KAYE: All right. Thank you, Tom Fuentes, Andrew Thomas, and Bobbie Scholley. Thanks very much.

FUENTES: You're welcome.

KAYE: As the search for Flight 370 now focuses on a new location we'll take you inside a flight simulator to show you what could have happened to that airplane.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

FLIGHT LT. RUSSELL ADAMS, ROYAL AUSTRALIAN AIR FORCE: We had really good opportunity, I think, to do anything like this and for the task that we have today the conditions were outstanding. Unfortunately the conditions that preclude us from staying on station as long as we would have liked, however, there are a few other aircraft out there (inaudible) as well as the United States Navy still out there searching and with any luck we'll find something shortly. We've got a lot of hope and the conditions remain as they are, hopefully we'll find something soon.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

KAYE: That's Flight Lieutenant Russell Adams of the Royal Australian Air Force talking about the search for the plane today. Chinese ships are now headed to a spot in the Southern Indian Ocean where an object was spotted by satellite four days ago.

While we wait for more news, we want to keep looking at some of the more talked about theories out there as to what happened to the missing jet 15 days ago.

CNN's Martin Savidge joins us live from a flight simulator just outside of Toronto.

Martin, hello to you, I want to ask you about this one theory that's out there about the possibility that lithium batteries may have sparked in the cargo and that fire might have spread to the cockpit. What do we know about that?

MARTIN SAVIDGE, CNN CORRESPONDENT: Well, you know, it was over a week ago, actually Friday, that CNN first reported that there was a cargo of some sort of lithium batteries on board this aircraft. And lithium batteries in the past have triggered fires or at least hazardous situations. There's one case where lithium batteries actually triggered a fire so severe it brought down a cargo plane in Dubai.

So obviously it's a very great concern. Malaysian officials said they do not believe that was part of what caused this plane to disappear. They say that whatever amount they had on there -- they wouldn't say, Randi, how many batteries there were, but they said that there wasn't a large amount and they said that they were all packed properly.

Let me tell you about this simulator here that we can do. And Mitchell, why don't you just sort of put us in a turn and steep dive. The incredible thing about this simulator is it seems so real. And it is set up, of course, a 777-200, the same as Malaysian Airline 370. And we've loaded it with all the information we know about Flight 370.

And I was just asking Mitchell to take us down so we can show you what, say, if this plane had to make some sort of approach to water if it was trying to make an emergency landing, but you get the feel of this plane. You get all the alarms that come on, you get all the indicators as far as everything that is reflected right here. I mean even the reflection of the sunlight on the water is designed to make it look and feel exactly as it was.

And so this allows us to test all kinds of theories. And one of them is that, of course, after flying for six hours, the plane simply ran out of fuel and then what happens? It was on autopilot, assume. So the autopilot would stop but it's not going to be a plane that just tips over and does like a roller coaster hill. Instead, this plane, Mitchell, the way it's designed, is to actually fly slowly, steadily, even with no one at the controls descending to the ocean.

MITCHELL CASADO, PILOT TRAINER: Yes. Like most aircraft, actually, they're designed to glide. If the engines were to cut out you're not going to get a sudden drop you're just going to glide down gradually.

SAVIDGE: And we've tested that with the simulator. You can go for maybe up to 100 miles beyond where the engines quit. The problem is, Randi, when it does get to the water level, the aircraft, without anybody flying it at the controls, is not going to do a miracle on the Hudson, I can tell you that. The impact would be quite severe. So, so many things we can test, Randi.

KAYE: Yes, that's what I was going to ask you. Could it actually glide down on to the water and sort of rest gently there but you answered that question already. One more question for you though. If something happened to the pilots and they were incapacitated or someone managed to get into the cockpit even. Once that door is locked, no one else can get in, right? SAVIDGE: Right. And, you know, of course, those were part of the new security measures that were implemented on all aircraft around the world after 9/11. The idea that you didn't want somebody breaking into the cockpit -- so you made it reinforced very strong door.

One of the problems to that is, of course, if somebody were to get in, breach somehow, and get inside and lock it again, it would be very difficult for now anyone on the outside to try to interrupt them, stop them from whatever they were doing. So it's kind of a double-edged sword.

There is an automatic locking system here. So there is a way to unlock it if the pilots wanted to but if it's somebody in the cockpit now with ill intent they're probably trying to keep people out. Could they have kept them out for seven hours? That's another matter. I mean people would have become quite concerned and doing all they could to get inside.

KAYE: Certainly. Martin Savidge, as always, thank you very much.

Well, we may not want to think about it, but the missing plane may be found deep on the ocean floor. And I'll show you some deep sea technology that could be key to a recovery mission.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

KAYE: The latest on the search for Flight 370, an object has been spotted in the southern Indian Ocean. A Chinese satellite captured an image of the object four days ago. China has said its ships are headed to the area to continue the search.

Now if we do find ourselves in a worse case scenario and investigators need to find a plane at the bottom of the ocean, technology could play a key part in the search and recovery.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

KAYE (voice over): This robot submarine may hold the key to finding Malaysia Airlines Flight 370. It's called the Remus 6000 and developed by the Woods Hole Oceanographic Institution on Cape Cod. It's 13 feet long, weighs almost a ton and costs about $2.5 million.

Mike Purcell is the principal engineer here.

MIKE PURCELL, WOODS HOLE OCEANOGRAPHIC INSTITUTION: They can go up and down mountains that are up to 40 degrees in slope. They are very stable, so you get really good data almost all the time.

KAYE: Why would this underwater robot find something even the U.S. Navy and search teams from more than two dozen different countries haven't been able to find? First of all, the torpedo-shaped vehicle can reach depths of up of 6,000 meters or more than 3.5 miles below the surface. And it can survey wide swaths of the ocean floor using what's called side scan sonar.

PURCELL: They send a sound pulse that's sort of a fan beam out to the side and it will travel out almost half a mile from the vehicle. And it bounces off the seafloor and we get a reflection back to the vehicle.

KAYE: They call the process mowing the lawn because it works its assigned grid back and forth before returning to the surface with images captured on a high resolution camera. It's all done at the touch of a laptop on dry land.

(on camera): How do you tell the difference? How do you know if it's a fish or a rock or a plane?

PURCELL: I think that you can just tell from the return. Manmade objects, metal down there on the seafloor respond very strongly.

KAYE (voice over): The team here hasn't been asked yet to help search for the plane in the ocean but if they are it won't be the first time. The Remus 6000 was called on to help find Air France Flight 447 after it crashed into the Atlantic Ocean in June 2009. Two years later, a search team from Woods Hole located the wreckage of the jet about 2.5 miles beneath the surface after months of searching -- something only possible because of this underwater robot.

This is the initial shot of the Air France debris field captured by the Remus 6000.

PURCELL: There were obvious signs that this was from the plane.

KAYE: One team member first noted a backpack on the ocean floor belonging to a passenger. Closer images revealed the plane's engine -- one of the wings, even the landing gear.

(on camera): Before you put one of these vehicles in the water you have to narrow down the search area. The team from here searched 5,000 square miles for the Air France flight and it still took them more than 100 attempts to find the debris. And that is just a fraction of the area that they're looking at for Flight 370.

(voice over): And while the team here with their underwater robots is ready for the call if it comes, what they hoped to discover more than anything are survivors.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

KAYE: This technology is so good it was actually used to help try and find Amelia Earhart's airplane -- no luck there. But it was used to map the field of the Titanic after that ship was found. It mapped that field and help people understand exactly what happened to that ship after it hit the iceberg. So it's pretty fascinating stuff.

Let's bring our experts back in. I'm joined by CNN law enforcement analyst Tom Fuentes in Washington; Andrew Thomas, editor in chief for the "Journal of Transportation Security" live in Cleveland; and Bobbie Scholley, retired Navy captain and Navy diver is in Washington.

Tom, let me start with you. I want to ask you about this phone call that was reportedly made, a call from the cockpit by the pilot before takeoff. Does that raise any red flags for you?

FUENTES: Not necessarily. You know, the authorities would know pretty quickly what number was called, who was the subscriber of that phone, go to that person, what was the call about. Could be a family member, we're running late, it could be anybody. It could be somebody in China who is going to be meeting the plane when they land and have dinner together or breakfast together or something.

So, you know, the pilot's report that they often make these last- minute calls because once that door shuts and they're airborne they're going to be in that cockpit for six, seven, eight hours and unable to talk to other friends or family on the ground.

KAYE: Bobbie, what would you say are some of the challenges in this part of the ocean in terms of searching? I mean we've seen the planes go out, they're coming back, as far as we know so far pretty empty- handed?

SCHOLLEY: Well, the big challenge that we have in that part of the ocean is the depth of water. We're looking at approximately 16,000 feet of water, which is going to make it very difficult. We're going to have to use the equipment that you showed previously, the equipment that is rated at 20,000 feet of water. Once we actually get some confirmation that -- that we have an aircraft on the bottom.

And then it's so far away from Australia, so our logistics port is going to be quite a ways away. The ships are going to have to transit all that distance out from Australia. The ships that operate off of -- for the salvage operation are not necessarily large ships. And so the same problems that the aircraft are having going back and forth to Australia are going to be some of the problems that the ships would experience.

And then the environmental factors -- the high winds, the heavy seas, the currents are all going to make any recovery operations very, very difficult, very time consuming. So the amount of time that will be spent doing a recovery operation, if we ever get to that point, if this does turn out to be aircraft debris, will just extend the operation, make it much more difficult.

But every operation of this type that I've seen, the people involved are so dedicated, so well trained, and so determined that they just go at it until they are successful. So hopefully this turns out to be debris and we can move forward in that direction. But we'll just have to wait and see.

KAYE: And knowing what you know about a situation like this, I mean, is it possible that someone could still be alive? I mean, what would they be going through right now?

SCHOLLEY: In my opinion, if that aircraft impacted the water, no. Once the aircraft impacts the water in these situations, the aircraft breaks apart. So there's --

KAYE: Yes.

SCHOLLEY: -- just not a chance of that happening.

KAYE: We have seen that before, certainly, with the Swiss Air flight many years ago. Andrew, what about the protocols in this case? I mean, do you get the sense that this whole operation, is sort of I don't know, being put together by piecemeal? I mean, were there any protocols in place for how to deal with an emergency like this?

ANDREW THOMAS, EDITOR-IN-CHIEF, "THE JOURNAL OF TRANSPORTATION SECURITY": Well, there are, but we need to remember the scope of the system as well. In the two weeks since that flight went missing, there's been 650,000 commercial flights that have taken off and landed and delivered 50 million passengers around the world to their final destination. And these are anomalies. The fact that this plane itself has gone missing and we're talking about it at great length speaks, I think, to the fact that the system operates 24/7/365 with near perfection.

And, therefore, we can train, we can prepare, we can deploy people in the event of an incident, but these are still very, very rare. And the confluence of events in this particular case, I think, exacerbated that anomaly event and made it even more difficult to try to locate this. But in the end, you know, we're still talking about a system that safely moves well over a billion passengers a year and has about 50,000 successful takeoff and landings every day. It's hard to prepare for the inevitable, in particular when the inevitable is something that doesn't occur that often, thankfully.

KAYE: Absolutely, all right, thank you very much, Tom Fuentes, Andrew Thomas, and Bobbie Scholley.

Ahead, more coverage on the search for Flight 370. And next, several Ukrainian troops in Crimea are under pressure to surrender. We'll have the latest on that crisis.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

KAYE: We'll have more on the search for Flight 370 in just a few minutes, but first, important new developments on the crisis in Ukraine. Another Ukrainian military base in Crimea has fallen to pro- Russian forces. Reuters reports the air base's commander says he will be taken away by Russians for talks. There were reports of shots fired and at least one Ukrainian is said to be injured.

So let's go to Ukraine's capital for the very latest. CNN's Ivan Watson is in Kiev keeping an eye on the developments there. Ivan, how worried is Ukraine about those Russian troops?

IVAN WATSON, CNN INTERNATIONAL CORRESPONDENT: Very much worried because there's been a pattern now of Russian military units as well as these kind of pro-Russian militias taking over Ukrainian military installations in Crimea one by one. In this case, we talked to the Ukrainian commander of this air base just about two hours ago by phone. He said that his base was surrounded by these pro-Russian militias, by the Russian military. He said he was going to try to hold back these forces using fire hoses. And he told us, quote, "We're going to keep our oath of service to the Ukraine and to the Ukrainian people."

Well, a live security camera stream within the last half hour showed what's clearly seems to be an armored personnel carrier most likely from the Russian military breaking through the gates of that air base and then moving in. And now we're getting reports that the commander has been taken into Russian custody. This is part of how Russia is using force to rest this peace of Ukrainian territory away from Ukraine, away from its military and give it back -- give it to Russia.

Over the course of this, a couple days ago, one Ukrainian officer was shot to death while on guard duty in a guard tower. The Russian military insists that in many of these cases the Ukrainian military are simply defecting over to the Russian side. But what we're hearing from the Ukrainians is a very different story, as you can see -- Randi.

KAYE: Ivan, the bases there are clearly vulnerable. Any plans at all to move the soldiers out?

WATSON: You know, the Ukrainian government has announced that its authorized its forces to fire their weapons in self-defense, but we've seen very little evidence that they're willing to use lethal force against the advancing Russian forces. Instead they've done things like used fire hoses or in one other base today, the Ukrainians used smoke bombs to try to keep the pro-Russian militias back. The Ukrainian government says it has set all shelter, residences for up to 25,000 people off the Crimean Peninsula in the event of an evacuation.

But we have not heard of a concrete plan to evacuate the Ukrainian military forces. It sounds like it's piecemeal on the ground depending on each Ukrainian commander and of course, depending on the Russian military forces, what happens as each one of these bases. And that's part of why this situation is so tense and why there are fears that there could be some kind of conflict, more loss of life.

In one other case in the last 24 hours, the only submarine in the Ukrainian Navy, it was also taken over by the Russian military after the Ukrainian commander was basically forced to surrender that. You can imagine how humiliating this is for people wearing Ukrainian uniforms.

KAYE: Certainly still a very dangerous situation there. Ivan Watson, thank you very much.

So what if someone else got into the cockpit of Flight 370. We don't know if that happened, but a hijacking is one theory. Next, the widow of a 9/11 pilot will join me with her plan to keep pilots and passengers safe.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

KAYE: A new potential clue in the search for Flight 370. Here's what we know right now. A third object has been spotted in the Southern Indian Ocean. A Chinese satellite captured images of it four days ago. It's about 74 feet by 43 feet. The object was found about 75 miles from two other floating objects spotted by a commercial satellite a week ago. But search planes didn't spot anything today other than a wooden pallet.

Crews have been looking for the first two mystery objects for three days now with no luck. But they will soon get re-enforcements. Two Chinese patrol planes are joining the search tomorrow and Japanese surveillance plane is expected to arrive a day or two later. More ships are also headed to that area.

Crews also continue searching in the northern corridor and seven countries in that area have told investigators they did not pick up any signals from the plane on their radars after it lost contact with ground control. Seem the ongoing search for flight 370 is heart breaking for families who have lost loved ones in other airline disasters and for some the idea that terrorism might be involved in any way is especially tough.

We want to be clear, we still don't know what happened here, but right now it seems like just about anything is possible and nothing is really off the table. I'm joined now by Ellen Saracini, her husband, Victor, was killed on 9/11. He was the pilot of the United Airlines flight that crashed into the World Trade Center south tower. She has pushed for better security for cockpits to prevent hijackings ever since.

Ellen, nice to see you. Again, I'm certainly sorry it's under these circumstances, but I know you're trying to do some important work here. Before we talk a little bit more about this, I want to show this video that you helped create to show how quickly someone can actually get into the cockpit. Watch this with me. So tell me what we were seeing there and why that is so important to you.

ELLEN SARACINI, WIDOW OF PILOT KILLED ON 9/11: It's so important because the FAA commissioned a study group to put together the knowledge of if we are vulnerable when the door opens up during flight and the results were pretty astounding. All the stakeholders were involved with this study and the results, this is a re-enactment, but the results are that cockpit can be breached in under 2 seconds using the most robust form of protection that the airlines can offer today.

KAYE: Two seconds. Given what happened on 9/11, that is just remarkable. Have you gotten any reaction to this video or has there been any word that maybe there will be better re-enforcement?

SARACINO: Not so far. That's why we're starting with legislation. We have a Senate and a House bill to make sure that this is mandated because the airlines are not moving in that direction. You know, the 9/11 commission stated a failure of imagination contributed to September 11th and today we are failing to imagine worse.

KAYE: When we're talking about this I want to be clear, we're not talking about the cockpit door. We're talking about this second re- enforcement that not all the airlines did, right?

SARACINI: Correct. United Airlines installed them on their 47s, 57s, and 777s. It's a secondary barrier. It's a lightweight gate that gets locked into place and then the cockpit door will open. And once the cockpit door closes they remove the gate. So it creates a sterile area outside of the cockpit for the pilot door to be open and shut without any problems with an intrusion. We're using flight attendants now as our forefront of the security measures with the cart. And we can't be thinking that a flight attendant with minimal training and the cart can be protecting, especially when in the study they knew the attack was going to happen and they still were not able to stop the attack and an intrusion and a breach of the cockpit in less than 2 seconds.

KAYE: So is this about money, do you think? Is this why they're taking the re-enforcements down?

SARACINI: I went to safety and security head at United Airlines and he said to me, Ellen, this is not cost, this is not weight. We're a $40 billion company. It simply has not been mandated and we're following TSA's rules which are focused on bombs on the aircraft and not a breach of the cockpit. You can compare that. The airlines pay a million dollars for their inflight entertainment system on each plane. These doors were already installed. And United Airlines paid $3500 per airplane for these secondary barriers to be put on. They work.

In the analysis over the years, secondary barriers are the only thing that can stop an intruder 100 percent of the time and they can be on 100 percent of the airplanes. All the other TSA layers that have to do with airplanes are not something that is a viable means to protect. You know, like one of their -- one of their things as passengers. I'm sure everyone when they buy a ticket they don't realize that TSA is counting on them to be in the forefront of airline security as well.

KAYE: Yes. It's always so odd to see the flight attendants there with the cart, you know, the beverage cart and you think that's going to make a big difference, but they are trained. I will give them that. Let me ask you about the families. Here we have all of these families who have no idea where their loved ones are. What are they going through?

SARACINI: Well, initially it was shock. And so you can handle just sitting there and waiting for people to come and tell you something because you don't know where to go. You don't know what to do. But time has passed and too much time for these poor families. My heart goes out to them. They're sitting there now in limbo. They can't give up hope that their loved ones are alive, but they have to face realities and it's a very difficult decision to make. You can't give up on anyone who is still alive because we have no proof that they aren't.

Continuing on this many days is just -- there's just so much anxiety I'm sure for them, so much fear, and just really a turmoil that they can't get out of. You know, they're kind of stuck in groundhog day because every day is the same day for them. It's just sheer terror.

KAYE: You can see the terror and the pain on their faces. It's just so hard, I'm sure. Ellen Saracini, thank you for your insight and your time.

More of our coverage on the search for Flight 370 right after this. (COMMERCIAL BREAK)

KAYE: Welcome back. The disappearance of Malaysia Airlines Flight 370 is one of the biggest aviation mysteries of our time and for 15 days now the world has been captivated by headlines offering new clues or theories. CNN's Nick Valencia joins me from Atlanta with more on the world's fascination with this story. Hi there, Nick.

NICK VALENCIA, CNN CORRESPONDENT: Randi, good to see you. This story has captured the attention of millions worldwide. The interest is high in the United States, but also in countries like France and China that had many passengers on the still missing plane.

(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)

VALENCIA (voice-over): From the human drama.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: On our broadcast tonight --

VALENCIA: To the incredible mystery.

UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: A frightening new conspiracy theory emerging about the plane that vanished into thin air.

VALENCIA: To the intense speculations that has fuelled theory after theory, the story of missing Malaysia Airlines Flight 307, which vanished more than two weeks ago, has led to non-stop coverage in the media worldwide. CNN's senior media correspondent, Brian Stelter says the event is unprecedented and unlike any plane story the world has ever seen.

BRIAN STELTER, CNN SENIOR MEDIA CORRESPONDENT: This story is one of a kind because it gets bigger every day, by virtue of the fact that the plane still hasn't been found. It becomes a bigger mystery as it goes.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: (Inaudible).

THOMAS MISRACHI, BFM-TV ANCHOR: The mysteries behind that disappearance are so mind boggle that no matter what your nationality everybody is interested in what happened to that plane.

VALENCIA: With four missing French passengers on board MH-370, the story has been front page news in France says French anchor, Thomas Misrachi. The interest undoubtedly fuelled by the parallels to the disappearance of Air France Flight 447 that crashed off the coast of Brazil on its way to Paris nearly five years ago. Also some debris from that flight was spotted early on in the search, it took almost two years to recover the voice and flight data recorders.

MISRACHI: Obviously for any news organization it's a big problem to talk about the story with so little information.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: We begin with the latest on the search for the missing Malaysian airlines flight --

VALENCIA: With 153 Chinese nationals on board the lack of information has been especially difficult for CNN China affiliate, CCTV.

STELTER: The Chinese media has been intensely focused on the story and especially on the feelings and struggle of the family members.

(END VIDEOTAPE)

VALENCIA: There's been no shortage of criticism about the coverage either. Some have said that the over coverage is merely a side show to boost ratings. Others say there's too much out there with too few facts. One thing is clear there, Randi, we don't know what happened and that has really captured the attention of so many worldwide -- Randi.

KAYE: It certainly has. Nick Valencia, thank you very much.

We'll have ongoing coverage of the search for Flight 370 and the latest details of the investigation in the next hour of CNN NEWSROOM.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)