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Improving Airline Security; Salvaging Wreckage From Ocean Floor

Aired April 02, 2014 - 15:00   ET

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

(JOINED IN PROGRESS)

BARACK OBAMA, PRESIDENT OF THE UNITED STATES OF AMERICA: That's a lot of people. That's enough to fill up the big house 65 times. That doesn't count more than three million young people who have been able to stay on their parents' plans. So we have seniors who graduate and it may take a couple of months to find a job and doing an internship or something that does not provide health care, you are going to be covered until you get that job that actually provides health insurance.

So, it provides you the kind of protection you need.

(CHEERING AND APPLAUSE)

OBAMA: So, that's the good news.

We have fought back from the worst economic crisis in our lifetimes. We have laid the foundation for America's future growth. But here's the problem. There has been a long-term trend that has really been hitting middle-class folks and folks trying to get into the middle class.

And that has been going on since before most of you were born. The economy increasingly has folks at the top doing really well, but then middle-class families, people who are struggling to get into the middle class, they are working harder, but their wages, their incomes are not going up.

And we are a better country than that. In America, we do not believe in opportunity just for the few. We believe that everybody should have a chance at success, everybody.

(CHEERING AND APPLAUSE)

BRIANNA KEILAR, CNN ANCHOR: All right, President Obama there in Ann Arbor, Michigan.

The point of his appearance there today is to push Congress to increase the federal minimum wage. But you heard him talking about Obamacare as the White House announcing yesterday that the Health and Human Services Department had surpassed seven million sign ups in the six-month enrollment for Obamacare.

We will continue obviously to listen to what President Obama says, but meantime we want to get now back to our special live coverage, our other big story.

And we have some new information on the search for Malaysia Air Flight 370. The U.S. pinger locator is just hours away from reaching its destination, a search zone that has actually just moved again. But unlike last time, this is not because of inaccurate data analysis. This is because they say this area has already been scoured, that it has been scoured to the point of no new objects being sighted.

And with no sign of the plane there, searchers are turning their focus to an adjacent area to the east of this. Is this move premature, though? And as for the investigation, we now have confirmation that all 227 passengers have been cleared of any role in the plane's disappearance.

Malaysia's police inspector general admitting that this has been deemed a criminal investigation and that that actually happened since March 16, the same day that Malaysia realized that the plane had been deliberately flown off course.

The investigation into the passengers has focused on four specific areas, hijacking, sabotage, as well as personal issues and psychological issues.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

KHALID ABU BAKAR, INSPECTOR GENERAL, ROYAL MALAYSIAN POLICE: It is a criminal investigation. That's why I'm not able to share with you. Actually, we have -- only the passengers has been cleared, the rest, no.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

KEILAR: And by the rest, he means the flight crew. The criminal investigation into them still continues.

Malaysia Airlines wants to make sure that this never happens again, so it's beefing up security in planes' cockpits, two sources telling CNN the measures include a rule saying that no pilot or first officer is allowed to sit alone in the cockpit. And if one or the other leaves, a senior crew steward must be inside the cockpit until the pilot or the first officer returns.

There is another suggestion to improve airline line safety and that is cockpit cameras. Could they make a difference in future incidents?

Our Stephanie Elam joining me now from Los Angeles with more on that angle.

Stephanie, what is the answer? Could they make a difference?

STEPHANIE ELAM, CNN CORRESPONDENT: Well, that's just the topic that everyone has been talking about lately, Brianna, when it comes to airplane safety, but I have to point out that this is not a new suggestion. This has been around for a while.

You can go back to the year 2000, when the National Transportation Safety Board made this recommendation, saying that, look, we should start putting cameras inside the cockpit so we can see exactly what's going there. The cameras would be behind the pilots' heads and show what they are doing, so that in the event that there is a tragic accident, when they do get the flight data recorders, that they would be able to see what happened.

Well, here's the thing. Obviously, this would not help with the Malaysia flight, because we still haven't found those black boxes. But I did talk to Jim Hall. And he was the chairman of the NTSB in 2000, when this recommendation was made. He says that he knows that pilots are against having these cameras in there. But he said the same pushback happened when the cockpit recorders were installed on planes and he said the safety of the overall flying passengers is more important. Take a listen.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

JIM HALL, FORMER CHAIRMAN, NATIONAL TRANSPORTATION SAFETY BOARD: They have demonstrated, along with the flight data recorder, that when effectively and appropriately used, we have been able to drive the accident rate in commercial aviation down to almost zero.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

ELAM: Now, pilots say that there is so much tracking of all of the data coming off the planes, what the hydraulics were doing, what the plane was doing, the altitude. There is so much information that is already tracked that adding cameras would be unnecessary and that it would violate their privacy in that cockpit.

This debate will continue on, but it has come up again because of what has happened with the Malaysia Airlines flight. Brianna, when you take a look at other disasters and when you take a look at 9/11, there were changes that were made, but they took many years for us to see them, like those reinforced cockpit doors.

Any changes that may happen from this, it will be a long time before we see them.

KEILAR: Yes. It takes time to certainly weigh the benefits as well. Stephanie Elam, thank you so much. Stephanie will have a full report tonight on "THE DON LEMON SHOW" at 10:00 Eastern right here on CNN.

Now joining us from Atlanta, aviation safety specialist John Ransom. He is a retired airline pilot. And here with here me in New York, Justin Green, aviation attorney and former military pilot.

So, Justin, really just to start with you, what are the practical implications of what we are hearing Malaysia Air talking about, the changes that they want to make where there really has to be two sets of eyes at all times in the cockpit?

JUSTIN GREEN, AVIATION ATTORNEY: Well, it's obviously a very good idea, because the idea is that you may have one pilot who wants to kill himself and murder the people on board the airplane, but he is not going to be -- he or she is not going to be able to do it when the other pilot is there ready to stop him.

The idea of not having one pilot alone in the cockpit is a good idea, but that doesn't mean at all that that's what happened. I think there have only been three incidents that have really kind of proven where that did happen. The cockpit -- pilot suicide, pilot murder of a flight crew is very, very rare.

I think it's a great idea.

KEILAR: We do know in other instances that it may have really prevented this from happening, although we don't know this is what happened certainly with Flight 370, but in other instances.

GREEN: Right. No, and one of the best things that you out of any crash investigation, whether it actually caused the crash if you identify a safety risk, you change it, so it prevents the next crash. Even if the pilot is innocent, both pilots are innocent, down the road this may pay safety dividends.

KEILAR: You see that certainly with all kinds of public safety debates.

To you, John, when we talk about the cockpit, does that include the space below, for example, where the ACARS system is located?

JOHN RANSOM, SAFETY OPERATING SYSTEMS: Hi there. Actually, no.

The cockpit is generally considered just to be the area that is above the deck. The engineering and electronics compartment, as it's called, when people call it the E&E compartment, or the lower 41, so- called because the nose section and manufacturing parlance is known as the 41 section, it's something the pilots generally never go down and look at.

They know it's down there. They know how to get to it. They know that there's a lot of electronics and maybe batteries and oxygen bottles and things down there, but they hardly ever get down there.

KEILAR: You think, as we heard Justin say, this is a good idea to have a sort of buddy system in a way?

RANSOM: It certainly will keep the security level a bit higher than leaving an individual by him or herself up in the cockpit with the ability to do anything they would like without any oversight.

KEILAR: Justin, something that I think may stick out to people is, you are hearing that Malaysia now saying since March 16, they have been considering this to be a criminal investigation. That was several days after the plane went missing.

What really -- what happened and also why do you think we are finding out about this now and is it just that the plane was turned to the left and they think that in itself makes this a criminal investigation?

GREEN: Well, I just think in today's day and age, there's a reasonable assumption to start a criminal investigation after an event like this.

If you remember, TWA 800 was a midair explosion. There was a major criminal investigation after that. They pulled the entire wreckage piece by piece out of the ocean and put it back to rule out the missile strike or some sort of bomb that might have been on board.

It doesn't surprise me that they did a criminal investigation. I think it's a responsible thing to do. I think it is being misinterpreted by some in the media, saying that they're saying that it was a criminal act. I don't think that's what they are saying and I think that they approached it as if it was.

And now they are saying -- at least the crew -- I'm sorry -- at least passengers, they are ruling out.

KEILAR: They are ruling out.

GREEN: Right.

KEILAR: And to that point, John, when you look at the timing of this, as we just heard Justin say, this allows investigators to kind of keep all possibilities on the table, but March 16, was that in your opinion late to the game to decide this could be a criminal situation?

RANSOM: Not really.

The issue becomes eliminating things that it could be. And early on, they could tell right away that they could not eliminate the crew. It sounds like now they are to the point where they have been able to eliminate the passengers.

So, it becomes a process of total elimination. It's hard for many, I would say most, to envision a mechanical or outside force that caused the airplane to do what it did. So, the result is, it boils down to at least one or maybe both crew members being involved.

KEILAR: Yes. And we will certainly be waiting to see what comes of that part of the investigation. John Ransom, thanks so much for being with us. Justin Green, thank you so much.

GREEN: Thank you, Brianna.

KEILAR: Now, next, moving to the search area, ships and planes looking for the missing flight are focusing on a different area of the Indian Ocean. What caused this shift and is the change too soon? We are live from Perth next.

Plus, we are taking you beneath the ocean surface. This is actual video of a U.S. Navy salvage team gathering pieces of TWA Flight 800. You just heard us talking about it. It crashed in 1996. We will show you the tedious and difficult task of salvaging wreckage of a plane on the ocean floor.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

KEILAR: I'm Brianna Keilar. Welcome back to CNN's special live coverage, the search for MH370 entering a new turn here. For the second time, authorities have shifted the search area to the east, closer to Australia. And here's the reason.

According to the Joint Agency Coordination Center, the group in charge -- quote -- "The area searched between March 28 and April 1 has been searched to the point where few new objects were being sighted. The search area for today, April 2, including adjoining water which had not previously been searched."

Let's go now to CNN's Will Ripley. He is in Perth, Australia.

So, Will, when you look at them searching the shift zone closer to land, does that make things easier for these search teams?

WILL RIPLEY, CNN CORRESPONDENT: Yes, in a sense, it does, because obviously now because we are now less than 1,000 miles away from the coast of Western Australia, it will take less time for the planes to flight out there each day.

We know the Ocean Shield is now due to arrive in the new search zone a bit earlier, possibly within the next few hours, later on this morning, Thursday morning here in Perth. And so, yes, in that respect, it does make it easier.

But the reality is, they have searched the old search area, as you mentioned, no new objects. There's the possibility they have spotted some new objects in this new area. But this is basically -- they are now going to have to start searching around the perimeter, because all of the data analysis still seems to indicate that the plane is somewhere in this zone. They just don't know where yet.

KEILAR: And what is the plan for tomorrow? It's really dawn breaking there in Australia here in just a few hours.

RIPLEY: Yes.

Well, we know that the Malaysian prime minister, Najib Razak, at his hotel right now, he is resting up, and he will be at Pearce Air Base later on this morning. He's going to be meeting with the people here who are coordinating this effort. And then later on in the day, he will be meeting with the Australia prime minister, Tony Abbott.

This is an important meeting because this is the first time that these two prime ministers will be face-to-face since the search operation has really begun, spearheaded by Australia. And so it will be a chance for the two prime ministers to coordinate, to talk about what's going to happen if and when debris is found, because Malaysia will have the final call on what happens to that debris once it's collected and brought back here to Australia.

KEILAR: All right, Will Ripley, thanks for the latest from Australia.

Now, next, Malaysia Airlines announcing new rules to keep the cockpit secure. We are taking you inside a flight simulator to show you how those changes will impact the pilot and co-pilot. Will it really keep future flights safe?

Plus, how do you salvage wreckage from an ocean floor? It can be done, but, as you can imagine, it's not easy. A former U.S. Navy diver is live to explain the long and tedious process of bringing pieces of debris to the surface.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

KEILAR: New rules issued by Malaysia Airlines prohibit pilots from being alone in the cockpit. Should one pilot need to exit, a senior cabin steward would have to come in to be with the other pilot.

Now, presumably, that would prevent a single rogue pilot from jeopardizing the plane and the lives of those on board.

Let's walk through this with Martin Savidge. He's in a 777 simulator outside of Toronto.

Martin, it seems kind of easy enough. Right? We use the buddy system for a lot of things. But might this cause some problems for pilots?

MARTIN SAVIDGE, CNN CORRESPONDENT: Well, first of all, we should point out that Malaysia Airlines is rather behind the curve on this. A lot of domestic U.S. airlines, a lot of international airlines have been practicing this for some time. The fact that they're just implementing it is obviously in light of what happened with Flight 370.

But pilot Mitchell Casado knows what the regimen is like.

You change out a pilot, somebody needs to use the restroom, how does it work?

MITCHELL CASADO, PILOT TRAINER: It's very simple.

We call the in charge to let them know. Everything is about communication in the cockpit. And she comes up or he comes up, whoever is the in charge, and sits down with the other pilot.

(CROSSTALK)

SAVIDGE: From there, they just keep an eye on them.

CASADO: Basically, yes. It's just a procedure to make sure that -- it's all for safety.

SAVIDGE: Right.

And it doesn't necessarily have to be because you don't trust the pilot or co-pilot. It could also to make sure that they don't suffer some sort of illness while the other pilot is away and that before they can get back and get in the chair, the aircraft ends up in some kind of trouble. It's not always just keeping an eye on somebody. There a number of reasons why you would want to practice that.

Could it be problematic? Not if it is practiced and not if it is done with everyone knowing how it's handled, Brianna.

KEILAR: Yes, exactly. And you would actually imagine that an illness may happen more than something like this, which is so extremely rare.

But what about this point, Martin, rotating pilots, so that let's say you had two pilots who had nefarious intent, possibly concocted a plan together? Is there a possibility of rotating pilots, so that they wouldn't know when they would be partnered? Is that practiced already?

SAVIDGE: It is, but it's not necessarily for security reasons. They do rotate all the time.

CASADO: Yes. Every flight is different. We rotate different -- depending on who is on vacation, who is scheduled. This is just like scheduling any other job.

SAVIDGE: It's not uncommon then for a pilot and a co-pilot to sort of meet in the cockpit at that flight?

CASADO: No. We wouldn't meet in the cockpit, but you would meet in the operations center. But it's not uncommon at all. You can go in some airlines, the bigger airlines, months and in some cases years and not fly with the same person again.

SAVIDGE: So, it actually works out that they often are not together.

KEILAR: Yes. And to that point, Martin and Mitchell, how much notice does a pilot get of who they are being paired with?

CASADO: Well, you have a schedule, just like any other job. And depending on the airline, you might know a few days. You might know a month before. So, it all depends on the airline's procedures.

KEILAR: All right, Martin Savidge, thank you. And thank you to Mitchell as well. Really appreciate that.

Now, next, a salvage mission thousands of feet below the ocean's surface, that could be the case if the plane is found in the Indian Ocean -- next, a look at the robots and the other machinery that would be able to pull that debris from the ocean floor.

Plus, this of course is not the first time that a plane has simply vanished. Amelia Earhart's is probably the most famous, but there have been dozens of planes that have taken off and have never been found. Coming up, we're talking live to a man who keeps track of all of these incidents. .

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

KEILAR: We are near the bottom of the hour. I'm Brianna Keilar.

And investigators have just admitted that the disappearance of Flight 370 has been considered a criminal act since mid-March. They have just cleared every passenger on board, but they have yet to do the same for the crew members. That includes the pilots, all of this as the search zone again shifts.

The previous area is coming up empty, so the Australians leading this multinational search are switching their focus to an adjoining area, to the east, closer to land. They say that the area searched between March 28 and April 1 has been searched to the point where few new objects were being sighted.

It's now closer to Australia, as I mentioned, and America's contribution to this search is that underwater pinger locator. It is still en route and it's expected to arrive in a matter of just hours.

Now, we don't know if parts of Flight 370 may be strewn across the ocean floor. It's certainly a possibility. But we do know this. Retrieving wreckage from deep oceans can take years. It's a painstaking process.

Correspondent Randi Kaye has more on how underwater divers work to salvage plane wreckage.

(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)

RANDI KAYE, CNN CORRESPONDENT (voice-over): This is what it looks like trying to recover an airplane in the ocean. You're watching a U.S. Navy salvage team gather pieces of TWA Flight 800 which went down off New York in 1996. Here divers are maneuvering among pieces of the twisted wreckage.

CAPT. CHIP MCCORD (RET.), FORMER U.S. NAVY SUPERVISOR OF SALVAGE: The U.S. Navy actually has recovered an intact helicopter from about 17,000 feet. So they have the capability. They've done this before.

KAYE: Retired Navy Captain Chip McCord has been involved in at least 50 ocean salvage operations, including TWA 800 and Swiss Air Flight 111, which crashed in 1998 off the coast of Nova Scotia. Those were both in water much shallower than the Indian Ocean. But the Navy has remote underwater vehicles designed for deep-water salvage operations. They can go as deep as 20,000 feet, but the deeper the recovery the slower the process.

MCCORD: It takes about a -- an hour for every 1,000 feet that you need to descend. So if you're going to 11,000 feet you can count on 11 hours to get down.

KAYE: At those depths, it's pitch black. So the underwater vehicles are equipped with lights and cameras. They're also outfitted with sonar to scout for debris.