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CNN Hero Helps Animals; Malaysians Now Say Passengers Not Cleared in Criminal Investigation; Two Navy SEALs Found Dead With Heroine Aboard Ship; Viewers' Q&A; Bubba Watson Excels at Augusta Masters

Aired April 11, 2014 - 15:30   ET

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

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

DON LEMON, CNN ANCHOR: Losing your home in a fire can be devastating, of course. When firefighter Jen Leary saw people forced to abandon their animals because they didn't have a way to care for them, she came up with a solution.

That's why she's this week's CNN Hero.

(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)

JEN LEARY, FOUNDER AND PRESIDENT, RED PAW EMERGENCY RELIEF: I was a firefighter in Philly for seven years.

I would see how upset the people were about their animals. You know, where is my pet? And then, where is it going to go

These are people's children.

We have a dog displaced by a fire, a Chihuahua. I'm headed to the scene now.

We respond 24/7, 365 days a year. We do for pets what the Red Cross does for people.

So, we went into the basement, found the dog hiding behind something. Once the fire is under control, we're able to look for the animals and bring them out.

Hi. Hi, baby. Come here.

Red Paw headquarters is my house. We've helped close to a thousand animals

She's been at my house and the owner said she was pregnant.

Everything that their animal needs we'll handle for free for them. When we reunite the families, it's a good thing. It's like this void has now been filled.

My hope is that it's a fresh start, that they can move forward together. After going through such a sad thing, it's so good to have a happy ending.

(END VIDEOTAPE)

LEMON: Each week we honor a new CNN Hero. If you know someone who deserves this recognition, tell us about them at CNNHeroes.com.

It is the bottom of the hour, 32 minutes after the hour, as a matter of fact. I'm Don Lemon.

Families of Flight 370 have just learned that as far as Malaysia is concerned the 227 passengers are still suspects in its disappearance, the explosive revelation today from Malaysia's transport minister just days after the police chief said these passengers were, in fact, cleared in this criminal investigation.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

KHALID ABU BAKAR, INSPECTOR GENERAL, MALAYSIA POLICE: As we have said earlier, only the passengers have been cleared. The rest? No.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

LEMON: Let's go live now to Perth, Australia. CNN's Michael Holmes is there.

Michael, just another flip flop from the Malaysians. Do we know why Malaysia's top brass can't get their stories straight?

MICHAEL HOLMES, CNN INTERNATIONAL CORRESPONDENT: Yeah, one of the problems that happened from the start, of course, Don, is they don't talk to each other at certain levels, as well.

We saw that with the Malaysian military slow to report what they had seen on their radar in terms of the aircraft taking that turn back across its territory. They didn't tell the civilians authorities for some time.

It's kind of that silo situation. The military doesn't talk to the civilians all that much. It's not been part of, if you like, the political culture there.

That's going to change. They're going to -- already have an investigation underway that lack of communication, so I suppose that is just another indication.

And it won't make those families happy at all. They have not been happy with the way the Malaysians have handled this from the start, as opposed to a lot of people being happy with how the Australians have been handling the search so far, which has been seen as very professional and measured, Don.

LEMON: As for the search, Angus Houston says, quote, "There is no major breakthrough." The Aussie p.m. a little more confident here, Michael. HOLMES: Yeah, well, keep that in context, though, Don. The Aussie p.m. is in China and he did come out today and said that he was confident that these four pings we do know about -- there's been that fifth ping that's been discounted in the last day or so -- but saying that he's very confident that those pings did come from the black boxes.

The head of the search operation, retired Vice Air Marshal Angus Houston, he also has said that he is confident -- optimistic, was his word -- that they would find the wreckage.

What he was saying, really, is nothing much has happened in the last 24 hours or so.

As for the Aussie prime minister over there in China on this visit, here is part of what he had to say.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

TONY ABBOTT, AUSTRALIAN PRIME MINISTER: We have very much narrowed down the search area, and we are very confident that the signals that we are detecting are from the black box on MH-370.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

HOLMES: Yeah, he said that they have narrowed the search area down, as you heard, to -- his words were some kilometers, but, you know, that's a relative thing.

They're still looking in that -- even that tighter area, Don, you know, it's something like the size of a state of Vermont.

So it's still a big area that they are searching, but they continue to search. They're still towing that ping locater behind that Australia vessel, trying to get more pings. They got the four that they're pretty sure are from the black boxes.

The more they can get, the more they can triangulate, the same as you would looking for a cell phone using cell towers, and the pings being the cell towers. The more they get, they more they can narrow it down.

And they really do have to narrow it down as far as possible before they put that submersible down, because that thing goes at walking pace, and it's going to take ages to cover any sort of measure of ground.

So, they've tried to narrow that down even further before they put that underwater. Still a long way to go here, Don.

LEMON: Michael Holmes in Perth, thank you, Michael. Appreciate that.

Coming up, if the plane did indeed crash into the Indian Ocean, what would that look like after more than a month miles under the sea? What would it look like and how would that affect what investigators are looking for and where?

Plus, a mystery on the board of the Maersk Alabama. That's the ship profiled in the movie "Captain Phillips." Two Navy SEALs found dead with large amounts of heroin near their bodies, but their families say it doesn't add up.

CNN's Drew Griffin did some investigating. See what he found, next.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

LEMON: In the coming days we could find the answers to a mystery on a ship that you have seen in the movies.

The Maersk Alabama was where Somali pirates took Captain Richard Phillips hostage. The story became a movie last year. Now, the same ship is a backdrop to a case of intrigue.

When it stopped in the Seychelles, police found two former Navy SEALs dead and drugs on the scene. But an overdose? There are doubts.

Here is CNN's investigations correspondent, Drew Griffin.

(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)

DREW GRIFFIN, CNN INVESTIGATIVE CORRESPONDENT: It was late afternoon and the two former U.S. Navy SEALs hadn't been seen all day.

Onboard the Maersk Alabama, Mark Kennedy's cabin door was marked, and inside no one was responding.

Crew members decided something was wrong and called Seychelles police.

JEAN TOUSSAINT, SEYCHELLES POLICE SPOKESMAN: What police discovered in the cabin was that one of the security officers had a syringe in his hand, and the other one was on the bed, partly, head was leaned against the wall.

GRIFFIN: Two days after docking in this tropical resort off Africa's east coast, 43-year-old Mark Kennedy and 44-year-old Jeffrey Reynolds, two private security guards hired to protect a cargo ship, were dead.

The autopsy showed both died of respiratory failure, coupled with suspected heart attacks. Police have confirmed traces of heroin in the room and a needle. The investigation has found no history of drug use by either man.

It is a mystery that spans thousands of miles, back to the homes of the two former SEALs in the United States.

Jeffrey Reynolds, just weeks ago, was playing basketball with his son outside of his Southern California home. Clean cut, according to neighbors, he was a man who didn't even drink alcohol.

MONIKA CONNELLY, NEIGHBOR: Jeff was just a friendly, good-looking young man that seemed to love life.

He liked his job very much, looked forward to doing his work, and he looked forward to spending time with his family. GRIFFIN: Monika Connelly, already shocked by Reynolds' death, was even more stunned by the details that emerged, including references to drugs.

CONNELLY: I just didn't believe it.

GRIFFIN: In Baton Rouge, Louisiana, 43-year-old Mark Kennedy was so dedicated to physical fitness, friends nicknamed him "Captain America."

He served combat missions in Iraq, Afghanistan, and was a decorated war veteran.

ALAN PITARRO (PH), NEIGHBOR: He didn't look like a guy on drugs. The shape he was in, he was always running around the block. Him and his wife were both real active.

GRIFFIN: His family has told the local newspaper it has no desire to talk to anyone.

PITARRO: Just been real hard. I haven't see the family come out once since he been gone. So, it's just been a hard loss for the neighbor.

TOUSSAINT: Everyone is surprised, and so are we.

GRIFFIN: Which is why police in Seychelles are trying to retrace the men's steps on shore.

What they found through surveillance cameras, eyewitnesses and two prostitutes is painting a different picture than the clean-cut former Navy SEALs friends describe back in the States.

Police say their investigation so far has found Reynolds and Kennedy were enjoying a night out on the town, February 17th, eating in a restaurant together, hitting a casino, then at 3:00 a.m. being asked to leave a bar at closing time.

A law enforcement source confirms video images from outside show the men meeting two women, disappearing down a dark corridor. That same source described the women as prostitutes and said they took the two private security guards to a place where the men could buy heroin.

(END VIDEOTAPE)

GRIFFIN: Don, the Seychelles police are now reviewing toxicology reports that were just finished this week.

Sources tell CNN, if those reports determine either the heroin or something in that heroin caused the deaths of these two former Navy SEALs, there could be criminal prosecutions.

Police right now say that decision most likely will be made in the coming week.

Don? LEMON: All right, so criminal prosecution, are they saying, Drew -- are they considering possible criminal charge -- is there a suggestion that these two men were murdered?

GRIFFIN: Not necessarily that they were murdered. There is no indication that anybody forced the drugs upon these two men.

But if they can determine that the drugs or, more importantly, they are leaning towards something in those drugs was involved in the actual deaths of these men, it could lead to charges associated with not only delivering the drugs but potentially charges related to the murders -- the deaths, I should say -- of these two men.

We're just going to have to see how they play it out and what those toxicology reports say.

LEMON: Drew Griffin, thank you very much. We appreciate that.

Next on our special coverage of Flight 370, we're going to talk about the four different ways a plane can crash and what that says about a lack of debris.

Plus, once crews start looking for wreckage, what would it look like after being underwater for a month? Stay right here.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

LEMON: There are many ways a plane can land on water. In a crash situation, the type of landing can determine how much debris is left and where to find it.

Here to give us a closer look at what this means for Malaysia Flight 370, ocean explorer and expedition logistics specialist Christine Dennison and CNN aviation analyst Michael Kay.

OK, first, let's break down the different crash landing scenarios, for an example, a nosedive. What is -- let's start with the nosedive.

MICHAEL KAY, CNN AVIATION ANALYST: Don, I'm going to come back to you on this.

LEMON: No, no, no.

KAY: It's too simplistic. Look, we spoke the other day --

LEMON: That's why we are here, Mikey.

KAY: Let me --

LEMON: With all due respect, that's why we are here -- to break down different crash scenarios. Many people are wondering if a plane landed on the ocean, where's the debris.

So, what happens with a nosedive?

KAY: The scenarios we need to be looking at, as we spoke to Marty and Mitch --

LEMON: What happens, Mikey, with a nosedive?

KAY: -- powered on or powered off. That's the reality.

LEMON: OK, you don't want --

KAY: That's the reality.

(CROSSTALK)

KAY: And we've spoken with the guys on the simulator, the pilots would not let a scenario occur where they were just going to run out of fuel and then they make an uncontrolled approach.

LEMON: OK.

KAY: So the reality is that if they are in this part of the world that didn't have a diversion, they couldn't make land, they were going to make an approach with power on.

And I think that's important, because with power on, you can drop the flaps, the gear, and you can slow the aircraft down.

LEMON: So if the pilots are not in control of the aircraft, let's say they're incapacitated, do you know what type of landing? Could it be a nosedive landing?

KAY: It could be.

LEMON: OK, so, what happens with a nosedive landing?

KAY: Well, it's going to be a hard impact. As we've already heard, I think when we spoke to (inaudible) yesterday, the chap who did the Titanic, it's like cement. The water is like cement.

We must get away from this notion that landing on water is going to be soft and all the rest of it. It's not.

And so nosedive is just like going into the tarmac.

LEMON: So that is going to cause debris to scatter everywhere.

KAY: Extreme fragmentation.

LEMON: OK, so then if it breaks apart in midair, that's going to give you the widest area of debris, I would imagine?

KAY: Absolutely.

CHRISTINE DENNISON, EXPEDITION LOGISTICS EXPERT: Yes.

KAY: Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah.

LEMON: So what happens, breaking apart in midair -- KAY: Depending on the speed, depending on the altitude, the higher the aircraft is, the faster the aircraft is, if it's going to start fragmenting, you're obviously going to get a greater spread area of debris over the ocean.

LEMON: OK, so landing on top of the water, we're talking about the Sully Sullenberger type of landing, wreckage with -- what would that look like underwater? Because chances are in the ocean, it's so volatile, right, you're not going to have this kind of landing that we're looking at right there.

DENNISON: No.

KAY: Look, and we saw from the "Miracle on the Hudson," we've looked at this a few times, is that it's completely intact, and when it sinks, it will be pretty much intact, and that debris field will be very close.

LEMON: It seems like this is how we talk when we hang out after the show.

So what is it bound to look like on the bottom of the ocean, this debris?

DENNISON: Well, I think I'm going to have to agree with you on this. I know --

LEMON: No, I'm going to let him finish, but I wanted to go through the scenarios and then what you're saying.

But what would the debris look like in any of these types after this -- after a couple of weeks down there?

DENNISON: It could be a large debris field, depending on how this plane came down.

Either way, you're going to have -- you may have a fairly large section that fuselage that is intact lying at 15,000 feet.

You could also have very scattered debris field, depending on impact, if it broke apart.

There are parts of it -- we don't have a debris field topside, which everybody is wondering about.

LEMON: But meaning if the debris is down there, how long does it take before the silt covers it, that sort of thing, how long does it take before --

DENNISON: That would take -- at this point, it wouldn't happen in a month. You don't have any currents down there, so anything that has fallen is going to be pretty much where it lays at this point in time.

LEMON: Now, here you go, Mikey Kay. I'm doing that because we're answering viewers' questions.

But you're saying the chances are that we have to look at what the investigators are saying, so go on now.

KAY: I just think, Don, we've been doing so much analysis on this, and we go back to where the transponder was, and we have a look at the nature of the route, we kind of have an idea.

We don't anything definitely, but if there's going to be an explosion at altitude that would suggest a terrorist bomb or something like that, it's not going to happen at the physical outer limits of endurance of the airplane.

We have to listen to what evidence we've got, and at the moment, it suggests that the pings and all the other analysis, the aircraft continued to the point where, most likely, it ran out of fuel or it was at the limits of its endurance.

That's why we're in that search area, so what I want to do is talk about the possibilities of that scenario rather than covering a million different scenarios when we know we can zone in on something.

LEMON: I understand, but as I said, we're talking about viewers having questions.

KAY: I agree.

LEMON: Go ahead. What else? Anything else?

KAY: No, no, no. So, again, it just goes back to the most likely scenario would be -- and I thought this was a brilliant point brought out by Marty and Mitch, a powered-on approach.

LEMON: All right, thank you.

KAY: A pleasure.

LEMON: Thank you, Christine. Thank you, Mikey. Still friends. Thank you, sir.

Coming up, he's a man who brought you the mega-blockbuster file, "Titanic" and "The Abyss," and he knows a lot about underwater. James Cameron is sitting down with us to give us his take on the missing plane.

Make sure you stay with us.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

LEMON: Before we go, second round of The Masters and -- wow, I look like I'm out on the green. That's pretty nice. It's time to check in with champion Bubba Watson, how it's going.

It's going nuts out there, so I want to check in now with CNN's Lara Baldesarra, and she's live from Augusta.

I'm so jealous. I usually go, but I can't go because I live here in New York now. It's a big day for Bubba. LARA BALDESARRA, CNN SPORTS: Hey, and it's a big day for me being here, too. You know, I'm glad you're jealous, Don, because I'm loving it.

Yeah, it certainly is a big day for Bubba. You say that he's going nuts. I say that this guy is simply on fire, and I mean that. He had five straight birdies from 12 through 16, which is absolutely impressive.

That means two of those holes are of (inaudible) corners, 11, 12, and 13 on Augusta National, and those are the holes that in the first round and even today in the second round, have caused quite a few number of problems.

But when we talk about Bubba Watson, it's this type of play that we really expect from him. He's the best shot-shaper in world, and he's a true bomber.

He's electrifying when you watch him play with that unorthodox, self- taught style of swing that he works with.

He's also amazing out of the rough. He's excellent on the greens, and this is a guy that obviously he's won The Masters before. He was the 2012 champion, so certainly, he knows how to win The Masters.

Now, Don, there's plenty more that's going to be coming up from Augusta. We have a CNN All-Access at Augusta special which will be airing on Saturday at 2:30 p.m. Eastern. It'll be hosted by Rachel Nichols, so it's certainly something to look forward to.

LEMON: Thank you, Lara. Appreciate it.

I'm Don Lemon. Thanks for watching. "THE LEAD" with Jake Tapper is next, but first, let's go there.