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Some Parents Say They've Received Messages; Report: Only One of 46 Lifeboats Deployed; Bluefin-21 Completes First Full Mission; Ukrainian, Russian And Western Diplomats Hold Emergency Talks In Switzerland

Aired April 17, 2014 - 10:00   ET

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

CAROL COSTELLO, CNN ANCHOR: One message from a son to his mother reads, "There are a few people in the ship. We are not dead yet, so please send along this message. Can't see a thing. It's totally dark. There are few men and women. Women are screaming." A young girl wrote to calm her father. "Dad, don't worry. I'm wearing a life vest, and I'm with other girls. We're inside the ship still in the hallway. The hallway is crowded with so many people."

Another young man on the ship wrote to his mother to say, "Mom, in case I won't get to tell you, I'm sending this. I love you." Back on land the families of the nine confirmed dead are grieving while others are struggling for answers. One mother sobbing as she recalled how she encouraged her daughter to take this trip.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

CHRISTINE KIM, MOTHER OF MISSING PASSENGER: My daughter said to me, mom, I don't want to go there because I went there again -- this time again. So I tell her I think this trip will be very great experience for you -- for your school days, so I'm very regret. I'm very regret.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

COSTELLO: Adding to the families' anguish, an unsettling report from a local news agency saying only one of the ship's 46 life boats have been deployed. These are the pictures of those life boats that are inside the capsules. They're still on the ferry. They haven't been used. This is a crucial detail that may have cost many lives.

CNN's Paula Hancocks is live in Jindo, South Korea. Hello, Paula.

PAULA HANCOCKS, CNN CORRESPONDENT: Hello, Carol. That's certainly going to be the focal point of any investigation. Why were these life boats not released? Is it that they were not able to be deployed or just that the crew chose not to? That's a crucial factor and one that many people are concerned would actually have added to the number of missing, the number of unaccounted for now 287. We are in the second night since the distress signal came from this ship.

(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)

HANCOCKS (voice-over): Beneath these frigid waters nearly 300 people, mostly teenage students and their teachers remain missing. The ship's captain with his head down telling police, I'm sorry, I'm at a loss for words. Overnight, three bodies were recovered from the sunken ferry bound for a resort island off the southwest coast of Korea. The miraculous rescue of a 6-year-old girl was caught on tape. Her parents and brother were not found.

Grief stricken family members gather at a harbor in Jindo waiting into the night desperate for any information. A mother's anguish as she recalls encouraging her daughter to take the trip.

UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: Just go. It will be a great experience for you, for your school days. So I'm very regretting -- I'm very regretting this.

HANCOCKS: Dramatic video of the first 24 hours of the frantic rescue shows passengers clinging to guardrails and being airlifted to safety. Most of the crews about what could have caused the ship to sink have come from eyewitnesses who report hearing a loud bang and feeling the ship beginning to tilt.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: It sounds like he hit a submerged object, which caused a gash in the hull which would allow a lot of water.

HANCOCKS: If that's the case the gash apparently was large enough to impact several compartments below and ultimately capsize the ship. Also in question, the handling of the evacuation. According to passengers they were initially told to stay on board. This cellphone video thought to be from inside the ship shows passengers all wearing life jackets.

Outside the ship, only one of 46 life boats deployed. These instructions heard from the crew saying, do not move. If you move, it's more dangerous. Do not move. Could have cost many lives. One of the ways relatives found out about their loved ones was through text messages.

There are a few people in the ship and we are not dead yet so please send along this message. Another student texted his friends. I think we are all going to die. If I did anything wrong to you, please forgive me. I love you all.

(END VIDEOTAPE)

HANCOCKS: Now, the weather conditions have not been kind to this search and rescue operation this Thursday. The divers have been trying to get in at least six times, we understand, to the cabins in the submerged part of the ship, but they failed up until this point because the end of the water currents are just too strong. It's very dangerous work for these divers.

We understand at this point the visibility is very slight. The hope is, of course, that that -- the weather conditions will improve, but of course, we are in the middle of the night, and now making it even more difficult to try to find survivors -- Carol.

COSTELLO: So hundreds of people are still missing. The captain did manage to survive, though. Only one life boat was deployed. Do we know how the captain managed to stay alive?

HANCOCKS: Well, of course, this is the question everybody is asking. How did the captain get off the ship, and yet, 287 people -- other people may not have got off the ship. They are still missing. Now, he is in custody. We know that he is being questioned. Understandably why police at this point all he has said is I am sorry. There are no words.

He was questioned by many of the reporters as he was at the police station. They were asking him many questions. How did you get off the ship? Were you one of the first off the ship? What happened? Were you actually driving the ship? None of these questions did he react to. All he would say is I'm sorry, there are no words.

COSTELLO: Do we know who was in charge of advising these students how to safely get off that ship?

HANCOCKS: Well, the information we have on this is from eye witnesses so from some of the survivors that have got off themselves. One student has been saying to local media that they basically heard the P.A. announcement saying do not move. It is more dangerous if you move. Do not move. So many people, even though they may have drawn large jackets stayed where they were. Did not go up to the desk and according to the eyewitness reports.

Now, this person that did manage to survive said that he disobeyed that order and jumped into the icy waters. He was then pulled back by one of the nearby vessels that was trying to pull people out of the water. Unfortunately, this is a situation where it could have been the case, but very bad information, very bad advice was given. That is being investigated at this point as well.

We know that the head of the shipping company itself is trying to find out exactly who was giving this order to not move because, of course, this ship went down in about two hours. There would potentially have been time for more people to get to the deck than to get into the water -- Carol.

COSTELLO: So now they have this plan to pump oxygen into the ship somehow. How exactly will that work?

HANCOCKS: They're not giving us many technical details on this. It's something that I can't answer very clearly. We've heard from the maritime police in their briefing that they were planning to pump oxygen into the ship. The thinking behind this was that there were still air pockets, then this would give any potential survivors more chance to keep breathing and to survive. They said there would be a assumption that there are still survivors.

The maritime police were actually questioned about this and drawn on it, and it seemed to appear that they said they haven't actually done it yet because they couldn't get the oxygen in. The divers are unable to access these cabins, so it was not possible to do that. It is a plan that they have. They're not being very clear about how exactly that would happen at this point, though -- Carol. COSTELLO: Paula Hancocks reporting Live from South Korea this morning. For the families and passengers aboard Malaysia Airlines Flight 370, it's been 41 days of anguish and still no answers. Today the Malaysian government announcing they will soon send a delegation to Beijing to brief the families on the search. The relatives have taken their fight to get more information online, posting a list of 26 questions for officials on everything from the black boxes to the air traffic control recording from the night the plane went missing.

Also this morning, we've learned that an oil sample from the Indian Ocean is not from an aircraft engine or hydraulic fuel. Early tests ruling out that possibility. And with no debris found or electronic pulse detected in a week, the data from that Bluefin-21 submarine becomes even more critical. The unmanned submersible finally completing its first full mission today.

Still, authorities caution there is a long way to go. Australia's top air accident investigator now saying the cost of a prolonged search could reach a quarter of a billion dollars if more private equipment is needed. Miguel Marquez joins us from Perth with the latest. Good morning, Miguel.

MIGUEL MARQUEZ, CNN CORRESPONDENT: Good morning there, Carol. Those discussions will be happening between all of the countries involved in order to pay for this. There is no indication that any country wants to give up this search. In fact, they are doubling down on it. The Bluefin going down, we believe, for its fourth dive now to search for another 16 hours and then do another data dump. All of those resources are still up on the ocean.

The ships on the surface of the ocean responding to what the Poseidon see from the air and the P-3s what they see from the air. Those ships can be directed to anything they see on the ocean surface. A very big blow to the families that the oil was found not to be that of an aircraft because they are hoping for any sort of physical evidence.

Although officials here still say that those pings that they got off the flight data recorders are the best information that that flight is down there and they say that they will continue to search that very specific area that they have right now until they can rule it out. They'll find another one if they do that and they'll continue the search -- Carol.

COSTELLO: All right, Miguel Marquez reporting live for us from Perth, Australia. I want to talk more about the cost of that search because that amount of money was mind-boggling. Brian Todd is live in Washington with that part of the story. Good morning, Brian.

BRIAN TODD, CNN CORRESPONDENT: Good morning, Carol. You were mentioning Australia's top air accident investigator, Martin Dolan. He said a prolonged undersea search and salvage mission using privately owned equipment could cost up to $234 million. I just spoke to one of our experts, Rob McCallum, an ocean search specialist. He does not believe that it would cost that much, but this gentleman in Australia, Mr. Dolan, one of the search investigators, said this was maybe a ballpark rough estimate. It's hard to really imagine exactly how much the costs are going to be when all is said and done, but investigators do seem to be at a point where they may be taking stock of where they are right now. Malaysia's transportation minister said if the search in the Indian Ocean doesn't find debris from the plane, quote, "There will come a time when we need to regroup and reconsider," but then he said the search will always continue.

Now meanwhile, we do have some new information on the cost of this particular phase of the search. Getting this from sources close to the operation. An official with naval sea systems command says the U.S. Navy has budgeted about $3.6 million just for its portion of this particular operation of the "Ocean Shield." Now, that $3.6 million covers the deployment of the Bluefin, of the towed pinger locator, which found those underwater signals more than a week ago.

It also covers the cost for ten operators on board the "Ocean Shield" and transportation to the region and back to the United States for those personnel and presumably for the equipment. Again, that is just the U.S. Navy's budget for this particular phase of the operation including the Bluefin and the towed pinger locator. It does not include the cost being footed by the Australian government for the "Ocean Shield" and all of that related equipment -- Carol.

COSTELLO: All right, Brian Todd reporting live from Washington. Thank you.

Still to come on the NEWSROOM, calming the crisis in Ukraine. Secretary of State John Kerry and his counterparts trying to do just that. Actually, we're waiting for John Kerry to start speaking from Geneva. Reza Sayah is there. We'll talk about it all next.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

COSTELLO: The situation in Ukraine is increasingly tense. For the first time Ukrainian troops killed pro-Russian protesters after they attacked a Ukrainian military base in the eastern part of the country. The fear here this more intense violence could invite Russian troops to invade Ukraine and annex Eastern Ukraine just like Russia annexed Crimea.

This morning, President Vladimir Putin held a marathon news conference that was a call-in session this morning. He dismiss the allegations that Russian operatives were deliberately destabilizing Ukraine and urged the United States to obey international law.

With me now Reza Sayah. He is in Geneva covering the latest diplomatic meeting between Secretary of State Kerry and his Russian, Ukrainian, European counterparts. Reza, did anything come out of these talks?

REZA SAYAH, CNN CORRESPONDENT: It's not clear yet because the talks are continuing. We can tell you, Carol, coming into these talks there wasn't much intrigue and drama because expectations were very low, but now we do have a little bit of intrigue because these talks are lasting much longer than we expected. We were told that these talks would end about 1:45 p.m. local time. It's now a little after 4:00 p.m. local time, and these closed-door meetings with all four sides are still taking place, and we're not sure why.

Are these four sides taking longer in an effort to hammer out some sort of agreement even if it's a symbolic one in an effort to tone down some of the rhetoric and soften some of the accusations that have been flying around? It's not clear. Once these talks are over Sergei Lavrov, the Russian foreign minister is going to have a news conference followed by a joint news conference by Catherine Ashton, the E.U. foreign policy chief and U.S. Secretary of State John Kerry for Washington.

So much at stake. This is not just about Ukraine. It's about U.S.- Russia relations. These are some big powers in the U.N. Security Council. If relations sour, they can certainly make life difficult for one another moving forward, and, of course, Carol, the Obama administration under intense pressure to make the right decisions in this crisis. We'll see what happens in these news conferences and what the outcome is of these talks.

COSTELLO: All right, we'll check back. Reza Sayah in Geneva, Switzerland this morning.

Joining me now, Leon Aron, he is the director of Russian Studies at the American Enterprise Institute and the author of "Roads to the Temple, Truth, Memory, Ideas and Ideals in the Making of the Russian Revolution, 1987 to 1991." Welcome, sir.

LEON ARON, AMERICAN ENTERPRISE INSTITUTE: Pleasure.

COSTELLO: OK, so Putin held this televised question and answer session for four hours, an epic session. Listen to a bit of what he had to say.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

PRESIDENT VLADIMIR PUTIN, RUSSIA (through translator): I can remind you that Russia's Federation Council granted the president the right to use armed forces in Ukraine. I very much hope that I will not have to use that right and we will be able to solve all current learning issues in Ukraine by political and diplomatic means.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

COSTELLO: Last hour I spoke with Senator Chris Murphy. He says Putin is simply lying, that Putin has already made up his mind to invade Eastern Ukraine. Is he right?

ARON: I think Putin's plan is this. You know when they annexed Crimea, they were talking about the Kosovo president, where the Kosovo Albanians with the assistance of the west declared eventually after a referendum declared their independence. What I think he is trying to do here is to use what they call the Libya precedent.

In other words, to force the hand of the Ukrainian authority. They have unfortunately done it. There were several people killed already. The pro-Russian militants to start shooting at these Special Forces and pro-Russian militants that are occupying half a dozen of Ukrainian towns and cities, and then say, look, the west intervened in Libya to protect the civilians. It's our right to intervene in eastern and Southern Ukraine to protect everybody, but particularly the Russian speakers and ethnic Russians.

That's why I think these negotiations are not going to lead to anything at least at this point unless Putin decides that he has done enough and he has enough of the leverage now to demand so-called federalization of Ukraine, which in effect makes eastern and southern provinces of Ukraine the Russian protector.

COSTELLO: Senator Murphy also said this. He said Putin has become unhinged. Listen to this.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

SENATOR CHRISTOPHER MURPHY (D), CONNECTICUT: I think he is living in just a different reality than the rest of us here. I mean, there are enormous consequences that are going to come to Russia because of this action, and he doesn't see that. There's going to be enormous pain to his people, and there is a solution.

I think the people of Eastern Ukraine have awe legitimate right to more self-governance, and we could have a dialogue with Russia about that, but they seem so intent and he seems so intent on essentially re-establishing the old Soviet Union that he is not willing to engage in real diplomacy. This is a guy that's impossible to talk to. He is lying to us on a regular basis.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

COSTELLO: So do you agree? I mean, is that what Putin has on his mind, to restore the glory of the former Soviet Union?

ARON: Not 100 percent. What he wants to do is he wants to have a veto power over foreign policy and domestic arrangements of the largest post-Soviet states. Ukraine being so close to Russia geographically, physically, historically, ethnically, he cannot let it go in the western direction, and so this is what it's all about. Whether Putin will annex actually eastern, central, and southern Ukraine, I doubt. This is too much responsibility. Ten million people. Huge territory.

But he can certainly make it almost separate from Ukraine, and then continue to destabilize, punish, humiliate, and the current pro- western government of Ukraine with the hope that there will be a crisis and chaos and eventually will return to Russia's influence.

COSTELLO: Going back to this unhinged and Putin is lying and we can't talk to him. It's frightening because Russia is a nuclear power, right? To call the leader of a country like Russia unhinged, is he unhinged?

ARON: No, I don't think he's unhinged. Remember, he was an undercover KGB operative. He could pursue several persona, public persona at once. Certainly in his Seminole March 18 speech to the joint session of the Russian parliament, he did sound totally wild. I mean, he was alleging that the west has always conspired against Russia. He used the term forced sexual intercourse to describe the U.S. policy towards financial institutions and the world corps and the world community.

This level of vulgarity and frenzy I have not heard even when I lived in the Soviet Union. So I think he is projecting this image of a man who is deeply hurt by alleged Russian victimization by the west and would better be careful, we better be nice, we better bend over backwards. I think he is also open to very rational thinking provided that he sees costs to his policy. So far I don't think he sees any.

COSTELLO: Leon Aron, fascinating discussion. Thank you so much for your insight this morning. We appreciate it.

ARON: Thank you.

COSTELLO: Still to come in the NEWSROOM, ever wondered what it is like to dip below the ocean's surface in a submarine? It's quite difficult. Claustrophobic even. Martin Savidge will actually -- he is down there right now. Hi, Martin.

MARTIN SAVIDGE, CNN CORRESPONDENT: Hi, Carol. I got to say, you know, as much as there may be a bit of claustrophobia. The challenge of retrieving any black box from this airplane, very difficult. We'll show you some of the problems next.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

COSTELLO: Good morning. I'm Carol Costello. Thank you so much for joining me. Today in the Indian Ocean, the Bluefin-21 finally completed its first full mission. Nothing found yet, but if that unmanned submersible was unable to find any traces of the missing plane, an alternative could be a manned vehicle. CNN's Martin Savidge joins me now from Vancouver where he has dipped below the ocean's surface to show the challenges even these vehicles could face. Good morning, Martin.

SAVIDGE: Good morning, Carol. I'll start off by telling you the vehicle that we are in, which is the Aquarius is only designed to go to a depth of about maybe 1,000 feet. This is not the vehicle that would be tasked with retrieving things at the bottom of the Indian Ocean where 380 -- MH370 is. It gives you a very good idea, though, of the conditions they're up against.

Phil Nuytton is the man who is joining me here. We're right now working through a problem. Problems are things that can exist when you are working in a submersible at depth. Right now the issue we've got here is, what, the arm sort of --

PHIL NUYTTON, SUBMERSIBLE CAPTAIN: The arm is -- we've just been maybe over taxing it in the last little while, and it's being a bit cranky at the moment. We need to get it clear and check it out and make sure that all the functions are working the way it is supposed to be working. SAVIDGE: This requires a lot of sort of many people communicating. We have a pilot that navigates in the back. You have Phil up front who is manipulating with the mechanical arm. You have the ocean conditions out here. Take a look. We're looking out there glass. This always worries me. What if the -- how thick is this glass?

NUYTTON: It's about this thick. Three inches thick.

SAVIDGE: It's a good three inches. It gives you a fantastic, you know, sort of panoramic view, and if you ever get any sense of claustrophobia, it's great to have a look. What are the lights that are illuminating? We should point out it would be dog gone dark without them, right?

NUYTTON: We have an array of lights here, 200-watt HMI lights and 600-watt HMI lights. These are the same lights that are used in Hollywood to light up the set so they are very, very bright.