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New Day Saturday

Malaysia Officials Update MH-370 Search; Argument Preceded Fort Hood Shooting; Possibility for Pingers from Flight 370 to Go Silent Soon; Interview with Desperate Mother of Pouria Nour Mohammadi; State of the Art Technology Used for Underwater Search; Professional Baseball Player's Paternity Leave Stirring Discussion of Men's Role in Family

Aired April 05, 2014 - 06:00   ET

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

CHRISTI PAUL, CO-HOST: Good morning. Christi Paul and Victor Blackwell here.

An intense search this morning as they frantically try to find Malaysian Airlines Flight 370 before the black box stops pinging. You are watching a live conference -- press conference from Malaysia right now. Let's continue to listen.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: ... four days. Individuals who have gone to meetings with the families have told us that none of the family members have been able to listen to that recording. It would seem that the family of the pilot or co-pilot, first officer, would be able to confidently identify the voice on the recording. Why have you not allowed or not been able to let the families of those two individuals listen to the recordings?

HUSSEIN: It was first a transcript of the conversation between the pilots and the tower. And I managed to convince the investigating authorities to release that.

On the audio, I've been told that there are still -- they are still investigating the audio evidence that exists. And it's still pending investigation. It cannot be released at the moment.

Is that it?

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: OK. Ladies and gentlemen, that concludes this session for today.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Thank you very much.

PAUL: OK. He just mentioned something that has been quite a question for a lot of people. Mainly the fact that there's been so much scrutiny against Malaysia authorities about how they've handled this whole situation with Malaysia Air Flight 370.

But lately, from the families, who are wondering why they will not release the transcripts -- or the audio recordings, rather, from the cockpit. They released the transcripts, but they wouldn't release the recordings.

And he is saying there now, because it's a pending investigation. They're not able to.

But it was interesting, did you notice, Victor, how he said, "I managed to convince authorities..."

VICTOR BLACKWELL, CO-HOST: Yes, I picked up on that.

PAUL: Yes. "... to release the actual transcripts." So it sounds like there might have been some dissension between these two, as he said, "I had to convince them to release that part of it."

BLACKWELL: Quite possibly. Quite possibly no coincidence there also, no coincidence that that was the end of the news conference after that question came out.

But you'll remember that it was a couple of weeks ago, when we first got news, actually, during the program, during this news conference, that the Chinese had found some image on satellite. And he held up the page, and he said, "Here it is. I've been accused of holding back information, so let me show it to you now." Again, saying that he is trying to convince -- trying to convince some of the resources there to release that information."

You know, the other news I think we got out of this was the formation three of committees to tackle the missing flight. One to deal with the families of the passengers. A second one will oversee the investigation team. The third will handle the deployment of assets. Maybe this is the evolution of the search. We're going now four weeks to the day since the disappearance back on March 8 of this flight.

It's unbelievable it's gone on this long. But are we now transitioning into a different phase of this search, and this is now the long-term search for the fight after. And the pingers are expected to -- the batteries on the flight data recorders quite possibly expected to die out in the next few hours.

PAUL: The other thing I believe we learned -- and producers, help me, you know, make sure that I'm relaying this properly -- that the flight recorders was due or to be inspected or replaced in June. But it should be working without any problems.

BLACKWELL: Yes.

PAUL: Which it should continue to ping for 30 days, and we're right at that 30-day mark here.

BLACKWELL: Yes, we're within hours here of that, I think. And guys, if you hear this, in fact, I think it's 1:30 today will be the 30-day mark from when, if this plane indeed went into water -- we have a flight data recorder here on the desk with us to give you an idea of what it looks like, the size and kind of the dimensions and what the parts we're discussing. Here it is.

This is not the exact model that was inside Malaysia Airlines Flight 370. But here on the front, this is the pinger that we've been talking about. And this, I can show you. I'll spin it around here so our camera can get it. You see that little dot in the center of the pinger? That is the center that, once it's submerged in water, the pings will start, one every second for 30 days.

And if this plane indeed was submerged in water and crashed, as the prime minister said, back on the 24th into the South Indian Ocean, that would have been the day that the ping started. And we are now 30 days from that coming up at 1:30 today.

PAUL: And let's get more from CNN's Nic Robertson. He is live in Kuala Lumpur, Malaysia, right now.

Nic, anything else stand out to you regarding this -- this news conference, and what else are you learning there today?

NIC ROBERTSON, CNN CORRESPONDENT: Yes, we have two questions of the news conference from CNN staff and really not particularly forthcoming answers from Hishammuddin, the defense minister, also acting minister of transport there.

From Jim Clancy, asked him, you know, have you been able to establish how many turns the aircraft made, were there any altitude changes, really key and important information that a lot of people are asking for. The acting transport minister really skirted around that. He said -- eventually, he said, we're able to get cooperation from all the different countries for the radar data. But he wouldn't say even how many turns the aircraft had made, how many -- or if any altitude changes.

The question there about whether or not the families of the first officer and the captain who have so far not been able to hear that voice data, been able to hear the conversation for the cockpit between the air traffic controllers which would help identify who was giving the last signoff there, "Good night, Malaysia 370." Again saying investigation, so that's why the families couldn't -- haven't been able to hear it yet. The families of the first officer and pilot.

Perhaps the key piece of information was coming from the CEO of Malaysian Airlines there, talking, as you were saying there, about the batteries in the pingers. The pingers attached to the black boxes. The concern that the batteries were due for change some time ago. He said, no, their scheduled maintenance was coming up in June this year, so really trying to lay that to rest.

Again, some inside Malaysian political issues coming up. And also talking about the Malaysia overseeing the investigation, inviting China, Australia, the United States, the United Kingdom and France and a number of other countries to be part of this investigation.

I guess another thing that stood out for me was the three ministerial committees that have been established here, all being overseen by deputy ministers, two of those deputy ministers report directly to the man you heard speaking there, Hishammuddin Hussein, the acting transport minister, the defense minister. So despite the fact he's sort of handing off these commissions they're going to direct subordinates of his, which really gives you an idea of just how much control he wants to continue to have over these unfolding events there -- Victor.

BLACKWELL: All right. Nic Robertson there for us in Kuala Lumpur. Nic, thank you very much.

PAUL: So let's talk more about this discussion with CNN aviation analyst and former inspector general with the U.S. Transportation Department, Mary Schiavo.

BLACKWELL: Also, we have Simon Boxall, an oceanographer with the National Oceanography Center. He joins us from Southampton, England.

Simon I want to start with you, four weeks into this -- this flight, I don't know. Were you able to hear what the acting transportation minister said this morning? And if so, what did you take from that news conference?

SIMON BOXALL, OCEANOGRAPHER: I did. I mean, the first thing to say is that the sort of 30-day battery life of these pingers is -- and it's been a high purpose to sort of talk about that as being just about the talk of the deadline, it took a lot longer. We know that these things can go twice the battery lengths sometimes, but also, they can go a lot shorter.

And we're assuming that the black box and pinger weren't damaged in the crash, because it's very likely that the plane would have broken up. I think it's highly unlikely that the plane would have landed whole. Bear in mind, we're searching an area greater than the great lakes of America.

PAUL: Mary, what do make of the committees they've talked about branching out? Because there's been so much criticism of how Malaysia authorities have dealt with so far? Is this say good shift to create these three committees?

MARY SCHIAVO, CNN AVIATION ANALYST: It is a good shift, and it's a pretty standard shift when the United States, or Great Britain or France countries used to doing accident investigation do that. That's what we do. We form these committees. And the committees are tasked to work on their areas, and then they report back to the investigation as a whole.

And when you have a public committee, even of these -- or public hearing, each of these committees generally reports.

So this is a very efficient way to deal with the investigation. And also a way to make sure all of these important areas get covered. I actually expect they'll form more committees as time goes on.

BLACKWELL: Simon, I want to talk about a different type of shift. The continuous shift of the search areas day to day. Do you attribute that more to either questionable analysis of the information and data? Or is this shift appropriate, considering if the plane went down in this area, the currents and the natural movement of water was shift the debris field or elements, as we see here, closer to or farther from the coast of Australia?

BOXALL: I think the key thing for us all is that the only note was the last satellite location of the plane. From there on, there's a certain amount of, I suppose, educated guesswork, as to how far it had flown from that point.

So we saw a big shift north from the last known located ping through the Inmarsat system to about 700 miles north of where they were beginning this week. With that, shifting, based on the aircraft range using fuel, which seems to be a long time to come out from the Malaysian government and from the airline itself. But that did shift did seem sensible.

Now the big question is, any search efforts how far as it gone, and moving the search area is trying to estimate how the currents would have moved the wreckage. And that's not easy, because it can be a number of directions and quite fast in the area. Large items would eventually sink, and really, begin the stage now where they can begin looking for relatively small items. That's going to become more difficult. And they're searching an area greater than the great lakes.

PAUL: Simon, I just want to ask you a question because I'm not sure I understand what you're saying, but I heard a past expert that we've had on the show say once that, based on what he knows of wreckage, within three to four weeks, some debris could be washing up on the shores of Australia. How...

BOXALL: No.

PAUL: No. OK. Go ahead.

BOXALL: Unless it takes one of the ships back or a ferry, there's no way that the currents and the winds will blow material onto the shore of western Australia.

If the plane generally went down in the original search area, it would be some years before anything washes up on any beach anywhere. It's as likely to be South America as Australia. In the new search area that picks up what we call the Western Australian current. But it's going to take a long time before anything washes up on the shore there. You know, we're talking months; we're not talking weeks.

PAUL: Thank you for the clarification.

BLACKWELL: So Mary, a Malaysian government source this week called that sharp turn that we've seen in that animation a criminal act. My question is, without any credible leads determining exactly what happened on Flight 370 or any debris field or really any narrative here, how credible is the determination that that was a criminal act?

SCHIAVO: Well, I don't think they can say that for certain at all. I think they're making their hypothesis that that was the case. And they're basing it on the assumption that the plane cannot turn without the hand of a pilot actually turning that plane.

And as we've seen over the weeks, you know, with the simulator demonstrations and through various reporting from triple-7 pilots, this plane, of course, can make the turn. You can do it in various ways, autopilot. There's an emergency descent procedure. There are many different ways. But they're -- they're announcing, they're assuming that the only way that would have happened was if human intervention had turned the plane. And that's entirely likely, too, if there was some -- you know, some kind of emergent situation on board.

But what's even more troubling is they have announced this, but they have not put forth anything that would explain that. For example, they still, as we heard in the press conference today, they will not release the audio of the air traffic control tapes which the rest of the world routinely does.

They won't release the data. They told Jim Clancy, "No, we're not going to release the Inmarsat data." And they said that all the countries they had asked had provided their radar data but then they would not list them. So whatever they're pursuing, they are going to keep a close hold on that evidence.

And I suppose the most disturbing thing was, not in this press conference but in the previous one, they talked about prosecution. Now prosecution, you cannot prosecute dead individuals; you can't send them to jail. So it was a clue that they are looking at others. But today, we didn't hear that. So apparently, that -- that particular item was not on the agenda today.

PAUL: All right. Mary Schiavo and Simon Boxall, thank you both so much for sharing your perspective.

SCHIAVO: Thank you.

BLACKWELL: Of course, we'll have much more on the search for Flight 370 in a moment.

But also just ahead, the Fort Hood shooter, he did not leave a suicide note. But now investigators are trying to find out why he went on that shooting spree and killed three soldiers.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

BLACKWELL: Seventeen after the hour. A memorial service will be held next week for the three soldiers killed at Fort Hood. On Wednesday, Specialist Ivan Lopez, he started shooting, killed Danny Thomas, Timothy Owens and Carlos Lazaney-Rodriguez before taking his own life. Sixteen others were wounded.

PAUL: Investigators say an argument preceded this shooting, and CNN's Pamela Brown is following this story for us. Good morning, Pamela.

PAMELA BROWN, CNN CORRESPONDENT: Well, Christi and Victor, military officials have confirmed that there was a verbal altercation between Lopez and another soldier in the moments right before the shooting, and officials say they believe that was the impetus that caused Lopez to snap.

Also, we're learning more about this argument from a victim's father, who says it all started over a leave request form.

(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE) BROWN (voice-over): CNN has learned before the weeks before his deadly rampage at Fort Hood, Army Specialist Ivan Lopez was creating a stockpile of ammunition.

Sources say when Lopez bought his .45 caliber semi-automatic handgun at this store, Guns Galore in Killeen, Texas, on March 1, he also purchased what one source calls a large amount of ammo. CNN has also learned the 34-year-old returned to the store repeatedly to buy even more bullets.

It's the same place where Major Nidal Hasan bought the weapon he used in the 2009 Fort Hood attack. The Army says it now thinks the shooting started as a dispute with another soldier.

LT. GEN. MARK MILLEY, COMMANDER, FORT HOOD: We believe that the immediate precipitating factor was more likely an escalating argument in his unit area.

BROWN: CNN has learned Lopez went to a base personnel building Wednesday to pick up a form to request time off. The father of Jonathan Westbrook, one of the soldiers injured in the attack, says after Lopez was told to come back on Thursday, he snapped, returning a short time later with his gun.

THEODIS WESTBROOK, FATHER OF JONATHAN WESTBROOK: The first guy he shot right in front of my son was killed. And then he turned the gun towards Jonathan, aimed it and fired.

BROWN: Investigators are still trying to piece together an exact motive of the shooting and why Lopez came on base armed. Tonight they're looking at evidence such as his gun, extra ammunition, his reported mental health issues and the medications he was prescribed, like the sedative Ambien.

On Capitol Hill, Army officials told Congress that, while Lopez, an Iraq veteran, had a spotless record, he also appeared to have an unstable psychiatric condition.

JOHN MCHUGH, ARMY SECRETARY: He was seen just last month by a psychiatrist. He was fully examined. And as of this morning, we had no indication on the record of any sign of likely violence.

BROWN: Sources tell CNN police searched the apartment where Lopez has recently moved with his wife and young daughter. But it found no evidence, such as a suicide note, to explain the shooting.

(END VIDEOTAPE)

BROWN: On Friday, Lopez's father broke his silence for the first time since the shooting. And in a statement, he says, "My son could not have been in his right mind. He wasn't like that."

Now, this is an ongoing investigation with more than 150 investigators on the case. And military officials have made it clear that we may never know for sure the exact motive that set Ivan Lopez off on Wednesday -- Victor and Christi. BLACKWELL: All right. Pamela Brown in Killeen, Texas, for us. Pamela, thank you.

PAUL: Next, we have new pictures of Flight 370 before it vanished from the sky as captured by plane enthusiasts. That's for you next.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

BLACKWELL: Well, before Flight 370 vanished from the sky, it was captured on camera. And when news of the missing plane broke, plane enthusiasts, they started checking their personal collection of photographs.

PAUL: The photo I want to show you, the most recent that they found shows Flight 370. There it is. This was on the runway in Amsterdam just last May. The photographer says he took the photo in the early morning right after sunrise.

BLACKWELL: Here's another one, a photo taken by an airline captain in Istanbul back in 2012. Now, the pilot says he loves taking pictures of the runway and regularly photographs planes taking off.

PAUL: This one here is from 2010 and shot where -- guess where? Perth, Australia, yes, which has become a hub for one of the most difficult searches in history. You can imagine people probably feel a little eerie when they go through these photos and they realize they've got one of the exact plane.

BLACKWELL: Absolutely. And a lot of spotters say that photographing or having known that they've photographed the missing plane is bittersweet, in their words. They're glad they had the chance to see the Boeing triple-7 in action, but knowing they captured some of the plane's final flights is a bit hard to digest.

PAUL: So that is the plane you're looking at right there, the very one that they are still frantically searching for right now, before the black box stops pinging, possibly within hours.

BLACKWELL: Yes.

PAUL: So obviously, we're going to have more on the, quote, "curious things," that we're now learning investigators found on a hard drive belong to Flight 370's captain.

BLACKWELL: Plus, the scary situation for a family on a sailing trip after their 1-year-old daughter gets sick on the open ocean. Up next, why the Air National Guard was forced to step in.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

PAUL: Oh, I hope Saturday is treating you well so far. Thirty minutes past the hour right now. I'm Christi Paul.

BLACKWELL: I'm Victor Blackwell. Here're five things you need to know for your new day. Up first, today's search for Malaysia Airlines Flight 370, a huge search 13 planes, at 11 ships while the submarine, the HMS Tireless is hunting under water for the plane's black boxes.

We are going to have much more on this in a moment.

PAUL: Number two, voters are heading to the polls now in Afghanistan to choose a new president. There are really brazing threats by Taliban militants who've carried out deadly attacks in recent days. A Pulitzer Prize winning German photographer for the Associated Press was shot to death Friday in eastern Afghanistan. The attack also injured a Canadian reporter an AP says an Afghan military commander shot them both and then surrendered.

BLACKWELL: Number three now, a federal judge says Ohio will have to recognize the same-sex marriages performed in other states. His comments came after final arguments in a lawsuit challenging the state same-sex marriages ban. The judge said he will issue a written decision within ten days.

PAUL: Number four, the drowsy train driver in Chicago whose train jumped the tracks out O'Hare Airport out of a job this morning. That's according to a Chicago Transit Authority spokesman. The incident happened last month when the train failed to stop at the end of the line, instead, it jumped the tracks and went up an escalator. You remember this picture. 32 people were hurt.

BLACKWELL: Number five, medics with the California Air National Guard, they've reached a toddler who fell ill during the family sailing trip off the coast of Mexico. Authorities say they launched the parachute mission after the family issued a distress call. The girl had a severe rash and infection, but reportedly, she is in stable condition.

Let's get you up now on the latest this morning in the search for Malaysia Airlines Flight 370.

PAUL: And another one's promising a lead that's now adding to the mystery of this all. A U.S. official tells CNN now the hard drives of the pilot's flight simulator turned up some, quote, "curious findings." Those "curious findings" again, a quote there from them.

BLACKWELL: Yeah, but no smoking gun, they say, and no answer about where the airliner is or where it was even headed.

PAUL: Authorities are ramping up the search. As Victor said, 11 ships, 13 planes, a British nuclear submarine, the HMS Tireless, two other ships, the HMS Echo and Ocean Shield are also involved and capable of looking under those waves.

BLACKWELL: Now, with the search for Flight 370 going under water, it's now this desperate hunt for a ping just from one of those black boxes, which could reveal the location of the boxes. And this is what it sounds like. Do you hear that? Yeah, that's what the electronic ping, it's not really audible, human ears can't pick it up. Of course thought, there's a catch to all this.

PAUL: The battery powering those pingers may have only days or hours left. And then those pingers go silent, which completely, I would think is a game-changer for this whole thing once that happens unless they can find something in the next 24 to 48 hours.

BLACKWELL: Yes.

PAUL: And joining us from London, former pilot and aviation consultant Alastair Rosenschein -- Rosenschein, rather, excuse me, thank you so much, Alastair for being with us.

BLACKWELL: Good to have you back, Alastair. So, a lot has been made of this flight simulator that the captain had in his home. So, now a senior U.S. official tells CNN, actually, our Pamela Brown, that investigators have discovered that they programmed alternate routes and searched what to do in flight emergencies, and they called that curious. Is it curious that a pilot, a captain, would do that, or is that just due diligence. You would want your pilot to do that?

ALASTAIR ROSENSCHEIN, FORMER PILOT & AVIATION CONSULTANT: I think it could be seen both ways. Certainly if a pilot has access to a simulator, he will indeed practice diversions. When you have a diversion come up, it's usually unplanned, that's because weather's changed or runway is blocked, typhoon whatever. And you have to think fairly quickly and that -- you know, as a commander of an aircraft, you'll want to be on top of those possible situations. What is interesting would be which diversions he planned. And that, of course -- they haven't told us.

PAUL: As a pilot, do you and maybe does your family expect this type of scrutiny in investigation, the scrutiny that he and his family and the co-pilot have encountered thus far?

ROSENSCHEIN: Oh, absolutely. I mean, whenever there's an accident or serious incident, the authorities, federal aviation authorities, civil aviation authority, whatever, will indeed look into a past. They'll look into whether you'd been, you know, resting properly, whether you've been drinking. Your financial affairs, just about everything. But in the event of an accident, and especially when the accident is unknown, causing the aircraft's disappeared, then the scrutiny will be of a much, much higher and deep in nature. So, yes, whether or not his family expected it, that's entirely another message. But pilots would expect that, yes.

BLACKWELL: You know, we're - Well, when I say "we," the search crews are still looking for the cockpit voice recorder. We know that the last two hours of the audio there have been some who have called for 24 hours of recordings. What do you think about that, extending it to 20 to 24 hours of the cockpit voice recordings?

ROSENSCHEIN: Well, the longest flight is probably going to be 14 hours, so the absolute top, so, it probably doesn't need to be longer than that. But I've always been in favor of a longer cockpit voice recording and I'm on record for having said so for many years now. But generally speaking, the pilots union is somewhat against it, because it means that all their conversations, and they are private conversations, could indeed be monitored by management. And that's probably the main reason why it's such a short period of time. And it used to be half an hour, they've now extended it to two hours, which is an improvement. But as you quite rightly note here and this is what I'm reading into it, is that there will be no recording, over the period -- the critical period where the aircraft turned back. And if it was an incapacitational something, we have no way of knowing. What was said or what happened on that flight -- at least audibly at that moment in time.

BLACKWELL: All right. Former pilot and aviation consultant, Alastair Rosenschein, thank you so much or being with us. We appreciate your perspective.

ROSENSCHEIN: Thank you.

BLACKWELL: Coming up on "NEW DAY," understandably, we've talked about the search and the assets. But this has been four weeks to the day of just agony for these families of the passengers and crew on Flight 370. But for one mother, waiting for answers, it's especially painful.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: I need to know what happened.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

BLACKWELL: Why the mother of one of the passengers says her son had nothing to do with the jet's disappearance?

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: I still have that slight, slight hope, you know. And sometimes, I catch myself, you know, seeing the excitement of him coming home. And I have to get rid of that out of my brain quickly because I can't let myself to go to that level of excitement because it would only -- it's only going to make me crash further when I find out the real truth, which we're all expecting more that the plane has crashed.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

PAUL: I just can't imagine what these people are going through, that's Danica Weeks there, keeping hope alive as she waits for information about her husband who is missing on Flight 370.

BLACKWELL: And there are so many families who week after week, four weeks now, are still suffering from the wait and the lack of answers.

PAUL: But, you know, there's one mother who has endured this additional layer of suffering, the suggestion that her son might have had something to do with the jet's disappearance. Well, CNN's Sara Sidner spoke exclusively with that mother.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

SARA SIDNER, CNN CORRESPONDENT: This mother is tormented by the words she saw used in conjunction with her son. Terrorism and suspect. She has asked us not to show her face for fear her family will be harassed.

UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: My son isn't a bad boy. He wanted to study. He wanted to work. And he wants to be freedom.

SIDNER: Her eldest son is Pouria Nour Mohammadi, initially suspected in the disappearance of Malaysia Airlines Flight NH-370. The Iranian teenager and his friend managed to board the flight with stolen passports. Investigators later determined they had nothing to do with the flight's disappearance.

UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: As already told, maybe they got (INAUDIBLE) an air force -- didn't give him permission to fly.

SIDNER (on camera): Where you hoping that they had caught him?

UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: Yes.

SIDNER (voice over): It turns Nour Mohammadi was trying to leave Iran quickly to be with his mother who has cancer. She needed his help. Because he's 18 years old, she couldn't bring him to Germany legally where she is awaiting refugee status along with his younger brother. So, Pouria decided the quickest way to get to his mom was to use the stolen passport.

(on camera): Did you think that you were going to die and that's why you wanted him with you and he wanted to be with you?

UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: Yes, that sickness reminds me all the time, short time. We have short time.

SIDNER (voice over): Shorter than she could ever have imagined.

UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: To lose your son is hard for every mother, but I'm here alone. Even I don't have any passport yet.

SIDNER: So she can't travel to Malaysia to be close to the investigation and information like the other families of passengers aboard NH-370. She is also still undergoing cancer treatment.

UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: These three weeks is - was more difficult than the rest of my life. I want to say that they are alive somewhere else. But I need, I need to know what happened.

SIDNER: After reading our story about her eldest son online, she decided to speak to us via Skype.

UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: This was the first time I've talked with somebody. I felt that you understand me. I felt you near me. I appreciate you. Thank you.

SIDNER: A mother with no support system at home, crushed by the burden of waiting to find out what happened to her first born son. Sara Sidner, CNN, Kuala Lumpur.

(END VIDEOTAPE)

PAUL: Our thoughts and prayers ...

BLACKWELL: Yeah.

PAUL: With all of these people.

BLACKWELL: Can you just imagine that you feel that your life is ending, and you want your child near you, and in route, he quite possibly, in this case, has lost his.

PAUL: It's unbelievable. And because of that, you know, she keeps saying I need to know what happened. Well, we have a virtual look into the state of the art technology officials are using under water this weekend to try to make that happen. Finally, hopefully finding something, anything that belongs to missing Flight 370.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

BLACKWELL: So Flight 370 disappeared on March 8th. It has been four weeks to the day since that disappearance.

PAUL: And the global hunt for clues. I mean in just one shred of physical evidence at this point is in full force this morning. Both on the surface of the Indian Ocean and deep below it.

BLACKWELL: So, CNN's Tom Foreman has more now on the state of the art technology being used in this underwater search. Tom, good morning.

TOM FOREMAN, CNN CORRESPONDENT: Hey, Victor, hey, Christi. Right now, all of the hopes of these families and these searchers are coming down to two things, an educated guess and advanced technology. The technology in the form of sonar. Let's talk about the passive sonar first. I'll bring you an example her that we could talk about. Passive sonar is this idea of the pinger listener. This device that will be towed behind the ship and taken above the ocean floor. And it's listening passively for the sound of the flight data recorders, if it gets close enough to them. It has to be within a mile of two to be able to hear them. But if it does, it can get a sense of where the plane might be. That's the first step. Very slow process. The ship's not moving fast at all.

Beyond that, though, there's the question of active sonar and that involves a robot. Essentially if we dive down below the water here, we can talk about this device that sort of looks like a torpedo. But it's put into the water and can operate for about 24 hours at a time. And it goes through the water, about half a football field off the bottom emitting sound waves that it bounces off of things and then recollects. And by doing this, symbol is essentially a sonic picture of the ocean floor. Then that picture can be studied for any sort of abnormalities that might suggest that there's a plane or part of a plane down there, that they can go back and look again. That's the technology side. The educated guess is figuring out where to deploy that. They've done that, they just have to hope now that they're in the right place. Victor, Christi.

PAUL: Already, Tom Foreman. Thank you so much. I appreciate it. BLACKWELL: And, of course, we'll have much more on the search for 370 in just a moment, but something else people are talking about. We are going to talk about here on "NEW DAY". This baseball player who is being slammed for staying with his wife as she delivers their first child. We'll talk about this next.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

PAUL: I know you've been talking about this this weekend.

BLACKWELL: Yes.

PAUL: Two New York radio hosts getting slammed now for taking Mets second baseman Daniel Murphy to task. This happened after Murphy missed two games, including opening game to be with his wife as she gave birth to their first child.

BLACKWELL: How dared he!

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Assuming the baby is fine, 24 hours, you stay there, baby's good. You have a good support system for the mom and the baby, you get your (EXPLETIVE DELETED) back to your team and you play baseball.

BOOMER ESIASON: I would have said C-section before the season starts. I need to be -- I need to be at opening day, I'm sorry.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

BLACKWELL: Wow. Yeah, the last guy you heard from there, former NFL quarterback Boomer Esiason. He's now apologized. Yeah, he's sorry. He says that he never meant to tell any woman what to do with her body and for bringing the personal lives of Murphy's into the spotlight.

PAUL: Let's talk about this with "Working Mother" magazine editorial director Jennifer Owens, which makes me -- as soon as I say it, I'm asking- I'm like you know where this is going.

(LAUGHTER)

BLACKWELL: Yes.

(LAUGHTER)

PAUL: And Jennifer Owens -- as soon as I say this, you know where this is going ...

(LAUGHTER)

PAUL: Jennifer, let me ask you first of all, what was most offensive to you in this conversation? What has people so riled up?

JENNIFER OWENS, "WORKING MOTHER" EDITORIAL DIRECTOR: I think that immediately it just negates the role that fathers have in their child's life in the formation of the new family. And anyone who has had a baby knows that it's more than 24 hours of parenting is happening in those first few days.

BLACKWELL: Yeah, so and his apology. And he has apologized. A lengthy apology.

OWENS: Yes.

PAUL: Yeah.

BLACKWELL: He said that he never should have -- they never met, rather, to tell a woman what she should do with her body. And here's a quote: "It's my fault for uttering the word "C-section" and it all of a sudden put their lives under a spotlight. He clearly got slammed for what that -- for that reference.

PAUL: The C-section, especially.

BLACKWELL: The C-section especially. Why do you think that part got so many people riled up?

OWENS: Well, if I may get personal, I've had two, they're major abdominal surgery.

PAUL: Yeah.

OWENS: Nobody really wants to have one. And if we can get real, it's really hard to recover from that. So, to have your husband there and to have your baby's father there to be part of just that moment is extremely worthwhile.

PAUL: I've had three. And let me tell you, I concur. I'm with you. I concur. And not only that, but I think people equated some ignorance to that statement because for the safety of the baby, you can't just schedule a C-section ...

BLACKWELL: At the start of the season, yeah.

PAUL: At an appropriate time. I mean, they say the longer that they're cooking in there the better it is for them. But we know, I mean women usually do take the brunt of maternity backlash. You know, you're judged at work because you can't be here, you can't be there.

BLACKWELL: Right.

PAUL: Whatever. In this case, the dad, Daniel is getting this thrown at him. How do you think that dynamic is maybe a positive to this conversation?

OWENS: Oh, definitely. I mean we do the "Working Mother" 100 best companies. And across those companies the average is, they offer to men three fully paid weeks of paternity leave. And -- which is great, you know, I would like to see more. But the men don't take it all -- and here even in this case, he has the benefit of three days and he took two. And so, men need to be encouraged to use it, to be there, and so I just like that this conversation that men were calling into the show and saying you are completely wrong on this.

BLACKWELL: Yeah. And that's where I want to take it. Because, you know, Boomer's getting the pushback here. The other talent there on the show. At least we're having this conversation, right?

OWENS: Uh-huh. Exactly. Exactly. I mean, you know, the - Mike Francesa called it paternity leave a gimmick and a scam because his own radio station offers ten days of paternity leave. You know, say it, say it, because let everyone come back to you and say you're completely wrong.

PAUL: And it really helps prioritize fatherhood again, right? I mean that - there's so many ...

OWENS: Well, yes.

PAUL: Men -- there are so many kids growing up without fathers. What an example this guy is to say, you know what, I'm an MLB player, yes. But I am a father first, yes.

OWENS: You know, family, we all -- the working moms, working dads, we want to be great parents and great employees. And great companies the Mets being one of them, and the players union giving him the benefit in negotiating this, it's a step towards allowing them to be both.

PAUL: All right.

BLACKWELL: Yeah, I was surprised that he only got three days. That to me was a surprise. You only get three days that kids coming into the world.

(LAUGHTER)

OWENS: He missed one percent of the season. One percent.

BLACKWELL: Yes.

OWENS: It's OK. It's all right.

PAUL: Very good point.

BLACKWELL: Jennifer Owens, thank you so much for being part of the conversation.

OWENS: Thanks for having me.

PAUL: Good to have you. And thank you so much for starting your morning with us.

BLACKWELL: We've got a lot more ahead coming up in the next hour of your "NEW DAY" which starts right now.

PAUL: You don't even have to get out of bed, so this is Saturday.

BLACKWELL: Hey! PAUL: Whoo-hoo! Just put your feet up and relax. I'm Christi Paul. We're so glad to have you with us this morning.

BLACKWELL: I'm Victor Blackwell. 7:00 as we say, here on the East Coast, 4:00 out West. This is "NEW DAY SATURDAY" and, you know, this could be the most crucial day of the search for Malaysia Airlines Flight 370.