>> i'm jim chute toe in new york. our live coverage of the mystery of flight 370 continues right now with don lemon. good evening, everyone, i'm don lemon, it is the top of the hour, thank you so much for joining us. this is a cnn special report on the urgent hunt for flight 370. right now the sun is rising over the southern indian ocean. that means as we come to you live tonight the search for missing flight 370 is resuming. search crews are back in the skies now heading to this remote part of the world with several new clues. one of them is this, an object floating in the area in the search area captured by chinese satellite. it appears to be fairly large. 74 feet long, 43 feet wide. why is this so important? well, this new object was spotted just 75 miles from possible debris that appeared earlier on australian satellite

images. and another potential break in the search, a visual spotter on an australian plane reported seeing several small objects including a wooden pallet floating in the search area. all these new clues catching the attention of nasa who are now training their space assets to this particular section of ocean. and cnn has just been given a demo of the black box ping that searchers are desperately hoping to hear. listen to this. [ clicking ] even the best quip can't solve the problems that the weather may bring. i want to turn now to cnn's meteorologist karen mcginnis. hello to you. the searchers are sandwiched between a cyclone to the north, severe with tore the south. what is the day ahead going to be like as the sun is now rising? >> we'll show you the broad view, don. and yes, it looks like some interesting weather coming up over the next 12 to 24 hours.

here's that tropical cyclone much further to the north. so the debris area or the object that has been sighted is well to the south. right now, relatively quiet. that's because we've got this ridge of high pressure. but there is going to be a frontal system that starts to sweep across this region. it's not going to be very strong. but there's going to be an area of low pressure to the south. we've got high pressure ridge to the north. as a consequence, this is an area known as the roaring 40s because unimpeded, a broad stretch of ocean where these weather systems can just move right on through. and they are not interfering with any type of land mass. when this weather system rolls in it already is seeing some fairly rough seas. you get this weather system on top of it, we could see seas on the order of 3 to 6 feet above where they typically are. that in addition to some pretty gusty winds. the roaring 40s. it is exactly as it sounds. and this is the area where that

object has been located. coming up in the next 24 to 48 hours, wind gusts around 50 to 75 miles an hour making it very difficult for those who are trying to locate any objects on the sea surface. back to you, don. >> difficult indeed, understatement there. karen, thank you, appreciate you. in the two weeks since the plane went down there have been only four satellite images that could be pieces of this missing plane. the first was a day after the incident. vietnam released this image of something in the gulf of thailand. then china followed that three days later with images of several objects in the south china sea. china later said releasing the images was a mistake. the search then shifted to about 1,500 miles southwest of australia with these images released this past thursday of objects from an australian satellite. then today as we mentioned, this one seen by chinese satellite in the same general part of the indian ocean. and tonight we have our panel for you. cnn aviation analyst richard

quest is here, miles o'brien, and jeff wise. all aviation analysts. and former commercial airline pilot bill savage joins us as well. rich, i'm going to start with you. i want to ask you this twitter question from hannah. the past two debrises have been found on satellite, they have taken three to four days to be released as to being found. so clearly it won't be there anymore. >> no. it takes by the way, first of all, quite a lot of time to analyze this huge amount of data that comes down from the satellite. so that is why it's taken them some time. they've got to get the data, they've got to look at it, they've got to analyze it. and we're talking about a vast area and a vast amount of information. you're right, it won't be there now. but you've seen the pictures of wherer that dropping the buoys with the transmitters on them. the reason they're doing that is to work out the currents so they know which way the ocean is moving. and then you reverse drift it up so they can work out where it should be now. >> you drop them -- do you drop

them where you spotted the debris? >> doesn't matter. where it should be where it was last time, in the vicinity. then you can work out -- that will help them immeasurably. you can have all the models you like. i know your experts are going to discuss this. you can have all the models you like, but ultimately you need to know the real data of what is actually moving. and that's how they do it. >> miles o'brien, another question from social media says, is there a possibility of any airplane being completely intact at the bottom of the ocean, hence the reason for no floating debris? >> i'd say that possibility is remote at best. you know, i suppose that this person is probably thinking of sully's landing on the hudson river. you know, you could ditch the aircraft and if that were the case, it could remain intact for some period of time. it doesn't sound, in this scenario, like that is a likely outcome. >> alastair, this one is for you. this is from patricia. why no debris washing up on any

shores? it's been two weeks. >> it seems like an obvious time that we should have something washing up on the beach by now. but that practically speaking isn't how these things go. it's a very large part of the ocean. there aren't a lot of places for the debris to wash up. and sometimes it just takes a really long time. the material that came from the japanese earthquake a couple years ago took almost 18 months before it reached land. and even then it was a tiny fraction of the amount of debris that was originally washed into the ocean, which was estimated to be between 5 million and 8 million pounds of debris. and so it -- it's entirely possible this stuff will never wash up anywhere. and the fact that it's been two weeks is really not that surprising in that part of the world. >> and let's talk about really the difficulty that they are facing there. because when you think about it, people say, why aren't the bodies washing up? why aren't they finding in example? when you look at the amount -- i don't know if everyone really understands just what they're up against. how much water. and the depths of the southern indian ocean, alastair.

>> the extraordinarily difficult place to work. not only is it far remote from the australian coast, the weather is rough as we've just heard. and that's the best part. because once you go below the surface of the ocean, it gets a great deal worse. the ocean there is between 10,000 and 12,000 feet deep. that applies thousands of pounds per square inch of pressure to anything that sinks there. you can imagine, for example, a foam seat from the aircraft. at those pressures, if it's carries downed with the debris, it's going to squeeze all the air out, completely collapse it. anything that's there is likely to be significantly deformed by the time it reaches the bottom. and then finding it is going to be exceptional hi difficult. >> jeff, you think a little differently. i know you know what they're up against. you think that there should be something, if not -- this is a 400-seat airplane, you said there should be something, a seat, something we should be able to find. >> right. imagine a shotgun blast. little pieces going all over the place. you know, we've seen satellite

footage of big pieces. but there's a lot of little pieces that should be coming out of this plane as well. after a while, if you're not finding anything, that itself has determinative value. so after a while, you can rule out a certain search area. again, this as huge area of ocean. the region that they're searching is based on models, probobalistic models generated from certain assumptions. in an area is searched you can check off those assumptions and have to ask, what assumptions can we change, develop a new mathematical model, go look there instead. >> i just wanted to bring you up to date. the number of planes that are searching today, there are eight planes that are going to be in the air today, don. this is the most number of planes that there have been. two civilians, a u.s. p-8 is already in the air, another civilian is going up in the air at 11:00. in total there will be planes

from the u.s., new zealand, australia, and china. in total eight. >> is that because as karen mcginnis is reporting, it's sort of a sandwich of bad weather, a good piece, another bad chunk? are they trying to make the most of it? >> i'm certain that's part of it. i think the assets are now there. remember, the u.s. p-8 didn't fly for the last two days because of crew rest and mechanical reasons. so now you've got the u.s. p-8, the poseidon, back into the air. you've got two civilian aircraft in the air. you've got the australians. you've got the new zealand. and those chinese planes which arrived. so eight in total will be searching. but it takes them four hours to get there, two hours of searching, and four hours back. >> miles o'brien, you know, i watched you forever as a young novice in journalism talking about aviation-related stories here on cnn. >> you make me feel old, don. >> no, we're about the same age. i'm just saying, you started a little bit earlier than i did. here's the thing. have you ever -- this is

unprecedented. as you hear richard quest talking about the apparatus and the equipment is now there, this is -- i don't remember anyone looking for -- i don't remember this many people, this much assets, being devoted to looking for an airplane, a missing airplane. >> i think probably you have to go back to amelia earhart. i think a good portion of the pacific fleet was involved in that particular search. the very famous aviatrix, of course. so this is unprecedented in so many ways. and the fact that we can lose a 777 in this day and age. >> it's amazing. >> as we sit here with our devices, we are pinpointable. it is amazing. >> it is unbelievable. stick around, thank you very much. as we said, the sun is coming up now, the planes are starting to go out, we are searching, we don't know, they could get developments in this hour, if they indeed do we'll bring them to you here on cnn. up next it is the theory many experts keep coming back to time after time. the so-called ghost plane scenario.

we're going to go live to our flight simulate tore demonstrate what may have happened inside that cockpit. joining me live now, a woman who was the sole survivor of a plane crash. i want you to hear how she survived and exactly what happened on board. this is a cnn special report. no matter how busy your morning you can always do something better for yourself. and better is so easy with benefiber. fiber that's taste-free, grit-free and dissolves completely. so you can feel free to add it to anything.

and feel better about doing it. better it with benefiber. ♪ ♪ so you can get out of your element. so you can explore a new frontier and a different discipline. get two times the points on travel and dining at restaurants from chase sapphire preferred. so you can be inspired by great food once again. chase sapphire preferred. so you can.

it's built to be as fast as it is strongor advil. and fights pain at the site of inflammation. advil has the strength and speed to help you move past pain. advil. make today yours. [ female announcer ] some people like to pretend a flood could never happen to them. and that their homeowners insurance protects them. [ thunder crashes ] it doesn't. stop pretending. only flood insurance covers floods. ♪ visit floodsmart.gov/pretend to learn your risk.

i'm don lemon. welcome back to cnn's special live coverage of the experience of flight 370. if searchers are in the area where the jet went down, the site is thousands of miles o off-course as you see from this map. take a look at that. the possible debris is even further south than the arc that estimated the borders of where the plane flight could have

ended up. and that is why one theory continues to persist here. it is the ghost, the zombie plane theory. it involves the pilots becoming incapacitated, the plane flying on auto pilot, ultimately descending onto the ocean when the fuel runs out. cnn's martin savidge live in a flight simulate tore test our theory for us. what did you come up with, martin? >> don, there are a couple of variations that can be done on the theme of the ghost plane or zombie plane. it could be a decompression, sudden decompression that incapacitates the crew. in our scenario it's going to be a fire. but whatever, you're at altitude, you're flying along, there's been no problem with the flight so far, everybody back in the passenger area is relaxed and settling in. and then all of a sudden you get some kind of alarm. for us, it's the fire alarm that goes off. this immediately sets off a series of almost automatic events. the copilot and pilot would begin delegating here. we'd say, all right, you fly the plane, i'll work at navigation, communication. you've got alarms going on

before the aircraft now, we're suddenly descending. because one of the steps you have to take is immediately try to get down to a normal or at least more normal atmosphere because you're going to try to open one of the windows assuming you have to ventilate the cockpit to get the smoke that's now building up in this fire. you can also launch the fire extinguishers that are located in the cargo hold, there are about five of them that are now dumping onto whatever is burning down there. you're hoping that is suppressing the fire. by this time you've also put on your oxygen mask. and you would be communicating. so you've also made a sharp turn because now you're planning to make the return to kuala lumpur or to get to an airport nearby. again, get on the ground, deal with this emergency. but in this scenario, you regain control of the aircraft. you settle things down. you get the plane level and flying straight. and as mitchell is doing, put it back on automatic pilot. and then apparently the pilot and copilot become incapacitated. maybe overcome by smoke. they passed out.

the plane now, with still six hours of fuel, because it had seven hours to go to beijing, just flies on. and it's on this new heading, the southerly course, because of that turn. and it flies and it flies and it flies. called the zombie theory because it's a plane flying essentially without a brain. the two problems with this, one, no radio distress call. it seems so unlikely in an emergency you wouldn't call. and the other is, what are the passengers supposedly doing in the back for six hours if they sense that there's no one in control in the cockpit? i can't imagine they just sit there and wait. >> yeah, absolutely. martin, can you taught to me a little bit more about this? i have wondered as i've gotten on a plane, you see the windows are you you mentioned it in a bit in the cockpit that they can open, many times they're open when it's parked on the tarmac and you're getting ready to take off. but you have to be below a certain altitude, right, you have to be in a certain zone in order to be able to open that window, correct?

>> what did we say, 10,000 feet or thereabouts? >> yeah, you want to be down 8,000, 10,000 feet, and we're below that. >> there are other ways to vent too. you can use air conditioning systems. it can depend on the aircraft, depend on configuration, vent laying of the cockpit. but you need to get down to -- you need to get down because you want to planned. you're not going to want to fight a fire in the air. fire is the worst thing you're probably going to face as a pilot. >> martin, thank you very much. mitchell as well. appreciate you. let's bring back our panel, talk about the zombie or ghost plane theory savage. bill, a lot of people quite frankly don't like us calling it ghost plane or zombie plane. because in deference to the people who are on board that plane. one can understand that correct? >> yes. yes, i would agree with that. but to incapacitate a crew, either through depressurization or smoke, is also very far-fetched because in any kind

of smoke situation that is recognized by the pilots in the cockpit you immediately don the masks. then you have full control of the breathing and the communication. in addition to putting out a squawk and declare an emergency that indicates to the ground that you are in an emergency situation. so it's -- without the irrefutable facts having been established of what was going on that aircraft and who was in control of it, then you really are just -- you're chasing theories. >> yeah, absolutely. bill, i've just got another question for you, then. because this one is from joe. joe said if any bodies from mh 370 are recovered from the ocean could they tell for certain if the cause of death is hypoxia or not? can you answer that? >> not with any expertise. i would recommend a pathologist answer that. >> richard quest? >> yes, i'll -- yes, they can.

having read numerous reports, most notably the crash of 447, the air france rio to paris. it's disturbing to read it. but the pathologists and the postmortems can determine with a great degree of accuracy the cause of death. and there have been times where there have been -- i'm not going to go into many more details. suffice it to say there have been times when they've been able to determine whether the person -- how the person -- >> we understand that we should be careful, we should talk about the families, the families obviously are distraught and they're probably watching this. >> yes. it is absolutely -- >> one possibility. >> there is no question at all they will be able to determine that, good forabout it that's the eventuality. >> thank you, gentlemen. stand by. up next, what if there are 75ers from this flight? the woman i'm about to talk to next was the sole survivor of a plane crash in the '90s. she survived on rainwater for

more than a week before she was found. survival story. talk about her - that's next. save you fifteen percent or more on car insurance.ould yep, everybody knows that.

well, did you know the ancient pyramids were actually a mistake? uh-oh. geico. fifteen minutes could save you fifteen percent or more on car insurance.

welcome back, everyone, to cnn's special coverage of the disappearance of flight 370. for nearly all of us, we can only imagine what it is like to be a passenger on a plane that's crashing. the author of the book "turbulence" is one of the few people in the world who is the sole survivor of an airplane catastrophe. her name is annette herpkins. her plane hit the side of a mountain in vietnam in 1992,

killing 29 on board including her fiance. she survived eight days alone in the jungle drinking rainwater. "i was sitting in what's said to be the least safe part of the cabin with the lowest survival rate. it was the aisle seat in the third row in front of the wing. but where i saturned out to be irrelevant. i wasn't wearing my seat belt. everyone else was." annette herpkins joins me now. your dad was arranging your funeral, and now you're here. what do you say to the families of flight 370? >> first of all, my heart goes out to them. i know how it was for my family. there's insecurity, not knowing. like them, hearing one day they're lost at sea, the next day the mountains, the next day -- it's awful. >> the impact of what they're hearing and seeing? >> the insecurity of not knowing. i think in a way it was worse for my family, the whole experience, and my loved ones.

because i knew where i was and they didn't. it was almost torture for them. >> you know, i asked you as you were coming on, i would imagine when something like this happens, do you relive it all over again? or is it something that's constantly in the either front or back of mind, top or back of your mind all the time? >> for me it's an experience i've integrated in my being. it's not my identity or anything. but it's major. it's cut my life in two. before and the after. because i lost my fiance. that was for me the most relevant part. and for me, again, the jungle survival, was not as bad as it seems. that's why i never really talked about it until now. then i felt it was a story to tell because it was not as bad as people expected it to be. that's why i told the story. also i gave my family a huge input. and i showed it from their perspective. because it was fascinating doctor me how different it was for them than it was for me. and it was so much more agonizing than it was for me. >> it's been two weeks.

13, 14 days that plane has been missing. you survived eight days. people can survive. i imagine someone like you gives the families hope. gives them some hope their families may be alive. we don't know. how did you survive for eight days? >> i behaved like a 75er in the way that i accepted immediately where i was. i didn't fight it. i just observed. i accepted reality. and i surrendered to the situation. and i think really, this is it. this is happening. and i kept my emotions in check. i didn't cry. because that would make me very thirsty. i made a plan. i kept my sense of humor. i did all that. but the most important thing, i shifted my focus slowly. more and more to the jungle because it was so beautiful. so instead of fixating on the dead bodies next to me and what could happen, i stayed right there and then and i fixated on the beauty, and it was beautiful. >> whart the t about the impact?

do you remember when it was happening, was there any warning? then the impact. tell us what you felt. >> we were flying and suddenly -- i was very claustrophobic and that's why i wasn't wearing my seat belt, i felt restrained. we suddenly made a huge drop and everyone's screaming and i said, well, that's logical in such a small plane. i didn't take it as scared. my fiance looked really scared. and then not a big scream but then we basically dropped, the airplane accelerated, and it flew into the mountain. it tumbled over to the next mountain. and that's where we stayed upside down and the plane broke in three pieces. i wasn't wearing my seat belt so i was like a lone piece in the dryer tumbling around. then i woke up under another seat with a dead man in it, as it turned out. then i realized that something happened. so i don't really remember the crash as such. and again, when i connected

later with a few families, they were very happy to hear that. it's very important for loved ones to hear. >> that's why we have you on. thank you, annette herpkins. we're glad that you can share your story. appreciate you, thank you. up next we're going to take you live to percent, australia, where the prime minister just made a surprising comment about the search. plus, this we're focusing on the captain and the copilot of flight 370. everything from this mysterious call before takeoff to what previous cockpit tapes could tell bus their habits. this is cnn's special live coverage. dear sun, meet your biggest competitor: philips slimstyle led bulb. beautiful quality light with a slim design, at a slim price.

[ matt ] the only thing better than the smell of fresh-cut grass is the smell of perfectly level, fresh-cut grass. that yellow seat's my favorite chair. [ kathleen ] you want to find a john deere dealer? just set your gps to tractor expert. [ jim ] when my grandson grows up, it's his. but it's all mine now. [ male announcer ] that's how we run, and nothing runs like a deere. now get $400 off all john deere four-wheel-steer lawn tractors at a dealer near you.

all john deere four-wheel-steer lawn tractors from point "a" to point "b." capella university is designed for your profession, so you can learn what you need to go further, to your point "c." capella university. start your journey at capella.edu.

welcome back to cnn's special coverage of the mystery of flight 370. planes back in the skies above the southern indian ocean and searchers have two new clues to guide them. the first is a mysterious object spotted by chinese satellite not too far from the search zone. it is the largest one seen so far. 74 feet long, 43 feet wide. this news is coming to us as we learn an australian plane reported seeing several small objects including a wooden pallet during a fly-over. back in malaysia, families of the missing are frazzled and they are exhausted. >> we are here! we are here!

>> to make matters worse, today they were asked to move out of their hotel and relocate to make room for formula 1 tourists. malaysian officials are promising to do more for desperate families. >> my pledge to all the families, wherever they are, is the same. we will do everything in our power to keep you informed. i will not give up hope. and i will continue as from day one. and i am given more hope to get closure to this by the support that we are receiving from so many countries. >> so as for the search itself, australian prime minister tony abbott says there is now increasing hope that we'll figure out what happened tonight 370. >> it's still too early to be definite. but obviously we have now had a number of very credible leads.

and there is increasing hope. no more than hope, no more than hope that we might be on the road to discovering what did happen to this ill-fated aircraft. >> live now, perth, australia. our correspondent there at the royal australia air force base. you heard him say, no more than hope, no more than hope. what are people making of this comment here? >> reporter: well, his comment hasn't been heard widely here at the military base but i can tell you certainly they are planning on hitting it hard today. i can actually hear the turbo jet of the australian p-3 orion. it's a jumbo jet sound. and this plane is about to take off. there will be a total of eight planes in the air today heading to that remote section of the southern indian ocean. remember, this is for those military planes a four-hour flight down. they'll have two hours to scour

before they have to make the long flight back. for crew time as far as gas, it is certainly something that they have to be mindful of. but the most planes in the air today, this is the fourth day that australia has led the search in this section. so don, yes, the prime minister has said that. and certainly we can see an increase in the number of countries involved, in the number of planes that are heading to that area. >> appreciate your reporting, keon is going to be standing by. we're getting a ton of questions on the captain and his copilot. returning is our panel right now. first to you, mr. miles o'brien, this one comes from jake. he says, is anyone aware of any medications the pilot or the copilot could have been prescribed that could have led to impulsive decision-making? miles? >> well, we're not aware. this goes in the category of thins that haven't been released by the malaysian authorities. i'd like to know a lot more about the two of them. and a little bit about how they were 90ing in the ten flights

prior to this particular flight. was there anything unusual about it? but, you know, there are medications in the u.s., if you're going to be flying airliners or for that matter little airplanes that are just outright banned. and that's the kind of thing that, you know, there are certainly medications that pilots still do take. you know, ultimately if they were to recover them or their bodies, a blood test might indicate something along those lines. >> jeff, brad asks are pilots aware of what is in the flight cargo hold? >> i'm not a pilot but i asked this question to 777 pilot rick soam. he told me that pilots are told what is on the manifest. they're particularly alerted if there is dangerous cargo aboard. in their walk-around they'll see the pallets. and so -- if there's animals in the hold, they'll be told about that because they need to be aware of the air conditioning and so forth for them. >> good question, bill savage, former pilot, are they aware?

>> i would say the same thing as your former guest. we are generally told the nature of the cargo but not the specifics of the cargo. >> okay. richard quest. let's see. have they looked at tapes from previous flights of copilot to see if he always signed off as "all right, good night"? >> i've no idea. i would imagine that they have looked very closely at all the various previous flights, as miles o'brien was saying, of both pilots to see if there's any inconsistencies in what they've said. i'm going to go back to this idea. the malaysian authorities today said that the transcript was not accurate. and it was not abnormal. and we've heard now from many pilots who have said that it was sloppy, perhaps. there may be a lot of reasons why. but it is not indicative of

anything that you just finished with "all right, good night." sloppy, perhaps. >> i want to go back to this. and here is -- about the pressure in the plane and the altitude. and how would you -- talking about this whole ghost plane scenario. someone, a pilot, sent me this saying how long someone would have to put on their oxygen mask if they were at 35,000 feet. if you're at 15,000 feet, you have 30 minutes or more. is that right? if you're at 18,000 feet, 20 minutes or -- let's see. 20 minutes to 30 minutes. if you're at 22,000 feet, 5 to 10 minutes. then it goes exponentially. usually they fly around 30,000, 35,000 feet? >> you've got to look at first of all what sort of decompression you're talking about. are you talking about a slow leak? are you talking about an explosive decompression? are you talking about a total decompression? in all cases it's very serious as i'm sure bill will explain to us. but once you get above 35,000

feet, the room, if you like, the amount of time you've got, dwindles enormously. once you get up to, say, 40,000 feet, which is where some of these planes will fly as they burn off fuel, you're down to minutes and seconds. >> miles o'brien, if you're in a panic, in haste, when you're looking at 30 to 60 seconds, at 40,000 feet 15 to 20 seconds, that's not a lot of time. >> no, it's not. it doesn't seem like much. but that oxygen mask is right behind them and they drill for this kind of thing in simulators time and again. this is one of the things they try for. i just want to walk down the ghost plane scenario a little bit if you'll allow me for just a moment. >> absolutely. >> let's assume for a moment there was some sort of golden bb fire that occurred that caused crew incapacitation, as well as communication incapacitation. and that is -- right there that's a premise that is hard to wrap my head around. but let's assume it for just a moment. if, in fact, there were such a

fire and the crew became incapacita incapacitated, what are the chances that that airplane would remain aerodynamically intact for another five or six hours? i think astonishingly minimal chances that would occur. so i think this ghost idea is truly we're chasing ghosts. >> we talked about this a little bit, jeff wise, on the special reports we've been doing at 10:00 here during the week. we talked about the idea if there was a fire in the cockpit, there was structural damage, what are the chances that the plane would be intact, as miles says, long enough to fly six or seven hours. >> there's a lot of improbabilities that add up. as i mentioned last night there's new data referring to -- we know more about the route. it did not go in a straight line. so i think by this point the ghost ship theory is out. >> i want to talk about your theory. you wrote on slate.com about this new theory. do we have time to get to it? we'll get to it after a break. it's very interesting. and the ntsb is using this

particular -- >> there was more data that came from the satellite. >> we'll talk about that after a quick break. stick around, we'll talk about that, a theory richard quest hates but a lot of you are asking about, can a plane essentially hide under another plane to avoid detection? jeff wise just wrote about it and richard will sound off. this is cnn's special live coverage. so our business can be on at&t's network for $175 a month? yup. all 5 of you for $175. our clients need a lot of attention. there's unlimited talk and text. we're working deals all day. you get 10 gigabytes of data to share. what about expansion potential? add a line, anytime, for $15 a month. low dues, great terms. let's close! new at&t mobile share value plans our best value plans ever for business.

your education is built to help move your career forward. here's how: we work with leading employers to learn what you need to learn so classes impact your career. while helping ensure credits you've already earned pay off. and we have career planning tools to keep you on track every step of the way. plus the freshman fifteen, isn't really a thing here. and graduation, it's just the beginning. because we build education around where you want to go. so, you know, you can get the job you want. ready, let's get to work.

wanted to go and see a lion up close. this zoom lens is amazing. go and smell the roses!

we're going to get our experts to weigh in on a theory many of you are asking about, a shadow mane concept, theories the plane maneuvered itself behind another plane, shadowing it to mask flight 370 from military radar. can a plane reprogram its digital signature i.d. to fly unnoticed as another flight to land elsewhere? richard quest. i hear you loathe this particular shadow plane theory. >> i do, because it puts together a whole lot of circumstantial facts and comes up with absolutely nothing. this is the theory that says that the plane came up behind singapore airlines sq 68 on its way to barcelona.

and then it shadows sq 68 all the way for most of the journey and lands somewhere to be used - by terrorists on a future occasion. let's go through the reasons why this is a really rather poor theory. one, you've got to get behind sq 68. >> and it would have seen you. >> whether it sees or not, it's very difficult to do at altitude. sq 68 is not flying at 10,000 feet, it's 36,000, 37,000 feet and making its own adjustments. number two, you've got to stay behind the plane. and there may be fog, there may be turbulence, there may be all sorts of things. number three, there's a real possibility sq 68 would have spotted you either i have a tcast or via its radar. finally, don, you've got to leave sq 68 and start flying at that altitude and radar on the ground would have a blip to pick you up. >> you said that your particular scenario discounts this whole shadow plane thing?

>> what i talk about this is scenario with new data that allows us to know more precisely than we did what path the plane took when it went either north or south. and that track does not permit flight over central india. it does not rule out the concept of flying behind a plane. it's conceivable that this technique, if it's valid, i don't know, was used behind another plane but it couldn't have been sq 68. >> let's get back to the search now for this. because i spoke to our meteorologists at the beginning of this broadcast, she talked about the weather. it's sandwiched between two storms. there's a cyclone. how is this cyclone going to affect the waters this. >> so it's going to make the surface of the water a great deal rougher. it would mean that it would be practically impossible to deploy a lot of the assets that you would use to look for something on the surface of the ocean. it may even make it so that shipping operations are completely impossible. but that's even the best news. because once you get below the surface, it gets even harder. it's very deep. if there was a purgatory on

earth, it would be very much like the deep oceans, it's perpetually dark, it's perpetually cold. the pressures are absolutely crushing. it makes it very difficult for any piece of equipment to work effectively down there. so the sort of cyclonic conditions on the surface, the good news. the bad news is what happens if you really do have to look for something in that part of the ocean, because it's exceedingly technically challenging. >> alastair, the most interesting thing to me recently is where they're searching. then how difficult it is. many of these waters, many parts of this ocean, uncharted. really undiscovered. people have never seen it. obviously we've never been to the depths of it. to get people to understand just how difficult it is, just how much water this is, the depths, the different currents, it's almost impossible. i think you said it was like searching for a needle in a haystack. you went beyond that saying, what? on the dark side of the moon, is that correct? >> right. so you're searching for a needle in a haystack when you're talking about trying to find

debris on the surface of the ocean. if you're trying to find debris on the bottom of the abyssal oceans that haystack is on the dark side of the moon. it's a deliberate analogy because we don't know that much about most of the abyssal oceans. it's equivalent to what we know about the dark side of the moon. noaa, national oceans and atmospheric administration, maintains a system of buoys around the world in the oceans that provide realtime data about what's going on in the oceans. and unfortunately that part of the southern indian ocean is one of the worst-covered areas in terms of providing realtime data about ocean conditions. and it's very poorly surveyed on the bottom. and it's a tremendously difficult place to look for anything. >> alastair and everyone else, stick around because when we come right back we're going to get more of your questions. everything from black boxes to how much this search is costing. that's next. [ male announcer ] we all think about life insurance.

but when we start worrying about tomorrow, we miss out on the things that matter today.

♪ at axa, we offer advice and help you break down your insurance goals into small, manageable steps. because when you plan for tomorrow, it helps you live for today. can we help you take a small step? for advice, retirement, and life insurance, connect with axa.

back to our special coverage of the disappearance of flight 370. we have a few more questions to our panel. first i'm going to start with richard quest. how much money is being spent on the investigation and search for possible rescue of flight 370? >> we don't have a full dollar number yet, don. we know the u.s. has said it's about $2.5 million so far. the department of defense and the united states has allocated $4 million so far. i'm expecting that of course to

go much higher as the search goes deep into the south indian ocean. but one thing to bear in mind, as long as they are using military assets, those assets already exist. so you're talking about fuel, overtime, all those sort of things. where it will become extremely expensive, although money is not an issue, is if you start having to rent external facilities. things like submersibles and the like. then the costs will go up. at the moment, not an issue. >> alastair, how much water pressure can a black box endure and can the pressure cause it to malfunction? i would imagine yes. >> possibly. it all depends on how much damage the black box sustains during any impact it might have experienced. they're really rated when they're manufactured to go to at least 20,000 feet, sometimes more, depending on the model. but that's enough to sustain them at the bottom of the ocean. they should function properly as long as they didn't sustain any damage themselves on the way down. >> this is for miles o'brien. miles, david on twitter wants to

know, granted it is not the hubble telescope, but i find it a bit hard to believe that satellite images of earth are so grainy. miles o'brien? >> well, it's -- a lot of it has to do with where the satellites are optimized. you know, basically when we're talking about the roaring 40s, there's not a lot of need to image down there. and so basically, we have kind of a dearth of good satellite assets trained in that area. now, we have polar orbit satellites so eventually they'll get around to it. we're talking now -- we're talking about a meter and less of resolution. so three feet and less. in the classified world, even better. so even in the commercial world, we should as time goes on, and we refine where this location is, get some better satellite eyes on it. >> all right. jeff wise, steve wants to know, will airline authorities use flight 370 as a teaching moment and change any procedures or technology so this doesn't happen again? >> oh, absolutely. absolutely. this is the real reason we have accident investigations. this is why there's black boxes on planes.

every single major accident you've ever heard of has resulted in a change of procedures or a change of equipment. and, you know, not only does the faa change the rules, but every pilot will think about it. they'll talk about it. and you'll see -- for instance, great example, in the case of air france 447, in the transcript you can hear the captain saying to the pilot flying, "not too much rudder." he was referring to an earlier crash that had taken place over long island in 2001 where a pilot had ripped off the rudder by using too much rudder. so he'd been working the rudder pedals back and forth and ripped off -- so everyone's going to have this front of mind the next time anything like this happens. >> there have been a number of incidents where the pilots have overcorrected using too much rudder. you remember the crash that happened right after 9/11 -- >> that's what i'm talking about. >> right, right. 847 or something like that. i forget what it was. unbelievable. listen, here's what bill southway asked. are the 777 experiencing

software malfunctions in the past? could this have sent the plane to stall and plummet on this flight? bill? >> i'm unclear about your question. but the airplane is very stable aircraft. and very easily controllable by experienced and trained pilots. so they just don't fall out of the sky. >> they just don't fall out of the sky. have something here we have to get to before the top of the hour. someone says, a pilot, the same pilot says, i say good night all the time, and i say good morning. he said, if the ttcas was turned off you wouldn't know if an airplane was near you. commercial planes do not have radar that picks up airplanes. the only radar is for weather detection and tcas traffic collision avoidance system. i said, can a plane shadow another at that altitude? he says the military does it all the time for refueling. >> yes, under the most perfect conditions. you're talking about two civilian aircraft shadowing each

other in less than perfect conditions, in the middle of the night, when it's not been practiced. it's a world of difference. >> yeah, can i jump in here? >> just quickly, fast. >> just because you can't do it doesn't mean somebody else can't do it. >> okay, that's it, thank you. we'll talk much more to talk about, everyone. another story that i want to talk about, that's why i'm cutting you guys off here, breaking news coming out of the ukraine here. ukrainian ship has just been captured by russian military forces. this is coming to us directly from sources quoted by ukraine's ministry of defense. they're telling cnn that men armed with military weapons stormed the ship. the crew on board tried to fight back. joined by crimea's special defense forces. but after a two-hour assault, there is a ship right there, they lost the battle and the russian military took over the ship and reportedly raised a russian flag. that is the ship you're looking at right there. we'll have more on this news throughout our broadcast, throughout our hours here on

cnn. but again, this breaking news coming to us from ukraine. it's talking about crimea and a ship. good evening. it is the top of the hour. this is cnn's live special report on the urgent hunt for flight 370. as we come to you live right now, searchers are now in the skies above the prime focus area for this plane, an isolated section of the southern indian ocean. this is an area that has just become the scene of another debris sighting. >> the news i just received is that the chinese ambassador received satellite image of certain objects in the southern corridor and they will be sending ships to verify. >> the object in question is the largest one we have seen so far. 74 feet long, 43 feet wide. what makes this so credible? it is its location. just 75 milesro