lithuania, estonia and the breakaway province of maldova. tomorrow much more on flight 370. we'll take you onboard the navy's p 8 poseidon searching for wreckage in the indian ocean. we took you on board and showed you how it works. this might be what finds that wreckage. coming up tomorrow. right now anderson starts. good evening, everyone. it is 8:00 p.m. here on the east coast of the united states, 58 a.m. in kuala lumpur and in western australia. new developments in the search for wreckage of malaysia airlines flight 370. we'll speak exclusively of the captain in the lead ship on the search looking for 122 pieces of debris spotted by a french satellite. whether they're pieces from the plane we do not know. there's that and the search for answers in the mystery of what or who brought the plane down. it is back to that. who. back to the deeply troubling notion that only a member of the flight crew could have made the boeing 777 do what it apparently

did. there are conflicting reports tonight on flight 370's captain, on his behavior leading up to the flight. the contents of his home flight simulator, any political influences on him and what investigators are telling reporters both in malaysia and here at home. i want to stress that there are conflicting reports. we're going to explain the sourcing on both of them for you. we'll be totally transparent about the fact that different sources with different connections to the investigations and potentially different agendas are as you might expect saying different things. "usa today" citing a high-ranking unnamed malaysian law enforcement officer who says the captain, zaharie ahmad shah, is believed to be solely responsible for the flight being taken off course. as for american investigators, they're also focusing sharply on the crew, analyzing captain shah's home flight simulator among other things. for the very latest we want to be joined by our justice correspondent pamela brown right now. i understand the fbi is expect end pecked to turn over hard drive information in the next day or

two. >> reporter: sources are telling me tonight that so far investigators have found no smoking gun in either the pilot or copilot's backgrounds that would suggest a premeditated act by either of them. sources say that investigators haven't found any concrete evidence on that hard drive of the captain's simulator that we see right here as well as his laptop. and the copilot's laptop. that indicates a motive or that the pilots were planning the plane's disappearance. also a source in malaysia told cnn that police who searched their homes did not find a said note or any evidence to suggest financial or marital problems. but this is an ongoing investigation, and investigators of course are still digging into the backgrounds of both of these men. >> and just to be as transparent as possible here, the other report which "usa today" put out, they said that came from a malaysian official involved in the investigation. your sourcing is on the u.s. side. >> reporter: yes. so i've been speaking to law enforcement sources on the u.s. side, and also there has been a malaysian source, a senior

malaysian official in the government that has been speaking with our tom puentes. there seems to be no concrete evidence at this point, anderson, that there is a clearcut motive, whether the communications that the pilots were in, their financial state. there is nothing to sort of jump out as a red flag that they were planning something. but then you look at the process of elimination here. and of course investigators are going to continue to zero in on these two men who were in the cockpit, who were in control of that plane. so nothing is being ruled out at this point. >> pamela, stay with us. i want to bring in cnn avenue yas analyst miles o-- aviation . miles let's start with you. what do you make of this "usa today" report pointing the finger essentially at the pilot? does it make sense to you? >> no, it doesn't make sense at all. i think it's premature, thinly

sourced. i just think they got out ahead of things. 20 days later and circling back to the flight crew. the flight crew cannot be excluded from possible blame in all this by any stretch. as a matter of fact, you have to put them very high on the list. but there's a lot of other series of events that could have occurred. for "usa today" to contend that the first officer could not fly the maneuvers that we witnessed is just plain wrong. >> mary, you basically agree with what miles is saying, that just because the lead pilot was the most experienced person on the plane that the indications that somehow makes him the responsible one. >> yes. there's a shocking lack of evidence. to make this leap that they have made, it's just really outrageous. i was a federal prosecutor before i was the inspector general. and the bottom line here is, they have no evidence. simply because they don't have any other evidence that it must have been the pilot, it's kind of like in a dime store mystery novel. the butler did it because they don't know who's did it.

there is simply no evidence here. and granted the plane -- what were the facts? the plane made a turn, the plane made a descent, and the plane stopped communicate. i've worked accident cases in which those things happened for mechanical reasons. >> michael, you say this is another big misstep by the malaysian government. how so? >> well, it seems to me like the malaysians are once again trying to book end this thing and sort of put everything to an end. they're saying it was the pilot. we can all go home now. and this was sort of similar to what the prime minister did on monday when he said, look, the plane is lost. everyone is presumed dead. so you sort of get this feeling from the malaysians that it's not as much about the evidence and the investigation as it is trying to make this thing go away. >> and miles, just as mary said, in terms of what we know, you could have a scenario where a pilot or these pilots were involved in somehow bringing down the aircraft. you could also have a scenario in which they were heroes trying

to stop the aircraft from ending up in the water. we don't have any evidence either way. >> absolutely. "usa today" with this sole source said that the entire group of passengers had been ruled out. i find that very difficult to believe. it's quite possible that there was a hijacking, that the pilots -- the crew was under duress, that perhaps there was a bomb on the aircraft and they're heroes for flying the airplane away from land. we don't know. and so i think we're coming full circle back to the beginning here where we started off blaming the flight crew. and again the malaysian authorities want to come to conclusions without any supporting evidence released whatsoever. >> pamela brown, u.s. authorities, as you've been just reporting at the top of the program, continue to do their own review. is there a sense of the timeline on that? when that will done? or is that just something that continues on? >> well, the malaysians are leading this investigation. and so right now fbi is really just focused on that hard drive,

anderson, and retrieving all the data they need to hand over to the malaysians. they expect to do that by the end of the week. i want to sort of emphasize here that neither u.s. officials nor malaysian officials are implicating either pilot in the loss of this plane. in fact, anderson, just talking to sources it seems like here we are almost three weeks in and they're still baffled by the fact that there aren't any clearcut answers right now. and as one of my sources said, there's a count argument for every single theory that's out there right now. >> mary, if the wasn't the pilot and he had nothing to do with this, either the malaysians or at least the malaysian source that "usa today" talked to are way off in terms of figuring this out, which is certainly discouraging that at this juncture as our other guests have said they're basically circling back to something early on. >> well, there's a common flaw in investigations called belief persisten persistence. when investigators or police get in their idea that somebody's a suspect, and then they try to

make everything fit it. that's how we end up with wrongful convictions by the way from criminal cases. but i think they have that going on. they've got belief persistence. they think it has to be the pilot. and by the way, on the four planes on september 11th, 2001, it took weeks in some cases months to figure out there were 19 people aboard, many of whom had flight training. we didn't find that out for weeks. finally that evidence came out. >> michael schmidt, this 122 pieces of debris that have been much talked about over the last 12 or so hours, seen on a french satellite, it's important to reiterate, there's a lot of junk floating around in the ocean, particularly in this region where the currents kind of swirl around and have stuff clumping together. we have no idea nor do the searchers at this point have any clear idea based on the information that's been released publicly what those pieces of debris are. >> as the australian prime minister said the area they're

looking 1500 miles off the coast there is really in the middle of nowhere. it's a very treacherous area. the currents are very strong. the weather is terrible. and there's really no land, making it even more difficult to get the planes out there. so i think we're going to continue to sort of see these reports that come out saying oh, there's pieces and such. but i'd be very surprised if we are able to find even a dozen of these by the end of the week. >> michael schmidt, mary schiavo, pamela brown, miles o'brien. let us know what you think. follow me on twitt twitter @andersoncooper using #ac360. more on the search for that debris ahead. we'll take you on board the vessel leading the hunt a 360 exclusive. we'll talk to australian captain in charge of that vessel, the australian ship success, optimistically named. later two incredible rescue. one a child pulled from the washington mudslide. see the child there being carried by a first responder. just an extraordinary rescue. the other -- we're also going to

talk to a woman who almost drowned in mud in her own home. the other which you've probably seen the video, this is in houston, raging fire out of control. there on the ladder to the left of the screen there was a captain fire department there in houston who was trying to reach a construction worker who is dangling. we're going to show you what happened next as the building started coming down around him. we're going to talk to that firefighter about what he saw and experienced. it's extraordinary when we come back. hey there, i just got my bill, and i see that it includes my fico® credit score. yup, you get it free each month to help you avoid surprises with your credit. good. i hate surprises. surprise! at discover, we treat you like you'd treat you. get the it card and see your fico® credit score.

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hopes as you know before. that's the possibility though after nearly three weeks that certainly is the hope. now only on 360 tonight, the captain of the lead search vessel, captain alison norris of the royal australian navy joins us by phone aboard her ship, the hms success. the new satellite images that are out there, some 122 objects, are you aware of where those are located? are you close to any of them? have you specifically been tasked to look for any of those? >> we are continuing to get updated information on those objects. and we will expect additional task i tasking weather permitting of course, should those images prove to be relating to the aircraft. >> how is the search going at this moment? are you in the search area right now? how are conditions? >> we've been conducting the search now for quite a number of days. we are in the search area. it's just getting light here.

it's about 7:00 perth time at the moment. we are continuing to conduct a vigilant search using all of the resources available to us to ensure that we are able to make the best opportunity to find any debris or any sign of the missing mh 370. we have not sighted anything relating to the missing malaysian airlines flight. >> and in terms of your capabilities with your ship, right now are you primarily relying on just people looking through binoculars? is it primarily radar? how does that work? >> the type of wreckage or object that we're looking for is so close to the water line that now radars would not be able to pick it up. so we are very reliant on lookouts who use binoculars and night vision glasses to scan the horizon and scan the area around

the ship while we conduct our search pattern. >> it's got to be a very difficult thing for those lookouts to be scanning waters hours on end. do you rotate them through? how long do they stay out there looking? after awhile i would think the eyes looking through the binoculars would be very difficult constantly looking in the water. >> the conditions down here, it's very cold. we rotate the lookouts through every hour. and make sure that they are appropriately dressed to combat the very cold conditions down here. yesterday's conditions were very good for visibility. and we expect that the conditions will probably deteriorate again over the next 24 to 48 hours. and we will adjust our search pattern to maximize our opportunity to find anything in the water. >> and do you have investigators or analysts on board the ship with you, or would you have to take that back to land to be

looked at further? >> anything that we recover would have to be taken back to shore for investigation. >> all right. captain norris, i appreciate all your efforts and i appreciate you talking to us tonight. thank you. >> thank you very much. you have a good night. >> all right. you, too. all eyes are on the ocean surface, all ears are or will soon be directed underwater listen foing for the acoustic pings. they're batteries with a limited life span. tonight safety analyst david soucie has new reporting on the possibility they're actually losing power even faster than expected. david soucie author of "why planes crash." he joins me along with david gallo, co-leader of the search for air france flight 447, director of special projects at the woods hull oceanographic institution. david soucie, you talked to an auditor who actually examined these pingers in the same warehouse where this flight was kept. what did he discover? >> what he found was the pingers were being stored in a hot,

closeted area, a lot of humidity and a lot of heat. the manufacturer recommends they either be refrigerated or be in a room temperature 70, 85 degrees, something like that. so what his concern was, and he brought this to their attention, is that these needed to be taken out, put into refrigerators or put them into proper storage areas. so they did that. they retired those ones that were out and put them in there. yesterday he called me again and he said, they're not doing that. the procedures and the processes -- >> it's not something they routinely do. >> exactly as part of their routine they're supposed to be doing it. he said it's just not being maintained well. so we can't say that all of them have been stored there. but my concern is that if those ones that were stored in there improperly and had been exposed to a lot of humidity and heat -- because remember, these are water-sensing devices. when they have water in them that's when they ping. so the fact that the battery of the ones that were bad was about half life. >> and these are again when we

say pingers, these are in the flight data records. this is what alerts people to the flight data recorders. >> it's the sound. >> are they test before being put into the data recorders and boarded on the aircraft? >> they're tested in that they have a machine that will test them to see if they ping. there's no way to check the load of the battery. >> really? david gallo, if the pingers have failed, or obviously limit a life span, what's then the best way to go about finding the black boxes? >> good old systematic mapping of the sea floor. line by line, step-by-step. it takes a bit longer but that's what happened in air france 447. >> now in that case, the pingers were no longer working, not because of any default that we know about but simply because it took so long to actually -- it took some two years to actually find the location underwater of where the plane was and where the boxes were, correct? >> yes. the pingers were long past gone. but i went back and looked at

some of the maps, anderson. it looks like they towed the pinger locater right over the top of the wreckage the first few days after the tragedy and didn't hear it. >> no kidding. >> it looks that way. i'll try to find the reference so we have it. >> explain how that could happen. >> it's not surprising to me. the oceans play games with sound all the time. a thermal layer, a mountain here and there, a valley, especially in that region it was extremely rugged underwater terrain. so it's easy to bend sound around. if you're not in the right place with the right gear with the right operators it might be easier to miss a signal. >> david soucie, after that air france crash, wasn't there a new mandate for the life of these devices? >> yes. the french civil aviation authority -- and i can't pronounce the name but it's a bar -- what they did they said look this was a horrible situation. they were racing against time trying to find this aircraft. so they recommended that it go to 90 days. everything manufactured be 90

days. what they did was they said the manufacturer of the device from now on, from 2015 on if you're going to make a new one it does have to be 90 days. but the faa and the iko, any of the other organizations, none of them have said yeah but we have to go back to the 20,000 aircraft that are flying right now and upgrade those. >> interesting. so it's only going to be for aircraft after 2015 for 90 days. david gallo, it's been 20 days. still not one piece of the plane has been picked up so far. does that surprise you? >> at this point, anderson, it's surprising me. i'm thinking with this latest batch, looks like to me anyway just a gut feeling the density and size of the objects looks about right. doesn't mean it's from this particular aircraft, but it looks like it came from one spot at one time. not accumulated over time. so we'll see what today brings. >> david soucie, does it surprise you that 20 days have gone by? >> it does but i'm really encouraged like david said about this debris field for two

reasons. one is that as he said it looks like it was all at one time. but even if it isn't there's some portions you can see it swirling a little bit. so everybody says maybe it's just junk. but that's actually a good thing. because that means that there's a place where it's coming together. so if you think about if this debris was anywhere within that same junk area it would have brought it in there. so they have a better likelihood of finding it. >> david soucie, appreciate it. david gallo as well. for more go to cnn.com. up next an incredibly story of the woman who survived the deadly landslide in washington state in her home. listen. >> it hit so fast that went down. we were underwater and mud. i just remember thinking, okay, creator, if this is it i might as well relax. and i just let myself go limp. >> she was buried in mud in her home. her home swept away a quarter of a mile. she was riding it out under just incredible. also a child stuck in the mud after landslide destroyed his

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an update now on the other major story, the deadly landslide in washington state. at least 24 people were killed when a mountain collapsed on saturday burying two small towns. officials say up to 176 people may still be missing in the mud, unaccounted for. today the governor of washington

says the area suffered what he called 100% devastation. we told you about the rest could you -- rescue of a 4-year-old boy on saturday. you see in the left-hand side of your screen the rescue in the black shirt securing the child. here's the same video with the boy. his name is jacob spiller. highlighted by the circle in the upper part of the screen as rescues first reached him, officials tell us jacob was upstairs when the landslide struck his house. his father and three siblings are still unaccounted for. jacob's mother is okay. she was not home at the time. for many the firefighters and the rescuers who are digging through the mud, the stress is taking its toll. >> we were digging, we came across a gentleman. and his son is out there as a civilian on the debris pile and it's his father. >> those rescuers are not giving

up, however. here's cnn's gary tuchman. >> reporter: the top priority is still the search for survivors. and firefighters we've talked to who have spent much of the day at the decimated landslide scene say they have not given up on that quest. >> that miracle can happen. we live for that hope. we really live for that hope. >> reporter: but this has been a disappointing day here in snohomish county, washington. with no survivors found. the rescue and recovery work is being done choppers, police dogs, bulldozers, shovels, even boy hand. dozens of structures buried in up to 40 feet of mud, mud that in many places is like quick sand which limits people's ability to work effectively and even to recover bodies. >> when we first got here, crews went out and hit the hot spots. there's a house roof here. let's get in through the roof, go down through, work on that house and see who's in there if there's anybody in there. as you continue along you step

back. you do a more comprehensive search. because now you're looking for the stuff that doesn't jump off the page at you. >> reporter: the main highway that goes through the affected communities, oso and darrington, remain shut off. for the time being the general public and even residents are being kept out while emergency vehicles go in and out. the recovery of bodies will continue, as will for now the continued search for people who may be trapped and alive. >> we can't lose hope for anybody in this kmuchblt that's not what we're here for. we're here to find those people. >> it is so difficult for all involved. gary tuchman joins us now live. these emergency work at the scene, it can't continue around the clock, though. once darkness falls what do they do? >> reporter: well, it actually does, anderson, but in a very limited fashion. once it gets dark here there will be trucks on the road rebuilding the country roads that were damaged during landslide. because the emergency work can't continue safely without those roads being in good condition.

but as far as the recovery work, and yes, the rescue work, that can't take place during the night because it's way too dangerous. you step in the wrong hole you could end up in 40 feet of mud. >> gary, appreciate it very much. robin youngblood lost her home in the landslide. she was bruised. she made it out alive. but she is angry about a situation. i spoke with her a short time ago. >> robin, first of all i'm so glad that you are okay. walk us through what happened saturday morning. i understand you were sitting in your living room with a friend. all of a sudden you heard this huge roar. >> yeah. i've never heard anything like it before. i said, what the heck is that? and we walked over to the window. there was a wall of -- it took me a second to realize it was mud. and it was racing like 150 miles per hour across the far end of the valley. and i said oh, my god and then it hit us. >> what happened when it hit

you? what did it feel like? could you actually see the mud as it came up to the house? >> i didn't see it hit us. i hit so fast that we went down. we were underwater and mud. and we had mud in every orifice. and the house was moving. and i just remember thinking, okay, creator, if this is it, i might as well relax. and i just let myself go limp. >> how long did it go on for? >> couldn't have been more than 30 seconds. >> that fast, really? >> from the time it hit us until we landed. >> and i understand it actually ripped your house off the foundation. >> my house is match sticks. there's nothing left. it ripped the roof off. and i thank god for that. because if the roof had still been on, the house filled up with mud and water, we would have drowned. the only way we got out is we dug the stuff out of our nose and mouth so we could breathe,

but i was able to pick my way through debris and get up to the top and call for my friend, yeddi from holland, my student who was with me for a week. and she was pinned under a tree that had fallen. and i couldn't get to her. there was nothing stable to stand on. so i just yelled at her to dig herself out somehow, even if she was hurt, better to be hurt and alive. because i could see that the house was going to fill up with mud. >> so you were actually underneath the mud? you were completely covered? >> yep. there wasn't a dry place on my body when we got in the ambulance. they had us strip down. everything was sodden. we were in hypothermia by that time. >> i understand the house was actually moved a long distance. about how far?

>> a quarter of a mile. >> that's an extraordinary thing. your house was moved a quarter of a mile in a very brief amount of time. i mean, you are so lucky to be alive. >> don't i know it. i have no idea how that happened. and i have a hurt finger and lots of bruises and a torqued back. but no broken bones. god knows how that happened. >> you bought i understand your house two years ago. did anyone warn you at the time that this mountain was unstable? because i've talked to geologists who did studies back in 1999 about this area. did anyone warn you? >> nobody ever told us there were geology reports. i heard on king 5 last night they asked somebody from the county zoning commission. and the guy said, well, yeah, that report was there but i guess we never read it. nobody told any of us. this is criminal as far as i'm

concerned. >> and you helped take care of a little boy, a boy named jacob who's four years old. he was rescued. you were there right after, i understand, he was pulled out of the mud, brought to the ambulance. how do you -- you talk about comforting people in a case like this. what do you say to him? >> the mini saw him i said, oh, my god, how old are you, jacob? he said four. i said what's your last name? he didn't know. i said, honey, i'm a grandma. i'll take care of you until we figure this out. i stripped his clothes off, i put him in a big blanket and i held him all the way until they found his mother. i sang him songs and i just tried to help him stay calm. >> robin, thank you for your strength and for talking to us. and i'm just so sick about what has happened to everybody there. and our thoughts and our prayers are with all the survivors and all those who are looking for those who are unaccounted for. thank you, robin. >> thank you so much, anderson. thank you for doing what you do.

we had to cut down that interview for time. you can watch the whole thing on our web site at ac360.com. you'll hear more from robin. if you want to help the landslide victims go to cnn.com/impact. a number of organizations listed. up next, the concept of pilot suicide on flight 370, one theory that investigators have to look at. we're going to talk about what investigators are looking at. one or both the idea that one or both of the pilots on board might have purposely crashed the jet. and we'll hear from a firefighter who rescued this construction worker just seconds before the building started to collapse. extraordinary. we'll talk to that firefighter precariously perched out there on that ladder.

break news tonight, conflicting reports on what role if any the pilots in malaysia airlines flight 370 may have played in the airline's disappearance. as we told you about at the top of the program we want to be transparent about the sourcing on this. "usa today" is reporting a high-ranking malaysian police officer said investigators believe the pilot is to blame and they're ruling out the copilot, simply saying the pilot was the only one who had the experience, the knowledge to do this. cnn sources say that investigators have not reached that conclusion. unfortunately, however, there have been instances when commercial airline pilots have intentionally crashed their jets, killing everyone on board. randi kaye takes a look back. >> reporter: a regularly scheduled flight from los angeles international airport to

cairo, egypt, with a stop at john f. kennedy airport in new york. that was the plan for egyptair flight 990. but on october 31st, 1999, the boeing 767 crashed into the atlantic ocean about 60 miles off the coast of massachusetts. >> i lost contact with the boeing 767 in my air space. we lost radar. we lost everything. >> reporter: crash investigators say the copilot had learned he was being demote and took control of the plane when the captain stepped out of the cockpit, sending it into a nose dive toward the ocean. the cockpit voice recorder revealed the copilot repeated "i rely on god" 11 times just before the crash. the captain can be heard on the recorder saying "what's happening?" even more chilling, the last words heard are the captain saying "pull with me" as he struggled to get his plane to change course. in that instant the copilot turns off the engine, sending the aircraft slamming into the

sea. all 217 people on board were killed. >> with egyptair, the transponder stopped working and there was no may day call. the ntsb ruled the copilot intentionally crashed the plane, though egyptian authorities still say it was a mechanical failure. >> certainly pilots are part of the potential for the problem. so they have to be looked at. but basically it's not a guilty until proven innocent really. because there's only a few sources that could cause this type of problem, someone outside the cockpit certainly the people inside the cockpit. >> reporter: a suicidal pilot was also to blame for this, december 1997, the crash of silkair flight 185. it was heading from gentlemjaka singapore when it crashed into this river >> it sounded like a bomb dropping. first explosion up in the air then it exploded again then it crashed into the water.

>> reporter: the plane dropped into the river in less than a minute, breaking the speed of sound and killing all 104 passengers and crew. the ntsb concluded that the pilot deliberately directed the flight to crash. in indonesia, they claim the findings are inconclusive. randi kaye, cnn, new york. >> it's certainly a troubling and perhaps remote possibility but one that has to be explored by investigators. joining us two pilots who are both cnn aviation analysts, les abend and miles o'brien. does that make sense in any way that pilot and copilot would be involved in this? >> why do it in the middle of nowhere? it just doesn't make sense. i would have done it after takeoff. my understanding is that there's one of the world's biggest buildings and towers in kuala lumpur. why not do it going into beijing? >> miles, others would say perhaps you wanted to go to a deeper area, the waters in the

gulf of thailand were very low. but pilot suicide as we talked about in that egyptair disaster off nantucket in the late 90s, that was shortly into the flight, correct? the malaysia airlines flight if the information is accurate, it went on for hours well off course. d's that li does that line up with the theory of suicide? >> if you look back at the egyptair 990 story, there was a lot of recriminations that were focused on the family of the first officer who was implicated by the ntsb on a suicide mission. of course the e judicigyptians all. we're not saying this is what happened, but the possibility that there was a suicidal crew member who might have been worried about some sort of stigma associated with suicide, particularly in the malaysian culture. if you wanted to commit suicide in such a way that you couldn't be implicated, this would be a way to do it. >> going to a very far, remote

area where the difficulty of actually finding the aircraft. >> exactly. >> les, what kind of psychological screening do pilots undergo? >> well, we go under most of the screening occurs at the time you're an applicant for the airline. the airlines do a good job of vetting people. a very similar type people. now, as we get on with the airline and go through our careers, there isn't a whole lot unless there's something affecting our job performance. >> i would imagine other pilots, co-workers keep an eye out for any anomalies. >> we watch each other's backs. we really do. >> miles, it is important to point out like everything else, this is just something that investigators are looking at. because again without a suicide note these pilots could just as well have been heroes to try to stop this plane from going into the water. >> there is a scenario you can add to the list where somehow they were come man deerd. the flight was commandeered. somebody in the back of the plane decided to hijack it.

for whatever reason the pilots were able to either dupe the hijacker or somehow take control of the plane in some way. but perhaps they thought there was a bomb on board and the same thing to do was to park it in the ocean like shanksville pa. >> we simply don't know. again les abend, miles o'brien, appreciate it. up next a remarkable rescue caught on video. an apartment building under construction in houston went up in flames. a working trapped on a balcony with the flames approaching. we'll talk with the firefighter who is out on that ladder there desperately trying to get to this construction worker in time. an extraordinary story ahead. [ sniffles, coughs ] shhhh! i have a cold with this annoying runny nose. [ sniffles ] i better take something. [ male announcer ] dayquil cold and flu doesn't treat all that. it doesn't? [ male announcer ] alka-seltzer plus fights your worst cold symptoms plus has a fast-acting antihistamine. oh, what a relief it is!

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that it can help lower cholesterol 2 times more. take care of those you love and cook deliciously. mazola makes it better. for weeks now we've been presenting coverage of the missing plane. we want to bring you a happy ending, a daring rescue. it's remarkable to see. just to set the scene, an apartment under construction in houston was on fire. construction worker was trapped on a balcony. a woman in a nearby office building grabbed her cell phone, started taking video. it needs knno no narration. >> he was inside there. do they see him? oh, my god. oh, god oh, god oh, god oh, god

oh, god. oh, my god. oh, no oh, no oh, no. oh, my god. >> look at the glass meting up there. see the window melting? >> they need to get him. oh, jesus. oh, god. oh, god. hell, he can jump from there. i mean, good grief. they need to move that truck up. oh, my god. i think that we probably should be going. >> time to evacuate, guys. >> hell yes. oh, thank jesus. thank you, god.

>> oh, my god. [ screaming ] >> oh, no, my god. >> hey, what about this guy? >> they got him. >> just extraordinary. remarkably no one was hurt in the fire. the firefighter on the end of that lard and helped rest cute construction worker, senior captain brad hawthorne of the houston fire department. he joins me tonight. >> captain, this rescue is extraordinary. when the video starts, how long had the fire been going on about at that point? >> not long. we pulled up and there wasn't much fire but it moved through the entire building in a couple of minutes. >> it moved that fast. >> it moved extremely fast. faeft-mo fastest-moving fire i've ever ben to. >> when you arrived on the scene were you immediately aware this construction worker was trapped up there? >> we had reports. our chief told us to go to the north side of the building,

there was three men trapped on the roof. so we got there, positioned the ladder truck, and got the ladder set up to the roof when we started noticing we had a small amount of fire on the left side, climbed about halfway up the ladder i noticed the whole attic roof was on fire. then just seconds later by the time i get to the top of the ladder the entire roof was completely involved in fire. >> was it moving that fast because of the winds? why was it moving so fast? >> the wind and just the construction. it was really fast, faster than i expected. >> you're on the edge of the ladder, right? >> right, yes. >> we see the ladder going towarded guy. were you afraid he would jump or something before you reached him? >> it was always possible. i mean, if it gets hot enough, most people will jump before they'll burn. >> that ladder looks like it's moving pretty fast. that must be pretty -- you're obviously experienced. that's got to be pretty frightening to be out on an

extended ladder like that moving fast. >> well, it's not typically a practice we like doing except under emergency situations. moving a ladder with guys on it. but we knew that seconds counted this one. >> the ladder couldn't get all wait to word the construction worker was. there's a limit. >> we got it over to him about a couple feet short. that's when i told him to hold up at first so he wouldn't jump until we got it to the right point. then i waved him to come on. and that's when i kind of got up there, gave him a little room. he jumped over and i grabbed him as quick as i could so he didn't slip. then my my chauffeur started moving the ladder to the right to get us away from the wall. within five seconds the wall and floor collapsed. >> did the guy say anything to you when he finally made it on the ladder? >> we kind of looked at each other, slapped each other's hands, smiled and thank you,

jesus. >> i can imagine. how's he doing, do you know? >> it was close. he's doing fine. doing fine. we seen him after all this was over, i'd have probably been more shook up. he was calm, cool, collected through the whole thing. and he's doing really good. he was back to work two hours later. >> we're watching this building collapse as you're pulling away. it's incredible. when it starts to collapse, can you tell the building is falling? i don't know where you were looking but do you see it coming toward you? >> you could hear the cracking and the popping of the fire, breaking boards. it did get louder for an instant, then you could feel the heat. and we was swinging to the right which it kept us out of the fire. and it saved us. my chauffeur did a good job getting us out of the heat. >> you all did an incredible job. i hope you get a beer or something after this. how do you relax after this? it's so stressful just watching i'm getting nervous.

>> right. it can be scary. but we train a lot. and you try to do it just where it's i guess -- don't know how to explain it. just doing your job. just human nature. just doing the job and making it -- it just happens. >> i'm glad you're out there. i'm sure a lot of people in houston are as well. thank you so much for all you do. >> thank you. >> just amazing story and heroic effort by captain brad hawthorne and the rest of the hughouston e department. the firefighters are working the scene of a zefdevastating landse in washington state to risking their lives to save others. at least two firefighters died, 13 others were injured in a fast-moving nine alarm fire at a brownstone in a back bay neighborhood west of downtown. we don't know what caused that fire. and our hearts really go out to the boston fire department, the families of the firefighters who died.

michael kennedy and el wad wals. we'll be right back. afghanistan, in 2009. orbiting the moon in 1971. [ male announcer ] once it's earned, usaa auto insurance is often handed down from generation to generation. because it offers a superior level of protection. and because usaa's commitment to serve current and former military members and their families is without equal. begin your legacy. get an auto insurance quote. usaa. we know what it means to serve.

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since we start our coverage of flight 370 we wanted to try to focus as much as possible on the passengers on the flight. to honor them we created a photo gallery you can see on our web site, ac360.com. new information about the

washington landslide expected shortly. we'll bring it to you at 11:00 p.m. eastern. set your dvr every night so you can watch "ac 360" whenever you want. piers morgan starts right now. this is cnn breaking news. >> this is "piers morgan live." tonight breaking news focused on the cockpit. questions about the pilot of flight 370, his behavior and what investigators think might have happened. meanwhile, the fbi working around the clock trying to find clues on the computer hard drives of both the pilot and copilot. and dangerous weather rolling in again to the search area in the southern indian ocean where planes and ships are hunting for any trace of flight 370. this in a part of the world that's renowned for high winds and rough seas. aircraft from australia, japan, china and the u.s. are closing in on the site along with ships from australia and china. all searching for what's being called the best lead yet in the mystery of flight 370. 122