getting ready for the whole thing to wind down. >> the ultimate success is finding an probable cause and that's what he may mean. we're find the plane. >> i'm don lemon. thank you for the shooter is dead from a self-inflicted gunshot wound. >> welcome to our viewers in the united states and around the world for this special edition of cnn newsroom. we are following two major stories this hour, the deadly shooting at america's biggest army base and the search for malaysia airlines flight 370. and very late wednesday night we learned the identity of the fort hood shooter. officials say army specialist ivan lopez killed three people before committing suicide. 16 others were wounded, several in critical condition. the fort hood commander says

there's no indication this was a terrorist act but nothing is being ruled out as a motive at this stage. lopez had served in iraq and was said to be suffering from depressid depression and anxiety and was being evaluated for possible post-traumatic stress disorder. the shootings stirred up painful memories of the 2009 mass shooting at fort hood when army major nidal hassan killed 13 people. u.s. president barack obama talked about all of that during a stop in chicago. >> we're heartbroken that something like this might have happened again and i don't want to comment on the facts until i know exactly what has happened but for now i would just hope that everybody across the country is keeping the families and the community of fort hood in our thoughts and in our prayers. >> cnn producer job rubin is at fort hood, it's just after 2:00 in the morning. he joins us on the phone. josh, at this point we know a

lot more about what happened on this that base. walk us through the details. >> well, john, earlier in the evening the base commander lieutenant general mark millie came out to give us a bit of a timeline about what occurred. there's still some sketchy details right now but listen to what he had to say. >> in the exact sequence of events and timeline of events are not 100% clear. it's believed he walked into one of the unit buildings, opened fire, got into a vehicle, fired from a vehicle, got out of the vehicle, walked into another building and opened fire again and then was engaged by local law enforcement here at fort hood. >> and it was after he was engaged by law enforcement on the base that private lopez took his own life. >> and as far as ivan lopez is concerned, what are officials saying about him? what do we know about him? >> we only know what they've told us which is right now lopez served four months in iraq in

2011. he was not wounded according to their records but he did self-report suffering a traumatic brain injury while deployed. and as you said before, he was known to be suffering from depression, anxiety and other psychiatric complaints. he had not yet been officially diagnosed with post-traumatic stress disorder because that process actually takes a while. but he was said to be on the path of receiving that diagnosis. >> josh, three people killed, the shooter took his own life, 16 people were injured. what's their condition right now and what do we know about the people currently in hospital, the injured here? >> last heard, we know that there are three people still in critical condition, one in serious condition. and the others are hopefully recovering well at the moment. >> we also understand that they're all military personnel. this is the biggest military base in the united states, it was the scene of that 2009 shooting the president spoke

about it on wednesday night. how are people there coping with yet another tragedy at this military base? >> this is a large military community. they are used to dealing with stressful situations, they're used to dealing with loss. but for something like this to happen just not that long after the trial of nidal hassan coming to a close just several months ago it is difficult for them. they expect tragedy, they expect hardship to happen overseas and in theater it's a little bit harder when it comes to home. >> job rubin on the line at fort hood following the latest developments, thank you. now to the other big story which we are following, the search for malaysia airlines flight 370. it has shifted again, it's moved slightly northward as authorities eliminate areas which have already been searched. so far, not a trace had been found. malaysia's top police official says this mystery may never be solved. but the malaysian prime minister speaking after meeting with his australian counterpart in perth

vowed to not give up. >> the disappearance of mh-370 has tested our collective resolve. faced with so little evidence and such a task, investigators from malaysia, china, australia, the uk and the united states have worked to reveal the aircraft's movements, their collective efforts have led us here. for the latest we go to perth and senior international correspondent matthew chant is there live. the australian prime minister told the chinese premier that the intensity of the search is increasing, specifically what is he talking about? >> well, he's talking about the international fleet of surface ships and aircraft that's been deployed, i think, in the search zone about a thousand miles, 1600 kilometers or so off the

coast of perth to look for debris from that missing flight. we're looking at at least eight aircraft that are in the skies scouring the seas and the waters in the southern -- south indian ocean. also a number of surface ships as well. add to this that the british nuclear submarine that's arriving in the area as well equipped with high-tech search equipment under the water, of course, and then the australian vessel the "ocean shield" which is equipped with a special pinger locater which has been specially brought in from the united states to try and find the black box flight recorder. so there really is now an intensive international effort to try and locate anything that may remain of this lost aircraft, john. >> of course "ocean shield" was expected to be in that searchson sometime today, that's now been delayed until friday because of the bad weather in the region. but weed that malaysian

prime minister there and while the australians are searching, malaysia is trying to get behind the mystery. >> well, malaysia airlines has the responsibility to lead this search but because of the geography of the search area, a thousand miles or so off the coast of australia, it's australia that on the ground in a practical sense is taking the lead. in fact, one of the things that's been emphasized by tony abbot, the australian prime minister is the international nature of this effort. australia says -- or he says australia is putting everything it has into this. although he's, of course, warned that the search effort may not end in success. take a listen. >> we can not be certain of ultimate success in the search for mh-370 but we can be certain that we will spare no effort,

that we will not rest until we have done everything we humanly can. >> and they're doing that now with that, as we said, intensive effort looking for any debris, any sign of what happened to this aircraft. still very much under way, john. >> matthew, very quickly, it's just after o'clock in the afternoon in perth. what's the latest on today's smerj. >> well, the various aircraft, we've seen eight aircraft according to the australian controllers and the search operation teams that have been in the skies scouring those waters. there's at least nine surface vessels as well that are making their way to the area or are in the area looking at what the -- what they can find in that part of the ocean. add to that, as i mentioned, that that submarine from the united kingdom that's on its way there, the exact location hasn't

been disclosed but it's said to be in the south indian ocean as well. a very intensive effort to find some debris. at the moment, though, nothing has been found. >> okay, it's a familiar story. senior international correspondent matthew chance, thanks so much. just ahead on cnn newsroom, we'll have more on the deadly shooting at a u.s. army post in texas and how it echos a not-so-distant past. was a truly amazing day. he was a matted mess in a small cage. so that was our first task, was getting him to wellness. without angie's list, i don't know if we could have found all the services we needed for our riley. from contractors and doctors to dog sitters and landscapers, you can find it all on angie's list. we found riley at the shelter, and found everything he needed at angie's list. join today at angieslist.com [ two greek blueberry yogurts, the yoplone winner.aste-off. i love this one. yoplait!

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welcome back. just after 3:10 on thursday morning on the east coast of the united states and we have more on our top story. four people are dead, including a gunman who opened fire at the u.s. army base at fort hood, texas. 16 other people are being treated for injuries at nearby hospitals. at least three people are listed in critical condition at scott and white hospital. five others are in a serious condition. the gunman has been identified as specialist ivan lopez. he died of a self-inflicted

gunshot wound. the commanding general at fort hood said the gunman was stationed in iraq for four months in 2011. the general says he self-reported stuffing a traumatic brain injury while on deployment. >> he was undergoing behavioral health and psychiatric treatment for depression and anxiety and a variety of other psychological and psychiatric issues. he was not diagnosed as of today with ptsd. he was undergoing a diagnosis process to determine if he had ptsd. that is a lengthy process to be confirmed with ptsd. >> now, wednesday's shooting at fort hood brought back some painful memories of nidal hasan's 2009 rampage at that base. he killed 13 people, wounded dozens more. hasan was convicted last year in a u.s. military court and was sentenced to death, he wanted that. he had admitted targeting soldiers who were about to be

deployed to afghanistan. ben corps ban is the mayor of the nearby town of killeen, texas. i had a chance to speak with him just a short time ago. go back when you first heard about yet another shooting at fort hood. what was your first reaction? >> it was just like a kick in the gut. it was -- it made me sad, it made me angry, it made me want to do something to help. our city was offered immediately all the assistance we could in terms of ambulances, police, our investigative resources and -- but it just didn't feel like -- it felt like you wanted to do more. those are real professionals out there in fort hood and they know how to deal with these situations. i know what it's like to be at war for a year and that's what

they do and they -- they need our moral support, they need us to stand shoulder to shoulder with them and express our love and respect for them and that's what we're going to do as a community. >> quite a few difficult days to come no doubt. >> there will be. there there will be funerals. there will be grieving. there will be families worrying about their loved ones who are in very critical condition over at scott and white memorial hospital in our neighboring town of temple. but i hope that -- i hope all your listeners will pray for a speedy recovery for those who are injured and pray for comfort, solace for the families of those who were killed. the shooting began just outside the hospital complex at fort hood. let's go now to tom foreman with a closer look at the layout of the army base and how these

tragic events unfolded. >> reporter: fort hood is located north of austin, south of dallas, pretty much in the center of the state and out in a big wide open area where it was established in world war ii for tank combat operations. they needed all of that room around them. this is the main part of the base running rectangularly this way back and forth. main gate right down here and even though it's a big base with many, many thousands of troops and civilians working there everyday, the bulk of this incident happened right in this area here. if we zoom in past a gate to the hospital complex, there is the commander says the shooting began in the parking lot outside of this hospital complex. from there, he said, the gunman got back into his car and drove toward the motor pool area. you can move this way just a very short distance and you start seeing some of these military vehicles, typical motor pool area, and that continues a bit down this road. this road by the way is called

tank destroyer road. a tribute to the history of the place. and if you were to continue following tank destroyer road you would come down here to where the incident involving major hasan happened back in this area. but as it is, according to the commander, this seemed to come to an end somewhere up in here. we don't know precisely where yet. but, again, a fairly small area from start to finish with this tragic event that once again has shaken this army post. a little earlier i spoke to a retired lieutenant general of the u.s. army. i asked him how was it that the shooter got this weapon on to the base and whether this shooting now will change security procedures in the future. given the history of fort hood, will questions now be asked as to how this soldier managed to get a private weapon, a semiautomatic on to that base? especially given what happened at fort hood in 2009? >> well, you know, fort hood is in texas and you've got open

carry law in texas. the rule is you cannot have a individual weapon carrying it around on a military installation, that weapon has to be registered. so if you were caught carrying a weapon in your car just by a random stop or someone was to see it you would -- you would have to go before the commanding officer and probably be punished for having a weapon on the installation. so we have strict rules about it. unfortunately none of those rules prevent people with bad intent from bringing a handgun on fort hood. >> given that, though, will security now be looked at, not just fort hood but at all military bases around the united states? >> oh, that is a normal procedure. we will do a review of what happened at this base and pass

any lessons on. but, again, this is a case of even to get on to fort hood, it's a sprawling military installation with 5,000 troops and a great r community of over 90,000 that go in and out of fort hood everyday. that includes civilian workers and to get on you have to show identification. f you're cleared to come on the installation. so it gives people a sense of security but what that does is it does not give you absolute security and that is the protection from someone will w will intent with a weapon and that is what happened -- has happened twice in five years at fort hood. still to come here, we'll have more on the search for flight 370 in the midst of this almost unbelievable mystery, some are now asking why not put cameras into the cockpit. back in two minutes.

welcome back. an update now on efforts to locate malaysia airlines flight 370. the search has shifted again today as authorities eliminate areas where nothing was found. investigators have also cleared all passengers of any likely role in the plane's disappearance and malaysia's top police official concedes this mystery may never be solved. one of the biggest problems they're having out there, of course, is the weather. let's get an update on the forecast for the region. of course it's been bad, it's been good. how's it looking right now? we've gone from so many different angles as far as the weather is concerned, going from the roaring 40s to the gyre region. at this hour, the weather pattern looking as good as we've seen in the recent days but i want to show you something taking place to the northwest. a complex of thunderstorms is

developing northwest of the search zone. that area has a low possibility of becoming a tropical cyclone in the next couple of days. we think a medium probability once you get into the latter portion of the weekend and the concern, again, 1700 miles to the northwest, there's the search area, roughly the size of the u.s. state of kentucky so still pretty significant region but that storm system models indicate it's going to travel to the south. there's the storm in the corner of your screen. notice a separate storm exiting this region. some low clouds in the southern tier of the search zone but generally speaking the weather pattern the next couple of days should cooperate with the searchers. we know mostly sunny skies, actually, come back into the forecast from friday into saturday. again, the models bring the storm system to the south and, john, in recent days when we've seen the search area move away from the south to the north and eventually a little farther to the west in this area the water temperatures warm up and that's a prominent issue here because now we're removed from the southern tear where the water temperatures around 50 degrees fahrenheit, now we're in the 70

degree fahrenheit. a magical number for a tropical psych clone to form is 82 fahrenheit. that's where the storm system is developing, if this area keeps moving around in this region you'll introduce a possibility of being in an active weather pattern and the wind will be an issue as well. the next couple days rather quiet but there comes the storm system bringing in strong winds. too far to tell if it's going to directly impact this region. we know clouds associated with this storm certainly will towards the latter portion of the weekend when the storm system nears. but in a region where we know container ships travel on a daily and yearly basis and leave behind some thousands of containers and inside of them you have anything from cans to rope to shipping devices that come ashore. it makes it very tricky when these storms are in the vicinity, john, because the swells begin to go up and any debris that may be associated with the plane goes down and a lot of the debris becomes

scattered about. so you see something on one satellite imagery and it's hundreds of kilometers away on another satellite because of so much weather. >> and it's also a ton of plastic. seems to be a lot of plastic floating around. that 's what they found mostly. talk to you soon. thank you. as the search continues for flight 370, some say cameras should installed in the cockpit of commercial planes. we look at whether this could make a difference in future investigations. >> we're at 3,000. >> reporter: as pilots guide commercial planes across the skies, everything they say recorded. >> 2,000 feet. >> reporter: unlike other modes of transportation, we can't see what's happening at the controls. cameras have shed light on accidents like when this bus driver was caught on surveillance cameras texting just before rear ending an suv. cameras are also keeping an eye on train conductors and now the mystery surrounding malaysia airlines flight 370 has reenergized the debate of putting cameras in the cockpit. >> the amount of information that they're deriving right now

from the aircraft exceeds anything from the other transport industries. >> reporter: mike karn of the coalition of airline pilots association says cameras would be intrusive. why not put cameras in the cockpit of commercial airliners? >> i want to pilot worried about flying the aircraft. the second thing is current technology allows you to monitor so many more parameters of the aircraft that it's not necessary. you're going to know the altitude, speed, configuration, everything mechanically about that aircraft. >> reporter: in 2000, the national transportation safety board recommended the federal aviation administration require airlines to record electronic images, data that would be included in two redundant cockpit data recorders, one in the front of the plane, another in the rear. but in the last 14 years, that recommendation has gone nowhere beyond being a suggestion. >> this information would be limited to accident investigation use and otherwise would not be available for viewing by anyone. >> reporter: jim hall was chairman of the ntsb when the

recommendation was made. after the investigation of several crashes found there wasn't enough cockpit data to determine what went wrong. >> the cameras would not be on the face of either of the pilot or the co-pilot. they would focus on the instruments and on the manipulations of -- that are made. >> we constantly see the edging and edging more towards taking away the privacy of the pilots. we're performing our job up there. i would rather be focused on doing my job than what people are seeing. >> reporter: yet hall sees passenger safety as a higher priority than pilot privacy. >> i hope that we won't wait until we have a similar incident involving a. [ inaudible ] to take the action that's necessary to provide for the safety and security of the traveling public. >> reporter: cnn. still to come here, we'll go live to kuala lumpur with more

on the investigation into flight 370 and the lessons to be learned. plus, we'll talk with the former assistant director of the fbi about getting to the bottom of the latest shooting at fort hood.

welcome back to our viewers in the united states and around the world with this special edition of cnn newsroom. authorities have identified the man who killed three people at the fort hood texas military base. he's army specialist ivan lopez who later committed suicide. 16 overs have been injured, several repain in a critical condition. the base commander says lopez had served in iraq in 2011.

he was suffering from depression and anxiety and he described lopez's last moments. >> military police officer responded and he was approaching her at about 20 feet, he put his hands up then reached under his jacket, pulled out the 9 millimeter and she pulled out her weapon and then she engaged and then he put the weapon to his head and he died of a self-inflicted gunshot wound. u.s. president barack obama was briefed on the deadly shooting at fort hood. he says everything will be done to determine what happened and also to help the victims and their families. he also referred to another shooting rampage that left 13 people dead at fort hood back in 2009. >> any shooting is troubling. obviously this reopens the pain of what happened at fort hood

five years ago. we know these families, we know their incredible service to our country and the sacrifices that they make. obviously our thoughts and prayers are with the entire community and we are going to do everything we can to make sure that the community at fort hood has what it needs to deal with the current situation but also any potential aftermath with. we know the gunman was married and have a family but authorities aren't saying much. i spoke to fbi assistant director tom fuentes about where the investigation goes next. tom fuentes, we're learning much about what happened at fort hood but as we look forward where does this investigation go next? what will authorities be looking at to try and work out the motivation, what actually happened here? >> exactly, john. what they'll be trying to do is

they'll get as many records as they can about the shooter one the shooter is verified, his identiei identity is verified and they'll be looking at computer records, e-mails, phone calls, any other personal information, interviewing co-workers, family members, friends, neighbors to try to get a picture of what sparked this act of violence. they'll make a final determination of whether it was possibly politically motivated -- which, of course, would make it terrorism -- or is it just a case of some kind of a personal dispute or was it maybe mental illness. you know, post-traumatic stress disorder. there's a variety of possible situations that would lead someone to begin an act of violence or to go on a rampage. they'll be trying to determine as much as possible what the trigger was. >> unlike 2009 shooting also at fort hood which was terrorism

related it appears this time it might not be, soldier-on-soldier issues here. but there does still seem to be this ongoing issue of insider threats, if you like, on u.s. military bases. spl first of all, when it comes to a military base, this is a place where the nation's war fighters are being trained. so, you know, by nature they're being prepared for combat or they've returned from deployments in combat zones around the world, particularly afghanistan at the moment. so, you know, they come back and you're asking people to turn that switch on or off of being in a position ready for combat to now return to a peaceful civilian life, get along with your neighbors and your family and all of that. so that's often easier said than done with some people, if that's what happened here. secondly, you're talking about a place that's really a small city with a population of about 50,000 people. so there are acts of violence

that occur in cities and towns, unfortunately gun violence in the united states and, you know, so that's another aspect of it is by here is population you have crimes often occurring. you hope it doesn't happen on a controlled environment like a military base but unfortunately it does. >> and the fact that this has happened at a military base, a very large one, does that change the investigation in any way? does it make it easier? does it make it harder? >> well, it really makes it about the same either way but in this case you have the fbi would normally have primary jurisdiction on a u.s. military base, whether it be a naval base, army, marine corps or air force however the u.s. army and the fbi have a memorandum of understanding which says that the fbi will support the u.s. army criminal investigative division -- cid -- so they will take the lead in this case, the prosecution, if there was going to be one, and we don't know in this case, if there's no other

person and if the shooter is dead there obviously won't be one. but it would be by military justice system and, again, the fbi would be providing the support. the u.s. bureau of alcohol, tobacco, firearms, atf, would provide investigative assistance, tracing, verifying where the weaponry came from. other federal agencies could be involved. and under the u.s. system, as i mentioned, crime on a government reservation -- which is the u.s. military base -- is a federal crime so in this case the state and local officials, the department of public safety and the local county sheriff, would provide any support that might be necessary to establish the perimeter around the base, any work that needed to be done locally outside of the base environment. but in this case, again, you know, if it's contained to a shooter who is now deceased than that will make things easier to go forward.

now back to malaysia and the criminal investigation into flight 370. jim clancy joins us live from kuala lumpur with more on that. jim, the australian prime minister described this as one of the great mysteries of our time and at this point that does not seem like an overstatement. >> no, not at all. and obviously people are going to be finding fault with the investigation, but the fact is that there aren't any facts. very difficult for them to know what went on inside the cockpit short of obtaining the flight data recorders. and there's a problem with that, as we all well know. at the same time, the industry is looking at this not for the first time, looking at this and saying something probably has to be done. they look at the circumstances that are involved with flight 370 and they say in the past

we've considered all of this but maybe this time it's time to take it seriously. take a look. >> we can't find it. we're not even sure we're looking in the right place. because flight 370's transponder was purposely shut down by someone in the cockpit or failed, search teams have been left to scour millions of square nautical miles. tech-savvy travellers wonder why. the director of the powerful international air transport association acknowledges the industry must act. >> we need to be in a position to track aircraft through the whole entire length of their flights even if they go outside normal radar coverage and so on. we need to now look at the best way, most effective way of tracking aircraft wherever they may happen to be. >> reporter: the agony of the families of those missing only adds urgency to act. >> you can continuously track one second at a time for

continuously across any trip and foe exactly where an airplane is. that is invaluable and in the case of 370 it would have told us whether the plane turned, whether the plane continued straight, and when it stopped emitting all together. >> reporter: as flight 370's disappearance became a global talking point, so did weaknesses in security. millions of travellers allowed to board planes with only minimal checks of their identities, including the two men who boarded flight 370 with stolen passports. >> let me be very clear. the airline's role is to fly aircraft and carry people. it's government's role to make sure people aren't traveling on fake or stolen or other invalid passports. border control is a government activity. >> reporter: interpol says it takes just seconds to reveal if a passport is among the $40 million known lost or stolen in its database. they want a single harmonized

system so airlines can quickly submit data to governments for screening. john, it may be that the security standpoint -- that is screening all of the passengers, using every database available around the world is going to be easier than tracking the individual planes. there's 60,000 flights today. these systems i'm told could cost $100,000 or more per plane. in the end -- and we've seen all of this before -- it's going to be the air travellers themselves who have to push for this, who demand it and then the industry will respond. but then those air travellers have to be prepared to pay for it. john? >> it does come down to money at the end of the day doesn't it, much of the time. jim, as far as the investigation goes, we're hearing no clues from the pilot's flight simulator. >> no. the latest that we heard at cnn on the flight simulator was that it had yielded no evidence of any wrongdoing, any foul play.

they said that the data had been overwritten. not really deleted, that it was just a matter of files being overwritten as you normally would have happen with temporary files on a computer. so there was nothing there. so far, there has been no smoking gun that has jumped out at investigators. nothing that would indicate anybody on the passenger list had any times to terrorism. there is no big insurance policies taken out by any of the passengers on the plane. so when you look at this, you say without all of these clues where do we go from here? from the outside, at least, john, this appears to be an investigation that is stalled right now. it may be perhaps the people on the inside know things they're not telling us, but right now everybody is thinking the same thing. it may be time to go back and start all over again. john? >> on that point, on the investigation. we're now hearing from the malaysian authorities, and they've said this for a day or so now, that 227 passengers on board that plane have all been

cleared. how could they do that so quickly? it's only been a few weeks and they came from more than a dozen different countries. >> well, they asked basically the individual countries to do the clearance on most of those. the malaysians didn't check the backgrounds on those people, check out who they lived with, their relatives and things like that. that would have been tune the individual nations and china, for instance, very much on board with that. they did, i'm told, a very thorough job of going back and checking the backgrounds of everyone. but that's why they were able to do it so quickly. >> yeah, certainly china has a very thorough process already in place for tracking anybody. okay, jim, thank you. jim clancy live for us there in kuala lumpur. we'll take a short break here. when we come back, we'll have the latest on the shooting at fort hood. i'll talk with a clinical psychologist about what could have caused the gunman to gone go on his deadly rampage, back in 90 second.

i want to just assure all of us that we are going to get to the bottom of exactly what happened. u.s. president barack obama reacting to the deadly shooting at the fort hood texas military base. authorities have identified the shooter as army specialist ivan lopez. they say he killed three people at the base before committing suicide. 16 others were wounded, some critically. lopez was married with children. he served in iraq in 2011.

we're told his wife is now cooperating with investigators. u.s. defense secretary chuck hagel called the shooting a terrible tragedy. he spoke to reporters on board the uss "anchorage" in honolulu. >> it's a terrible tragedy, we know that. we know there are casualties, both people killed and injured and injured. it's still under investigation our military has it as well as law enforcement. >> and texas governor rick perry released this statement shortly after the shooting "today fort hood was once again stricken by tragedy as texans, our first priority, must be caring for the victims and their families. fort hood has proven its resilience before and will again. texas will support those efforts in any way we can with any resources necessary. the thoughts and prayers of all

texans are with everyone affected by this tragedy." dr. paula bloom is a clinical psychologist and a blogger for the huffington post. she joins us now right here in atlanta. paula, good to speak with you. army officials said the gunman was suffering from -- or complained of suffering from a traumatic brain injury which he receive during his time in iraq, he's been treated for depression and anxiety. given all of that, what does that say to you about what his state of mind may have been and does that give you clues a toz what may have happened as a possible trigger? >> what it says is that there's a lot of vulnerability here. i remembered i listened to the commander's conference. he talked about that he already had a diagnosis of depression and anxiety and was in the process of going through the diagnostic process for post-traumatic stress disorder. so depression and anxiety, you know, they're a bit different. depression is feelings of sadness and hopelessness and those kinds of things and it's a really big key in this because we talk about him shooting

others but many people -- i mean, this is really a suicide in many ways and that is often depression. the anxiety is more about worry and those kinds of things but the ptsd diagnosis to me is very important because one of the big symptoms in ptsd is a hyperreactivity. and being sort of really spring loaded, walking around very spring loaded, very hypervigilant. and that would give me a lot of information to explain some of this behavior. >> something which struck me, though, officials say they served in iraq in 2011, he was now in the process of being evaluated if he was, in fact, suffering from post-traumatic stress disorder. that seems like an awfully long process. an awfully long time here, doesn't it? >> it does. but you never know when he presented with symptoms. a lot of times with ptsd you can have a delayed onset. in fact, you can't diagnose ptsd until it's been a month of symptoms and often times it's six months or a year that people have the actual symptoms of ptsd and also in the military, listen, we have limited resources for treatment and it's

very easy for people to say, hey, i have ptsd but there's a lot of consequences and a lot of benefits that come with that. so a lot of times the process to diagnosis it is much more deliberate than anxiety or depression. >> one thing which i think we should point out here, making this connection, we should be very care informal making this link between mental illness and also a motive for the shooting. >> such a great point because, listen, most people -- anxiety and depression and ptsd are far more common than people who are violent with it. this does not mean you're going to be violent. i think that's very responsible of you to bring that up. that's a very key point. >> finally, when we're looking at a motive and trying to work out exactly what happened here, when the shooter takes his own life, he suicides and there's no suicide note left behind, how difficult does it then become to work out exactly what was going on with this guy? >> it's very hard. i'll be curious to see. they said he was going -- undergoing treatment so it will be interesting for them to look at the treatment notes.

sometimes people do say and have some sort of plan that they may articulate. they may not. but it's really, really difficult because ultimately you really no matter what your profession is, you're a psychologist, whatever, you can't read people's thoughts. you cannot fully get into one's head and it's pain for for those around them. >> that was clinical psychologist and huffington post blogger dr. paula bloom. authorities say they won't rule out anything until their investigation is over. go to our web site, cnn.com, for the very latest on the story. we are continuing to update the site with new details which we're gathering from our reporters as well as what we're hearing from officials on the ground. find all of that at cnn.com at any time. still to come here, after weeks of searching and still no sign of flight 370, anguished families get a promise from malaysia's prime minister. >> i know that until we find the plane, many families cannot

start to grieve. i cannot imagine wham they must be going through. but i can promise them that we will not give up. .

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malaysia airlines flight 370 has become a nightmare for the relatives of those on board. their loved ones vanished four weeks ago and no one can tell them what happened. after meeting his australian counterpart today, prime minister najib razak offered these words of comfort. >> we are here today in cities and countries from the world where families of those on board wait and wait desperately for news. and in the vastness of the indian ocean where mh-370 disappeared. let's get more on this now. pauline chiou is live in beijing. how are they dealing with news from investigators that this mystery may never be solved? okay, is pauline with us? do we have -- i think we may

have a small problem with pauline there in beijing, we'll come back to her in a moment. in the meantime we're at the international weathercenter because we've been keeping a very close eye on the weather. like we said, some days it's good, some days it's bad. right now you're saying it's pretty good? >> we're in the rare stretch where we'll have a couple days of generally clear skies. improving some time in the next several hours into tomorrow afternoon. right now the southern tear of the search zone we have a weak disturbance so that southern tier has low visibility issues but this region roughly the size of the u.s. state of kentucky so expansive area of the search zone where the weather pattern at this point looks good but i want to point out something in the corner of your screen out there. to the north and west we know there is a tropical cyclone trying to develop. rainfall the next couple days nonexistent but low probability of this forming into a tropical cyclone into the next 24 hours but we think odds will improve towards the next 48 to 27 72 h.

the models want to bring it just west of the search zone. at this point we don't think lilt make it there in one piece because the water temperatures here are not conducive of supporting a storm system when it comes to tropical features but it will pack blustery winds up to tropical storm force winds and maybe even hurricane force wind gusts so that will churn up the seas in this region. also the cloud cover will be on the increase towards the latter portion of the week so we're watching that carefully. of course, john, as the search zone continues to move we continue to put an area where the water temperatures, of course, get warmer as you go to the north so that's something we're watching carefully with these cyclones in the area. >> appreciate you standing by there jumping in when we needed you. let's go back to pauline chiou live in beijing. pauline can hear us now. pauline, we are hearing this word from the investigators that this mystery may never be solved. that's got to be pretty fuf for the families there in beijing.

>> and that's something that the families, most of them, will just not accept. they want to find the plane. they need an answer. they need some sort of hard evidence and from their perspective they're saying this is 2014, technology is widespread, more than 20 countries are involved in this search, how can you not find a boeing 777? as you can imagine, this weight has been just so excruciating and i sat down once again with several family members this morning and they at this point just want to express themselves. they want to express how frustrated they are. and one woman talked about how she's been coping. >> translator: we comfort each other. i'll pretend to be strong for her, she will do the same thing for me. we are crying inside. we have to support each other as we bear all this pain. >> john, she's talking about

"each other" she's talking about people she just met 27 days ago. this woman is staying in a hotel that's not the lido hotel behind me. this is one of the five hotels in beijing. she says she's become friends with some of the family members in the hotel where they're staying and she talks about the pain. you can see it written all over their face. and as one man put it, he says "it's painful for us to talk to you, to talk to the media, but you cannot imagine the amount of pain we're feeling inside." >> absolutely. one things which interesting here is china's envoy to malaysia now seems to be trying to walk back animosity between beijing and kuala lumpur saying essentially the chinese government is not ang write the malaysian officials for the way they've carried out the search and investigation. >> he seems to be dialing back because we know the chinese government has been putting pressure on the malaysian government. the president has sent the

deputy foreign minister a couple of days ago to put pressure. but we need to distinguish between diplomacy as well as families. the malaysian government, the chinese government, they have fairly good ties, fairly good relations, they've got economic and trade ties so it makes sense that they do need to preserve this relationship. let's talk about the families now. they are angry. they're very upset. i haven't met one person who has said that they're satisfied or happy with the way this search has been going and part of the reason why they're ang i have the mixed messages that they're getting. keep in mind, the prime minister of malaysia on monday, march 24 said that you have to presume there are no survivors and that the plane went down. and then later on that week the acting transportation minister says he has hope against hope that there may be survivors. some that's a big mixed message right there and the families here are saying that's the problem. they're just not getting a consistent stream of information or uniform information so that's why they're so frustrated and

angry. john? >> i did note that china's envoy to malaysia blamed western media for fabricating stories and stirring up trouble which is pretty much an old standby, i guess. pauline, thank you. pauline chiou live for us there in beijing. before we go, one last look at our top story, the fatal shooting at the fort hood texas military base. a gunman there killed three people and wounded 16 others. authorities say he then killed himself. he's been identified as 34-year-old army specialist ivan lopez. several of the wounded remain in a critical condition. lopez had served in iraq, he was said to be suffering from depression and anxiety. the shooting happened some four and a half years after army major nidal hasan killed 13 people also at fort hood. thank you for watching cnn newsro newsroom, i'm john vouse. early start is coming up next in the united states. for everyone, stay with us for world business today.

breaking news overnight, 4 people dead, 16 others injured after a gunman opened fire at ft. hood. this morning, new information about the shooter and his history of mental illness. also new, how the tragedy played out and how it's affecting a community hit by the same violence just five years ago. we are live with the very latest. good morning. welcome to "early start." i'm christine romans. >> and i'm poppy harlow. it is thursday, april 3rd, 4:00 a.m. we begin a