tom fuentes, where does it take the investigation next?oesn't change the course of the investigation. from the aspect of the criminal investigators they were looking at all possibilities of what occurred in that cockpit and who might have been at the controls of that aircraft when it changed direction and flew off into the indian ocean or on the northern route. i think from the other standpoint, the other aspects have changed frequently. i don't know what to say about that. technicians and experts who read radars and know about ground communication systems and immarsat satellite systems, that's where a lot of data changed overtime first three weeks of the investigation. >> justin green, an aviation attorney with me in new york. i guess i know you worked extensively on the egypt air flight 990 where there was a pilot suicide. do you see any similarities at all here? >> not at all. two things. in egypt air, i was just a young associate at the time but in egypt air we had cockpit voice reporter pretty soon after the accident. we had indicatio

let me thank tom fuentes, mary schiavo, kit darby. live inside a cockpit flight simulator where our own martin savidge will break down the significance of flight 370's transmission and what we learned about those transmissions today. dear sun, you created light. you are loved. celebrated. but things have changed since you got into this business. at philips, we're creating led light that people can color... adjust... even make beautiful sunsets. dear sun, you might be number one, but we're getting closer. innovation and you philips put it on my capital one i earn unlimited double miles. hey, you're not the charles barkley? yes i am. nah charles barkley is way taller. there's my picture on the wall. yeah that could be anyone. what about my jersey over there? oh yeah, that's your jersey. there's my bobble head right behind you. alright well let me see you bobble. yeah, i'm just not buying it man. earn unlimited double miles with no blackout dates from the capital one venture card. my brother john, he works here. john, you know this guy?

and now to help us we have tom fuentes, and jim tillman, and cnn analyst and retired pilot himself, and our own cnn aviation analyst miles o'brien. mile miles, i want to start with you, just for the viewers to i suppose put the expectations into context here. this is the third satellite photo that we have had and treated as a clue, and the first one was really a disastrous mistake, and a chinese satellite as well, and put the search up there in the south china sea, and now we have a photo, and the australians said that there were a lot of planes in the air yesterday, and saw nothing, and how significant of a development is this or does it show just how little progress is made in the investigation that, you know, what they have to latch on to clues like this, because they don't have anything else? >> well, what you said there at the end is the most accurate statement that we can say. in the absence of anything else to look for, you check it out. but we don't even know that it went in that direction, and you know, when you look at that piece, not only is the piece an odd and large shape a

we have chuck, tom fuentes and susan. chuck, your company makes the component that emits the signal from the flight data signal. i understand it's been tested down to 20,000 feet and there are parts of the indian ocean that go deeper than that. are there blind spots in effect in the deep water? >> i can't comment on the blind spots necessarily, but it has been tested successfully to the 20,000 -- to the depth of 20,000 feet. so that's what it's certified to. but as far as the ocean floor, you really can't comment on that necessarily. >> okay. you did mention earlier i want to remind our viewers on land, that ping from the flight data recorders does not go off. it only goes off when it touches water. tom, i want to bring you in here. one of the key revelations over the last 24 hours, that good night from the cockpit, the handoff when the jet was leaving malaysian air space, radar space, going to vietnam, that good night happened several minutes after the first data system, the acars system was turned off. if you can put in

tom fuentes is still with us. our law enforcement analyst.'ve worked on these international investigations. why wouldn't they go into that home just to rule out the possibility that someone untoward might have happened? >> i think, wolf, the only explanation that i can think of is that maybe in their legal system they don't quite have enough probable cause to get a search warrant to actually go into their homes because there's been no indication specifically that there was wrongdoing on their part. >> but the lead pilot, the 53-year-old pilot, he had in his home the simulator of a cockpit, if you will, and a lot of people are suggesting, maybe they should take a look at that, see if he was looking at various destinations, looking at various dress rehearsals, anything along those lines. >> right. you would think they'd want to look at that and computer and e-mails that he sent and received, phone records, bank records, are either of them in financial trouble, are they in trouble with their employer? you know, in some kind of a situation with t

turn to law enforcement analyst tom fuentes. tom, what can you tell me about the stolen passports an these two passengers that were traveling with them? what we understand thus far is that investigators have examined surveillance video and they have also determined that these tickets were purchased at the same time. what kind of questions do you have in terms of advancing the whereabouts and locations of the passengers. >> right now it's going to be tough to link the videos to the individuals who purchased the fraudulent tickets. that will be ongoing and they will try to do that but it's not going to be an easy match. there is the possibility the individuals carrying those passports had nothing to do with the aircraft. it could be a coincidence. it's too soon to tell that. but the authorities can't wait to confirm if it's a terrorist act before they start looking at the passenger list and the backgrounds of as many passengers as can be identified. i want to clarify reports of the fbi on the way there. the fbi is already there. t

kit darby, tom fuentes, thanks so much. we'll return to this conversation. we are entering the fourth week of the search for any evidence as it pertains to flight 370. >>> meantime, people in california are still trying to get back to some kind of normalcy after friday's big earthquake. but could it be a sign of more to come? that's coming pup. and we'll hear from the man famous for handling some of the biggest high-profile compensation cases. he tells us his predictions for the families of those missing on flight 370. [ mom ] over the years, i've learned how to stretch my party budget. but when my so-called bargain brand towel made a mess of things, i switched to bounty basic. look! one sheet of bounty basic is 50% stronger than a full sheet of the bargain brand. bounty basic. the strong but affordable picker upper. definitely not routine. bounty basic. and that can take a lot of energy. introducing nature valley breakfast biscuits. four biscuits, 26 grams of whole grains that give you the energy to help keep you going. i love nature valley breakfast biscui

i want to bring in tom fuentes. tom, what do you make of this latest information about the positioning of this plane? >> hi, don. same thing everybody else is saying. you still can't rule out some partial mechanical failure, enough to eliminate communication but not enough to bring the plane immediately down. but you can't rule out either the act of terrorism. obviously appears to not be a catastrophic explosion or the plane wouldn't be airborne for another hour and a half. but it could include somebody gaining access to that cockpit and taking over the controls or forcing the pilot and co-pilot to fly where they wanted to fly. and disengaging the transponder at the same time. maybe they were able to take control before they did that. obviously they're already raising the issue about the mental health and stability of the pilots. all of these are possibilities. it could still be mechanical, it could still be suicide, it could still be terrorism. it's as baffling as it ever was, other than now there's a new place to a

pamela brown, tom fuentes, thanks to you as well. heartbreaking scenes in kuala lumpur where some passengers are enduring an excruciating wait for any information about the plane's fate. today some just couldn't take it any longer and their emotions boiled over. [ speaking foreign language ] >> heartbreaking scene. cnn's atika shubert is in the malaysian capital. you were right in the middle of those emotional scenes today. tell us what you saw, what it was like. >> well, it was utter chaos, frankly. what happened was these family members came here specifically to address the press briefing. they unfurled this white banner and they gan began to speak to press. at that point security came in and literally dragged these women out. you could hear that heart-rending scream of one of the mothers. it was very badly handled by malaysian officials. and the fact that you had these hoards of press following them didn't help it either. and what family members have told me essentially is that what they need is just some sort of consistent story,

also joining us to discuss what's going on, tom fuentes, our cnn law enforcement analyst, former assistant director. how likely is it that terrorists may have commandeered this aircraft and done with it whatever they wanted? what do you think, bob? >> well, you know, that's sheer speculation at this point. i always discount the conspiracy theory, but now that it's clear, it's fairly clear that this plane's been diverted and somebody with knowledge of a boeing 777 did divert it, it's terrorism or someone in the crew had other motivations. that's what the cia is looking at, who on that plane would have an interest in crashing it into the krouground or stealing it? they're going through the passenger list, they're founding on the malays to give them full disclosure on who got on the airplane. who else besides the two iranians got on with fake passports, there could be others? and then looking at the chinese individual passengers trying to figure out motivations. >> there's a lot they have to go through. there's a paragraph, tom, that jumped out at me from today's "wall street journal" lead st

also former american airlines pilot, mark wise, and cnn law enforcement analyst, tom fuentes, former assistant director at the fbi. so peter, they came back empty-handed today. what does that say to you? these sophisticated aircraft, the p-3, the p-8, the poseidon, the orion, they knew where to go. they knew the location of where this debris was a few days ago. but they didn't see anything. >> well, it's disappointing, but it's not surprising, wolf. i mean, this is a huge area. even with the sighting of the wreckage, it is still a daunting task. and is going to take weeks, months, maybe even years. >> even though they did see something that was floating now five days ago, big objects, big -- could have been part of the plane, could have been a container, could have been something else. >> and it could have sunk. they had rough weather there for a day-and-a-half. it could have gone under. it's just -- and we're not clear what the currents were, where they were moving. we think we know. but we don't know for sure. >> if the plane had actually run out of fuel, there's no fuel left on th

once again, joining us, aviation analyst, mark weise and peter goelz and tom fuentes. t do you make of this new development, tom? >> i think that shows, wolf, they are having the other experts, the u.s. and the british and other experts look at the data, look at the information. as i mentioned earlier, in terms of the flight simulator, would they need to look at the monitor, the joystick or the wires. they need to look at the memory in the computer itself. or did he have any other evidence in the house, like thumb drives, that might have flight plans for some other exotic city that he might have intended to take that airplane to. so so far, if they're finding none of that information -- doing that kind of a computer search is definitely not as difficult as searching raiders and satellite and that type of information. it's a much -- it's something the police do all of the time, practically every day. to look at data on a computer. >> peter, what should the malaysians do to reassure the families of the -- of those 239 people who were on board that they know what they're d

and tom fuentes, senior law enforcement analyst. clive, let's begin with you.ked what it might be. take us through if you can what might float and ma wwhat might float. >> the plane is not designed to float so what happens to it is very dependent on the dynamics of the angle at which it hits the ocean and the speed at which it hits the only. the only thing we have to go on that's any guide is what happened to air france 447. when it sank into the south atlantic, and in that case what it happened was that the plane hit the water almost as though it was landing at an airport, relatively stable latitude so the rear of the aircraft hit the water first and the nose sank and there was a huge what's called a vertical impact and the impact was so huge it went up through the cargohold into the cabin, compressed the seats in the cabin and compressed the spinal cords of the passengers on that flight. we know this from the examinations done afterwards so the dynamics are very complic e complicat complicated, how the airframe itself breaks up. most likely thing is the wings

tauchl tom fuentes, former assistant director of the fbi. peter, first to you. what do you make of this revised final communication from "all right, good night" to "good night malaysian -- not mh, but malaysian 370." what , if anything, should we read into that. >> what you read into it is, now you understand why the chinese families are so upset. with the malaysian government. this kind of correction, which is not minor, is just simply inexcusable, and inexplicable. what, they need to release the tower tapes right away. let people hear them. there's nothing secretive on them. and how they could -- how they could screw this up is just inkrentzab inkrentzable. >> to see what the pilot or co pilot had to say. mark, you're a 777 pilot. you're leaving malaysian air space, you're going into vietnamese air space. you want to complete the conversation with ground control, air traffic controllers in malaysia. what would you normally say? >> well, you know, what's come out is much more typical and much more related to ikao, the international krifl aviation organization,

tom fuentes is our law enforcement analyst, former assistant director of the fbi. the other breaking news this hour, tom, what the cia director, john brennan said, pointedly. he said he's by no means ruling out terrorism. in his words, quote, not at all. saying that terrorists since 9/11 have wanted to go after international aircraft. what do you make of that? >> wolf, i don't read anything into that or his tone of voice or how -- the way he stated that. because law enforcement and the intelligence community have never ruled out terrorism, ever, in this case. they have to investigate it as a possibility from the very beginning and have. so knowing that aircraft are a historic target for a variety of terrorist groups and they have never stopped putting out threat information regarding possible aircraft attacks, no one has ever ruled that out. nor in this case. and i think that what we have learned about the change of course, in a way, it raises as many or more questions as it answe answers. it's an important piece of information, but it shows that that plane was in t

back with us, the cnn aviation analyst mary schiavo and john mcgau, and tom fuentes.the break, john mcgaw, there are three things kind of missing thus far, especially to help ease the grieving loved ones. you say there needs to be grief counselors and a command and control center. and the third item would be what that is missing thus far? >> well, the search of the land, fredericka. it's with as much sympathy as i can say, if they are in the water, they are gone. so concentrate on the land. and each area that has responsibility for that land. take their ministers or whoever their lead people are and let them exclude that part of their country or that part of the land. so that you get it down to where it might be just a small area that you can then search so that you're not sitting on a possibility of it being on the land and not doing something very immediate about it. >> and now today, in fact, the malaysian defense minister says they will concentrate more now on land searches. so i wonder, mary, now with day ten of this search, trying to get to the bottom of this mi

>> let's go back to miles o'brien, peter goelz and law enforcement analyst tom fuentes. miles, i don't understand, in this day and age in 2014, you can only detect this pinger here on this box for only two miles away for only 30 days when it has the whole history of the flight, so much crucial information are we living in 1950 right now? >> yes. in a word we are. there is great irony here. some of the aircraft involved in searching for this aircraft, the pm p-3, has a floating black box capability. how redoundant is that? of course, we have the technology to have lagitude and when you think about how we're surfing the internet at 37,000 feet routinely these days, the fact that the aircraft is not identifying where it is on the face of the planet is absolutely outrageous. >> it's amazing to me that -- everybody has been e-mailing for three weeks now, tweeting, e-mailing, questioning, a 777 with 239 people on board, one of the most sophisticated jetliners in the world, it can simply vanish in thin area like this and nobody can find it? >> this is in reality 30-year-old tec

this first one i'm going to give it to tom fuentes. hijacking by passenger or passengers.aul says, ask if it could be a hijacking gone wrong. the hijacker ran out of fuel flying under radar. so if it was a hijacking, are you perplexed by no claim of responsibility, tom? >> not necessarily. there have been other cases where there hasn't been. also the flying under the radar, i would dispute that. when that plane turned back and went through three other airport radars, those radars go to the ground. that plane would have had to have been a subway train to avoid radar. those radars would have picked that plane up. there's no going under those radars. >> this scenario is batteries on board catching fire. here's what lori says, huge question is the lithium batteries on board. could that be a cause of explosion and crash? huge question mark for me, could that be the cause, jeff wise? >> sure. theoretically, that could be the cause. there could be an unknown cause of fire. fires can rise from a number of causes. there haven't been any indications, there's no evidence for a fire.

let's bring in our law enforcement analyst, the former fbi assistant director, tom fuentes along with mark weiss. tom, you think now that they've narrowed the search in the southern area, does that mean you think they're getting closer to actually finding something? >> i don't know, wolf. this is a phrase we've heard about ten times in the last 12 days, we've narrowed the search area. i don't know completely what it's based on. seems to be based on a negative that surely, some country would have seen it had it gone north. maybe yes, maybe no. we've seep where thailand and other countries look back ten days later and say, across our radar, i don't know we can rely on just the fact it didn't show up there, or we don't think it did, to say it for sure went this way. also, you could speculate the reason the area is being narrowed is that maybe australia saw that plane and said, okay, it's over here, but don't tell anybody we told you. >> so, the fbi is now looking at the hard drive from the pilot, the co-pilot, as well as the flight simulator the pilot had. >> they're going to look for an

in evan perez and miles o'brien and cnn law enforcement analyst, former assistant fbi director, tom fuentes. miles, let's start with you. what do you make of this information that they are making out? >> a 270-degree turn right all the way down to left, it's very difficult, wolf, to come up with a scenario where that is some sort of a mechanical failure or malfunction. if a pilot was in a bad way, rapid decompression, fire, whatever you want to say, he or she would not take that long way around to gain that direction. it would be a sharp turn to the left. and so it's very difficult -- i've talked to a lot of pilots about this, it's very difficult to look at that diagram and not say that it was an intentional act of some kind. that jives with what nic robertson's sources have been telling him. the one thing i might quibble with on his sources, that could have very well have been flown by autopilot. it could have been flown automatically and in a gentle way that the passengers would have had no idea. >> tom, i know you have good sources over there in malaysia as well, that they are coming to

than you, tom fuentes, former analyst and drirector of the fb. >>> now, also, overseas the ukraine crisis is more volatile with fresh rounds of bullying from the pro russian forces in crimea, and meanwhile president obama spoke with key leaders today, and all agree that russia needs to immediately deescalate the situation. the president spoke individually with prime minister david cameron, and this comes as secretary of state john kerry issued a note to his counter part of france, president hollande, and also to prime minister lavrov. in crimea, a group seized a capital office in simferopol chance visited the scene after masked men showed up there, and said that the mood was oddly calm there. and a short time ago, i talked with chance about the situation, and this is what he had to say. matthew, two issues that the u.s. officials are watching closely is one, the number of russian troops on the ground there, and two, how the troops and the militias are used invading or taking over the ukrainian posts, government posts and ukrainian posts, and are you seeing more troops like that? >> yes, w

and the former fbi assistant director tom fuentes.h you, you're reporting breaking potentially new ground. tell our viewers precisely what "usa today" has. >> as pamela says, a look at captain zaharie's background has not found anything that would indicate that he would have been capable of such a terrible act. they've looked into his finances, according to our source, who is a high level source for the kuala lumpur meese department. they found nothing amiss, according to this source. they also haven't found any indication of militancy or ties to militant groups. however, they're drawing their conclusion that he deliberately committed this act and they're doing it based on the fact that they believe he is the only one really capable of doing all the things that had been done on that plane to divert it down to the south indian ocean. >> michael schmidt of "the new york times," you've been doing a lot of reporting on the pilot and co-pilot. what are you hearing? >> u.s. investigators say that's plausible, but as we were saying before, t

i want to introduce peter goelz, cnn law enforcement analyst tom fuentes. peter, let's talk about this new development and it's a huge development now because if in fact this plane flew four or five hours after the transponders stopped sending signals, where could this plane be? >> you're absolutely right, wolf. one, it's good news a little bit because it's showing that the agencies and malaysian government are cooperating more, looking at the radar together, the satellite data together, they are making decisions that our government and their government can agree on. that's a plus. but as you said, this area is tremendously large. this is an impossible task. they've got to narrow it down more. >> and correct me if i'm wrong, as a result of this new development, the likelihood that there was a catastrophic mechanical error as opposed to some human getting involved and doing this, the likelihood of mechanical problem has dimmed. >> that's right. the mechanical structural has reduced and human increased. >> so where does that leave the investigation now, tom?

i want to bring in evan perez and tom fuentes.ack to that in a moment, the whole pilot issue. but interpol released an interesting statement today really critical of the malaysians for not checking the database that interpol has. as we know, two passengers with stolen passports got on to that flight. the truth is, this is from the interpol press release, the truth is that in 2014 prior to the tragic disappearance of flight 370, malaysia's immigration department did not conduct a single check of passengers' passports against interpol's databases. what do you make of this? because pa malaysia claims that the computer system was too slow. >> that's an absurd claim. >> the malaysian claim? >> the united states queries that database 30 million -- sing ga p pore, 30 million times. in two-tenth of a second when the pass board is scanned, it goes through that database and it's scanned. that's a false claim. >> should we read anything into the fact that the interpol is releasing this statement? there was always suspicion about these irania

tom fuentes, cnn law enforcement analyst. former assistant director of the fbi. so mark, let's talk about this. so what do you think when you see what's being described as these objects? you've flown 777s. does it sound, does it appear to be based on the initial indications wreckage from that plane? >> you know, wolf, we heard this before when we heard the 300 objects. the 122 objects. and those seem to be debris fields. again, trying to manage expectations. we have been down this road before. and certainly everybody is hopeful. you know, some of the pieces, single pieces, may or may not really be part of the wreckage. we just have to wait. this one, fortunately, is close enough to a ship that's being repositioned that will have hopefully have it in our hands tomorrow. >> if it is wreckage, peter, and you've investigated a lot of these disasters, is it likely there's one individual piece floating around in an area? wouldn't there be a whole bunch of stuff sort of clogged up together? >> well, you would have hoped that that was the case three weeks ago. but today

joining us, law enforcement analyst, tom fuentes. what do you make of this new piece of information we're now getting from nic? >> hi, wolf. it provides great leads for the investigators to follow up on, particularly in thailand. the passports were originally stolen in 2012, the second one in 2013. in phuket, thailand, a resort town. and now you have the tickets actually being fraudulently obtained by using the stolen passports in thailand also. and passports were paid -- or the tickets were paid for in thai currency, the thai bottom. so it will be a great lead to locate this individual dealing with that travel agency and intensive investigation of that agency themselves. are they providing stolen passports on a regular basis to a variety of customers for many different reasons, which could be unrelated to terrorism but passport fraud, people using for drug trafficking or organized crime or any number of reasons that could be possibly why they were used. >> and the fact that this individual that nic describes, this iranian, that may

tom fuentes in washington, jim clancy in kuala lumpur. let's start with renee marsh, joining us by phone in washington. so, renee, there has been some confusion surrounding the identities of two of the passengers. malaysia airlines saying there is an austrian passenger and italian passenger, but austria and italy are denying that because of the issue of passports, one stolen or lost. and possibly replaced. explain to us what's going on here? >> that's the big question that investigators have and it's something that people are really zeroing in on here. if indeed those passports were lost and stolen, were they reported lost and stolen, authorities are saying they were, so the question now becomes how did someone get on board this malaysia airlines plane with these documents that should not have been valid. this is a question that investigators really want to get to the bottom of and so, how will they get to the bottom of this at this point? because as i speak to you, this plane is still categorized as missing, so you know, i spoke with one

aviation analyst, former american airlines pilot, mark weise, and cnn law enforcement analyst, tom fuentes, former assistant director of the fbi. tom, it's significant that now the malaysians are at least letting the fbi go into those hard drives and investigate. >> right, wolf. and they'll be able to tell deleted files that were not written over. and that's the problem with this. i mean, you can commercially buy programs for your own computer to go back to files you've deleted. what technically happens is, you delete a file, actually only the first letter from the name of the file is deleted. so it doesn't come back up. and when you go on your computer and say how much room do i have? it doesn't count that. it says that's available space. the next question is, when you save a new file, did it save over the top of -- in other words, erasing the previous file, or just pick new or different space. and that's what they have to look at. they bring up every deleted file that they can, and determine whether or not it's been written over in the interim. >> how suspicious should we be about the de

tom fuentes can help shed light on the stolen passport issue. he's our law enforcement analyst and former assistant director of the fbi. tom, for so many years, this has been a fear. somebody is going to get onboard that plane who simply doesn't belong there. the whole stolen passport issue. is this now coming to roost? >> it could be, deborah. this could be something that -- that has nothing to do with the reason that airplane crashed. or it could be that the two people that got on did have something to do with it. we don't know. it may be actually a long time before we can confirm one way or the other. 1 billion people a year worldwide board aircraft without their travel documents being screened. that's just a fact of life right now. secretary general of interpol, ron noble, has been pushing for years to get governments to check the outbound passengers as well as the inbound when you come through passport control. many countries still do not do it. here in the, the united states makes 240 million inquiries per year into the interpol lost and st

i want to bring back tom fuentes. assistant director of the fbi, national analyst, operative seth young. bob, i wonder if i can talk to you first. we talked before the break about how this is an international effort. the malaysians finally reaching out for hem asking 25 nations to examine satellite data. they got 11 nations searching on the water and in the air for signs of this plane. you have two tensions here kind of pulling that coalition apart, right? you have frustration with the malaysian government, the chinese sniping, the indians withdrawing their search and then you have sensitivities in this area of countries not wanting to reveal their capabilities. how good their radars are. how extensive their satellite coverage is. how much do those tensions pull apart that coalition and hamper the investigation, do you think? >> you know, you hit the nail on the head. a country like india is not going to want to give up its radar screens, show the resolution, the real-time capture of images. they don't want to do it.

joining me right now cnn law enforcement analyst tom fuentes and, tom, let me get to you first.e're asking about these passports because apparently on the manifest were names matched to these passports which both countries, austria and italy, are now saying were stolen. so help us understand, you know, how to piece this together. on the level of importance, where is it? >> well, fredricka, it's important to be followed up on. if the individuals that previously owned those passports weren't passengers, who was? so that's going to be an important part of the investigation. i should add that i was on the executive committee of interpol for three years, worked closely with interpol for decades, and interpol maintains a database in france of lost and stolen passports. most of the 190 countries that belong to interpol which would include malaysia and china and in this case thailand, if that's where the passports were stolen, they enter that information into the database which contains over 30 million records in leon. in the united states, if you go through passport control in the u.s.

let's go back to our panel, our aviation analyst mark weiss and peter goelz and tom fuentes.ou're a pilot. one thing people have realized if this is debris from this airliner, it would basically correspond to where the flight could have run out of fuel if it had flown that entire six or seven hours. >> absolutely. you know, i think what's been done is they've taken the amount of time it would have normally gotten to beijing with the alternate fuels that it would have had and reprojected that on a southern path. and given that, given the winds at the time, this is the most probable area that this would have been in. so i think all of that coming together really kind of focuses the attention and now put the resources there. >> some have suggested even if it were cruising on automatic pilot, say the pilots were disabled for whatever reason, runs out of fuel, it could still glide for a while before it actually went into the water. >> yeah. aircraft are inherently stable. but obviously gravity is a very large pull. so had that scenario been the case, then the aircraft would have k

wallace, former director of the faa's accident investigation and our cnn law enforcement analyst, tom fuentes, former assistant fbi director. steven, now that the ntsb, steven would lasso owe now that the ntsb apparently involved, why is it difficult if the malaysian air force says it spotted this plane going across malaysia, no transponder, but they have radar, why is it so hard to interpret that radar? >> well, i'm glad to hear just now that the u.s. experts and ntsb has some very first-rate radar experts and faa experts as well looking at that data. without the transponder on, you're just looking at the bounce off the skin of the airplane. this is basically radar that is designed to help you see somebody who doesn't want you to see them. like an enemy. so that primary radar is just a sort of -- can be kind of a fuzzy blip. so -- and whereas with the normal transponder, you're going to have a data block as to where the airplane is, the speed and altitude and all that. >> so it's -- so they think the malaysia air force, this was the plane, the 777, flying across malaysia, over the sea to the

and tom fuentes, cnn's law enforcement analyst, former assistant director of the fbi. i was a little surprised. i must say, i was plenty surprised that the prime minister of malaysia would make this announcement, based on analysis from inmarsat, the british radar company, the satellite company, based on deep analysis. but they still haven't located actually any debris, even though they're apparently getting close to finding something that may or may not be related to the plane. were you surprised he would go this far, that malaysia would tell everybody all hope is lost without any physical evidence? >> actually, i was, wolf. i thought that, you know, you could wait until you even have one piece of debris confirmed and say, okay, now we know that the plane is in the ocean. so absent that, just based on the analysis of the satellite data, it seemed like a little premature, unless they already know. >> maybe they have a piece of debris they've already got in possession and confirmed and haven't put that part out yet. >> i have to assume, he knows more than he's saying, th

weeks together before a determination was made, whether it was a criminal act or an accident. >> tom fuentes thank you both very much for being with us and sharing your expertise. >>> next up, putin starts his own offensive and the prime minister of ukraine heads to washington. more with u.s. deputy national security advisor tony blinken is next. ou know that if you wear a partial, you're almost twice as likely to lose your supporting teeth? try poligrip for partials. poligrip helps minimize stress which may damage supporting teeth by stabilizing your partial. care for your partial. help protect your natural teeth. being carried in your arms... but after a morning spent in the caribbean, playing pirates with you in secret coves, an afternoon swimming with dolphins, finished with a movie watched against the setting sun... she won't exactly be short on memories. princess cruises, come back new. ♪ princess cruises, come back new. why are house repu"retreating," ng," and privately saying they'd rather do "nothing" on immigration reform this year? doing nothing puts jobs on ice... forces us to lo

and cnn law enforcement analyst tom fuentes, former fbi director. steven, any of these scenarios make more sense to you? >> wolf, i heard an expert say, you know, it's time to call an investigation of the investigation. and i agree with that. >> the malaysian government's investigation? >> yes. the entire investigation. you know, until you know where the accident occurred, you're not sure which country's in charge. but absent that international waters, the country of registry malaysia is in charge. as near as i can tell, this accident investigation hasn't even started. you convene the parties together, you designate groups to focus on different areas. this is the normal iko process. now, we seem to have a new theory every day. two days ago we were focused on the radar data. >> malaysian air force. >> right. people have questioned that. experts i've talked to say there's a lot of reasons that that doesn't look too reliable. but it was worth looking at. yesterday we had this floating piece of wreckage that looked to a lot -- >> chinese satellite image

peter goelz, former ntsb managing director and tom fuentes, cnn's law enforcement analyst, former assistantor of the fbi. right to the questions, tom. first one for you. how can they say the flight crashed in the indian ocean and yet they still haven't recovered anything, #what are they hiding. >> that's the thing. the calculations of the inmarsat technicians. there is no debris. no other separate proof to corroborate their information. either they're hiding it or they want to have some closure. maybe slightly prematurely. >> they want a closure, but this is not bringing closure. this is only bringing more frustration to the families of the passengers. mark, here's a question. how does auto pilot work in an onboard emergency? is it possible the pilots became incapacitated? >> well, it depends on the emergency that you have. you're normally flying with it on, other than necessarily the takeoff. you could have it on for a landing. in an emergency, depending on the type of situation, you would turn it off. if you had it on this program, it could either be programmed to follow the flight manage

tom fuentes is a cnn analyst and former fbi assistant director. this flight simulator. i guess it has been a week now, right, since they first started. are you surprised they are still searching? >> no. i'm not surprised but i would like to add, they are not searching it on our behalf. they are searching it on the behalf of the malaysians. when they get the results, that's going to be directly conveyed back to the malaysians. later, that will get leaked out when other officials in our government know about it and typically leaks come out pretty quickly after that as to what was found or what was relayed back. as of now, everything that they find will go back to the malaysian government. as we've seen, they don't feel the need to tell everybody as much as we would normally say in this country during a crisis like this. they may hold it close to the vest. we may not know for a long time exactly what the findings were. >> well, considering that the families are demanding answers and putting pressure on the malaysian government, might they be more fort

tom fuentes and tom flores. before we dive in, gentlemen. at 1:07 the plane's data reporting system shuts down. just 14 minutes later at 1:21 a.m. the transsponder sent its last signal. now, authorities believe they were turned off separately and deliberately. i'll start with you, bob, does that mean we can rule out some kind of catastrophic event happened? >> i don't think we can rule out anything. this is so complicated and so much unknown. i think, you know, we all love to speculate and we like to speculate responsibly and i just think the kind of information that is out there makes it enormously difficult to say anything for certain. >> but wouldn't those communication systems go down at the same time if the plane, let's say, exploded? >> well, it depends on what communication systems you're talking about, too. if these are the systems that are reporting the engine parameters and functioning, that's one thing. if it's, if it's what the plane puts out ordinarily, other than that, you're talking about a different place. >> so, tom, i want

tom fuentes is an analyst. not much to go on yet. it is 11 days into this. >> that's right.es out, i don't know how helpful they are. you were just raising more questions in the last hour that thailand just now figures out 10 or 11 days into this that their radar said something was unusual. you would think the first day this goes missing that every neighboring country in asia would be looking at their radars to see and would know relatively quickly if they had something very unusual, either come into their radar space or into their air space for the country or nearby as in this case. if it was an everyday matter and nothing had been reported anywhere in the world about i amissia missing aircraft, you see strange things on the periphery of the coverage. when you know that this disaster has happened, that day, to your neighboring country and then, what, you don't find out for ten days before you make it known. i think that's the part that misty phis me. >> the other part that is misty phiing. let's say the thai air force notices this plane. it was flight 370 on its regular pat

yesterday i talked to tom fuentes about this very thing. he's a former fbi guy. course they're considering all the possibilities. of course they are. he doesn't believe there's a lack of imagination at play in this scenario, but he's an investigator. he's with the fbi. investigators tend to be -- they're not going to come out and say, no, we're not considering every possibility. that's not even possible. what do you think? >> well, i don't know what the investigators are currently considering and i don't know that they are using their full imagination, but the way you get the full testing of every hypothesis is to get people with different points of view and have them examine each other's high pot cease and the facts. as you point out here, the fact here is a real derth of facts. the plane went down in a hellish environment constantly and whether there will be any facts to debate is an open question. >> do you think when all is said and done, and i'm hoping they'll figure it out, i hope so, and if they do, should there be some sort of international coalition put

tom fuentes, thank you so much. >>> our own richard quest recently met some members of the missing crew while doing a report for cnn international, and earlier today he described that experience, and revealed what he learned during that interview. >> yeah, two or three weeks ago we were filming on malaysian airlines, in the cockpit, for cnn business traveler, this has all been authorized and properly regulated and there was a safety check captain with us as well, and it was apparently the same copilot, and we believe maybe the same captain that was onboard the aircraft. these are the pictures of landing the aircraft at, we flying down from hong kong to kuala lumpur, and it is one of those very strange coincidences. >> you know, this flight disappeared just about one-third of a way into the six-hour flight. technically. what's happening at that point, and what might cause a problem? i've heard this might have been asked the safest part of the flight? >> there's no question. this plane was, the fwraz iphran the cruise. flying about 36,000 fleet according to various logs. maybe drifting up

we spoke to our law enforcement analyst tom fuentes, and he said that is something that should have a close look into as the investigators are looking into the flight. >> jim, it is an important issue to resolve of who used those passports to get on the plane and why. in a case like this, yes, it is too early to speculate, however, the law enforcement, and the intelligence community can't wait until pieces of the plane are recovered or the flight data recorder or the voice cockpit recorders are found and analyzed and then a year or two decide it was terrorism, and we should look at that. they need to look at every possible issue right now. >> we learned a lot of lessons and one, previous bombers and terrorists have traveled on foreign or fake passports and not foreign, but fake passports and including very significant bombers associated with the 9/11 terrorism, and also concerns me where the plane was headed. i have gotten chinese visas, and they are exacting and it takes time and not a bad process, but you don't up and decide to fly into beijing. >> and the investigation into the fli

cnn analyst tom fuentes in washington and andrew stevens in beijing. let's begin with tom. how are we going to find out the identities of these people who may have been indeed traveling on stolen passports? >> again that could be a slow process, but the first thing they'll do is going back over the videos of when they checked in, and see if there's video coverage of that at the ticket counter in the malaysian airport. see that would be, you know, probably the first clue to try on that. i should add something to my earlier reporting about visas for china. you can enter about seven cities in china and if you stay less than 72 hours, you basically come in, play tourist, go shopping, and leave, you don't need a visa. it's considered that you're in transit. so the malaysians and china southern airlines, the flight that they booked it through, will be able to say if they had round-trip tickets to leave china less than 72 hours, they would not need a visa. but a lot of this is going to go back to the circumstances of when those passports were stolen. see if there's any information

also with us is mike weiss, a 777 pilot and peter goelz, and former fbi assistant director tom fuentes. evan, let's start with you. you're talking to your sources and learning new information. tell us what you've learned. >> wolf, the leading theory, we're hearing from counterterrorism officials here in the united states, is that they believe this is ultimately going to prove to be an accident. now, they are not ruling out anything. there are still a lot of questions that they are looking into but they have come to this initial conclusion at least because they've looked at online profiles, they've done interviews with neighbors, friends, and they have done everything that they think they can to put together profiles of these two pilots to try to determine whether there was anything that indicates that they could have done this and what they've come to is that this is the only theory that they can come up with. >> these are counterterrorism experts? >> correct. >> these are counterterrorism experts. they see no evidence of terrorism. do they see any evidence potentially of pilot suicide

steven wallace, former faa director of accident investigation and cnn law enforcement analyst, tom fuentes. this latest revision of what the malaysians are saying about when the system was turned off before or after the formal good-bye, good night from the co-pilot, what does that mean to you? >> it means that there is still confusion about what happened and when it happened and when it was turned off. we don't expect that this late in the game of this event. the malaysian authorities are relying on what the technical analysts, the experts on radio satellites, communication systems and aircraft, they are relying on their analysis and what they believe happened and the experts are either disagreeing or changing their review of the facts and conclusions about the facts. so that's the difficulty in this. these are technical questions. when did that get shut off? what does that mean? how could they have shut it off? we don't have answers that are solid yet that may not change tomorrow. >> even though the malaysian government, steven, saying this was a manmade diversion, if you have, it was not

also, law enforcement analyst tom fuentes and peter goelz. you and we'll show our viewers, this is not a 777 but it's similar. you push a few buttons here and then you change the flight deck. when you hear these reports that someone in the cockpit changed the flight path for whatever reason, what goes through your mind? what was your thought when you heard that? >> well, i expected that. >> tell us why. >> because if -- there's an echo. because -- and so i'm a -- there was an echo. because the fact that the airplane changed its flight path indicates that somebody reprogrammed the flight management system. that's how it is done. that's the standard. there's very little hand flying anymore. shortly after takeoff you have the flight -- it takes over until shortly before landing which is, by the way, a challenge because pilots don't get to practice their piloting skills that much anymore. but it takes a huge burden off the pilot to not have to hand fly the airplane. >> if you were leading this investigation, peter, and you have led other investig

. >> let's bring in cnn law enforcement analyst tom fuentes. tom, i want to look at this map.f we can put the map up with tom so viewers understand the context of this question. we see these two paths here. the southern corridor, if this is where this plane was, the last ping we got from the satellite, if someone deliberately took control of this plane, it doesn't look like that path goes anywhere. so me question is which one has more credibility? which one is more probable, that it went south and someone deliberately took a plane nowhere or that this went north but then you consider that there would be radar all over all of these countries. and you see where it ends, in a pretty dangerous neighborhood. is there one that you give more credence than the other? >> hi, victor. i have to admit personally i don't give much credence to any of this the way things have gone the last couple of days. had that plane going in so many different directions, up, down, and sideways. and we're relying on technical experts to tell us what they're interpreting from the satellite signals. i hate

i think he's getting more intelligence than maybe they're letting on. >> let me bring tom fuentes intoe was a very important intriguing article in "the washington post" today. you probably saw it, about what's called this swift upgrade in which the plane, if they would have had it, malaysian airlines, would have given speed, altitude after all communications were cost. and it would have cost $10 per flight if they had it. they didn't install it. "the swift upgrade is technically the capability of bandwidth that the system can operate upon. the need for swift has never been mandated and all our aircraft has what's called the aero h satcom system." . i know you've been looking into this and you've worked with other countries in these kinds of investigations. what do you say? >> well, you see this in governments all over the world including ours. that budget decisions get made that are not the smartest decision and you look at something say it's so logical and so inexpensive, we really need to do this, yet when the ax falls, you may not get it. we're finding a number of systems with these

let's bring in mike weiss, peter goelz, and tom fuentes. peter, what do you make of all of these reports? five nations now providing satellite imagery of possible debris but no confirmation that any of it may be wreckage from the plane? >> well, i think this is good news. this is the type of debris field that you would expect to find. and i know that u.s. investigators just recently turned over new analysis of the rad radar pings that have narrowed their search area even further. they were the first ones to identify this area in the south indian ocean. they've narrowed it further within the last it 4 hours. hopefully this is good news. >> so let's say that one of the planes flying today, it's already friday in that part of the world, they spot something, they get a boat nearby, a ship, they pick something up, what do they do with that? walk us through the next step? >> initially they are going to be looking at any sign of the debris that would indicate how it became debris as our burn marks or other residue on it would indicate that it's pa