There were still more
questions than answers Thursday as U.S. officials said investigators
might start combing the Indian Ocean as they look for the missing
aircraft.
Why would authorities expand their search rather than narrowing it?
New information, U.S.
officials told CNN, indicates the missing airplane could have flown for
several hours beyond the last transponder reading.
Malaysian authorities
believe they have several "pings" from the airliner's service data
system, known as ACARS, transmitted to satellites in the four to five
hours after the last transponder signal, suggesting the plane flew to
the Indian Ocean, a senior U.S. official told CNN. That information
combined with known radar data and knowledge of fuel range leads
officials to believe the plane may have made it to that ocean, which is
in the opposite direction of the plane's original route.
"There is probably a
significant likelihood" that the aircraft is now on the bottom of the
Indian Ocean, the official said, citing information Malaysia has shared
with the United States.
It's the latest twist in a
case that's baffled investigators and grabbed global attention for
days. Information about the missing flight has been hard to come by, and
numerous leads have been revealed by some officials only to be debunked
by others hours later.
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There are conflicting reports about this latest lead as well.
Earlier Thursday the
Malaysian government denied a Wall Street Journal report that the plane
was transmitting data after the last transponder signal.
And a senior aviation
source with detailed knowledge of the matter also told CNN's Richard
Quest on Thursday that there was no technical data suggesting the
airplane continued flying for four hours, and said specifically that the
Wall Street Journal account was wrong.
But U.S. officials
maintained Thursday afternoon that the information from the airplane's
data system was being actively pursued in the plane investigation.
Analysts from U.S.
intelligence, the Federal Aviation Administration and the National
Transportation Safety Board have concluded that pings sent to a
satellite hours after the plane's last transponder signal likely came
from the missing aircraft, the senior U.S. official said.
"It appears the plane
was flying most of that time," the senior U.S. official said. The
"indication" that the plane kept flying is not based on U.S. government
information but rather based on radar readings and plane data.
There is reason to
believe the plane flew for four hours, the officials said, but there is
no specific indication where the plane actually is.
Multiple bursts of data were received indicating the plane was flying over the Indian Ocean, the senior U.S. official told CNN.
And there's another
confusing twist. An emergency beacon that would have sent data if the
plane was about to impact the ocean apparently did not go off, the
official said. The beacons, known as Emergency Locator Transmitters,
activate automatically upon immersion in fresh or salt water, but must
remain on the surface for a distress signal to transmit.
The failure of the
beacon to activate could mean that the plane didn't crash, that the
transmitter malfunctioned, or that it's underwater somewhere.
This new information has
now led to a decision to move the USS Kidd into the Indian Ocean to
begin searching that area, the official said.
The Navy destroyer is
now on its way there at the request of the Malaysian government, Cmdr.
William Marks of the U.S. 7th Fleet told CNN's Wolf Blitzer Thursday.
"We're not out here
freelancing, and it's not just something the U.S. Navy thinks and no one
else," Marks said. "So this was by request of the Malaysian government.
They asked the Navy to move our ship to the west into the Strait of
Malacca. ... It is coordinated, but certain ships and aircraft stay in
the east, and some go to the west. And we're moving to the west."
Mary Schiavo, former
inspector general for the U.S. Department of Transportation, said even
though it's unclear how accurate the latest information is, authorities
have no choice but to pursue it.
"Well I think basically
given that there is some information -- how reliable or not -- we have
to respond," she said. "There is no way we cannot follow up on this
lead. It would be inhumane. And it might turn out to be just the lead we
need. ... There isn't much, but I think we have to do it."
So are we any closer to knowing whether a mechanical problem, terrorism or hijacking could be tied to the plane's disappearance?
Not really, said Evy Poumpouras, a former Secret Service agent.
"The sad thing here is,
we don't have enough information to say, 'It's not this, it's not
that,'" she told CNN's Don Lemon. "We're still at the point, six days
later, it could be anything, and that's the frustrating thing."
Analyst: 'Deliberate act' shut down communication
An ABC News report added
another twist to the mystery Thursday evening. Citing two unnamed U.S.
officials, the network said two separate communications systems on the
missing aircraft were shut down separately, 14 minutes apart.
The officials told ABC
they believe the plane's data reporting system was shut down at 1:07
a.m. Saturday, while the transponder transmitting location and altitude
was shut down at 1:21 a.m.
"This is beginning to
come together to say that ...this had to have been some sort of
deliberate act," ABC aviation analyst John Nance told CNN's Erin
Burnett.
White House spokesman
Jay Carney didn't go into details when he discussed the search for the
plane Thursday, but he said "some new information that's not necessarily
conclusive" could lead U.S. searchers to the Indian Ocean.
"We are looking at
information, pursuing possible leads, working within the investigation
being led by the Malaysian government, and it is my understanding that
one possible piece of information or collection of pieces of information
has led to the possibility that a new search area may be opened,"
Carney said.
Originally, a report from The Wall Street Journal
said data from the plane's Rolls-Royce engine had raised questions
among some U.S. officials about whether the plane had been steered off
course "with the intention of using it later for another purpose," the
newspaper reported, citing a "person familiar with the matter."
The newspaper later
corrected its story, saying that data leading investigators to believe
the plane had flown for up to five hours came from the plane's
satellite-communication link, which the newspaper said is "designed to
automatically transmit the status of certain onboard systems to the
ground."
Malaysia's acting
Transportation Minister Hishammuddin Hussein rejected the Wall Street
Journal report at a news conference Thursday, reiterating that the plane
sent its last transmissions at 1:07 a.m. Saturday.
And Malaysia Airlines
Chief Executive Ahmad Jauhari Yahya said that Rolls-Royce and Boeing
have reported that they didn't receive transmissions of any kind after
1:07 a.m. Saturday. Air traffic controllers lost contact with the plane
shortly afterward, around 1:30 a.m.
Erin Atan, a spokeswoman
for Rolls-Royce in Asia, declined to comment on the matter, telling CNN
it was "an official air accident investigation."
Authorities have not
ruled out the possibility the plane continued to fly, however. And given
the lack of evidence, all options remain on the table.
Photos: The search for Malaysia Airlines Flight 370
The report threatened to
open the door to a fresh round of theories about what has become of the
plane, which vanished while flying over Southeast Asia on its way from
Kuala Lumpur to Beijing.
Four more hours in the air could have put the plane many hundreds of miles beyond the area currently being searched.
But one aviation industry observer expressed skepticism about the report even before the denials by officials.
"I find this very, very
difficult to believe," Tom Ballantyne, chief correspondent for the
magazine Orient Aviation, told CNN. "That this aircraft could have flown
on for four hours after it disappeared and not have been picked up by
someone's radar and not have been seen by anyone, it's almost
unbelievable."
Search getting harder
The news came after
Vietnamese and Chinese search crews found nothing where Chinese
satellite photographs released Wednesday showed large floating objects
in the South China Sea.
The spot is between Malaysia and Vietnam and not far from the plane's expected flight path.
China's State
Administration for Science, Technology and Industry for National Defense
described the images as showing "a suspected crash site."
But Chinese authorities
later said the release of the satellite images was a mistake and that
they didn't show any debris relating to the plane, Hishammuddin said.
The mystery over the
fate of the passenger jet, a Boeing 777-200, and the 239 people it was
carrying has so far left government officials and aviation experts
flummoxed.
"With every passing day the task becomes more difficult," Hishammuddin said.
Searchers have already
been combing a vast area of sea and land for traces of the plane. But so
far, with the search well into its sixth day, their efforts have been
fruitless.
Malaysian officials say
they are still trying to determine if a radar blip detected heading west
soon after the plane lost contact was in fact the missing jet.
If it was, the plane
would have been hundreds of miles off its original flight path and
headed in the wrong direction. Malaysian officials say they have asked
U.S. experts to help them analyze the radar data.
Meanwhile, India is
joining the multinational search, dispatching two of its naval ships off
the remote Andaman and Nicobar islands, a military spokesman told CNN.
Last known words
Also on Thursday, a
Malaysian aviation official told CNN that the last known words from the
flight crew of the missing plane were "All right, good night."
Malaysian civil aviation
officer Zulazri Mohd Ahnuar said he couldn't confirm which member of
the flight crew sent the message, which was transmitted from the plane
back to Malaysian flight controllers as the aircraft transferred into
Vietnamese airspace early Saturday.
For the families of those on board the missing plane, the wait for news is torturous.
Danica Weeks is trying
to keep it together for her two young sons, though the possibility of
life without husband Paul, who was on the plane, is sometimes
overwhelming. She's clinging to hope even though, as Weeks told CNN's Piers Morgan, it's "not looking good."
"Every day, it just
seems like it's an eternity, it's an absolute eternity," Weeks said from
Australia. "We can only go minute by minute ... and hope something
comes soon."
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