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CNN NEWSROOM

Airasia Jet Vanishes On Flight To Singapore; 300+ Passengers Trapped On Burning Ferry; Social Media Posts On Missing Jet

Aired December 28, 2014 - 14:00   ET

THIS IS A RUSH TRANSCRIPT. THIS COPY MAY NOT BE IN ITS FINAL FORM AND MAY BE UPDATED.


MARTIN SAVIDGE, CNN ANCHOR: Hello. I'm Martin Savidge in for Fredricka Whitfield, and let's just bring you up-to-date on what this conversation is all about.

A passenger jet carrying 162 people is now missing in Southeast Asia. And here is what we know at the moment.

The officials searched at sea has been suspended for AirAsia 8501 because of darkness. It is the middle of the night, their local time. The area is a very busy shipping channel, though. And some ships that are in that area continue to comb the waters off of Indonesia. But a full blown search is now on hold until daylight returns to that area, and that is still some hours off.

The airbus A320-200 left Indonesia around 5:30 in the morning, local time. It was bound for Singapore. That is not a long flight. Indonesian officials say that at one point the captain asked to climb to a higher altitude apparently to avoid heavy storms. The plane disappeared from radar while flying at around 38,000 feet and almost the entire flight was to be conducted over water.

Families, as you can only begin to imagine, are desperate for any sign of what may have happened to this plane. There were no Americans on board, but the NTSB is monitoring the wags situation from here in the United States and says it is prepared to assist if that request comes in.

Almost all the passengers on board are Indonesian nationals and they include 18 children. This situation is unfolding less than ten months after Malaysian airline flight went missing from Kuala Lumpur to Beijing. And we know despite a massive international search effort, there is still no trace of that aircraft or the 239 people who were on board.

So let me go now to correspondent Andrew Stevens who is standing by in Surabaya, Indonesia. And that's where this missing jet originally took off from en route to Singapore, and where reporters are now waiting at a crisis center to get any updates. That's at a name airport terminal.

And Andrew, what are we hearing from authorities there?

ANDREW STEVENS, CNN CORRESPONDENT: We're really just now waiting for the daylight hours, Martin, so the search can take off. There is going to be a much, much bigger presence. The Indonesians have seven vessels, two helicopters. And Malaysia is also sending three vessels down. Singapore is sending an aircraft down, a surveillance aircraft. And Australia has also offered to send us. We're not sure at this stage whether the Indonesians are going to accept that offer or not, Martin.

But, what we're being told by the national transportation safety authority here is that the most likely area where this plane may have come down is going to be basically gritted off into four separate search areas, and the search will commence at first light. And this is obviously the next step.

What actually happened, it is still a mystery at the moment. That there have been unconfirmed reports of wreckage being spotted. Indonesian authorities have said they haven't had any reports. They haven't seen anything that suggested there is wreckage out there. So that one has been denied.

And meanwhile, the families are here in Surabaya. They are also in Singapore where that flight was due to land. And just one very small story, Martin. I've spoken about this before, but it's so tragic.

There are young girls, young teenagers who have arrived in the last hour or so. They are friends, and they both going to school in Singapore. They are Indonesian girls. Both sets of parents were on that flight. They were actually going up to join their daughters for festivities, new year's festivities in Singapore. Of course, that flight never arrived. The girls have now come down chaperoned by members from the school, and their own family here in Indonesia. But to try and find out what's happened. It's just tragic stories. I didn't speak to us. We spoke to family members just to find out what was going on.

And they just look the world, that they looked shocked. And you can't imagine what they're going through at the moment. These young teenage girls with both sets of parents on that plane, Martin.

SAVIDGE: Andrew Stevens, thank you very much for that poignant observation.

CNN aviation correspondent Rene Marsh is live in Washington.

And Rene, you have been in touch with both airbus since (INAUDIBLE) with the aircraft and the NTSB. So first, what if anything, is airbus saying about their aircraft and we're talking about the airbus A320- 200.

RENE MARSH, CNN AVIATION AND GOVERNMENT REGULATION CORRESPONDENT: Right. And we know that this particular aircraft that we are talking about involved in this incident is a relatively new aircraft. It was delivered in 2008 of October. So it's was just over six years old. We know the flight time about 23,000 flight hours.

So this is a well-traveled aircraft. When we talk about the A320, it is often referred to as the work horse of commercial aviation. And it makes a lot of sense because this has a lot of wretch when we talk about how many millions of flights this particular family of aircraft has made.

We also, Martin, have been in touch with authorities here in the United States. Just to see what kind of role they could possibly play in all of this. In my conversation with the NTSB this morning, they say that they are actively monitoring this situation. They say that the lines of communication very much open between the NTSB as well as the manufacturer airbus as well as French authorities. French investigators which is essentially the equivalent of the NTSB there.

They're also in conversations with the Indonesians who where most likely lead this investigation. But it's fair to say that the NTSB will not have an extremely prominent role. They say that they areal ready and willing to assist if anyone has any technical needs or needs any mechanic advice.

However, we expect that the French authorities will have a more prominent role here for a couple of reasons. This aircraft was manufactured. It is a product, essentially, of France, is manufactured there. That is where airbus is based. No U.S. citizens onboard this flight. So it makes sense for the French authorities to take the lead on this one.

SAVIDGE: Right. But just as point of reference, it is an aircraft that used widely by American air carriers, correct?

MARSH: Absolutely, it is. But as far as investigation goes, and usually what protocol is, is the entity in which they have some sort of interest at stake here. If we had a U.S. citizen on board or if this was a Boeing manufactured plane without a doubt we believe the NTSB would have a more prominent role because that is not the case in this situation. We expect investigators, the French investigators, to have a more prominent role.

But to be clear, and to your point, this just speaks to why this investigation is so important. Because there are, as we speak, more than 6,000 of these sort of aircraft flying in the air. That includes flights overseas as well as U.S. carriers. So it's imperative that they figure out what caused the issue that we're seeing here, why this plane did not land at the time it was supposed to land with thousands of others in the air, they want to get down to the nitty-gritty of is this an issue that could play out on another aircraft or was it something else? So this is why it is so crucial to get to the bottom of what caused this.

SAVIDGE: Right. Thanks for bringing that point home.

Rene Marsh, thanks.

CNN international meteorologist Tom Sater joins us now from the CNN weather center.

And Tom, what was the weather like across the region? What's it like right now, I guess, is the really the important question.

TOM SATER, CNN INTERNATIONAL METEOROLOGIST: Yes. Well, we still have thunderstorms, Martin, in the region. But when it comes to our planet, there isn't an area or a region in the world that are seeing worse weather than Malaysia, Indonesia, and southern Thailand. It's been this way for a month.

When you think about thunderstorms that are strong, maybe dropping two or three inches, this inter tropical convergence zone, there's Malaysia and Indonesia, it's dropping two feet. Three feet of rain in just two to three days. That's an entire month's worth of rain in two or three days. And in the next week, it does it again.

Here in Surabaya to the south, Surabaya, and you got Singapore to the north. So this is mainly your flight path. And this is an active current conditions. So we are starting and continuing to see flight that are moving. If you are wondering the time zone from the east coast to the U.S., 12 hours ahead of us. So right now, it's just after 2:00 p.m. It's about just after 2:00 a.m. in the morning. So they are still in darkness.

Twenty-four hour thunderstorm is developing. Take a look at this one right. Can you see that large area of red, the brighter colors are the higher and colder cloud top. So, did the pilot taking off from Surabaya, have a problem with that thunderstorm there?

Let's look at the time we lost contact. It is very possible, and this is just speculation, taking off from Surabaya, these cloud tops speculating to be somewhere around 50,000 to 53,000 feet high. That's tremendous height. They cannot fly through this. Did he encounter turbulence here, getting to an area to recover, only to find himself in another thunderstorm cluster. That's what we do not know. But this is currently where we believe we have lost contact.

Notice this little island here in Palao (ph). We are going to take a look at that region. Also, we are going to look at what the pilots see. This is a pilot briefing chart. These areas of red are turbulence where pilots should avoid. As we get in closer on the edge of your screen here, our auto going to see just on the edge, this is our area of concern. Notice it's covered in red, and it says occasional embedded thunderstorms up to 53,000 feet. Isolated and embedded up to 50,000 feet. So they were flying in the embedded zone.

When it comes to the height, and we believe the last report, this is an estimate -- (INAUDIBLE) of where we are from 32,000 flew to approximately 38,000 feet, that is. These cloud tops are up to 50,000 or 55,000. Tremendous icing occurs, tremendous turbulence. You got to fly around these. So again, That is the concern.

The next 48 hours shows a few thunderstorms, small in size, will drift across what we could have as our crash site. Again, most of the heavy rain seems to want to stay on land mass, but if you look at the winds, and this is important for debris flow, they seem to be coming down from the gulf of Thailand through the straight, also making their way from a west to east fashion. So if this is our concern, and our area, our target zone, we could expect possibly, Martin, these winds to cause a drift of any debris possibly towards the coast of (INAUDIBLE). So we are keeping an eye on that course closely for you as well.

SAVIDGE: Tom Sater, a great breakdown for us. Thanks very much. Joining me now is our aviation correspondent Richard Quest. Also

joining us former pilot Les Abend, and on the phone from the United Kingdom is air traffic control expert Philip Butterworth-Hayes.

Philip, I'll start with you. We know that there were heavy storms in the area at the time this plane went missing, and it appears that is a key initial factor in trying to understand, correct?

RICHARD QUEST, CNN AVIATION CORRESPONDENT: Yes. And that is where any investigation will begin. And until they find the wreckage and the black boxes, or -- and they are analyzed, then you're left with what you know so far. And what we know is that there was these storms, that the pilot requested a higher altitude. We know also from other sources that it looks as though they were flying quite slowly at the time. And Les Abend will be able to give us much more indication about the difficulties of climbing from 32,000 to 38,000 feet quite quickly when the envelope of safety is really on the speed I really quite small at that particular point.

Those are the starting points. But an investigation takes months, if not many, many, months. And therefore, for the time being, the only thing we can do is wait while the asset gets only on to the sea in to the air to find the wreckages.

It is going to be a -- I wouldn't say I'm relatively optimistic, but they will find something relatively quickly because it's not that deep of water, and the (INAUDIBLE) why the plane was is known.

SAVIDGE: OK.

And Philip, before I turn to Les, Indonesian air traffic control lost contact early this morning after flight 8501 requested a deviation due to weather. Based on last known coordinates of the plane and what kind of information I suppose is it that air traffic control can use to project or maybe help those searching on the water?

PHILIP BUTTERWORTH-HAYES, EDITORIAL DIRECTOR, PMI MEDIA (via phone): The most important one is radar track. And I'm guessing there will be four different radars (INAUDIBLE) that will be tracking aircraft not just the transponder which gives the identification of the aircraft, but the time the radar will actually be able to track weather, and the aircraft is in the air. So, it is going to -- we're going to know pretty accurately where the aircraft was, and when it certainly went off the radar screen. So that's the case where we could start looking.

SAVIDGE: And also, in your work, you managed to -- or you managed, rather, an air cargo charter service from the U.K., with MH-370 we learn, and many of us that didn't know that that there are parts of the world where planes are almost out of communication. Are there parts of the world where it's easier for planes to disappear off the radar and run up against adverse weather at the same time?

BUTTERWORTH-HAYES: I'm afraid so. I mean, even over land, even through parts of, say, the Sahara and Africa, it's very difficult to track an aircraft because there is no radar and there is nothing on the ground there. So it's like flying over an ocean.

SAVIDGE: OK. Thank you both very much. Richard Quest, thank you as well. I know you're all going to be part of this conversation as the day wears on.

In the meantime, we're going to take a break and be back with the very latest information we have as our coverage continues.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

SAVIDGE: We're continuing our coverage of missing AirAsia passenger jet that is the one that flew out of Indonesia on its way to Singapore. And we're learning new information about the search plans. Here's what we know right now.

Flight 8501 left Indonesia at about 5:30 in the morning local time bound for Singapore. The jet had 162 people on board, including 18 children with a crew of seven. Officials say that large ships now with powerful lights will continue to comb the waters off Indonesia for the plane. But the more intensive search efforts will have to wait until day break. And that's when officials say seven ships and two helicopters will join the search for the missing plane.

Heavy storms have been reported in the area when the jet vanished. Indonesian officials say that the pilot requested to fly at a higher altitude because of that bad weather. And, of course, this incident becomes just ten months after Malaysian airline flight 370 vanished on its way to Beijing with 239 people on board.

The missing AirAsia jet airliner is the second one to go missing this year. And as we've just pointed out, and all of that has a lot of people wondering what is going on in that part of the world. Could there somehow be a connection?

So Nick Valencia is here in the studio and has been sort of looking at what is similar and what is not similar in the disappearance of these two planes?

NICK VALENCIA, CNN CORRESPONDENT: Sure. And we've had people wake up this morning tweeting us, giving us messages on social media saying what is going with this area of the world? What is happening here?

So let's just break down exactly what the comparison and similarities are between MH-370 and this AirAsia flight that went missing? I believe we have a map to show you here, some comparisons.

We know that MH-370 deported Kuala Lumpur to Beijing and went missing on the 8th of March. Now, AirAsia left Surabaya, Indonesia to Singapore and went missing overnight. Here's is one of the similarities, one of the big similarities, Martin.

Both disappeared from radars and made no further communication after that moment. That is essentially, though, where the similarities end. MH-370 was not in Indonesian airspace when it went missing. AirAsia flight was within Indonesia airspace. We don't know exactly what that will mean for the search. Now, let's update you on the MH-370 search plans. The Australian

government earlier in August reached tout a Dutch company to continue with its undersea search. We know they've earmarked quite a bit of money as well, $60 million earmarked by the Australian government. That's being matched by the Malaysian government. And they've said that they hope to -- this is optimistic expectation. That they hope to finish the scouring of the priority zone, the so-called priority zone, Martin, in the Indian Ocean by May 2015. But that's only if there weren't any technical difficulties or hiccups that has not been the case. Some of the equipment that's being used. There have been some problems. That's led to some delays. And so for now, both planes missing and another one added to the list.

SAVIDGE: Yes. Still very interesting that the search for MH-370 continues. Now you have another search that's just begun.

Nick Valencia, thanks very much for pointing ought of that out.

And we are joined by CNN aviation analyst and former inspector general for the U.S. department of transportation, Mary Schiavo. And she now works for a law firm that represents victims and families after airplane disasters.

Mary, an NTSB official says the agency, of course, is monitoring the search. It stands ready to assist if needed. What can we provide? What can we do?

MARY SCHIAVO, CNN AVIATION ANALYST: Well, we have to be invited in. It's not our jurisdiction. It's not the United States' waters or airspace. And so if they are invited in, of course, the NTSB has tremendous expertise and tremendous assets to actually conduct the investigation. But the most important thing right now is going to be to be able to find the plane and those black boxes because the communications that we do have and without any may day or phantom (ph) calls, we don't know really what was going on.

So United states, unfortunately, you know, the situation is similar in another way in that what we could send is equipment to help them find the wreckage, which we're assuming is wreckage at this point, find the black boxes and get those hauled up and read them.

And of course, NTSB can read the black boxes very quickly. They're good at it. So can the French BEA, the British can do it, the Australians can do it. So there are many countries that have that capability.

But the most important thing right now is finding it. And you know, no beacons, no ELT's going off right now apparently. No way to do it except the long search with eyes and with, you know, radar coordinates, et cetera.

SAVIDGE: And this may sound like a very basic question, but we know it's a European aircraft. So are the black boxes the same? I mean, is it all essentially the same? Does internationally we all have the similar kind of device? SCHIAVO: They're all pretty much the same and this being a new

aircraft. It will have a lot of what they call perimeters. You know, in the olden days, you know, decades ago, they -- when they were invented, they recorded, you know, maybe five basic things. Air speed, you know, position of basic controls and things like that. Now if it's got an input, any kind of an electrical or computer input into it or off of it, you could pretty much have the perimeters on that black box.

So as soon as they get them, and, of course, the cockpit voice recording, separate from the flight data recorder, that will have the comments and most likely it will be the comments of the pilots as they fight, say, the plane because in the accidents I have worked, they didn't get off a may day call. Those pilots were just darn busy trying to save flight.

SAVIDGE: Right. Mary Schiavo, thanks very much.

We're going take a break now. Now, coming up on the other side, we'll talk to very experienced pilots about what they know and what could have happened.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

SAVIDGE: We're continuing our coverage of a missing AirAsia jet. It's been 19 hours now since flight 8501 with 162 people on board went missing in Southeast Asia.

CNN's Erin McPike joins us now from the White House.

And Erin, what are you hearing from there?

ERIN MCPIKE, CNN GENERAL ASSIGNMENT CORRESPONDENT: Martin, President Obama was briefed last night when he was out to dinner with the first lady and some friends in Hawaii. And the White House says it's closely monitoring the situation. And, of course, we'll continue to brief the president in the coming days.

What we understand is that we do not expect to hear from President Obama about this situation today. But we have heard from some other agencies within the U.S. government about what the response could look like. No ask has been made yet. And the U.S. will have to be asked in order to help out. But I do have a statement from a senior state department official that I'll read to you about that.

This official says the Indonesians and Singaporeans are leading the search for the missing airplane as we have in the past. The United States stands ready to assist in any way that's helpful.

But we should also point out here that both -- when MH-370 went missing in March and when MH-17 was shot down over Eastern Ukraine this summer, those were both Boeing aircrafts. Those were Boeing 777s. Boeing is an American company, and, of course, airbus, the aircraft used here, is made by a French company. So the French will be more intimately involved in this search and some of the technical issues in the way that the U.S. was in these other two instances.

But the last thing I would point out is that after MH-370 went missing, there was an increased call to track all of these flights very closely. And as you have been talking to some of these aviation experts today, they're saying it's really disgraceful that many of these flights are not tracked closely. The Obama administration joined ICAO, an international organization, in saying these flights all need to be tracked very closely, and we will watch for more increased calls from the administration in the coming days, we should expect, that it will happen in the wake of this as well, Martin.

SAVIDGE: Yes. I think you can almost be certain.

Erin McPike, thank you very much.

We're joined now by Les Abend, a 777 captain and a contributing editor of "Flying Magazine." We are also going to bring in former pilot Alastair Rosenschein who joins us on the phone from (INAUDIBLE), England.

And Alastair, let me start with you. You've flown the same flight path that 8501 has flown. So what can you tell bus that particular airspace?

ALASTAIR ROSENSCHEIN, FORMER PILOT (via phone): Well, what we're talking about here is the wet up. And at this time of year there can be a lot of -- well, thunderstorms and vertical activities as we call it. And those are predominantly associated with severe turbulence, icing, and hail.

Now, the problem about the sort of thunderstorms you get in the tropics is it's very difficult to fly over the top of them because they can go off very high. Up to 55,000 even 50,000 feet sometimes because the tropicals that the air in the atmosphere where those were all the water or most of the water in the atmosphere is much, much higher than the tropic than it is in latitudes like New York or London where it would be typically 15,000 or 20,000 feet lower.

So the problem here is reaching around those storms. Now, these storms tend to usually occur in similar locations, so the pilots will be aware of this. However, looking at the weather radar pictures that you have shown up on your program, you can see that these storms cells, they are in fact extremely large. And lost an airway that in 10 miles wide. These storms could be 30 or 40 miles wide. And then again, they could be a whole line of them. So you may have to divert quite a few miles off track.

Now, if you can't do so, if one (INAUDIBLE), you may end up flying inside one of the cells. Now, it would be something that all pilots trying to avoid at best they can all the time. But every now and then, one gets caught up and gets a little bit too close or the weather is a bit too rough. And although the aircraft can with stand one hell of the pounding, the kinds of storm you get in this particular can be even more extreme than that of the aircraft can withstand.

SAVIDGE: All right. Well, that's a horrible thought.

Les, let me ask you this. Once the pilot has taken off, you have the weather brief before you took off, so you knew where the storms were. Is there a way while flying that you can still get a real-time read of where the storms are in front of you and where you might want to go to avoid?

LES ABEND, CNN AVIATION ANALYST: The weather radar is really our only major source of seeing what we have ahead of us as far as storms are concerned, and like Alastair had mentioned, this situation, you know, sometimes you have to mitigate your risk by if you get to an area where you can't deviate from your route to any great degree, you find an area that has the least resistance so to speak, and you pick your way through it. We've all done it. We have tried to avoid it the best we can. Most of us will look at either a line or above and say I just will deviate completely away from that storm if we have that option.

SAVIDGE: Why would you not have that option?

ABEND: Well, the problem is you've got other air traffic on other routes going opposite directions, and at possibly at similar altitude. So, there is only so much leeway that you have to deviate around that particular route because -- and this is a busy corner. So indeed, that problem does exist.

SAVIDGE: Got it.

Les Abend and Alastair Rosenschein, thank you very much.

Next, an expert on the airlines who fly in Asia.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)\

SAVIDGE: Let's bring you up to date on our major breaking story. A passenger jet carrying 162 people has gone missing in Southeast Asia. Yes, it's happened again.

Here is what we've learned. The official search at sea has been suspended for Airasia 8501 because of darkness. It is the middle of the night local time. The area is a busy shipping channel and there are some ships in the area.

They will continue to comb the waters off Indonesia. But the full search isn't expected to resume until day break. The Airbus A-320-200 left Indonesia around 5:30 a.m. local time. It was bound for Singapore.

Indonesian officials say at one point the captain asked to climb higher to avoid heavy storms. The plane disappeared from radar while flying at 38,000 feet. Almost the entire flight path was over water.

Families are desperate for any sign of what could have happened at the aircraft. There were no Americans on board. But the NTSB is monitoring the situation from here in the U.S. and says it is prepared to assist if a request comes in. Almost all the passengers on board are Indonesians including 18 children. All of this comes less than ten months after Malaysian Airlines Flight 370 went missing en route from Kuala Lumpur to Beijing.

A massive international search effort has still not found any trace of that aircraft or the 239 people who were on board. So what do we know about Airasia itself?

Julian Bray is an aviation expert. Airasia is often called the pioneer of low cost airlines in Asia and it's been flying since the early 1990s. Let me start off by just asking how is the safety record for the airline?

JULIAN BRAY, AVIATION EXPERT: Well, it's got a very good almost impeccable safety record. I think this is the very first incident that they've had. It was actually a loss making airline back in about 2001, I think it was, and then it was bought over.

And the new owner has plowed so much money into it and he is quite a famous record producer and has a string of hotels and an airline, and he took very good advice in setting up this thing.

And he talked to us from easy jet and also Sir Richard Branzen as why the fuselage is painted red. He actually put a lot of money into this to make sure it was an airline to be proud of.

Although it is a budget airline, it will probably carry around about 50 million passengers this year.

SAVIDGE: And we say it's a budget airline, what exactly does that mean? Is it one of those you get no frills or anything like that?

BRAY: There are several in Europe. One is Ryanair. Another one is Easy Jet, although Easy Jet seems to be going slightly up market now. They all have very good equipment so there's no corners being cut on the actual aircraft, and they tend to have very few older aircraft in their fleets.

SAVIDGE: The amount of air travel or aviation in that particular part of the world has really exploded in the last decade or so and some have wondered if perhaps they have out sped keeping up with the safety regulations or requirements, what would you say to that?

BRAY: Not a chance because everything is well regulated. Everyone is tested. Every few months, they had to go in the simulator. They are independent testers, independent inspectors. In fact, I've been on the 747 simulator. It is a frightening experience. It is very realistic, and very life-like.

SAVIDGE: The likely impact on this airline for the future going forward, disasters? I mean, obviously how they handle this is going to be clear in how they continue to attract people to fly.

BRAY: Well, I like the idea that the owner is actually making contact with people. He seems to be driving through Facebook, and I would like to see more media briefings even if they have only got very little to say. At least it does mean that there is a physical presence. Unfortunately, I'm hoping for the best, but really I am also equally looking at the worst.

SAVIDGE: We'll hope with you. Julian Bray, thank you very much.

Next up, an update now on another massive story that's going on as a ferry fire off the coast of Greece.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

SAVIDGE: We're following other breaking news today. Italian firefighting vessels and Greek crews are trying to put out a fire on the ferry off the coast of Greece. A passenger on board says it seems like the Titanic and that people are dying of cold and suffocating from the smoke. Their feet are also burning from the heat of the fire nearly burning through on the deck.

We are joined now on the phone by journalist Barbie Nadal who is in Rome and Barbie, what's the latest of what we know now?

BARBIE NADAL, JOURNALIST (via telephone): They've managed to secure the ship with a tugboat. They've used a metal cable in order to keep that ship steady so they can take more passengers off the vessel. There are still 312 people on board that ship.

It's been on fire now for 15 hours, and the concern right now is really a race against time because there are so many big semi-trucks in the bottom of that ship. Many of them carrying, you know, full gas tanks, and carrying all sorts of chemicals and things like that.

This is a ship that was filled with commuters in that sense coming from Greece to Italy to go up into Europe. There is a concern that fire is not yet completely contained. They're working to put out the fire.

Right now the concern, though, is to get these people off the ship. Some of the injuries we've seen of the 165 have been rescued have been smoke inhalation and various degrees of hypothermia. So it's quite cold out there.

They've taken all of the children off the ship. They've taken most of the women off the ship. So right now it remains are a lot of truck drivers and people whose vehicles are at the bottom of that ship -- Martin.

SAVIDGE: And what are we hearing about the conduct of the captain or the crew because unfortunately, in other disasters at sea, the news had not been so good. What do we know now?

NADAL: Right. You know, three years ago in January, the Costa Concordia cruise ship crashed with no help from the captain. This captain of this ship seems to be handling the situation much better. He has been lauded by the people that have come off the ship by providing a sense of calm. He has been making sure the people have what supplies there are in terms of food and blankets. They have to stay outside. They can't be inside the vessel anymore. So he is trying to keep these people in harsh conditions warm and safe and calm.

There have been a couple of people that have jumped off the side of the ship. There right back have been rescues that way. Right now, they've been in circles with merchant vessels who have tried -- it seems to try to create a sort of a wind break they say to try to keep as much as they can to protect it while they try to rescue people with the helicopters off the ship.

Most of the rescues right now have been by helicopter. In the early hours this morning, when the ship still had power, they were able to use the life vessels in the electronic arms, but the ship no longer have any functioning devices whatsoever.

So they can't lower the lifeboats. But it is a race against time because the ship is still burning. There is a lot of questionable material in the bottom of the ship. So they need to get the people off the ship and then figure out what to do with this burning vessel -- Martin.

SAVIDGE: It is an unbelievable drama just looking at the imagery here that we've seen. Barbie Nadal, thank you very much. We'll continue to reach out to you.

In the meantime, we are also following what is going on with the missing aircraft in Asia. We'll update you after this.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

SAVIDGE: We're continuing our extensive coverage of the search for Airasia Flight 8501 and this hour we are learning the identity of some of the passengers. Chanel reports that the British citizen on board is an Indonesia based energy executive, and then the Singaporean citizen is his 2-year-old daughter.

Flight 8501 left Indonesia at about 5:30 in the morning local time bound for Singapore. The jet had 162 people on board, including, as we point out, 18 children with a crew of seven.

Officials have left some ships in the water to comb the area off of Indonesia, but the more intensive efforts are really on hold until daylight returns to that area when officials say seven ships and two helicopters will resume the search for the aircraft.

Heavy storms have been reported in the area right around the time that the jet vanished. Indonesian officials say that the pilot requested to fly at a higher altitude because of bad weather.

And of course, the incident comes just ten months after Malaysian Airlines Flight 370 vanished on its way to Beijing with 239 people on board. CNN international meteorologist, Tom Sader, joins us from the CNN Weather Center. Tom, what is the weather like across the region there right now? SATER: Well, sporadic thunderstorms. Again, it's in the middle of the night. It's almost 3:00 in the morning so still in darkness. They are trying to use what they can as far as vessels in the Java Sea.

When we look at thunderstorm activity, there's little we know, but we do know that weather was an issue, but we keep pouring over the information. There's a thunderstorm that comes off the coast. This is part of Indonesia.

Watch the color of red, those are the highest coldest clouds, right there. When you fly in a plane and you look out the window, you see towering cumulus, but you see some thunderstorms that are taller than all the others.

They have the anvil head. Whatever direction that anvil is pointing tells you the direction the storm is moving. This is a time where we know we last lost contact where the plane is.

Notice the indication here and kind of the shape. This is the anvil, the very top, the cold cloud tops moving towards the flight path. Now, we can only assume after taking off in Surabaya, did they encounter turbulence with the cold anvil of this, and then try to recover before hitting this cluster.

Another inspection and a closer look at this thunderstorm cell, it's pretty interesting. Bear with me. This is not the best resolution. This is the visual image, where are the clouds the whitest?

Notice now, again, they are pretty white right here, keep in mind, the sun is going down. So the sunlight at sunset is brightening up those high cloud tops.

What you see in gray are the shadows on the other side. So really this is the main concern where the clouds are the whitest and again, even though they were in cluster of thunderstorms a little bit further on, it make sense that this was the strongest storm in the entire region.

So we continue to focus on that thunderstorm, although there are so many questions that still remain. Thunderstorm activity possibly yes within the next 24 hours, but into 48 hours, Martin, it does seem to break up.

Now besides vessels in the waters of the Java Sea, there is going to be sunlight soon. We are looking at several aircrafts. They'll be watching this closely as well. But most of the heavier thunderstorm activity for the next 24 to 48 hours wants to stay over land masses, which is very good news.

SAVIDGE: Let's hope they had the best of weather possible. Tom Sater, thanks very much. CNN's Rosa Flores joins us now from New York. And Rosa, you've been tracing the traffic on social media. What are the posts saying?

ROSA FLORES, CNN CORRESPONDENT: You know, a lot of folks around the world wondering how it is that we can track a cell phone down to the block, yet, another plane lost. A lot of folks comparing it to MH-370 simply because of the area of where this plane is lost and, again, it's in Asia, and so a lot of questions, but a lot of thoughts and prayers also floating in cyberspace from every corner around the world.

Now here's the other use of social media in a moment like this, officials are using it to disseminate information. Let me start with this and this is from Airasia CEO, Tony Fernandes. He writes, "I as your group CEO will be there through these hard times. We'll go through these terrible ordeals together. We'll try to see as many of you."

Now here's another thing that's floating around social media and it's sort more into a controversy. Take a look at this, because this is the logo of Airasia, and of course, they have a very powerful red color, red and white.

But now they've turned it into a gray and white so folks in social media wondering why that is. Are they trying to tell us something? Is this a change in mood? It's a lot of conversation regarding the actual logo on social media.

And now to Malaysia Airlines, an airline that knows very well a mystery of a missing plane and a tragedy having to deliver hard news to the family members of passengers. They tweeted this, "Our thoughts and prayers are with all family and friends of those on board QZ 8501."

And then you've Malaysia's transport minister also tweeting this, "We will support indo counter parts as they take lead in this crisis under ICAO protocol," that's the International Civil Aviation Organization.

That organization is also sending their thoughts and prayers via social media. So, again, back to this little device, Martin, tiny device, people from around the world using it to send a big message of solidarity with all the families of these passengers.

SAVIDGE: That is a way to be in touch even if you are far away. Rosa Flores, thank you very much for that. We are going to continue to follow Airasia 8501 with the latest developments after this break.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

SAVIDGE: Continuing our coverage of the missing airliner, that is Airasia Flight 8501. Joining me now from New York is forensic audio expert, Paul Ginsberg. He is the president of Pro Audio Labs.

We don't want to get too far ahead of ourselves here, but we do want to talk about the possibility of flight data recorders and what they could possibly tell us about what may have happened to this flight once they are discovered. Let me ask you this, Paul.

First of all, what is it that the first thing the investigators will want to know from these so-called black boxes, and I should point out there's really two. There's one that records what the aircraft did, and there's another one that records the conversations that the pilots had, correct?

PAUL GINSBERG, PRESIDENT, PRO AUDIO LABS: Well, they want to know exactly what happened. They want to know from the flight data recorder what was the attitude of the aircraft, the speed, the altitude, and everything to do with the mechanical operation of the machine. That is was there a malfunction, or was this something from outside the airplane that happened?

Now on the flight -- the cockpit voice recorder part of the two, there are going to listen to everything that happened in the cockpit and there will be warnings, alerts, and the conversation of the pilots.

We can tell whether the wind chill was punctured by a bird strike. We can also listen to the engine to see whether it was a constant frequency or whether it was varying or slowing down.

There are a number of different clues that we will get to see whether it all put together and synchronized with the data that was recorded at the different various locations and to see whether it all comes together.

SAVIDGE: Right. Will these recorders tell us all we need to know about the effects of weather? Right now bad weather seems to be a clue as to what possibly may have happened?

GINSBERG: Well, we will be able to hear hail on the fuselage and the windshield and also thunder. So they may provide some clues. Often, there are non-verbal mechanical and external clues that are gleaned from the recording. Not just the conversation of the pilot and co- pilot.

SAVIDGE: Right. I find that fascinating because often we intend to fixate on they're going to tell us something. What about radio traffic? What might we find out more from that?

GINSBERG: Well, we may hear what might have been an attempt to reach the control tower from the plane, but was never transmitted because we hear what is going on in the cockpit including what happens in the headsets of the pilots.

SAVIDGE: From your expertise, from your vantage point, these recorders have been criticized sometimes as having kind of outdated gathering -- information gathering systems, what would make it easier for you to do your job?

GINSBERG: Well, I want to see constant streaming and updating through satellites, if possible, because then we'll know exactly what is happening just about in real-time. Right now, it's self-contained with the aircraft, and we have to find the aircraft first and download, and that takes time expense, and there's a delay built in.

SAVIDGE: And when you say forensic audio expert, that's a fascinating term. What would that mean? You carefully diagnose and listen to every nuanced sound?

GINSBERG: Yes, indeed. Not only in aircraft, but undercover recordings for various law enforcement agencies and so on.

SAVIDGE: Paul Ginsberg, thank you very much. We appreciate your insight and expertise.

GINSBERG: Thank you, Martin.