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CNN NEWSROOM

Crashed Flight's Cockpit Audio Leaked; Report: Co-Pilot Had Antipsychotic Injections; Families of Passengers Visit Scene of Crash in the French Alps; German Authorities Prints Out Audio Recordings of the Crash; Threat of Saudi Invasion Looms Over Yemen; Deadline for Iran Nuclear Talks in 2 Days. Aired 6-7:00p ET

Aired March 29, 2015 - 18:00   ET

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


(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

[18:01:02] POPPY HARLOW, CNN ANCHOR: Six o'clock Eastern. You're in the CNN NEWSROOM. I'm Poppy Harlow in New York.

Today, what may be the final words spoken by captain of the commercial flight that crashed in the French Alps, a German tabloid newspaper publishing a summary of the cockpit voice recording retrieved from the wreckage of Germanwings Flight 9525. Who leaked that recording is still unknown and French officials are dismayed that it has been released.

The microphone in the cockpit that picks up the captain locked outside of his own cockpit banging on the door shouting -- shouting for his co-pilot to open it. Passengers can also be heard in the background screaming. The co-pilot Andreas Lubitz did not open that door. By all accounts, he intentionally steered that plane into the mountains.

Police searching his home, found drugs prescribed to treat mental illness, and ripped up notes from doctors saying he was unfit to fly this week. Executives at the airline say they had no idea that he was under mental healthcare or that he was in any way unfit to fly that aircraft.

One hundred and fifty people were onboard the Airbus 320. Today, Pope Francis took time during his Palm Sunday Mass to pray for those who died in the crash.

Our Will Ripley joins me this evening from Cologne, Germany, where Germanwings' parent company Lufthansa is headquartered.

Will, I want to be very clear here. None of us here at CNN have heard this cockpit audio recording and we have only seen a summary of it from this German newspaper. Take us through what they are reporting.

WILL RIPLEY, CNN CORRESPONDENT: A German newspaper that is a tabloid, we should point out that does get a lot of things right, but at times Poppy has been accused of embellishing. And so, in this case, we certainly hope they've been accurately reporting what was on this. On the other hand, though, the contents of this transcript and for the families of the people onboard is mortifying, something that they never needed to hear, frankly because it would indicate that they had, the people on the plane for eight minutes knew something was horribly wrong as the plane was going down closer to the French alps.

You hear Andreas Lubitz speaking before takeoff to his pilot, Patrick Sonderheimer who had mentioned he didn't have a chance to use the restroom at the airport in Barcelona before they took off. This was a two-hour haul. A lot of the times, the pilot and co-pilot would stay together in the cockpit during this entire time.

But in this instance, the pilot, once they were in air, once they reached their cruising altitude of 38,000 feet, he made it clear he needed to leave the cockpit to use the restroom and you can hear Lubitz telling his captain, "OK. You can go. You can go now". And you hear the captain leaving the cockpit telling Lubitz to take over, that's when investigators believe he locked the pilot out and then started that descent.

At 10:29 a.m., the flight radar monitors noticed the plane was starting to go down and it was a rapid descent. It was noticeable to people in the back because by 10:32, air traffic control was trying to contact the plane, they didn't get an answer, the alarms in the cockpit started going off, the alarm saying that the descent was happening too quickly, and according to the newspaper, there is a loud bang on the door and the captain is heard screaming "For God's sake, open the door", all of this playing out in very frightened passengers and some of them could be heard screaming at 10:32, but the plane would stay in the air descending for another eight minutes.

At 10:35, loud, metallic bangs are heard -- this is apparently the captain heroically trying to break in, trying to stop this disaster. He wasn't able to get into the cockpit. No words, no response from the co-pilot just the sound of his breathing which is -- which is chilling in itself as he sat there and piloted the plane for 90 seconds, more alarms going off, telling that the terrain was approaching, telling the co-pilot the pull up, he's disregarding, the plane keeps going lower.

Sixteen thousand feet, the captain screaming "Open the damn door!"

[18:05:00] At 10:38 a.m., the plane keeps descending towards the French Alps. Again, you hear the co-pilot breathing normally. The plane now at 13,000 feet.

Two minutes later, with passengers looking out their windows and seeing the mountains getting closer and closer, the plane's right wing scrapes the mountaintop and you hear more screaming from the back -- 149 people defenseless as all of this is happening and Lubitz flies that plane into the mountain and the recording goes silent.

The question now, Poppy, was this a spur of the moment decision or was this something that had been planned out, premeditated for a while?

That's the question that investigators are trying to piece together. They certainly didn't want this audio released at this point in the investigation where they still haven't looked at the data recorders and they still don't have all of the facts. But what they do have now are very, very upset families who now know just how long it took for the plane to go down and people knowing that whole time for eight minutes that something was horribly wrong -- Poppy.

HARLOW: It is unconscionable.

Will Ripley, thank you for the reporting live for us in Cologne, Germany. I appreciate it.

Here with me in New York, commercial airline pilot, Les Abend, also, CNN aviation correspondent Richard Quest in Tokyo, joining me this evening, CNN aviation analyst and a pilot himself, Miles O'Brien.

Thank you all for being here.

Richard, I want to begin with you.

You are appalled --

RICHARD QUEST, CNN AVIATION CORRESPONDENT: Absolutely.

HARLOW: -- that this has been released?

QUEST: Absolutely. This not an issue of freedom of information, this is not about revealing something that we don't know.

We have known the salient facts since Thursday morning. We have known that he was locked out. We have known that he banged on the door. We have known that there was screaming. We have known that there was the sound of breathing. We've even known the timeframe of it because the prosecutor told us all of this on Thursday morning.

HARLOW: Right.

QUEST: All this does is to use a phrase, tittle-tattle, titillating, whatever the BEA summed it up -- voyeuristic.

HARLOW: Voyeurism.

QUEST: Now, look, if, Poppy, if we had not known any of this, I'd be the first person who said we need to know or someone hiding something, I would say, yep, we need to know.

HARLOW: But we knew.

QUEST: We knew.

HARLOW: Miles O'Brien, to you as a pilot and aviation analyst and expert in this, what do you make of, (a), what we've learned and much of what we knew as Richard says, but also the fact that this was leaked by someone?

MILES O'BRIEN, CNN AVIATION ANALYST: Well, as a journalist, Poppy, you will not get me on the record saying it's a bad idea to report a scoop. "Bild", whatever you may say about their credibility, they've got a good story here. So, I'm not going to go out against that.

And I would offer up this and I know in the face of it, it would seem like an affront to the families and it is a horrible tragedy, and it's an awful tragedy. But I will tell you that every second of pain and suffering that their attorneys can document, a cruise to the bottom line and buttresses their legal case. And so, having this information out there actually helps the families in the long run.

The other thing I will tell you is the flight data recorder has not been discovered and the Internet is alive with all kind of conspiracy theory. So, to the extent that this helps allay a lot of that, I think it's of value to get this information out. Knowledge, information, needs to be free and this is a perfect example of that.

QUEST: I'm sorry, Poppy. Please, Miles. This does -- bearing in mind the prosecutor gave us the same information from the same source, Miles. There's nothing in this that had to be gotten and as you know, in the Annex 13 final report and in the discovery process, every word of this would come out in a more contextual fashion, Miles.

O'BRIEN: Right. So, if it's going to come out eventually -- if it's going to come out eventually, it's just a matter of timing. Why not now?

HARLOW: Les?

LES ABEND, CNN AVIATION: Not at this point because the investigation isn't complete, Miles, and this is a sacred part of accident investigation, the transcripts and the privacy to all the families. It's not necessarily -- if you have an opportunity to listen to a cockpit voice recorder that you know the endgame, it's a frightening, awful, terrible experience and the public doesn't need to consume this kind of information at this point in time.

HARLOW: Let us talk about --

O'BRIEN: Let me be clear. I'm not saying release the recordings. We're not talking about releasing the recordings.

ABEND: No, transcripts.

O'BRIEN: We're talking about substantive transcripts. That's a different story.

ABEND: Sorry, Poppy.

HARLOW: I want to talk to les about, as a Pilot, what we have learned from this "Bild" report that ticked through the timeline there. Is there anything significant about that that stands out to you the most?

ABEND: No. Well, it's a question -- most of it sounds routine, yes, maybe he urged the captain to go to the bathroom and now his plan is now coming together, maybe it started at the gate, who knows? I mean, the end result is the tragedy that we've all been witnessing.

But the bottom line is him leaving the cockpit, more than likely he said, you've got the airplane and that was all very routine up until the point that you heard the warning system say that the descent rate was too high. [18:10:09] That, to me, means he disconnected the autopilot and was

going to fly the airplane for the last time in his life. The terrain warning, the machine did what it was supposed to do, it warned any pilot that he's getting close to terrain and he's got to pull up.

Other than that, most of it was routine. I cannot as a captain conceive and make that assessment, the co-pilot for not locking me out of the door. This is impossible. And then his final realization that was happening and doing everything he could to get back in. That captain should be held as a total hero, because it sounded --

HARLOW: Because he absolutely is, and we learned from his grandmother who said he is a true hero, a father, only 34 years old, Captain Patrick Sonderheimer.

Richard, to you, from what the prosecutor has said and from what "Bild" is report, what stands out to you the most?

QUEST: Nothing. Obviously, I associate myself with Les' comments in terms of what the captain did, but it was a quixotic attempt in the sense that he was never going to break that door down, but God bless him for trying.

We have been given -- look, when you ask people, when viewers are listening and watching, the first thing everybody is saying is, what was it like? And we now know what it was like. But we have not advanced the question of why.

And this idea of telling him, "Now you can go." The captain said that to him before he took off. You haven't had a chance to go if the bathroom before they took off?

HARLOW: Right.

QUEST: Is that a moment of taking your opportunity? Who knows?

HARLOW: Miles, to you as a pilot, one of the father -- the father of one of the victims, a 28-year-old spoke out at the crash site today and said, "I don't care to know what the motive was or why this happened, but I care to know that things will change, that airlines will protect their people, that they will keep a closer eye on their pilots" -- do you think anything in the system needs to change?

O'BRIEN: Lots needs to change and starting right off with the fact that this was an extremely green pilot, so inexperienced. He would not be sitting in that seat in a U.S. carrier. You'd have more than twice as much time logged. He'd have an airline transport pilot certificate, a PhD of flying. Neither of those things in the case.

This cadet program that Lufthansa uses I think is fundamentally not as safe. Among other thing -- I mean, first of all, he didn't have the capability really to fly that plane and frankly, my insurance wouldn't have allowed him to fly my little single-engine airplane that I used to own. So there he was at the controls of an A320, taken aside his psychological condition. But the other thing is that period of time, that 1500 hours and that ATP, that puts him in cockpits with all kinds of pilots over a much longer period and things that were awry might have come to light and that's how the system has worked for years and years, and these low- cost carriers trying to rush people into seats and trying to fill the pilot shortage and not pay them enough money and get them in there soon, this is what happens.

HARLOW: Miles O'Brien, Les Abend, Richard Quest, thank you very much. Stay with me, gentlemen. We're going to take a quick break.

Coming up next, we're going to talk about new details we have learned about how doctors were treating the co-pilot, what medication he was reportedly given. We'll talk about it with our Dr. Sanjay Gupta, next.

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[18:16:36] HARLOW: All right. As we continue to cover the tragic, tragic crash of Flight 9525, I want to talk about what we've learned in terms of the potential mental illness of the co-pilot who by all accounts deliberately crashed the plane right into the mountains.

Let me bring in our chief medical correspondent, Dr. Sanjay Gupta.

Sanjay, there are reports out of "Le Parisien", a French newspaper, saying that he suffered what they're calling a general anxiety disorder and that the co-pilot, Andreas Lubitz, received injections of anti-psychotic drugs back in 2010. What do you make of that?

DR. SANJAY GUPTA, CNN CHIEF MEDICAL CORRESPONDENT: Well, the medication they're talking about, specifically, the medication called the Olanzapine is a medication that can be given orally, by pills, or as an injection. If it's given as an injection, often times it's given because someone has significant agitation, if you will, associated with psychosis or even just bipolar depression, significant bipolar depression.

But I think the thing that you really take away from it is that this is a pretty powerful medication. It speaks, I think, to the severity of the illness. People can have depressive disorders. They can get treatment and they can be very productive if you're having psychosis with schizophrenia, for example, that's a lifelong illness and you want to know how severe this is going to be.

This sort of speaks to how significant it was at least at one time five years ago.

HARLOW: But if he was treated, Sanjay, if these reports are accurate with this injection in 2010 and this is 2015 -- I wonder, would it have any impact now?

GUPTA: You know, if it's sort of depression that became more of a depression-associated with psychosis you can have very effective treatment for that. If this was more of a schizophrenia, you can have effective treatment, but it is a lifelong illness. So, you know, was he continuing to get treatment? Was it different

forms of treatment that he was still getting for psychosis, that's not a detail we have right now, but that would be a very important detail. That medication alone, that injection from 2010 wouldn't have lasting effects from that five years later.

HARLOW: Right.

GUPTA: But the real question is if he had that diagnosis, was he continuing to get treated? How functional was he?

HARLOW: And we know that he according to investigators ripped up doctors notes saying he was unfit to fly this very week.

Finally, Sanjay, you noted one of the side effects of some of this can be blurred vision and "The New York Times" had reported he had some vision issues.

GUPTA: Yes. You know, and again, it's one of those you don't want to start speculating too much on all these things back and forth, but the idea that you have a medication that could be providing benefit. You're a pilot and it's causing blurred vision, and it may make you not want to continue to take that medication, obviously, so you know, who knows? You know, if he was prescribed this medication, and you have the injectable form five years ago and now taking an oral antipsychotic, and not taking it because it was causing these detrimental side effects and that could be very concerning, as well.

Also, you know, the idea that in a psychotic state versus a manic state with bipolar, your mind can be racing fully and yet outwardly you may not have many indicators -- would be a lot to ask if anybody, who's not a mental health professional, pick up on signs or side effects of these medications. But it's quite possible that, you know, there weren't much to pick up on in terms of clues here.

[18:20:04] HARLOW: And that's what everyone is saying they had no idea. Dr. Sanjay Gupta, thanks to all the perspective context. We appreciate it.

GUPTA: Yes, thank you.

HARLOW: We're going to keep talking about this after a quick break, because when it comes to mental illness, should pilots have to sacrifice their privacy if they want to fly passengers? We're going to talk about that issue of where the line is on medical privacy for pilots, next.

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HARLOW: More now on the crash of Germanwings Flight 9525. And a key question, should doctors have to report the co-pilot Andreas Lubitz's mental health state to the airline?

Let me bring in doctor and columnist, Dr. Sreedhar Potarazu in Washington. He just wrote a column about exactly this.

And also, criminal defense attorney Brian Claypool who spent part of his career defending French Airbus.

Thank you, gentlemen, for being here.

Doctor, in this column that you just wrote, you write in part, quote, "The relationship between mental illness and mass murder whether by guns, terrorism or airplane is indisputable and the time to take measures to prevent deaths caused by that relationship is long past due."

So, this brings up the key question, right now it is up to the pilots to self-report any mental illness, bout with depression, any medications they may be taking to treat it to the airline.

[18:25:06] Is self-reporting enough, Doctor?

DR. SREEDHAR POTARAZU, OPHTHALMOLOGIST: It's not enough, Poppy, and this raises a whole new issue between physicians, other professionals and the patient in a whole new domain of health privacy that's going to raise a lot of questions and concerns. Of course, as a doctor, we can only tell the patient what they're supposed to do or not to do, and then as you said, it's going to be up to the patient in terms of making the determination whether they tell their employer. The doctor cannot tell the employer under privacy laws and the employer is not allowed to reach out or understand at an individual level and it's still up to the patient in terms of reporting that.

HARLOW: Let me ask you this, doctor, and I don't want to interrupt, but I do want it to be clear for the viewers -- I was reading through the HIPAA laws, right, and deep into them, it says that covered entities which are doctors may disclose protected health information that they believe is necessary to prevent or lessen a serious and imminent threat to a person or to the public.

POTARAZU: Yes. That's a great point because a covered entity and there is a very fine line. An employer is technically a covered entity, but typically what employers do when they want to reach out directly to an employee, an employer can never know that an individual has a given illness and they're not allowed to use that information under HIPAA to reach out to them directly. But what they can do and they do is to hire third parties, usually through the insurance companies who are contracted to reach directly out to the individual. They know who the individual is, and they can engage in a conversation and a program to ensure that that patient is getting what they're supposed to in a direct follow up and that could be a condition like diabetes or it could be a mental health issue.

HARLOW: To you, Brian, does this, when you look at HIPAA laws and this covered entity, does that include doctors -- meaning, are doctors completely prohibited from telling an employer, look, I wrote this note saying this co-pilot was unfit to fly or does this sort of part of the HIPAA laws allow the doctors when they think they could be a risk to the public allow the doctors to tell the employer?

BRIAN CLAYPOOL, CRIMINAL DEFENSE ATTORNEY: Poppy, the key in the law that you just read is the word may. You said the doctors may report it. We need a change in the HIPAA laws and worldwide we need changes that

say that doctors must report, the key word must and make them a mandated reporter that if they suspect -- especially with the pilot -- if they suspect a pilot has a medical condition that impairs his or her ability to fly a plane, or a mental health disorder that compromises his or her ability to fly a plane, then they must report that to the employer and if need be, law enforcement. And if they don't there are consequences, which means criminal prosecution for failing to report.

The only way to stop this from happening again is if everybody has skin in the game. The medical health personnel have skin in the game, therapists have skin in the game, and that there are consequences. Public safety trumps privacy.

HARLOW: Doctor?

POTARAZU: I complete --

HARLOW: Would you be onboard with a change like that?

POTARAZU: I completely agree. I think that physicians have a new responsibility, but it's a fine line because you'll ask many physicians today and they'll tell you as a practicing physician most people don't often put into context what it is and the patient situation outside of taking care of the condition, and it doesn't matter whether you're a bus driver, an Uber taxi driver or whether you're a pilot.

Every single day, every one of us puts our lives in the hands of somebody who we take it for granted has the wherewithal in terms of maintaining the sanctity of that relationship and not putting our lives at risk and we just take that for granted. But there are any number of things that we don't necessarily assess as physicians to know whether the functional status of that individual in that medical condition are adept enough and satisfactory enough for them to perform that.

You know, you mentioned the blurred vision earlier, and I'm an ophthalmologist. And it's a good point. But even if you were to measure that his vision is not adequate, I think the attorney raises a good point that how are you going to enforce it, because it's still left to an individual whose functional state is still a question?

HARLOW: I want to get Brian in here, final word.

CLAYPOOL: Yes, sure, Poppy, look, the reality is this. Lubitz was unfit to be a co-pilot based on the ejection he got that Dr. Gupta mentioned in 2010. He should have never been a pilot.

So, if we have new laws in place that mandate that that medical doctor that gave him that shot immediately reports to Lufthansa, then I guarantee you --

[18:30:00] UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Dr. Gupta mentioned in 2010. He should have never been a pilot. So if we have new laws in place that mandate that that medical doctor that gave him that shot immediately reports that to Lufthansa, then I guarantee you he would not have been flying that plane.

POPPY HARLOW, CNN ANCHOR: But -- we do have to wrap it up, but I've got to say, as I leave it there, here's the fear, that if you -- if you do that, right, many of these pilots, it is believed, that people would not then go to get the treatment that they need for fear of losing their job. That is what you run up against.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: They shouldn't be a pilot then.

HARLOW: What the answer is, I'm not sure.

Gentlemen, we got to go. I got to leave it there.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: They shouldn't be a pilot.

HARLOW: Thank you for being with me, both of you, Doctor O'Brien, I appreciate it very much.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Thanks, Poppy.

HARLOW: Coming up next, we're going to talk about this search that continues for recovering the victims' remains. It is a very grim task that is going on in the alps right now while the families mourn loved ones who they will never see again.

Our coverage continues next.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

HARLOW: The German tabloid newspaper "Bild" has published what is described as a summary transcript of voice recordings made in the cockpit of the airline that crashed this week into the French Alps.

CNN has translated that summary, however, we cannot independently verify that it is indeed a correct transcript of what actually was captured on that cockpit audio recording.

The voices paint a picture of what started out to be a normal, routine on the flight deck turning suddenly desperate when the co-pilot refuses, refuses to open the door for the captain whom he has locked out. According to the transcript, 13 minutes passed between when the time the captain starts furiously banging on that cockpit door and the plane crashes into the mountains killing all 150 people onboard.

On the rugged hillsides of the French Alps, a grim task continues day by day, hour by hour, the recovery of the remains of those 150 people onboard Flight 9525. Teams on the ground now say they have identified between 70 and 80 of the victims.

Let me bring in CNN international correspondent Karl Penhaul.

You have been talking, Karl, to families of the passengers. I cannot imagine what it is like for them.

KARL PENHAUL, CNN INTERNATIONAL CORRESPONDENT: Absolutely, Poppy. And of course, we've been doing a lot of reporting about transcripts, about laws, about states of mind, about the whole psychological thing. I want to take this right back for you, the real, basic human level.

Today I've spent most of the day at the memorial site about two and a half miles from the actual crash site and what I've seen is just a reminder that there were people of all nations on that flight. There were people of all ages and the people that I've seen shuffling up to a marble plaque have been elderly moms and dads, they could be your and mine moms and dad. I've seen brothers and sisters hunched and broken.

I've seen husbands and wives looking into those mountains, looking for inspiration, looking for some kind of comfort, and I want to show you this report.

(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)

PENHAUL (voice-over): A father grieves. A mother and the sister wonder why.

Milad Eslami was a sports journalist from Iran. Tamashii, he was big brother.

MAHSHID ESLAMI, MILAD ESLAMI'S SISTER: He said to one of his friends that if someone killed in the flight crash is would be OK because if for one minute and be gone and you are in the sky, then your soul will go. But he has been eight minutes.

[18:35:06] PENHAUL: Eight minutes for the co-pilot to crash an airliner into the French Alps. But Milad's uncle, Dawud, prefers to focus on his life, not death.

DAWUD TAWAKOLI, MILAD ESLAMI'S UNCLE: He was a fantastic journalist. And he's still one of the best we have in Iran. And because he worked not only as a journalist, he worked with his heart.

PENHAUL: Milad had been in Spain with friend and fellow journalist, Hossein Jawadi. They've taken these photos together. They've been covering the soccer game, Barcelona versus Real Madrid. Milad was a lifelong Barcelona fan. His hero --

ESLAMI: Absolutely, miss.

PENHAUL: Local village Mayor Francois Balique is here at a memorial site to help console all the grieving families. And on Sunday, he sent this digger to carve a track to the crash site. That's around four kilometers or two and a half miles away as the crow flies, but until now accessible only by helicopter.

"I felt the families wanted this, and they asked me to get them as close as possible, as if every meter mattered to them," he says. Relatives asked him to describe the area closest to the crash.

"This was a corner of paradise, but now there is the before and after the accident," he says. "I tell Mahshid and Dawud about the alpine scenery up there but wild flowers grow and melted snow runs in crystal streams."

ESLAMI: And everything is scared for him but for us, we just can calm ourselves down with these pictures that he's now the king of the Alps.

PENHAUL: Milad and all those who flew with him the kings of the Alps.

(END VIDEOTAPE)

PENHAUL: Now that, of course, is just one story. On that plane, there were 150 stories. 150 life stories, and that's what we've also got to do. We've got to remember the manner in which those people lived, at the same time when we analyze the nature of their deaths -- Poppy.

HARLOW: Karl Penhaul with absolutely beautiful reporting for us this evening about what really matter, the people.

Thank you, Karl.

We'll be right back.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

[18:41:20] HARLOW: If a pilot steps out of the cockpit a flight attendant must step in. That is the rule here in the United States, among all carriers and now it is being adopted by an increasing number of airlines overseas including Lufthansa, the parent company of Germanwings. They implemented that just days after this horrific crash.

So is this just the beginning of protocol changes when it comes to the cockpit in particular?

I am joined now by CNN aviation correspondent Richard Quest, commercial airline pilot Les Abend joins me as well, and in Tokyo and our aviation analyst Mile O'Brien.

Thank you, gentlemen for being here.

Richard, to you first.

RICHARD QUEST, CNN AVIATION CORRESPONDENT: Yes.

HARLOW: What is the number one thing, if anything, you think should change across the board in the U.S. and overseas?

QUEST: I can't say at this point. I mean, the -- what we've seen in this example is that the very -- the very instrument to which was used to solve one problem created another problem, and it was a complicated piece of equipment, the door, with its override and its time delays, and so it wasn't like something just thrown together. A lot of thought had gone into it. But nobody ever thought it was going to be used as against the aircraft itself. Now I think the two-men rule is coming pretty much universally. Those airlines that haven't are merely foolish and will no doubt --

HARLOW: But it wasn't the rule here.

QUEST: Sorry?

HARLOW: It wasn't the rule.

(CROSSTALK)

QUEST: No -- it's now come in, it's now come in, and it will become universal, and of course, it's still not entirely certainly would have done anything, but I'll accept for the purposes of your question there will be more changes on psychological testing on cockpit etiquette, on doors, on mechanisms.

HARLOW: Miles, you believe, look, this pilot -- co-pilot did not have the hours, did not have the training, did not have the experience to even be piloting this plane.

MILES O'BRIEN, CNN AVIATION ANALYST: I think that's true, Poppy. And, you know, you have an industry that is very cost conscious and really ever since going back to the days of deregulation in 1979 management at airlines has really put pilots under the gun as far as giving back wages and benefits and work rules and on it goes. They treat their pilots like data points.

There is a terrible adversary relationship that has developed over the years with the labor strife and in that environment is any surprise that people are reluctant to come forward and say hey, I've got a problem here?

HARLOW: Yes. Les, you're a commercial pilot. We've seen the fights that go on and on between airline pilots, their union and the airline that leads to strikes and that is not what causes something like this. This is a person clearly disturbed with a mental illness, but does Miles has a point?

LES ABEND, CNN AVIATION ANALYST: You know, Miles has a good point, and I agree with Miles on that aspect of it, but I think we've got to differentiate between experience and flight time. In other words, this individual was training specifically for that job. Somebody as miles has talked about in those segment here in the United States would be 1500 hours which is the point that he can sit in the right seat of commercial airlines.

So that's going to give you more experience, the idea that I'm not going to go through that thunderstorm just more aviation type experience. That doesn't necessarily mean he's less qualified and can't fly the airplane. Remember we took people in World War II with no aviation experience and sent them over --

HARLOW: Yes.

ABEND: You know, to fight a war so I mean, there is an aspect of that, but Miles does have a good point with reference to experience.

HARLOW: One of the things that everyone hopes will not come out of this is stigmatizing people that are battling depression because of these reports that Lubitz was battling depression, psychosis, et cetera, and we were talking about this in the break. I'd like you both and Miles to jump in and address this.

If someone is a pilot battling depression, Les, you say you would still fly with them.

[18:45:03] ABEND: Yes. Because I understand that aspect that this individual was monitored before he got -- throughout the time that he began that medication, and in addition, Richard and I were talking just before we went on air, pilots have an incredible ability to compartmentalize. That's a safe place, a cockpit for them. They get away from all their family problems and things that are causing that depression.

That's not saying that that's necessarily a great thing, but if they're being medically treated for it I'm still comfortable with that because he's still the same colleague that's qualified and experienced in that seat.

HARLOW: Richard.

QUEST: You said the phrase, Poppy, " The pilot who is buckling depression. That's different to the pilot who's being treated for depression.

HARLOW: A very good point.

QUEST: Or who's under treatment.

HARLOW: And the FAA rules make that very clear.

QUEST: Right. And once the pilot is treated for it, as in any business, we can't stigmatize people then you have to monitor, you have to look, you have to do all the right procedures and so I don't have a problem with it.

HARLOW: Miles, do you as a pilot?

O'BRIEN: Well, I mean, it's an evolving thing. It was only a few years ago that taking antidepressants was disqualifying for pilots so, you know, it wasn't a problem if you were taking heart medication if you were flying an airplane or any number of medications, but for whatever reason, antidepressants were considered differently and this is really part of a much wider, societal bias against with people mental illness and until we as a society see a disease of the brain just like it's a disease of the heart this is going to be a problem. But I think we're moving in that direction as a society. HARLOW: Yes. Miles, Les, Richard, thank you very much. We

appreciate it.

We're going to take a quick break. Coming up next, we're going to hit on some of the other key headlines right now especially air strikes looking like we may just see the first step in fighting rebels in Yemen, what other Middle Eastern nations are doing right now in Yemen.

Also talking about ground troops that may be in Yemen within a matter of days and we'll have the latest on that next.

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[18:50:15] HARLOW: An update to the chaos unfolding in the Middle East. There are ominous signs today in Yemen and new evidence that Saudi Arabian military forces are poised to invade and take on Iranian-backed Shiite rebels. This video showing Saudi tanks on their way to the border in Yemen. The Houthi rebels in Yemen have driven out the president of the country leaving the government in absolute shambles.

A journalist there on the ground yesterday telling us they have no idea who is in control. Protesters taking to the streets for the chances of a diplomatic settlement are fading as Arab nations mobilized their forces for action possibly in just the next few days.

CNN's Becky Anderson has more.

(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)

BECKY ANDERSON, CNN INTERNATIONAL CORRESPONDENT: As the Saudi-led offensive from the air continues to grind down the capabilities of Houthi rebels on the ground across Yemen, there is a very real chance that tens of thousands of Arab boots on the ground could be deployed within days to further degrade the Iran-backed militia.

Now, Arab leaders and their delegations have thrashed out plans for an Arab military force ostensibly to counter threats of insurgency across the region going forward, concentrating, though, in the first instance on Yemen.

Now the so-called Sharm el-Sheikh declaration allows for military action led by the Saudis and urges Houthis to immediately withdraw from the capital Sana'a, from government institutions, and to surrender their weapons to, quote, "legitimate authorities."

Now I guess the implicit understanding then being that if they don't there is a mechanism in place to ratchet up these Arab-allied efforts. President Hadi of Yemen as we know last week, he turned up here at the Arab League Summit over the weekend to rally support for this "Operation Decisive Storm" and in his opening speech he didn't mince his words denouncing Houthi rebels as Iran's puppets and warning them that there will be -- that they will be responsible for what happens next in the country.

When he flew back to Riyadh late last night I sat down, though, with the Yemeni Foreign minister in the wee hours of this morning, and I asked him about how -- what he believed the addition of ground troops will be and when.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

RIAD YASSIN, YEMEN FOREIGN MINISTER: I think we need ground troops as soon as possible to keep things and to hold it together.

ANDERSON: Are you talking days?

YASSIN: Could be.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

ANDERSON: Well, this is by no means unanimously supported, dissenting voices from Lebanon and Iraq, Baghdad, for example, going so far as to say that Riyadh's decision to launch their operation on Yemen was hasty. They made it clear that they are against military intervention. They called for political dialogue that includes all stakeholders.

And my sense is that the international community is also eager to promote further discussions, possibly hosted by longtime mediator Amman. So I guess what happens from now on in will inform the future for Yemen and the consequences of a possible all-out fight in what of for many years has been a proxy war between Saudi and the regional rival Iran is what we should be watching out for.

Becky Anderson, CNN, Sharm el-Sheikh.

(END VIDEOTAPE)

HARLOW: Becky, thank you for that report.

And to Switzerland now, where the nuclear negotiations with Iran are up against quite a deadline, a deadline now just two days away. Will a deal be reached?

Our CNN global affairs correspondent Elise Labott has that.

(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)

ELISE LABOTT, CNN FOREIGN AFFAIRS REPORTER: Well, Poppy, these nuclear talks have really intensified over the last 24 hours as the negotiations reached the endgame. Now all the foreign ministers have arrived and diplomats here tell us that they could see the contours of a deal taking shape. They're trying to find compromises, but those two thorny issues we've been talking about -- sanctions and Iran's nuclear research and development program -- remain sticking points and could prevent a deal ahead of Tuesday's deadline.

Iran is demanding all United Nations sanctions be lifted immediately but world powers here say Iran could see some economic sanctions lifted right away, but those U.N. measures are going to take some time and there's still a big gap on how much research Iran can do on advanced nuclear technology while a deal is in effect. Diplomats say Iran wants to do much more than the international community is comfortable with.

Israeli Prime Minister Netanyahu isn't comfortable with any of this. He's saying on Sunday that the deal shaping up is worse than Israel's deepest fears.

Now it's unclear this will all come together before Tuesday's deadline, but all sides here say there is a real desire to try and find agreement. Everyone very cognizant of the fact that like it or not, if there is no deal, Congress could impose additional sanctions on Iran as early as next month and that could scuttle any chances of a deal with Iran -- Poppy.

[18:55:15] HARLOW: Elise, we'll be watching very closely.

Elise Labott for us in Lausanne, Switzerland.

Quick break. We're back with more headlines after this.

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HARLOW: A look at your top stories this hour. An AirCanada jet touching down short of the runway today as it landed in Halifax, Nova Scotia. An airport spokesman calling it a hard landing. The Airbus A-320 was heavily damaged. The 25 passengers and crew onboard were treated for minor injuries.

World leaders join Tunisians marching against terrorism today. They're still angered and saddened by the terrorist attack that broke out at Bardo Museum in Tunis where 22 people were murdered. The leaders from Tunisia and France joined Italy's prime minister and U.S. ambassador under tight security. The Bardo Museum reopened for the first time today since that horrific attack.

And protests continue in Indiana after the governor of Indiana signed a controversial religious freedom law this week. Critics say it discriminates against gays and lesbians by allowing businesses to refuse to serve them based on their religion. The governor of Indiana says that is not the intent or the case. Major businesses including Angie's List and Sales Force have scrapped their expansion plans in the state in response to this law.

We have a lot lined up for you tonight on CNN. A marathon of "FINDING JESUS" episodes coming up including the premiere of "FINDING JESUS: THE TRUE CROSS." That is at 9:00 Eastern right here on CNN. Could pieces of the cross Jesus was crucified on still exist today?

[19:00:05] Then at 10:00 p.m. Eastern, the famous Dead Sea bordering Jordan and Israel, drying up at an astonishing rate. Tonight's episode of "THE WONDER LIST" with Bill Weir, right here, takes you there, on CNN.

Thanks very much for being with us. Have a great week.