we want to welcome our viewers in the u.s. and around the world. here are the stories we are following for you right now on cnn. in the search for malaysian airlines flight 370, the hms echo is moving to the northern end of the search area supporting australia s ocean shield focusing on the area where four suspected pings have been picked up. authorities in pennsylvania say 16-year-old alex hribal went on a stabbing rampage at his high school wednesday. they don t know why. police say 20 students and one adult was stabbed in the attack. doctors say some of the injuries are life threatening. the teen is being charged as an adult. 92 seats in india s parliament decided as indians head to the poles fls today. the indian capital region among 14 states where people are casting their ballots. the country s five week marathon vote began monday and continues
the ocean shield while it was carrying out this very sensitive audio detecting work. so, it s unclear what the hms echo will be doing, how close it will be getting to the ocean shield when it arrives at its final destination later today, christine. and so we know that these ships and planes have really been looking for any signs of debris, and they have been retrieving things from the ocean, from the surface of the ocean. has any of that been tied yet to this flight? reporter: well, not that we re aware of. it s another search day, day 24. some 14 aircraft and 13 vessels are out there to the west of where the ocean shield is conducting its work, scouring those waters. that area based largely on experts detections or beliefs in terms of where the debris may have gone, the tides may have taken the debris, if the plane did, in fact, go down in the
to say yes we have absolutely found it. off the record, they are absolutely certain. mike dean, what does your gut say were yesterday s pings the last pings we are going to get? how much could be left in the batteries? certainly could be more battery life and we hope they are not the last pings, but again as we continue to track and try to triangulate to a smaller search field, it s very encouraging that we are still getting some feedback from the pingers. geoffrey, angus houston was asked when would the drone start to look for debris and he said it wouldn t be far off. but isn t time running out here and we heard the hms echo is heading out. so there are signs this might be happening sooner rather than later. why not send it now that the batteries and pingers are going out. the last thing you want to do i m sorry.
yeah, i think so. it s a i think it s like a maritime order. when you have a ship in trouble you go help it. this is not under that order but i think that this is where the united states is proven to be available for whatever it s needed for, even if there were only a few people involved in that plane. what joe s piece in the story didn t mention is these are mainly military assets being used and as a former military pilot, what do you think of that, mikey? i think it s the best equipment for the job, don. when you look at the state of the art technology like the p-8 that only initial operating capability only last year and has the state of the art equipment on it. there isn t anything i can see in the civilian world that will have that kind of equipment and be able to deploy those assets as long as they have. we heard the other day that there were 133 missions that were known. you have the australian air crews flying around the clock.
yards off the ocean floor and with an expensive and highly sensitive piece of equipment like this, you don t want it colliding with things, getting stuff and losing valuable time. that s whey thooy they re waiti that and focusing on the work on the surface. the ships like the hms echo. what it can do is give them a better picture before they start, wolf, of what they re taking pictures of so hopefully when they put the bluefin down there, it can be the most productive. because the big production to get it into the water and get it out safely, they don t want to lose any of that time through bad planning. very, very, very complicated. tom, thank you. colleen keller, senior analyst with the scientific consulting firm metron. worked on the search for air france flight 447. and eric is joining us from sydney, he s an oceanographer with the climate change research center. talk a little bit about these waters. how challenging, eric, are they