Communicated with the ground. And where is the debris . So far not a speck found. Even if search crews were able to discover a speck of flight 370, that doesnt mean that the reason for the disappearance will follow. Good afternoon, everyone. Im jake tapper. Welcome to the lead. A new wrinkle in the story that has captivated the plan. Its been six days since Malaysia Flight 370 disappeared, seemingly into thin air. Six days of dead ends and false alarms its taking on dimensions such as the doomed planes and now nearly a week after flight 370 vanished without a trace, the white house says the search will get even wider. It is my understanding that one possible piece of information or collection pieces of information has led to the possibility that a new area, a search area may be opened in the indian ocean. In the indian ocean. What is this new information that has propelled the search in a different direction towards the west . The plane may have flown on for several hours beyond the last radar reading that the malaysians have shared. There are 56 ships and 30 aircraft taking part in the search but they better hurry because the locator beacons and flight recorders only have 23 days of battery life left. Lets bring in jim sciutto and barbara starr. Why do u. S. Officials feel like the plane may have made it to the indian ocean . A senior u. S. Official tells me that they now have information from the malaysians that the engines on this plane sent data to satellites, Maintenance Data about the engines, very routine business to do that, sent to satellites, several pings, if you were, picked up by the satellites. The malaysian ares getting some help from the United States. The possibility is that the plane flew four or five hours to the west out over the indian ocean. None of this is 100 , as you are pointing out. A lot of confusion, a lot of mystery about where this plane is. This is significant because it makes all eyes turn to the west, hundreds of square miles of the indian ocean now potentially to be looked at and the u. S. Will have to decide how much it wants to participate in that new search. There are navy ships in the area. Some officials that im talking to said the navy ships will move out over the indian ocean and some Officials Say they wont. Well have to see what happens. The wall street journal had a similar report, although they have since corrected that report. Explain to us the difference and the significance. Well, their correction. They say rather than the data being transmitted back to ground, theres a system on the plane thats constantly sending data back throughout periodically. The data didnt go to the ground but it went up to a satellite which is similar to barbara and my own reporting. Its not just this engine data that gives them an indication that it went into the indian ocean. Its the radar data that the Malaysian Air force had, showing the plane taking a left turn and heading towards the south and west of the indian ocean and how much knowledge about the gas in the fuel tanks which gives them a sense of range. They had about seven hours of flying time fuel. Took a turnabout two hours into the flight so it would give it four or five hours to fly conceivably. Its a combination of things. This is an investigation. These are all clues. Some of the clues have not panned out. For instance, the satellite images. They have more than one clue that points them in this new direction. The radar data, the engine data and thats why they are going to be looking at the indian ocean. Barbara starr says its not 100 . Three indications are pointing that way. Plus, as we learned, so many leads, as you heard, have been undermined by further examination. What other capabilities does the u. S. Government have to look at this situation completely independent of the malaysians . Well, thats what is so important right now. Were told by u. S. Officials that there are a number of intelligence and military analysts working this problem right now, looking at commercial satellite imagery, trying to look across all of these areas and see if they can figure out any anomalies, anything in the water that might indicate a piece of debris rather than just trash or garbage floating through the ocean, something more legitimate than what the chinese purported to show about 24 hours ago but theres an even bigger mystery here of another piece that they cant confirm right now, the same u. S. Official telling me the emergency beacon system on the airplane that would have transmitted an emergency if the plane was about to impact the water or impact land. If it was about to go down. That system should have gone off and so farther not finding any data that shows it went off. Doesnt give us much to go on about what happened to the plane and its another piece of puzzle, jake. Barbara starr and jim sciutto, thank you. Joining me now from chattanooga, tennessee, former head of the National Transportation board. He was head during the crash of twa. Jim, thanks for joining us. So help us understand this with all this new information about the flight may have continued for several hours, based on information that the engine gave that was picked up by satellite, the u. S. Officials now say that the flight may have continued westward into the indian ocean. Why would that information be coming out now, six days after the flight disappeared . Well, it took several days to get the ntsb experts in location and so i would imagine that now with individuals who will highly specialized in the accident investigation arena, that they are able to start putting together this puzzle as to where is the best place to look for this aircraft. There is a thing called acars. The Airlines Service data system. Thats correct. Did i get that right . Yeah. Its a Maintenance System that goes to a satellite and then to the ground that provides information about the mechanical health of the aircraft. It was that system that was very helpful in identifying the location of the air france accident. So i understand that information has come to light that may indicate that theres a possibility and this is pure speculation at this point, that this may be similar to the Payne Stewart flight, that there was some decompression of the oxygen system on the aircraft, incapacitating not only the crew but the passengers and the plane continued to flight for several hours. And what happened at that point, theoretically . And i understand that everything is speculation, although it is informed speculation, based on the most recent information that were getting from Government Entities and investigators. What would happen at that point . Would the transponder go out . Would decompression lead to everybody on the plane becoming unconscious . What would happen . Well, unfortunately, it would decompression after a handful of seconds. I think it was in the 30, 40 seconds without supplementary oxygen. Unfortunately, everyone would become unconscious and its a fatal event. Again, this is pure speculation but i would hope the investigators are looking very closely at the maintenance records. Its a very modern aircraft, but it had a lot of cycles to try and determine what may have occurred. So if the pilot actually turned because of a problem to return and then there was an event that incapacitated the crew, we might have seen a situation that is being described here, the possibility of the plane then flying for several hours as a Payne Stewart plane did. We knew the Payne Stewart aircraft was over georgia, that the crew was incapacitated because the air force scrambled jets and were able to see to get close enough to the aircraft. But that plane continued forsever for several hours. We thought it was going to possibly crash in chicago but fortunately it veered, because of the winds it ended up in i believe it was south dakota. Jim, in terms of the airliner service data system, which is where this latest information comes from, the Airlines Service data communicating with the satellite and that leads officials believe that the flight went westward into the indian ocean, how would they not be 100 sure that it was flight 370 . Are there not specific signals that are given off . Well, they are going to have to i would imagine they will probably know more information than what has been released at this point. I think we ought to look very closely now at where the u. S. Navy, if the u. S. Navy starts searching in the indian ocean, i think that would be an indication that theres some reliable information that is a place that we need to be looking. Lets lay out all of the twists and turns in terms of the location precisely of this plane and well put up a map. First we have the site where the transponder stopped working. And then we had the military pick up go ahead. Im sorry. Well, im saying, thats really the key event. There are only two ways that the transponder that im aware of could have stopped working and that it was turned off, which would be a very highly unusual move by the flight crew or there was an electrical failure of some kind. Okay. So thats the last known site of flight 370. Then we have the military the malaysian military pick up this radar blip on the western side of malaysia which were still not sure if its this plane. Then yesterday we had satellite imagery from the chinese, not too far from the last known site of the plane back to the east thats been searched. Nothing has been found. Now we have reports that the flight may have gone on for four more hours towards the west and as far as the indian ocean. If you were leading this investigation right now, would you focus on the west, would you focus on the indian ocean or the last known spot more in the South China Sea . Well, if i was leading this investigation, first of all, i would be very dependent on the experts in Radar Technology and aviation that work for the board and work for various agencies to determine. This needs to be an extremely coordinated effort and hopefully were going to see more of that now that we have all of the right players in place in malaysia. But obviously this is not simple. This is why i have been a longtime advocate for deployable recorders, such as we have on our f18. But that recorder deployable signal had this aircraft gone into either the ocean or the ground. Coming up next, how a plane communicates when a pilot does not say a word. Were looking at the signals that every plane sends back to land and what those signals can tell us about where flight 370 may be. And later, the anguish of waiting. 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Malaysian authorities tell cnn they think several pings of the airliner were transmitting to satellites four to five hours after last contact with air Traffic Control on saturday. This all suggests that the plane could i want to emphasize the plane could have flown over the indian ocean. It still does not answer why it lost contact with the transponder an air after takeoff. Reporter inside the cockpit of a boeing 777, there are multiple ways that the pilots communicate with the ground. Information beams down and until today we thought the last transmission was 1 07 a. M. Local time. Now there is word it may have been transmitting data hours beyond that. What information give me details, what kind of information is being beamed down. Engine parameters, temperatures, amount of fuel burned, any maintenance discrepancy. Airlines monitor the realtime data. Radio, all right, good night, the final call from the pilots of flight 370 left Malaysian Air space. A common phrase when changing controllers. Alaska Airlines Flight 261 when the plane dived out of control, pilots radioed what was happening. But no mayday from flight 370. In the event of an emergency, is communication secondary . Yes. The First Priority is to fly the aircraft and then communicate. Reporter a third way to communicate, by transponder. 12 1, a. M. , the plane loses contact. Is there any good reason that a pilot would want to switch that off . No. Clearly, if all of the power was lost to the aircraft or something happened to take out that part of the electronics, the electrical system, yeah, that would turn it off. But certainly one aspect of turning it off is because you dont want to be seen. Reporter radar tracked flight 370 flying for another nine minutes. Then the plane vanishes. But the one piece of the plane that is likely still communicating, the flight recorders. Only sonar equipment can detect their pings and time is of essence. The signal only lasts for about 30 days. Rene marsh, cnn. I want to bring in jim tillman, a retired aircraft pilot. What does this tell you about the last contact with the transponder . Im troubled by the lack of more complete information. Ive been looking at the timeline, jake, and its very interesting to me that conversation that you mentioned that they had, the last known transmission from the cockpit was stated without any emotion or without any indication that anything was wrong. And moments later, literally moments later, the transponderers went off the line. Now, what happened in that little time span between everythings okay, roger, have a nice night, and transponderer is off the line and no communication whatsoever after that point . And the other thing is, this thing about the engines communicating with acars on the ground, its my understanding that transmission is not absolute in terms of by the realtime, this is a precise moment, that the information can be collected and saved and then sent out in bursts of communications through the system. That could happen after the engines may not be running because its another communication system. Theres a lot of possibilities. And i dont even have a favorite one right now. Jim, is there a reason why pilots are even able to flip off transponders . I dont really know why thats an option . The plane is in the air, the transponder should automatically be on. Essentially it is. But what if you had an electrical fire that involved the transponder . You would want to be able to turn it off. Pilots dont like to have anything in the cockpit that you cant turn off. You dont know what youre going to need. I cant imagine a good reason for turning it off unless there was an electrical situation that could not be handled in another way. You can see that little box there. Its just got a switch to switch it on or off or from transponder number one to two. Jim, youve logged thousands and thousands of hours flying commercial for 29 years. Have you ever willfully cut ground communication with Ground Control . Never. Never. Thats your lifeline. You depend on air Traffic Controllers because they let you know if there is traffic that you should know about or any other fact that would be interesting to you and the safety of your flight and the comfort of your passengers. No. I cannot imagine any reason for leaning over and shutting off the transponders. Im no aviator, but i thought there were so many redundancies that built into planes that being noi knocking out communication could really only happen during a catastrophe. Is that right . Essentially thats correct. A gross electrical failure would do all of those things at one time and it could be simultaneously. A fire in the as they call it the e and e compartment, which is generally somewhere in the vicinity of the cockpit itself, that could disrupt a lot of things all at one time and electrical fires are pretty spooky. There are a few situations where they crash and once it starts it moves very rapidly. It could definitely take everything off the line. We had the former chief of staff of the federal Aviation Administration on the show yesterday and he said one possibility that hasnt really been pursued by investigators as much as he thought could be pursued is that the idea that the plane could be on land somewhere as opposed to in the ocean. Is that more possible than people think . Its very possible. And being on land some place could mean one of two things. It crashed on land and with all that jungletype terrain out there, the geography, it could hide under the canopy of trees. The other possibility of it landing someplace is that they intentionally flew that plane where they knew they could land and landed there and probably had no more damage. You know, this story has consumed the media, its consumed people, the american public, and the public around the world. They are speculating, talking about what might have happened. We can all identify with the fear since most peop