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Too surprising that they didnt find anything, that the bluefin-21 didnt find anything during that search. it really only lasted about two hours on the ocean floor, covering what must have been a fraction of the 15-square-mile area that was designated for the days mission, that area being the most probable place for the black box, that according to officials based on those pings that were heard last week. this is going to be a slow and painstaking process, that according to officials here. nothin...

Sources close to the operation. they say the bluefin had been calibrated to go to a certain depth. its not clear why but the vehicle started to move towards a lower depth and at that point it took itself out of the mission. a source close to the operation tells cnn, the bluefin-21 is back in the water, searching for possible debris in the same place it was looking monday night. the source says the underwater drone is operating at about the same depth as its first mission, even though in that fir...

Mission. it was supposed to have lasted 24 hours. officials say a built-in safety feature automatically aborted the mission when the device exceeded its maximum depth. in the meantime, the first data from bluefin 21 has now been analyzed. the u.s. navy says no objects of interest have been found. malaysia is now promising to reveal any data that is retrieved from the black boxes. >> i dont think its important who gets custody as far as im concerned. and this is my own personal position. its find...

Navy-provided blue fin 21, the underwater autonomous vehicle capable of searching the ocean floor for actual wreckage. now, australian authorities have not been in a rush to do that, saying they want to be absolutely certain the black box batteries have completely expire they have detected every ping there was to detect. why? because the more pings they can detect, the more information they have with which to narrow down a potential search field. that helps the blue fin 21 search some 2.8 miles ...

Hours to return, and four hours to down load images which are high resolution image of the area searching 4.500 meters. so that is about 2.8 miles underwater. and the terrain is very difficult. its an area that is, he says quote new to man. its flat and rolling. a lot of silt on the bottom. it can be layered and very teep which will complicate the search. it is a final step towards making a visual determination. said they have not heard a detection from the pinger since tuesday. is six days now....

Tony abbott, over the last couple of days expressing some level of confidence of finding these black boxes. but let me ask you this. how close are they now to finding the airliners flight recorders? >> reporter: we havent been given a specific timetable. yesterday the australian prime minister tony abbott saying that itll likely take some time for them to physically locate the black box. they have 2.8 miles of water to contend with. as you mentioned, he is confident, though. he said that they ar...

Is a new challenge, which is silt, the silt on the ocean floor here, some 2.8 miles deep. tell me what kind of challenges that will pose. >> yeah, so, in some ways, its a good sign that there is a lot of silt down there, because that means that, actually, the currents arent that strong. what this silt is, its essentially dead plankton. its the carcasses of everything that lived above it, including, for instance, things also like fish poo. fish poo slowly falling down through the ocean and at the...

That underwater autonomous vehicle, it would be a very, very, very long time before they could verify or find any sort of wreckage. christine? >> tell us about the difference in the signal strengths. is that casting any doubt on their findings? >> reporter: well, the signal that they detected is a total of 33.2 kilohertz, and theyre expected to detect a signal of 37.5. houston addressing that at the press conference earlier today, saying that that doesnt necessarily diminish these results, given...

30 days. but officials say they are going to continue searching. the "ocean shield" will continue to use that american-provided towed ping locator in an effort to pick up a signal until they are certain there is no possibility that that black box pinger is still working. john? >> erin, i understand they want other vessels to steer clear right now of the "ocean shield" to give this ship some space. why is that? >> reporter: thats right. those 14 other vessels that they have out there, theyre sear...

In very deep oceanic water, nothing happens fast. >> reporter: now, at the moment, the "ocean shield" is currently in the area where it detected the signals. what theyre trying to do now, use that towed ping locator provided by the united states to detect possibly a third signal. if they get that third signal, their hope is theyll be able to triangulate a narrow search area in which they can deploy the bluefin 21, also provided by the united states. its an unmanned autonomous vehicle, able to go...