in the search for the flight, the plane's voice and data recorders. they were crucial to investigators and malaysia is appealing to the u.s. to provide more of the devices that can detect the pings from those recorders. we get more on that from renee mar marsh. >> reporter: these two hints in the indian ocean may be the best hint yet. but even if they are from the missing plane, the real key to understanding what happened could still be miles away at the bottom of the ocean and it's call, but time is running out. >> so the minute this is no longer broadcasting things become much more difficult. >> reporter: the cockpit voice recorder stores at least two hours of audio and the data recorder contains at least 36 hours of instrument data. both crucial to understanding what happened. transmitters on the recorders send out a locating tone, but that only lasts for 30 days. malaysian officials say without