That music sounds familiar to you, we used that during the mh 370 disaster. We have another air disaster that we are following right now with breaking news. Hello, everyone following us here in the United States and around the world. Im natalie allen. The story is airasia flight 8501. Its missing, its been missing for hours. It went missing with heavy thunderstorms in the area around the time it lost contact with air Traffic Controllers. Heres ha we know. Were going to break it down for you. It happened early sunday morning local time there in indonesia. As the plane was flying from surabaya north to singapore, its about a twohour flight. Search and rescue operations are under way, c130s are in the air, there are ships in that area very heavily trafficked area with many ships. So should be many eyes trying to find any sign of this plane. No sight of it yet. Most of the path took it over water. The pilot asked to change route because of the weather. Asked to ascend to 38,000 feet. There was a storm at 52,000 feet so no way to get up over it. Soon after that request was asked for a dieversion for the flight and all communication was lost with the airplane. It is an a320. A nofrills airliner. There were 162 people listed on the flight manifest 155 passengers and seven crew most on board indonesians. There were some others. There were three South Koreans. One singaporean, and one french person on board. The list included 17 children and an infant. We are also told by one of our analysts from the region that 17 people listed on that flight did not board. There were 17 noshows. The ceo of airasia, Tony Fernandez, is now on his way to surabaya. Earlier, he tweeted this short statement thank you for all your thoughts and prayers. We must stay strong. We are covering this from many angles. Weve been talking with analysts for hours now about what perhaps, happened. The last hearing from this airplane that it was trying to vector around a thunderstorm and very very dangerous weather in that region right now. Cnns will ripley is joining me now from beijing, hes among our team who are helping us cover this breaking news because will you were covering the mh 370 story for some time and were there in kuala lumpur and strangely enough airasia is based there in kuala lumpur. The similarities will end there, hopefully, it will not be an aviation mystery like we saw with mh 370. Right now we just dont know anything. We do know and i want to start with you on this point, airasia lost contact with that airplane and didnt announce it for several hours. You were saying the one thing that people went through that was so hard to take with the investigation with mh 370 was transparency and communication and openness. Reporter and certainly, natalie, in the initial hours, when a plane goes missing, and there arent a lot of answers, it does take a while for any organization to get their emergency teams in place, get their information, the means to deliver the information to the families. So there are going to be delays in the initial hours. But what families here in beijing, the families of more than 150 passenger, the majority of the people on mh 370 were from china. And what the families here in beijing had to contend with was very limited and slow and incomplete information over the course of days and weeks. And you saw the frustration levels continue to build, and there were waves of emotion, grief and then anger. People who were almost shells. They were resigned to the fact that they still didnt have answers. And here we are now ending the year which has been a horrible air travel year in asia. And those families, mh 370 families still truly dont know where their families are. There are Search Operations in the indian ocean that have so far turned up no tangible evidence. There are some includes some educated guesses that they going on. This doesnt seem the case here. Unlike mh 370, there were no technical problems and the transponding equipment was switched off. They know there was weather in the area. Lets home for the sake of these 162 peoples families that theyll be able to quickly put together the information, find this plane and give these families closure that a lot of people in china are waiting for as well as the other countries of the people from mh 370. We are presuming this plane did crash. We dont know if it crashed in tact or not. Weve had many analysts talking about what situations might cause it to as far as if there was ice or hail that just caused the plane to freeze. But anyway, there are a lot of questions to be answered. A lot of information to be put out there, and we havent heard from airasia in a while. Are you in kuala lumpur. Its so hard to look at people who happen to be in an airport, and there are video cameras everywhere from people. Were told that theyve created a Crisis Center for these people certainly, they have. What can you tell us about what people have told you about how they were treated early on and how important it is that the families get communication and get information even before the public. Can they expect that . Of course this is a completely different airliner. But its the same region and its certainly paid attention toe what its neighbors in malaysia dealt with. Reporter certainly certainly. In the case of mh 370, we saw as indicated by the tremendous amount of confusion when the plane went missing and the fact that there was confusion about what its actual flight path was. So there werent a lot of answers to convey. But i think what infuriated a lot of people was that there was confusion. Instead of laying everything out there transparently right away, there were things that were held back the radar for example. There was concern that there could be you know youre talking about multiple different countries, different governments, and everybody might have had a tidbit of information and there was reluctance to share it because of security reasons. It took a long time for that to come together. The fact that people were waiting at the airport in beijing even an hour later it still hadnt been reported that the plane was missing. It was agony for those families to see the flight number and not have any answers. We see the same pictures now in singapore. The board, with the flight number and it says go to the information counter. Its just its heartwrenching and a feeling that people here in china know all too well two Kuala Lumpurbased carriers have seen planes crash this year and there was another crash that didnt make a ton of news but the transasia crash as well where more than 40 people died. This has been a very painful year for air travel this thisin this part of the world. And were you telling us that people in china have just been able to fly more and have access to fly more. And now we have three planes disasters, associated with this region. And how familiar are you as a correspondent who flies all over the region for cnn, how familiar are you with airasia . Have you ever flown it . Reporter well i, yeah, i can tell you, reporting in kuala lumpur in the months after mh 370 i did a story about the fact mh 370 was facing very intense competition from budget carriers in asia like airasia. That was the number one competitor that was taking customers away from Malaysian Airlines because that more traditional airline, the price struck fewerture is different, the amenities, and a lot of passengers who couldnt afford to fly are getting on flights like airasia, nofrills, budget carriers. In this part of the world it really is booming and opening up the air travel world to a whole generation of people a whole income level of people who never had the freedom before and it lets them go visit their families. In the case of people heading to singapore, we know a big portion of the population there are domestic helpers in addition to students and sailors. Perhaps people were going to visit families working over there in singapore. Something that they may not have been able to afford to do five or ten years ago. So for every name on that passenger list and we cant stress this enough there is a story, people who love them people who are going to miss them terribly and we need to remember those people and so do the airlines. They need to be transparent and when they have information to share, they need to share that information with the Families First so that the families dont have to learn about things on television or the internet like they did far too much during the mh 370 investigation. Yeah. Absolutely. And as we said the ceo of airasias on his way right now to surabaya. And perhaps when he gets there we will get more information from the leadership of the airline. Will ripley we thank you from beijing for us. Weve been talking to many aviation experts for several hours. Weve been on the air just a little over five hours now, just talking about what we do know with it this flight and what it was dealing with when we last heard from the pilots. Julian bray is an aviation expert based in the united kingdom. He joins me by phone from peter borough, and we thank you, julian for adding your voice to our coverage. We know that there is very little that we do know about this flight except that the last time we heard from the pilot was that they wanted to maneuver from a thunderstorm and descend to 38,000 feet with a thunderstorm though was all the way at 52,000 feet. So what does that tell you, as an expert what they were dealing with in the cockpit at the time . Caller well, good morning from the u. K. The latest theory and its only a theory and its pure speculation, obviously, is that he might have encountered icing on the wings, and he requested to be vectored to a new flight that could shift the ice. It could be that or a thunderstorm. Its a tremendous storm. The weather map is red all around the area where the aircraft was. So even if he did divert request the deviation, he probably would go into another storm. Now these pilots are very very experienced. And airasia is a very good airline, has a very good Safety Record. And of course the airbus 32200 well it flies by wire. It has multiple backup systems. But unfortunately, there are external factors which do affect aircraft and of course it comes down to the pilot, whether he takes that aircraft up and flies into the conditions. Because they are given all the weather maps beforehand. What you mentioned ice. What could have happened as far as if they encountered ice or icing conditions that could have immobilized the airplane is that what youre saying . Caller basically, if you get ice on your wings it alters the whole formation, format of the wings and alters everything and adds weight as well. So if it does build up very quickly, theres quite a lot of weight there and it wont be evenly distributed. Were always dealing request this. But it does look like a very Strange Weather pattern there. They lost contact with the signal which is the Automatic Dependent Surveillance system. And he was flying at 32,000 feet when that happened. And there are two pilots on board, so they must have been trying everything to get out of this particular situation. And the pilots in that particular region know the weather patterns. And so theyve all experienced them before and theres nothing to suggest that anything untoward has happened on board at the moment. The plain fact of the matter is that contact has been lost. It would have had enough fuel i think, to probably carry it for four hours. Were now several hours since it went down so it must have landed or gone down somewhere. Because it hasnt got that much fuel on board for a short flight. And also julian does the pilot have the discretion to get anywhere he or she needs to get to get a, to move away from a thunderstorm . Like not just descend, not just descend but turn completely around and go the opposite direction. Do they have that discretion . Caller well as the last resort. But normally what they do they do things properly and file the deviation to the alreadyfiled flight plan so Everybody Knows where this aircraft is and they can track it. And then the aircraft will squawk out a number send out a number the code number which will be picked up. Theres various website tracking organizations, and you can see these tracks and you can see the individual aircraft so obviously, theyve got to make sure that all the other traffic in the sky is absolutely safe as well. So you try and do it by the book. But if something really strange did happen at the end of the day, the captain is master of the particular ship or aircraft and he has absolute discretion. He might have to answer to an inquiry afterwards but obviously, the safety of his passengers and his aircraft is the number one priority. Right. What about other conditions . Say, not just icing, but what about hail . Is there a possibility that hail or something could cause the radar to be inoperable . Caller it comes under icing, basically, but it could be bird strike multiple bird strike that put out all the engines. You just dont know at this stage. The weather has been very, very strange right around the world at the moment and these things do happen. Thankfully, not too often. Its just unfortunate it all seems to happen in this particular region. But say the airline can, sorry, airasia is by a very very astute businessman who flies this particular operation very very well. He follows all the rules. His aircraft are stateoftheart. He supplies a very good service, and he carries millions of passengers. He also owns a Football Team in the u. K. , as well as a Record Company and a chain of hotels. And theyre called the tune group, which is originally based on the easyjet concept, basically. You say this airline has a very good reputation as you say, and this pilot had, what 6100 hours of flight time, do we know how much flight time the pilot, he or she, had as a captain of this particular airplane and how significant would that be . Caller i dont think that would be very significant, because these days youll find that most pilots actually fly, they train in simulators and the first time they go up in the air, theyve actually got a full load on board, of passengers. Obviously, theyll be assisted therell be a fullytrained captain with them when they take it up. But the way it is done these days it really is done by the book. You have computeraided systems, backup systems, systems to die for, basically, which is probably an unfortunate thing to say, but the point is they have them so they can rely on them. Now what has happened here is very very strange, because suddenly all contact has been lost. So either something catastrophic has happened and it has ditched, its gone into the sea, or it could have actually veered off and landed somewhere, but i think the fact that they got the airsea rescue already in progress and i have to say this time the authorities are being very quick with the information unlike previous instances in this region. So they are keeping us wellinformed. Theyve set up a relative center and i think you have the phone number there for it. If you dont, i can give it to you, which relatives can call and try to find out whats happening. So they are keeping us all in the loop. And i see that theyve gone and turned their Facebook Page gray all the logos were red, now theyre gray. We noticed that. Caller hmm. Do you have the emergency number . Please go ahead and provide it. Caller it is whatever your local country code. 622129850801. And that is for relatives to ring if anybody on that particular flight if you want to know more they apparently will be able to tell you there. And they have set up several sensors. Now the owner of this airline is Tony Fernandez who is the ceo. He was a failing airline in about 2001. He put a lot of money into it. They actually fly around 50 million passengers a year. So thats quite something. And its had a pretty good Safety Record. Almost impeccable Safety Record so he will be very very upset as will everybody else. Everybody in the Aviation Industry doesnt like to see these things happen. Hmm absolutely. Caller it is still a very safe way to travel. Weve had tweets from Tony Fernandez. And thank you for giving us more about his background, and, as you say, all the work he has done to bring this airline around. He did tweet that he was on his way to surabaya where the flight originated. And he also sent out a tweet saying stay strong. Also Malaysia Airlines tweeted support for asia air. We know they are a competitor as well. Caller yes. I want to go back to one point. You mentioned ditching. Someone has said earlier that i was interviewing, that this airplane the air 320 has some kind of mechanism in order to ditch, to try to ditch. What are the chances we could have seen Something Like what happened on the hudson, which i know was a miracle. Caller yes, it does have a ditching protocol. But the point is its how can i put it . It is it is a lastditch a last attempt, if you like. So you cannot rely on this but lets just assume lets be positive about this since were sounding very negative here. It doesnt seem that it has ditched. The pilots managed to keep the nose up and glide just like the hudson river inch dipts. They deploy the chute side to side. And the chutes turn into notation areas, rafts, if you like. So the chutes normally come down and you climb on board those everybodys got a life jacket under their seat and they would have put those on. The crew would have gone into a preplanned protocol making sure that everybodys off. All the emergency exits would be opened and exit over the wings or wherever. And have you noticed that they always make sure that the big, strong chap or lady is sitting right by the emergency exit. Because they usually have to assist the staff, the crew in opening the pressurized doors. So those pop out, and off they go. So hopefully there will be warning beacons going up. I would have expected some warning beacons to be tracked by now. And that is a slight worry, which might mean that it has actually gone under the water. So if its actually floating on the water, then the tracking beacons would have initiated. And theres a beacon thats just in front of the tail fin on that particular aircraft. All right, julian bray we appreciate your time with us so much speaking with us from peterborough england. And we appreciate you ending our conversation with you on a positive note the ever so slight chance of a successful ditching and we certainly dont know the fate of this airplane. So why not discuss al