Page 21 - Flight 447 News Today : Breaking News, Live Updates & Top Stories | Vimarsana

. 239 people on board this plane and they are getting advice from people who can relate to the agonizing wait. flight 447. we have been talking a lot about recently. it crashed in the ocean a couple of years ago. it took them two years to figure out what happened and urged families to get tough with authorities. this letter encouraging families to put pressure on the malaysian military and civil authorities to speed up the investigations. it goes on to say that families should go to their choosing. a former director of accident investigations. nice to have you on. let's begin with that advic...

Morning. >> it's just off the coast here in the south china sea between malaysia and vietnam. we know the flight made its last known recorded location and shortly after that it made that crucial turn. two fishermen believe they saw a very low flying aircraft that evening. i have been out speaking with them today on that boat talking to them about their sighting. they say this was very unusual. have you ever seen a plane flying low? because they go fishing you should the flight? they said no, i have never seen a plane flying so low. we remarked wow, is this pilot crazy? i then asked them what d...

Necessarily between that and what happened. the more compelling clue to come out in the past couple of days is this 12-minute lag in the communications. the acars and the voice communication. it's important to confirm that those timelines are accurate and they do lineup. even if so, however, it's not necessarily a smoking gun. there still remains the possibility although it is admittedly a shrinking that they were dealing with some kind of on board emergency and we are making that turn or even preplanning for the turn to the west. the wrinkle there is of course that timeline that doesn't match...

Parker for national geographic.com and patrick smith of ask the pilot.com. welcome back. one thing we know for certain, there would be a lot less speculation and guessing for planes in flight and those on the ground. i want to come to you because the different ways the planes can communicate and my question to you is why not have the device where planes are in constant communication with the ground. we wouldn't be having this conversation and guessing. >> that's really a question i would like to hear my companion speak on that. one of the questions that has been raised is why don't the flight ...

Different how you shut them down. >> martin, and maybe this is more of a question for your pilot there, mitchell, but why is it possible -- because i've gotten this question a lot from viewers. why is it possible to even shut down the transponder. why can pilots have that ability? >> the only reason that we have an off switch, anderson, is when we're on the ground. after you're on the ground and land and taxi off the runway, you're no longer a factor for any traffic so there's no point in you being on the screen, you turn it off and save the air traffic controllers the hassle of trying to decl...