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There is no account that signal was ever sent. >> at 1:07 on saturday, the data reporting system was shut down and 14 minutes later, that trance ponder was turned off. tell us about the data responding system. >> there are a lot of things on this airplane that are sending out data. that can be a little broad in that term. sometimes it has been confusing. we are not sure what it is. mitchell, explain, what are the various things transmitting out information. >> you have acar to send short but vicele messages to a ground. we use that the same way you would use a text on the phone. the ground wan...

Radar screen this transponder we're flight 370 and at this altitude. can you turn it off? >> yes, you can. here's how you do it. just three clicks to the left and it's off. but you would never do that, mitchell. >> we would never do that. never in flight. >> it would be like driving the wrong way down a highway and that's how a no go this sort of maneuver is, but it can be turned off. let me show you something else this transponder can do. put it back in the normal position. if i was hijacked, a way to use the transponder to send a code. i will not do the code, but a code you can enter and imm...

Communication, what does that tell you about what might have been happening in the sky, mitchell? >> if a plane is flying, if it was off course and it was flying for four hours after last contact, someone's flying that airplane. someone turned it off. of course, someone was flying that airplane. if it was the pilots, if the pilots were flying when they were supposed to be, they would have been communicating with air traffic control. there's weather, volcanoes erupt and we have to go around it, but you're always talking to somebody. we have that saying, navigate and then communicate with air tr...

Traffic, so air traffic controllers no longer need to know where you are and they don't need any of your information, you're just going to clutter up their screen. you turn them off to declutter their screens and no longer a factor. >> on the ground you don't need it, you switch it off. that's the reason it exists. you also mentioned the shut down of some of the communication equipment. the radios, mitchell, a number of radios, not just one. they're located right here. >> here and we have radios within range of ground stations. when we're flying over the oceans we use high-frequency or hf and ...

You don't have to delete all the radio signals and radio stations. >> what we are saying is that if those systems were shout shut down as has been reported, it means the pilot or co-pilot was intentionally doing it or somebody that knew their way around a 777, 200 flight deck. >> how far into the flight are you now? >> well, we have just taken off. so, mitchell, where are we? >> we're passing 18,000 feet. so this is the point where we would transition to what we call high-level air space. it is just about another 10-15 minutes before we transition to the north/northwestern shore of the malay p...