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We've seen it in smaller aircrafts. the wings come off,-- when you're trying to regain control -- we just had one of these events this past july with an md-80 aircraft they got into thunderstorm activity and they lost control of the airplane. during the recovery they went into a big corkscrew turn and ended up crashing into the ground. the airplane stayed together. it's just that the thunderstorm activity is what put them in an out of control situation. >> once again this year we have another malaysian-owned air flight that goes down with somewhat mysterious circumstances. is there something a...

If necessary, they have emergency authority to do that. that's very rarely necessary, but the pilots will turn to whateveroff course they need to to provide a separation. usually 20 to 30 miles is common from the cell itself and the airplane. and you do this for several reasons. one, you don't want to have hail, the potential for hail but also to give the best rides to the passengers, you decrease the likelihood of turbulence. these are absolutely normal events normal steps for the pilots. what happened after that, we don't know. we don't know what occurred. >> you talk about pilots having thi...

Appropriate definitions. then and only then can we figure out if in fact a loss of contact in the literal sense occurred. if in fact the airplane came down rapidly, the data block will only show the flight number, the transponder code and speed. the last information that i've heard said that that is what occurred. the altitude block was not visible. that was because of the rate of change meaning the airplane was descending very rapidly. that also indicates something is amiss, but that's where the investigators are going to look. >> appreciate that point. of course, you sharing your technical e...

It's the most modern technology to look into a thunderstorm and determine where the severe areas you cannot go are and where the areas are where it's just potentially light precipitation, where you can go safely. >> right. what we do know is the pilot asked to go higher. air traffic control said no you can divert to the left but you can't go any higher. it was three, four minutes after that that they lost contact with the plane. that's a very short period of time. what does that tell you? >> well something occurred very quickly. we know the airplane did, in fact start the left turn. we know th...

If that's the case in an aircraft that normally does 500 knots, this air bus 8320 that means at least it tells me i'm not an investigator that either they were pushing some -- facing some heavy head winds over 100 knots or the pilot had slowed the aircraft down because he anticipated a problem and wanted to give himselves a few more seconds to divert away from what was on the radar screen. i'm coming to a number of different conclusions but this does make sense? doesn't it? >> absolutely. or could be a combination of both. you know as a pilot whenever you get into severe turbulence you want to...