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Stop. it fades kind of like a flash light and gets dimmer and dimmer. so that range is going to be shorter and shorter as we go on. but for the environmentals, it is pretty deep. something i think the side scan sonar, once that gets down there, it will tell how much. >> and once a decision is made from the tpl to the sonar to the side scan sonar, the bluefin, how much time does it actually take to get that in the water? >> well, just to get it in the water is not that long of a process. but once it is in the water it is very slow moving. so a couple of knots, and you're kind of piloting this l...

Bluefin it is essentially -- that is essentially it. you know, the tpl is done. and then we objenly have the bluefin to search, and it is very slow and deliberate and methodical. so leave that in, once you pull that out you're kind of done with that. so any use we can get out of that we may as well get to further narrow down the search area. because like i said even though you know, by another mile or so if we can narrow down the search back there that makes a world of difference when we're doing this very slow search with our bluefin 21. >> commander marks i also want to bring in david gallo ...

Here on land. just wondering about the operating depth of the bluefin and how comfortable you are in the water and depth that appears to be underneath the ship right now in the survey area? >> yeah, so as you know, the pings we think are at about 4500, to 5,000 meters down. so pretty deep. also it is a silt bottom. so environmentals are okay right now. the side scan sonar does have enough power to penetrate through the silt a little bit of a layer there. so this is a pretty powerful sonar and camera system we have. you know, i -- it is tough to say with the environmental sound certainly at tha...

Search with the tpl for now. >> commander marks, good luck with the search, thank you so much. let's bring in tim taylor, sea operator, and david souci, analyst and author of the book "why planes crash" they're here with me. and cnn analyst, miles o'brien. tim, i want to start with you. the fifth ping is building confidence increasing the data map that could bring the searchers to the source. >> continue the pings, as long as you can get ping. the av work and ultimately rov work on this site, we have forever to do. we have limited days or hours as commander marks said on this. so get as much...

A black box is tuesday. you're now coming into saturday. how long are you going to keep looking if you don't hear a ping before you decide to go to the next step, to put that bluefin the water? >> yeah, that's a great question. and that's certainly a decision point. but i really want to stress how critical it is to not put the bluefin 21 in sooner than we need to. just using the tpl is a slow and deliberate process. so it drags through the water. and it listens in for those pings from a black box. and that's a pretty slow process. we can tow it about as quickly as a person walks. well, once yo...