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Pilot on Doomed Plane Locked out of Cockpit; Saudi Arabia Launches Airstrikes in Yemen; U.S. Airstrikes Target ISIS in Tikrit. Aired 6-6:30a ET

Aired March 26, 2015 - 06:00   ET

THIS IS A RUSH TRANSCRIPT. THIS COPY MAY NOT BE IN ITS FINAL FORM AND MAY BE UPDATED.


(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)

DON LEMON, CNN ANCHOR: Evidence that one of the pilots on the doomed plane was locked out of the cockpit.

[05:59:14] RICHARD QUEST, CNN AVIATION CORRESPONDENT: There should have been two people in the cockpit. Why wasn't there two people in the cockpit?

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: There's video of everything on the street. Why don't we have video in these cockpits?

TOM FUENTES, CNN LAW ENFORCEMENT ANALYST: The security measures worked too well.

CHRISTIANE AMANPOUR, CNN INTERNATIONAL CORRESPONDENT: Saudi Arabia has launched military operations against Houthi rebels in Yemen.

UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: The future of Yemen should be determined by the Yemeni people.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Formally charge Sergeant Bergdahl with desertion and misbehavior.

REP. JOHN BOEHNER (R-OH), SPEAKER OF THE HOUSE: The more troubling part of this is that we transferred five prisoners in this trade.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: It looks like it's moving this way.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: It's about to go down Main Street.

(END VIDEOTAPE)

ANNOUNCER: This is NEW DAY, with Chris Cuomo, Alisyn Camerota and Michaela Pereira.

CHRIS CUOMO, CO-HOST: Good morning, to our viewers in the United States and around the world. Welcome to NEW DAY. It is Thursday, March 26, 6 a.m. in the East.

One of the pilots was locked out of the cockpit, according to "The New York Times," and can be heard trying to break down the door just minutes before Flight 9525 of Germanwings slams into a mountainside in the French Alps. ALISYN CAMEROTA, CO-HOST: Investigators are trying to piece together

all of these new, strange clues from the disintegrated debris, though the focus now is on the pilots. This as we're learning more about the victims of Flight 9525, including the Americans on board.

We have the story covered the way only CNN can. Let's begin with Erin McLaughlin. She is near the crash site in the French Alps. What's the latest there, Erin?

ERIN MCLAUGHLIN, CNN CORRESPONDENT: Well, Alisyn, as the mystery deepens, the recovery effort continues. All morning choppers have been leaving from this staging area, full of investigators. They're flying to the crash site to continue the recovery of human remains. They're also working to figure out what happened to Flight 9525. After all, what was reportedly found on that flight cockpit voice recorder, is stunning.

(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)

MCLAUGHLIN (voice-over): Stunning new details this morning in the crash of Germanwings Flight 9525. According to media reports, one of the pilots was locked out of the cockpit when the plane crashed into the side of this mountain high in the French Alps. All of the 150 people on board, including school-aged children and two infants, presumed dead.

"The New York Times" cite as senior military official involved in examining audio evidence from the cockpit voice recorder. This official says, before the plane's rapid descent, one of the pilots left the cockpit and was unable to get back in.

The paper quotes this investigator as saying, "The guy outside is knocking lightly on the door, and there is no answer. And then he hits the door, stronger. No answer. There is never an answer." He says, "You can hear he is trying to smash the door down." The chilling report deepening the mystery of why this plane crashed.

QUEST: It means either a medical emergency, which meant that they couldn't get back in again, or secondly, nefarious.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: OK.

MCLAUGHLIN: The lock on the cockpit door is controlled by a lever on the pilot's dashboard. In order to lock the door, someone would have to intentionally move the lever from the normal position into the locked position. The question is who.

QUEST: There should have been two people in the cockpit here. Whatever was happening, with locked doors or not locked doors, why wasn't there two people in the cockpit?

MCLAUGHLIN: Lufthansa, the parent company of Germanwings, told CNN they did not have any information about the "Times" report but are looking into it.

(END VIDEOTAPE) MCLAUGHLIN: They're still searching for a critical piece of this puzzle, the flight data recorder. And that would be able to tell them how the plane was flying what sort of commands the plane was receiving prior to the crash.

Now they've managed to find the case, but the recorder itself is missing. The CEO of Lufthansa says that he believes it's highly probable they'll eventually find it. But the question, obviously, becomes what sort of condition will that recorder be in, when and if they do -- Chris.

CUOMO: And now, of course, the idea of what the plane was doing is secondary to what the people who were supposed to be flying the plane were doing.

Now, the Germanwings CEO will speak at 9:30 Eastern Time, presumably, about this new development. In an odd twist, Lufthansa, the parent company of Germanwings, claims it knows nothing about a pilot being locked out of the cockpit on Flight 9525. But investigators do seem locked onto this. So the focus is, again, now on the people who were supposed to be flying that plane.

CNN correspondent Diana Magnay is live in Haltern in Germany with that part of the story -- Diana.

DIANA MAGNAY, CNN CORRESPONDENT: Hi, Chris.

Well, Lufthansa said that they don't want to participate in speculation. And to a certain extent, you can understand why both Germanwings and Lufthansa are keen not to add to any of the speculation or fuel anything before they have the verified facts in front them that they can present to the grieving families of so many victims from 18 countries across the world.

And I just want to move out of the way and show you just about ten minutes ago, there was a moment of silence held here in front of the Joseph-Konig-Gymnasium School in Haltern Am See, where 16 exchange students and two teachers were lost.

And in fact, the children filed out of the school a little before 10:53, which is the moment when the plane lost contact with the radars and came down. And they've been standing here, a very, very solemn moment, for quite a long time now, much longer, in fact than one minute. The headmaster spoke to them about their grief. They have, of course, been counseled by psychologists, trauma counselors, but yes, we've witnessed a very painful moment here in Haltern as the students come to terms with their loss and as so many around the world come to terms with their loss -- Chris.

CUOMO: All right, Diana. Thank you very much.

The dignity of the dead obviously of the upmost importance. But that also involves knowing what happened on that plane. So let's try to figure out where we are in this investigation.

We have our best here: Mary Schiavo, CNN aviation analyst and former inspector-general with the Department of Transportation. We have David Soucie, CNN safety analyst, and was an FAA safety inspector; and Tom Fuentes, CNN law enforcement analyst, former FBI assistant director. We have the right team here.

Let's take a look at what we're doing here. We're trying to figure out what was the plane doing, David? What was going on with it mechanically? Not now. Now, it's about understanding what was heard on this voice recorder. How do you break down the questions raised?

DAVID SOUCIE, CNN SAFETY ANALYST: The questions that are raised right now is that if the pilot, if this "New York Times" report is true...

CUOMO: The facts here.

SOUCIE: Of course, we have to qualify that, but that the pilot had left the cockpit, the other pilot tried to -- evidently, tried to lock him back out of the cockpit. In other words, that has to be manually done.

CUOMO: Can that be done? And how?

SOUCIE: It can be done. And what's -- there's a switch that you have that controls that door. So it can be done by simply putting it in the locked position and not allowing the person to come in. There's some procedures that we'll go through, probably, as we go forward here. But nonetheless, it was an intentful [SIC] to lock that door.

CUOMO: All right. Now to make this a little bit clear to the team here, you guys know all this already. But for the rest of us, here's how the Airbus company explains how this door mechanism is supposed to work. Listen to them in their own words.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: The captain moves the toggle switch to the lock position. The open light remains extinguished. Now if we look at the code pad, the red LED is lit, confirming the door is locked. Be careful: automatic door opening, the code pad and the buzzer are inhibited for five minutes.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

CUOMO: All right. So what he seems to be explaining -- let's put it over to you, Mary -- is the person who remains in the cockpit can defeat the ability of someone outside the cockpit to get back in, even if they know the code on the keypad, by flicking a switch. And then that would buy that person in the cockpit an additional five minutes before someone can attempt to re-enter. What does that mean to you?

MARY SCHIAVO, CNN AVIATION ANALYST: Well, that means -- and that is something for which airlines need to have policies and procedures in place. That is why if, for U.S. carriers and various other carriers around the world, if one of the pilots leaves the cockpit during the flight, a flight attendant must enter the cockpit and be there, as well. We don't require three pilots or four pilots on flights, but we do require someone else in the cockpit. In the event that the pilot remaining in the cockpit, who hasn't left for the bathroom break or whatever, somehow becomes incapacitated, there is a second person there.

CUOMO: But Mary...

SCHIAVO: And those situations have happened.

CUOMO: But Mary, is that the same rule in the U.S. and in Europe?

SCHIAVO: No.

CUOMO: No. All right. So...

SCHIAVO: No. No.

CUOMO: So if that's not the same rule, then Tom, then we don't know that anybody else was in the cockpit except whoever was flying the plane, right?

SCHIAVO: Right.

CUOMO: And then what issues does this raise for you as an investigator?

FUENTES: That's right. We don't know that for sure, Chris, but on the other hand, even if a member of the crew went into the cockpit, if the other pilot is going to kill 150 people, including himself, then he could kill that person right away and defeat that issue of having the second person able to let the other pilot back in. So...

CUOMO: But do we hear anything? We don't hear anything reported about what was heard on the tape to suggest that.

FUENTES: We have a completely partial leak here. We don't know if that was the extent of the voice conversations. We don't know if there was more to that. You know, there's much that we don't know.

And the other fear that I have is that, if the French plug this leak, and this person can give no more information, it could be months before we hear another thing about this. Because if they have the press conference today and say, you know, "We're not talking about it" or "No comment," that's going to be it. Especially if they're going to wait until they get the flight data recorder.

CUOMO: I'm OK with that. I'm OK with that, as long as they know what they're talking about.

FUENTES: Right.

CUOMO: I mean, if somebody comes out and says, "Hey, this isn't true," then "The New York Times" has made a huge error, I would be very slow to accuse "The Times" of that, given the level of reporting there, generally.

And so David, if this does hold and something like this did happen... SOUCIE: Right.

CUOMO: ... one of the scenarios that's being offered up by experts in the community, as well, maybe it was, you know, a catastrophic health thing.

SOUCIE: Right.

CUOMO: And there was nobody else in the cockpit because Germanwings doesn't follow the protocols we do in the U.S., as Mary was just explaining. But then in this Airbus, that simple scenario of someone slumping forward, the stick, as I've been told by my producer, Griffin, John Griffin, is that the wheel is not there. The stick is not right in front. How does it work?

SOUCIE: Well, you're -- it's right here is where the control is.

CUOMO: It's on the side.

SOUCIE: If you slump forward, it would have to be this. But if that happened, if it was pushed forward, what happens on the Airbus is you make a controlled input. Then you let go of it. What it would do is it would take that controlled input, knowing that you intended to start your descent, so it will start the descent. Wherever you let go of it, it will maintain that exact flight path. So if you let go of it, it's not going to come right back up like this. It's going to just continue in whatever you did.

[06:10:15] So this would have had to be a bump and it would have had to be directly forward. Because remember, there was a no change in the flight path.

CUOMO: Right. The heading. The heading was 26 degrees northeast.

SOUCIE: So it's hard for me to put together the fact that a bump in the cockpit would have caused it to maintain -- to descend and stay -- now, the autopilot would take over at that point, maintain the heading, as well. So that's a possibility, that it did get bumped forward, but that the autopilot maintained that direction.

CUOMO: Another big question, Mary Schiavo, is even if everything as reported so far is true, is there no other way for the crew to communicate with the tower or anybody else about what's going on in the plane if they're not in the cockpit?

SCHIAVO: Well, actually, yes and no. Remember back to September 11, 2001. The way that the flight attendants and others in the back of the planes had to communicate is they literally got on -- some got on their cell phones and some tried the air phones, which no longer exist. And so there wasn't any way for them to do that.

Now, it depends on the airline itself, if they have put in additional communications capacities. But it doesn't seem that way. Because if someone was trying to get back into the cockpit, they would have used it. And then of course, there's another thing looking back in prior

crashes, not this one. But in one where the pilots were alleged to have been intent on committing suicide, one of the pilots, they turned off the cockpit voice recorder. They pulled the breakers on it. So that's another mystery. Why, if that was the case here, why did they leave it on? He leave it on.

CUOMO: Tom Fuentes. Before -- as people were seeing in the media are now going down the road of, if this is an intentional act, what are the kind of people that do this; what do we know about the pilots; who are the names involved; any affiliations? This would be late already for a group to claim credit for something like this, wouldn't it be, Tom?

FUENTES: I think in most cases you would have expected credit, but maybe not. So it's not always immediate when a group claims credit for this. But you know, there's still much to be done and learned about the pilots, the crew, the passengers, everybody about that.

You know, and I think originally most people ruled out that it was an explosion or a bomb on board because the appearances of the pieces of debris being so small, that right away, they thought that plane hit full speed into that mountain and disintegrated. But it doesn't rule out bad behavior on the part of somebody, whether it's mental illness or whether it's a terrorist act or a suicide or any number of things that way. But a deliberate act nonetheless by somebody on that plane.

CUOMO: You guys taught us that, to the uninitiated when you hear about an explosion, you think oh, it will make small pieces. You know, you guys taught us, as experts that actually know, they'll wind up being bigger pieces because the explosion goes out. In a situation like this, high speed into an immovable object, you wind up getting disintegration like we're seeing on the scene right now.

Thank you very much, David, Mary, Tom, as always. We'll be back with you on this.

You know, Mick, another question now that this raises, if what they were hearing on this recording is accurate, who else was hearing it in that plane? Who else was suffering for these last long minutes while this plane was descending?

PEREIRA: As much information as we're finding out, still leaving so many more questions unanswered. Chris, thank you. We'll get back to that.

We are also following some breaking news out of Yemen this morning, Saudi Arabia launching airstrikes against Houthi rebels there, with help from Gulf Arab allies, Egypt and Jordan. The U.S. also providing some support, but not with military action. Now Iran, who has backed the Houthi rebels, is infuriated and calling for a stop to the Saudi intervention.

CNN senior international correspondent Nick Paton Walsh joins us live with the very latest -- Nick. NICK PATON WALSH, CNN SENIOR INTERNATIONAL CORRESPONDENT: Well,

certainly, the conflict that's been dragging Yemen into a spiral now, which makes it even easier for al Qaeda in the Arabian Peninsula, who want to attack the U.S. to base themselves there, has taken itself to a whole new level.

In the past few months, we've seen those Houthi rebels you mentioned sweep across the country and kick out of the capital, the president, Hadi, whose whereabouts isn't really known. Reports he might be heading to Saudi Arabia. It's still really unclear right now.

The decision by Saudi Arabia to intervene like this with 100 warplanes, they say, with dozens from other Gulf nations backing them up, they say, and also Egypt making it clear they're militarily involved, as well. That plunges, potentially, Yemen's internal conflict into a big wider regional problem.

The U.S. is in the game here. They're clearly providing, they say, logistical intelligence support to this Saudi-led coalition. They are fighting the Houthis. The Houthis are backed by Saudi Arabia's key enemy in that region, Iran. This has a potential to spiral regionally out of control. But bear in mind, too, in the background here, we have the U.S. very keen on a political deal with Iran, imminently. The seismic changes happening across the region could also impact that, too, Michaela.

CAMEROTA: Nick Paton Walsh, thanks so much for that report.

We want to go to Iraq now, the U.S. fighting to take back the Iraqi city of Tikrit from ISIS. President Obama making the decision to launch airstrikes, responding to a desperate call from Iraqi forces on the ground.

[07:10:11] CNN's senior international correspondent, Arwa Damon, is live in Baghdad for us with the latest -- Arwa.

ARWA DAMON, CNN SENIOR INTERNATIONAL CORRESPONDENT: And overnight the U.S. launching a dozen or so strikes in and around Tikrit. This coming at the request, the specific request of the Iraqi government.

And this is a portion of the battlefield that the U.S. had largely been uninvolved in up until now. The fighting force on the ground, mostly made up of Shia militias, volunteers, most of them Shia, as well. The Iraqi security forces present, too, yes alongside some Sunni fighters, but definitely, this battle being led by those Iranian-backed Shia forces. Iran very overt in its presence in the fight for Tikrit, as well. Top commanders on the ground advising the Iraqi troops, all different factions of them as they are attempting to move forward.

Why these strikes at this critical junction? Well there had been something of a pause in the battle as ISIS, it seems, regrouping itself in Tikrit, really digging into a point where, at this junction, the Iraqi government felt it was critical to ask the United States for those airstrikes. But the potential to cause tensions, as well. Because the majority of

those Shias, those volunteers, those militias that are fighting on the ground, very adamant that they do not need America's involvement.

CAMEROTA: Arwa, thank you so much for that. We'll be talking to our international experts about all of this coming up. We have a big news day here. So keep it right here on NEW DAY, because we have all the developments, the new developments overnight in the crash of Germanwings Flight 9525. Our top aviation experts examine how a pilot could get locked out of the cockpit mid-flight.

CUOMO: Another big story this morning, Bowe Bergdahl now facing charges, desertion and other charges. Also, giving his first explanation of what happened. Listen to the latest, and then deal with the question that's being asked more and more: Were the five Taliban prisoners we swapped worth it for a deserter?

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

[07:01:13] CAMEROTA: More now on that mysterious development overnight in the Germanwings crash. "The New York Times" reporting that one pilot became locked out of the cockpit. Why couldn't he get back in? And what are the protocols for locking the cockpit?

Let's bring back David Soucie. He's our CNN aviation analyst.

David, it just gets stranger and stranger. A half an hour into this flight, one of the pilots left the cockpit. Is that unusual?

SOUCIE: It's not unusual. It's something that can happen. It's part of a protocol that there -- in the United States, we have a different protocol than they do at Lufthansa. So we have the protocol of making sure that there's no one alone in the cockpit at any time.

CAMEROTA: We do here in the United States.

SOUCIE: We do.

CAMEROTA: In Europe, they will allow one pilot alone.

SOUCIE: I don't know if it's Europe in general, but I know Lufthansa was reported last night as not having that procedure.

CAMEROTA: OK. So one pilot wants a drink; he wants to use the rest room. It's fine, it's normal, you're saying, for him to leave half an hour into the flight.

SOUCIE: Sure. You know, it's not typical, but it could happen.

CAMEROTA: OK, then our -- let's look at the cockpit door lock.

SOUCIE: OK.

CAMEROTA: Here's the -- we're inside the cockpit here.

SOUCIE: Right, right. CAMEROTA: After 9/11, airlines installed this.

SOUCIE: This system right here. The cockpit door control system and lock system.

CAMEROTA: And it's on all planes.

SOUCIE: This is on all planes, yes.

CAMEROTA: OK.

SOUCIE: This is something that was required after 9/11. It's something that everyone has accepted and installed from the manufacturer.

CAMEROTA: When the pilot leaves the cockpit, does the door automatically lock behind him?

SOUCIE: It does. However, it stays in this normal mode. In the normal mode, then there's a code that can be entered into there to unlock the door.

CAMEROTA: When you say that there's a code that can be entered, you mean -- here's a video that has been put out about this very airplane model.

SOUCIE: Yes.

CAMEROTA: The A-320 Airbus.

SOUCIE: A-320, right.

CAMEROTA: Here's the flight attendant trying to get into the cockpit to bring them some refreshments. She then keys in to a keypad, because she knows the secret code.

SOUCIE: She's actually keying in the thing -- a request to get into the cockpit. But she just pushes something to say, "I need to get into the cockpit."

CAMEROTA: OK. But I want to stop right here. Is there a key pad outside the cockpit door on all planes?

SOUCIE: Yes.

CAMEROTA: OK. And the pilot who left, would he know the secret code?

SOUCIE: Yes. However, it's not -- you don't need a secret code to get into it. What happens is, you make the request to the cockpit. If there's no response, because remember, if we had -- if there were two pilots, if they were both incapacitated, how do you get in there? And you don't want to give somebody the pass code, because then terrorists could have it and all of that. So what happens is you make a request. If that request isn't responded to, then you pick up the phone and you try calling them.

CAMEROTA: OK. We can assume that that's what happened if "The New York Times" report is right.

SOUCIE: Yes.

CAMEROTA: That the pilot who left knocked on the door, was trying to get back in.

SOUCIE: Yes.

CAMEROTA: And it wasn't working.

SOUCIE: Right.

CAMEROTA: And then...

SOUCIE: Well, first, he would have made the request on the pad.

CAMEROTA: On the key pad. Yes.

SOUCIE: Yes. And that warns, that puts a sound in the cockpit that says, "I want to come in." If it's not responding, then that means that there must have been something medical or something going on up there. So what happens then is he calls, no answer. Hangs up, tries it again. Nothing. Picks it up, no answer again. Now, it's an emergency.

Now remember, after this request, if he does not respond, if the pilots don't respond by locking the door, so for example if they don't follow the protocol which there are other protocols we can't mention on air. If he doesn't follow the exact protocol, then -- the person trying to get in, then the pilot arms the switch into the locked position.

CAMEROTA: Because something amiss is happening.

SOUCIE: Something is going on.

CAMEROTA: OK. But what we know from "The New York Times" report, again if it's accurate and the airline has not confirmed this report...

SOUCIE: Exactly. That's very important to point out.

CAMEROTA: It is important, because these are -- you know , we're just getting details from an unnamed senior military investigator, who says that the pilot was knocking, trying to get in, and there was no response.

So back to the key pad, isn't that when the pilot outside can enter in the key, the secret code and get in?

SOUCIE: No. What happens is that, if he hasn't responded to the response for 30 minutes, and he...

CAMEROTA: Thirty seconds?

SOUCIE: Thirty seconds -- I'm sorry. Thirty seconds. And the switch has not been armed, then the door opens.

CAMEROTA: OK.

SOUCIE: All right.

CAMEROTA: So what happened in this -- if the accounts are true, why didn't this door open?

SOUCIE: Because it was locked.

CAMEROTA: You think it was intentionally locked?

SOUCIE: It nearly had to have been. Because it doesn't automatically go into the locked mode. This is a trigger switch. It normally is in the normal position. If you're going to lock it, you don't flip it and it stays there. You pull it down and you hold it; and then it locks. Then you let go of it, it goes back to the normal -- to the normal position, although the door is locked. And the light out there shows that the door is locked. Red light comes on.

CAMEROTA: You know, there's been a call after 9/11 for cameras in the cockpit...

SOUCIE: Yes.

CAMEROTA: ... to monitor what pilots are doing at all times. Pilots have fought that.

SOUCIE: And there's a lot of different arguments on that. The one that I think is the most -- most has the most merit, let's say, is the fact that it is an added expense that is not required by the pilots and doesn't think it should be. The money should be spent elsewhere, and I would agree. It needs to be spent on direct streaming of information so that we're not out there like archaeologists right now, trying to find out what happened on this airplane, looking for a box this big.

CAMEROTA: Well, what do you mean direct streaming? You mean real- time...

SOUCIE: Real-time.

CAMEROTA: ... live information being fed to the tower.

SOUCIE: That's correct. Or fed to the satellite, which would then feed to the ground and then back to the air.

All of these aircraft have that capability. But they don't use that. It has to be upgraded, of course. Because it's faster, and it's more expensive.

CAMEROTA: Yes.

SOUCIE: But that money would be much better spent doing that, because then we would know exactly what's going on. We would have the cockpit voice recorder information. To have video versus audio, I'm not sure that really tells us a whole lot.

CAMEROTA: Yes.

SOUCIE: But if you have -- there's 10,000 pieces of information, including on the new airplanes, this would be known right now. The older airplanes, this may not be recorded, but they would know whether this door was in the locked position or not.

CAMEROTA: What happened, yes. We sure wish we had that this morning.

SOUCIE: Yes, we do.

CAMEROTA: David Soucie, thanks so much for all the information. Really interesting.

SOUCIE: Thank you.

CAMEROTA: Let's go over to Michaela.

PEREIRA: Fascinating stuff. And we will have much more on Flight 9525 ahead. But first, back here at home, parts of Oklahoma torn apart by twisters. At least one death is being reported. We'll bring you the very latest.

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