[Sciutto:] There's new evidence today that something sinister could have happened on this airplane. Was it hijacked and were the pilots involved? We have a new time line suggesting that that the last radio transmission, the words "alright, good night" seemingly calm and happy were said after the tracking system on this plane was switched off. CNN has also learned that police searched the home of the pilot and the co-pilot, shown here, after the country's prime minister confirmed the plain was likely in his words deliberately diverted. Richard Quest is here again, Richard. So many questions to go over. I wonder if we can ask first again to explain to our viewers who might not have heard this yet but the significance of the sequencing now, the idea that that seemingly everything was fine and dandy, good night came after at least one of the systems was turned off.
[Richard Quest, Cnn International Business Correspondent:] Absolutely. But this is not this is straight forwardly from the prime minister's statement. And aisle caveat it before, after and in the middle. People, they are not speaking with the precision of the final investigative report.
[Sciutto:] No question.
[Quest:] So, the prime minister says the ACARS data transmission system is switched off or disabled, as the phrase he used, disabled as the plane goes out over the east of Malaysia.
[Sciutto:] Just as it crosses the land area.
[Quest:] Then also last says, the last known point of contact is in the South China Sea.
[Sciutto:] Right.
[Quest:] And that's either by transponder or by the handoff between Malaysia and Vietnam.
[Sciutto:] But we also know that those words "goodnight" were spoken at that point.
[Quest:] We know that and several minutes after the ACAR system was
[Sciutto:] We know that because a civil aviation authorities person in Malaysia said that. Would I be surprised if tomorrow we're told that that actually never happened? No, I wouldn't be surprised. But on Tuesday or Wednesday of this week, that's what we were told.
[Quest:] Right. And once those words are out there, it was probably a longer sentence. It was probably Malaysia acknowledging and then saying "alright, good night."
[Sciutto:] Well, granted, because there are so many things have changed. We remember the excitement over the satellite photos. But potential significance of this separation of things, it indicates that there was some control or decision making, is that your view?
[Quest:] It indicates, it suggests that at the moment when that last voice transmission was being made, there was the incident was already underway. And there is no indication in what was said that we know of that leads one way or the other, but of course something could have been happening in the aircraft of which they were not aware.
[Sciutto:] Right. Something that could have been under
[Quest:] Or something could have been happening.
[Sciutto:] A fire or something and the system could have gone down.
[Quest:] Yes.
[Sciutto:] Fair points. Fair points. So, OK, that's the questions it raises. It has given the Malaysian government some more certainty in the prime minister's words that it was a deliberate act. Let's talk about other potential failures here though. That handoff happens, or that handoff supposed to happen between Malaysian Air traffic control and Vietnamese Air traffic control, but it doesn't happen. The Vietnamese never picked up the plane. And then you have it traveling southwest, we would believe, and possibly over other radar-controlled areas. You have a lot of people in governments and countries along the way who could have said, where is that plane, the Vietnamese? What is this plane that's coming over my air space, why did that happen?
[Quest:] We don't know at what point and if the Vietnamese went back to the Malaysians and said, we haven't seen MH 370.
[Sciutto:] Right.
[Quest:] The flight plan there, we should have seen it by now. Now, having read enough reports, what tends to happen with a missing plane is and this happened with 447, this happened with 447 and all of the different places on the route. What tends to happen is the next point of call where you're going to check in doesn't hear from you, might think, well, we'll give him five more minutes.
[Sciutto:] Right. But you all give them seven hours the whole night.
[Quest:] No. And then you go back to the last one and say, hey, what happened to Malaysia flight 370? We haven't heard from it. Well, we've handed it on to you. Now, the moment that happens, you get other aircraft in the region to start hailing them, in cases of radio. You start asking other planets in the region
[Sciutto:] All things that to our knowledge didn't happen.
[Quest:] We have not got anywhere near to that depth of understanding of what else was happening during those times. But ultimately, within an hour if you haven't heard from a flight like this, you're pushing the big red button and you're basically saying we haven't heard from this flight. Now, meanwhile, seven hours later, this is heading up towards other countries. Indonesia, it went past China and it went right back over Malaysia and seemingly no one thought to scramble fighters with Helios.
[Sciutto:] And this is a very sensitive part of the world with a lot of countries watching each other with a lot of very powerful surveillance tools because they are concerned about what other country's aircraft is doing.
[Quest:] Last night, I was looking at the report into the Helios Cypriot plane and they have jets up in the air within an hour to see what was happening.
[Sciutto:] And this is something we know did not happen with this flight.
[Quest:] Approximately not.
[Sciutto:] Well, as you note though, there are still many questions and we're following this step by step along the way. Some new information today, not definitive. Still to come, we're digging deeper into the mystery of Malaysia Airlines flight 370 and where it could have landed. More after this.