FBI told firefighter to "keep your mouth shut" about finding WTC black box

[Minstrel Boy]

Rescue workers silenced after exposing 9-11 whitewash
By Greg Szymanski

A 9-11 rescue worker recently came forward to say he was told by FBI agents to “keep my mouth shut” about one of the “black boxes” a fellow firefighter helped locate at ground zero, contradicting the official story that none of the flight and cockpit data recorders were ever recovered in the wreckage of the World Trade Center (WTC) towers.

Honorary firefighter Mike Bellone claims he was approached by unknown bureau agents a short time after he and his partner, Nicholas DeMasi, a retired New York firefighter, found three of the four “black boxes” among the WTC rubble before January 2002.

...

“They confronted me and told me to not to say anything,” recalled Bellone, referring to one of three reddish-orange boxes with two white stripes he saw in the back of DeMasi’s ATV. “I said, ‘Give me a good reason.’ When they couldn’t, I told them I wouldn’t shut up about it.

“Why should I? I have nothing to hide and nothing to gain. It’s the truth, and Nick and I are sticking to our story as we always have.”

http://www.americanfreepress.net/html/black_box.html

Here's the original story, posted Oct 28:

2 say they found 9/11 'black boxes' (Philadelphia Daily News)

Two men who worked extensively in the wreckage of the World Trade Center claim they helped federal agents find three of the four "black boxes" from the jetliners that struck the towers on 9/11 - contradicting the official account.

Both the independent 9/11 Commission and federal authorities insist that none of the four devices - a cockpit voice recorder (CVR) and flight data recorder (FDR) from the two planes - was ever found.

But New York City Firefighter Nicholas DeMasi has written in a book self-published by Ground Zero workers that he took federal agents on an all-terrain vehicle in October 2001 and located three of the four. His account is backed by a well-known Ground Zero volunteer.

Their story raises the question of a cover-up at Ground Zero - although's it's not clear why the government would want to keep the discovery under wraps.
http://www.philly.com/mld/dailynews/news/local/10033802.htm
http://www.democraticunderground.com/discuss/duboard.php?az=show_topic&forum=102&topic_id=938848

[mhr]

1. Why Is This Story Three Years Late - Why Are They Speaking Now?

I'll never understand this aspect of the story.

[Minstrel Boy]

3. They're just being heard now.

Big difference.

[BattyDem]

2. "although's it's not clear why the government would ..."

"... want to keep the discovery under wraps."

I think it's pretty damn clear! :grr:

[Minstrel Boy]

9. "I said, 'Give me a good reason.'"

I like that comeback:

"I said, 'Give me a good reason.' When they couldn't, I told them I wouldn't shut up about it."

I think that's what we all should be saying: "Give me a good reason!" Because they haven't yet, about virtually everything.

[havocmom]

4. Official story: Couldn't recover black boxes, but found passports of the

terrorists.

Sure, I believe that crock of equine excrement. :eyes:

[Skink]

5. This is the same FBI that immediately confiscated

tapes that would have captured a plane hitting the Pentagon. From a Pentagon Goverment only gas station.

http://www.freedomunderground.org/memoryhole/pentagon.php#Main

[Nordic]

24. yeah, and wasn't there a story about

a stewdess' body found with her hands tied behind her back or some such nonsense?

[Tinoire]

6. Hmmmmm... Our little Reichstag

not clear why the government would want to keep the discovery under wraps

Can anyone say Reichstag?


On edit:

Bush's 9/11 Reichstag Fire
by Harvey Wasserman

When Hitler was rising to power in 1930s Germany, somebody did him the favor of burning the Reichstag, the German Parliament. It's widely believed the Nazis torched it themselves.

Hitler's cynical minions turned that fire into a horrific wave of terror. They blamed "the communists" and the Jews, the trade unionists and the homosexuals. With the support of a terrified populace, they suspended civil rights and civil liberties, fattened their war machine and rode the fascist tide into a full-blown dictatorship. The rest, as they say, is history.

The neverending White House-sponsored orgy of 9/11 rhetoric, recrimination and retaliation has become a treacherous parallel. Few Americans believe the Bush Administration itself brought down the World Trade Center last year. But the conviction is widespread throughout Europe and the Muslim world, and for good reason.

This unelected regime---Hitler also came to power with a minority of votes---has used the terrible tragedies of September 11 in much the way the Nazis jumped on the Reichstag fire. Bush has failed to capture or try 9/11's alleged perpetrators. But he's used the tragedy to push an extreme rightist agenda aimed at crushing civil liberties, silencing all opposition, fattening a war machine, and arrogating the right to unilaterally attack other countries without tangible provocation.

(snip)

http://www.commondreams.org/views02/0913-03.htm



Address by Adolf Hitler to the Reichstag, Sept. 1, 1939

For months we have suffered under the torture of a problem which the Versailles Diktat created - a problem that has deteriorated until it becomes intolerable for us ...

As always, I attempted to bring about, by the peaceful method of making proposals for revision, an alteration of this intolerable position. It is a lie when the outside world says that we only tried to carry our revisions through by pressure. Fifteen years before the National Socialist Party came to power there was the opportunity of carrying out these revisions by peaceful settlements and understanding. On my own initiative I have, not once but several times, made proposals for the revision of intolerable conditions. All these proposals, as you know, have been rejected - proposals for the limitation of armaments and, even if necessary, disarmament, proposals for the limitation of warmaking, proposals for the elimination of certain methods of modern warfare ... You know the endless attempts I made for peaceful clarification and understanding of the problem of Austria, and later of the problem of the Sudetenland, Bohemia and Moravia. It was all in vain.

It is impossible to demand that an impossible position should be cleared up by peaceful revision, and at the same time constantly reject peaceful revision. It is also impossible to say that he who undertakes to carry out the revisions for himself transgresses a law, since the Versailles Diktat is not law to us.

In the same way, I have tried to solve the problems of Danzig, the Corridor, etc., by proposing a peaceful discussion. That the problems had to be solved was clear. It is quite understandable to us that the time when the problem was to be solved had little interest for the Western Powers. But time is not a matter of indifference to us ...

For four months I have calmly watched developments, although I never ceased to give warnings. In the last few days I have increased these warnings ...

I made one more final effort to accept a proposal for mediation on the part of the British government. They proposed, not that they themselves should carry out the negotiations, but rather that Poland and Germany should come into direct contact and once more pursue negotiations.

I must declare that I accepted this proposal and worked out a basis for these negotiations which are known to you. For two whole days I sat in my government and waited to see whether it was convenient for the Polish government to send a plenipotentiary or not. Last night they did not send us a plenipotentiary, but instead informed us through their ambassador that they were still considering whether and to what extent they were in a position to go into the British proposals. The Polish government also said they would inform Britain of their decision.

Deputies, if the German government and its leader patiently endured such treatment Germany would deserve only to disappear from the political stage. But I am wrongly judged if my love of peace and my patience are mistaken for weakness or even cowardice. I, therefore, decided last night and informed the British government that in these circumstances I can no longer find any willingness on the part of the Polish government to conduct serious negotiations with us.

The other European states understand in part our attitude. I should like all to thank Italy, which throughout has supported us, but you will understand for the carrying on of this struggle ... we will carry out this task ourselves.

This night for the first time, Polish regular soldiers fired on our territory. Since 5:45 a.m. we have been returning the fire and from now on bombs will be met with bombs. Whoever fights with poison gas will be fought with poison gas. Whoever departs from the rules of humane warfare can only expect that we shall do the same ... until the safety, security of the Reich and its rights are secured.

http://www.commondreams.org/views03/0321-07.htm

[cliss]

8. I wonder.......

This whole thing seems strange to me. There's so much subterfuge. So many unsolved mysteries. The 9/11 commission stunk of a cover-up.

Speaking of stink, I smell a rat. And his name is....Rodent Cheney.

[Killarney]

14. Holy shit. The similarities are frightening.

[OneTwentyoNine]

7. Zapruder type of tapes......

They'll bury the info on these like they did the movie that Zapruder took of Kennedy's head flying back and to the left.

[Wild Rabbit]

10. Hard to believe.

If they claimed that they had found one of the black boxes, and had been told to remain quiet, I might believe. But to claim that they found THREE of them???? Sorry, but it sounds like these guys are simply braggarts.

[Minstrel Boy]

12. Harder to believe

is that all the black boxes simply vaporized. They're in the rear of the plane, and are subjected to stress tests more extreme than what they encountered on 9/11.)

They didn't stumble upon them by chance. They were asked by feds to help on the search, and they were equipped for the task.

From the Philadelphia Daily News story:

DeMasi, with now-defunct Engine Company 261, told his story in a 2003 book published by a group that calls itself Trauma Recovery Assistance for Children. He said he donated 4 ATVs to the cleanup and became known as "the ATV Guy."

"At one point, I was asked to take federal agents around the site to search for the black boxes from the planes...," he wrote. "We loaded up about a million dollars worth of equipment and strapped it into the ATV...

"There were a total of four black boxes. We found three."

[Wild Rabbit]

17. Still hard to believe.

I am not arguing about the rest of the story. But the data recorders, (actually orange - BTW) aren't that big, and there was acres of rubble, much of it still on fire, and piled deeply. And one team found three of the boxes by just driving around on an ATV, looking? That is the part I have trouble believing. Of course, since I don't believe that part, then I don't believe the rest of their story either.

[proud patriot]

11. add to all this the fact that the Air traffic Control tapes

were destroyed and placed in seperate rescepticles
throughout the FAA office building .

[Killarney]

15. Yeah, that's right! One guy took it upon himself to destroy

the tapes. For no reason, of course. :eyes:

At least the NYT reported that one, I'm pissed that no one big is reporting this.

[Fusions_Minion]

29. KiCk

[patcox2]

13. Such blazing bullshit.

First of all, this comes from an "honorary firefighter" who went to help? Whats an honorary firefighter?" Some wannabbee who hangs around the station helping them polish the chrome?

Second, this Honorary firefighter and some un-named retired firefighter show up at ground zero and, working on their own, manage to find not one, not two, but three black boxes? He must have been some kind of fucking genius, huh? To know exactly where, among acres of burning rubble, to go to find 3 of the four black boxes. Yeah, sure, thats plausible.

And then they self-publish this astounding story, so it must be true, because they self-published it and a tabloid reported that they self-published it.

This makes sense only to those who beleive the planes were radio controlled and that the towers were brought down by planted explosives. Sure they were. And then this "honorary" loon comes and finds three black boxes, but the FBI is covering up the truth so we won't know about the radio-controlled planes and the planted explosives and the aliens at Wright-Patterson, or is it Area 51, I get confused?

[sangh0]

19. Yep, but some will keep trying to push this story

no matter how uncredible it is.

[NecessaryOnslaught]

21. Un-named firefighter?

Nicholas DeMasi was an active firefighter on 9/11 and was with the now defunct company 261.
http://www.ufanyc.org/news_stories/newyork1/ny1_5_24_03.html

Are you calling NYFD firefighter and 9/11 first responder Nicholas DeMasi a liar?

[Nordic]

23. The disinformation campaign is working brilliantly, Smithers!

Uh ... you might want to not lump together "radio controlled planes" and "planted explosives" with the REAL stinking-to-high-heaven weirdness of the "official story" of 9/11

I'd bet you a case of beer that all those "radio controlled plane" stories and "planted explosives" stories are deliberate disinformation, planted at sites like DU (the people who plant them are REALLY agressive about it!) so that most people will lump together any odd realities about 9/11 with "whack-job conspiracy nuts".

I'm just sayin.....

I'm a born skeptic myself, but if you really start looking into 9/11 and what really happened, it's a black hole of weirdness and misinformation and it stinks to high heaven.

The disinformation is part of it.

[Selwynn]

16. What I think, though it is PURELY THEORY, is:

I think there was cover-up, but I think it was cover up of people trying to save their asses and destroy any kinds of things that could be used to place blame on them. The FAA tapes, I don't think those were destroyed because the FAA was in on a plot to blow up the buildings. I think they were destroyed so that no one could do investigation and come back and blame them for the worst tragedy in history. I think the government does the same kind of thing - covering up all the loose ends that could be discovered as an example of their glaring ineptitude.

Honestly for me, the Aug 6th memo, testimony of Clark and others, and Rice's lying testimony really pushed me towards my belief that this administration is guilty of criminal negligence/depraved indifference. I still cannot join some people who are convinced the government planned and executed the attacks. I've seen no evidence for that, only a long string of questions that need answers. A long string of questions that need answers is not proof of any kind, especially when those questions can be more easily answered through simpilar explainations.

I think the adminstration was so obsessed with its own agenda (tax cuts, etc) that it willfully ignored and refused to pay attention to the impending threat information. I think they thought, "we're not really concerned about this, and even if something did happen, it would only further our aims, so we're not worried about it - we want o focus on our agenda."

That's what I think. That's what I think a lot of the evidence points to: criminal negligence/depraved indifference. And I think after 9/11 happened, there was a collective "oh shit!" as everyone realized just how negligent they had been, and realized that if anyone started putting the pieces together, it would paint a disgusting picture of personal agendas and an obsession with pet conservative politics that put partisanship above national security.

[JohnyCanuck]

22. I'll post here what I posted on another GD thread

Cheney's war games make it MIHOP, not LIHOP nor just incompetence.

Mike Ruppert's book Crossing the Rubicon: The Decline of the American Empire at the End of the Age of Oil has been out for a while now and in his book he charges that during the week of 9/11 including the day of 9/11 itself there were multiple war games and exercises going on (under Big Dick's direction) simulating aircraft hijackings which 1) led to fighter aircraft resources being drawn away from the North Eastern US up to Northern Canada and 2) caused false targets to be displayed on FAA and USAF radars which in turn contributed to the confusion at the onset of the actual 9/11 hijackings as to whether or not they were real or just part of the exercises. Ruppert charges in his book that this confusion along with the lack of available fighter aircraft caused crucial delays in implementing the standard operating procedures calling for fighters to scramble in order to intercept, inspect and shoot down, if deemed necessary, hijacked airliners

Now your typical coincidence theorist type would no doubt have no problem considering this is all just another of those peculiar coincidences that crop up from time to time and Osama just by pure luck picked the best time possible to stage his attack such that the US military and intelligence services were distracted by Big Dick's war games which (surpraaaaazzzzz, surpraaazzzzz, surpraaaazzz as Gomer Pile would say) involved painting bogus blips on radar scopes while simulating aircraft hijackings, sending fighter aircraft from the North Eastern US up to Canada where they would be unable to respond to the real hijackings and simulating an aircraft crashing into a government building. Having worn a tin foil hat for as long as I have, that just doesn't wash.

Note that Ruppert's book has been out for a while now and to my knowledge no one has publicly challenged the assertions he has made regarding the war games and the affect they had on the US military's delayed response to the hijackings. I should think if his facts were not correct the establishment would love nothing better than to trumpet it from the rooftops in order to discredit him as an author and 9/11 researcher.

Here's an excerpt from an August 2004 speech by Ruppert to the Commonwealth Club of California just prior to the release of his book (all caps in original).

FOR ME, THE PIVOTAL EVIDENCE ABSOLUTELY DEMONSTRATING
DIRECT GOVERNMENT COMPLICITY IN, AND MANAGEMENT OF, THE
ATTACKS WAS FOUND IN A NUMBER OF UNDISPUTED, YET VIRTUALLY
UNADDRESSED WARGAMES THAT I WILL SHOW WERE BEING
CONDUCTED, COORDINATED AND/OR CONTROLLED BY VICE PRESIDENT
DICK CHENEY OR HIS IMMEDIATE STAFF ON THE MORNING OF
SEPTEMBER 11TH. THE NAMES OF THOSE WARGAMES ARE KNOWN TO
INCLUDE: VIGILANT GUARDIAN, VIGILANT WARRIOR, NORTHERN
GUARDIAN, NORTHERN VIGILANCE, AND TRIPOD II. ALL HAVE BEEN
REPORTED ON BY MAJOR PRESS ORGANIZATIONS RELYING ON
UNDISPUTED QUOTES FROM PARTICIPATING MILITARY PERSONNEL.
THEY HAVE ALSO BEEN CONFIRMED BY NORAD PRESS RELEASES. ALL,
EXCEPT FOR NORTHERN VIGILANCE AND TRIPOD II HAD TO DO WITH
HIJACKED AIRLINERS INSIDE THE CONTINENTAL UNITED STATES,
SPECIFICALLY WITHIN THE NORTHEAST AIR DEFENSE SECTOR WHERE
ALL FOUR 9/11 HIJACKINGS OCCURRED.

ACCORDING TO A CLEAR RECORD SOME OF THESE EXERCISES
INVOLVED COMMERCIAL AIRLINE HIJACKINGS. IN SOME CASES FALSE
BLIPS WERE DELIBERATELY INSERTED ONTO FAA AND MILITARY RADAR
SCREENS AND THEY WERE PRESENT DURING (AT LEAST) THE FIRST
ATTACKS. THIS EFFECTIVELY PARALYZED FIGHTER RESPONSE
BECAUSE, WITH ONLY EIGHT FIGHTERS AVAILABLE IN THE REGION,

THERE WERE AS MANY AS 22 POSSIBLE HIJACKINGS TAKING PLACE.
OTHER EXERCISES, SPECIFICALLY NORTHERN VIGILANCE HAD PULLED
SIGNIFICANT FIGHTER RESOURCES AWAY FROM THE NORTHEAST U.S.
– JUST BEFORE 9/11 – INTO NORTHERN CANADA AND ALASKA. IN
ADDITION, A CLOSE READING OF KEY NEWS STORIES PUBLISHED IN THE
SPRING OF 2004 REVEALED FOR THE FIRST TIME THAT SOME OF THESE
DRILLS WERE “LIVE-FLY” EXERCISES WHERE ACTUAL AIRCRAFT, LIKELY
FLOWN BY REMOTE CONTROL – WERE SIMULATING THE BEHAVIOR OF
HIJACKED AIRLINERS IN REAL LIFE. ALL OF THIS AS THE REAL ATTACKS
BEGAN. THE FACT THAT THESE EXERCISES HAD NEVER BEEN
SYSTEMATICALLY AND THOROUGHLY EXPLORED IN THE MAINSTREAM
PRESS, OR PUBLICLY BY CONGRESS, OR AT LEAST PUBLICLY IN ANY
DETAIL BY THE SO-CALLED INDEPENDENT 9/11 COMMISSION MADE ME
THINK THAT THEY MIGHT BE THE HOLY GRAIL OF 9/11.

THAT’S EXACTLY WHAT THEY TURNED OUT TO BE.


www.fromthewilderness.com/PDF/Commonwealth.pdf

[mistertrickster]

25. Good analysis. We should all keep in mind that Al Qaeda types

tried to blow up the WTC in 1993 and killed 8 people with a truck bomb. According to articles at the time, they might have brought down one of the towers if they had only parked the explosives closer to a weight bearing column.

Was Clinton part of this grand conspiracy too?

If you could CYA after the worst disaster in history, why wouldn't you?

Still, it is criminal the way this administration won't just stand up and answer simple questions.

[morgan2]

18. ya they found 3 of the blackboxes

when only two planes crashed into the wtc

[MadHound]

20. Each plane has two black boxes

One is the flight data recorder, the other is the cockpit voice recorder. Two flights, four boxes.

Oh, and these boxes each have a transmitter that will help them be located. All you have to have is the proper receiver, then it is a piece of cake.

[BikeWriter]

26. There were hundreds of workers on the site, mountains of debris...

...and this turkey wants us to believe he found three (3) of the black boxes?

[RBHam]

27. the house of cards is ready to fall....

there are way too many loose ends here...

something's gotta give...

[NecessaryOnslaught]

28. Bethos Inc assists in recovery

"Benthos is one of two companies in the country that manufacture the emergency locator pingers that help investigators recover black boxes when planes crash into water. The pingers are attached to the boxes and submersion triggers an acoustic signal that can be tracked from a mile away.

...Benthos has lent federal authorities some of its testing equipment that would pick up the signal - if the pinger has been triggered, Babicz said. On Wednesday, the equipment was flown to New York on military aircraft out of Otis Air Base.

...After the attack, Benthos received numerous calls from federal agencies, including the FBI, Federal Aviation Administration, National Transportation Safety Board and the U.S. Marshals Service, all wanting to know how they could find the black boxes.

Engineer Russ Blake and four or five other Benthos staff members have been working closely with federal authorities ever since.

"We've been in constant contact with them, with phone calls daily at home and here (at the office.) We're offering technical support for them."

Benthos offered to send employees to the site, but federal authorities declined, not wanting to add more people to the crowd already there.
http://www.capecodonline.com/special/terror/terrornews/blackboxes25.htm