Storming a cockpit

[Kevin Fenton]

There are two official versions of the last minutes of United 93.
(1) The passengers attacked, broke down the door using the food cart as a battering ram and then fought the hijackers in the cockpit, while the plane dove into the ground.
(2) The passengers attacked, but could not breach the cockpit door. The hijackers, realising the passengers would soon be upon them, crashed the plane into the ground. This is the version endorsed by the 9/11 Commission.

I have some problems with both of these.
(a) The evidence for the food cart being using as a battering ram is supposed to be the sound of crockery smashing (presumably as it falls from the food card), but if crockery smashing can be heard, why can’t the sound of the food card impacting the cockpit door be heard – surely this should be louder?
(b) Why don’t the passengers just open the door? If it’s locked, why not just unlock it with a key – there were five flight attendants (plus the pilot and co-pilot if they hadn’t already been killed) and they should have known where the keys were. There are no reports the hijackers confiscated any keys to the cockpit on any flight. We can assume that the American Airlines flight attendants would have mentioned any key confiscation during their calls, as they had the keys in their possession, whereas United Airlines stored keys in lockers on the plane. Surely, the flight attendants can’t have forgotten there were keys on the airplane?
Also, neither of the official accounts suggests a good reason for the transponder being turned back on from 10:00 to 10:03.

What’s the most logical way to storm a cockpit?
I think the prime aim of any group storming a hijacker-controlled cockpit must be to remove the hijackers from the cockpit as soon as possible, as any prolonged fighting in the cockpit would endanger the aircraft. The passengers need to get the hijackers out in the open, where they can use their numerical superiority effectively, so the first 2-3 passengers should go in, grab a hijacker and haul him back down the aisle, where the other passengers can get in on the action. They should then be followed by other passenger groups, who drag further hijackers out. When the hijackers are out of the cockpit, the passenger-pilot goes in and starts flying the plane. Whilst dragging the hijackers out, one may have been shoved into a galley near the cockpit, which would account for the sound of breaking crockery.

[philb]

1. Its my understanding there was a request for a new flight plan at 10:00

The plan was apparently granted, to D.C. airport. Who would have been requesting a new flight plan at 10:00, and why hasn't there been more explanation of this??

[Old and In the Way]

7. If 93 was part of the military hijacking games....couldn't that

have been a pre-planned part of their script? Of course, if that was the case, then they have to cover-up 93's involvement.

I want to know if all 4 of those planes were part of that exercise.

[MercutioATC]

53. Do we know the change was verbally requested?

I haven't seen that transcript.

[philb]

94. I hear it was granted, but that may be fairly automatic and I doubt

the request was oral. I suspect my source was Dr. Griffin's book, which depends a lot on Paul Thompson. Who I think is a pretty reliable source. It can likely be found on his timeline.



If the request was oral, there would be someone who knows more about this than has been released.

[Woody Box]

2. The "passengers storm the cockpit" story is bogus

like the whole Flight 93 story we are told. With all respect, Kevin, but your question is waste of time.

I recommend the work of Flight 93 specialist John Doe II deconstructing the various phone calls:

http://www.democraticunderground.com/discuss/duboard.php?az=view_all&address=125x48029 (cellphones/airfones)

http://www.democraticunderground.com/discuss/duboard.php?az=view_all&address=125x48033 (Tom Burnett)

http://www.democraticunderground.com/discuss/duboard.php?az=view_all&address=125x48032 (Jeremy GLick)

http://www.democraticunderground.com/discuss/duboard.php?az=view_all&address=125x48034 (Todd Beamer)

http://www.democraticunderground.com/discuss/duboard.php?az=show_mesg&forum=125&topic_id=39827&mesg_id=39827 (Edward Felt)

http://www.democraticunderground.com/discuss/duboard.php?az=view_all&address=125x48030 (Other phone calls)


Last but not least, I recommend a piece of my own, already archived: "Jeremy Glick and the collapsing South Tower":

http://www.democraticunderground.com/discuss/duboard.php?az=view_all&address=125x6210

[Kevin Fenton]

3. Phones

I'm not so sure about that. I think cell phones can work in the air - see my post in the John Doe cellphones/airphones thread.

As for the discrepancies about the time, why are the 9/11 Commission times set in stone? Just because the 9/11 Commission gives a time of 9:58:57 for something, that doesn't mean that the time is exactly right, given the 9/11 Commission's somewhat spotty record on United 93.

What do you mean by "bogus"? That it was hijacked by Al Qaeda operatives who crashed it without the passengers attacking, that it never existed, something else?

[Woody Box]

4. Several callers reported the passenger's revolt beginning at 9:58

but not Jeremy Glick. He was still on the phone at 10:00 when his wife told him about the South Tower collapse. He mentioned no passengers running to the cockpit.

With "bogus" I mean, in this case particularly, that the phone calls were not made by people on a hijacked plane; therefore the revolt is bogus, too.

[hack89]

5. Why would all the clocks and watches be expected to have the same time?

Two minutes might be significant if every time piece was synchronized to exactly the same time. But they weren't - or is it your assertion that it is possible to tie every one of thousands of data points to within seconds of each other? How is this possible with hundreds of different clocks, watches, and systems time being used to record when things were happening?

[Woody Box]

6. So your assertion is the revolt began after 10 o clock?

Interesting new theory. I have to think about it.

[hack89]

9. Don't put words into my mouth...

Short of having God's own pocket watch, you do not know precisely when anything happened and to therefore hang so much on a two minute difference is ridiculous. There is some unkown error associated with time - there has to be with so many sources of data.

[John Doe II]

15. Do you doubt that the WTC collapsed at 9:59?

For all further details please check out the thread on Glick.

[hack89]

18. My point is ...

that your argument depends on every clock reading exactly the same time and also that the time for each event was recorded accurately. I question that premise.

I have no problem with believing that the 9/11 commission's time line is not perfect as I see no method by which they could have synchronized all the different reported times. Their times have to be subjective - some human chose one time over others based on their assessment of what happened. Simply put - there is enough error and subjectivity inherent in the process to make a two minute difference insignificant (or at least an unlikely smoking gun.)

[spooked911]

20. Your assertion is not true-- the only time that is important is when the

south tower collapsed, which was right before 10 am. Glick said they would start the take-over right after he heard the towers collapsed, ergo, the revolt started after 10am. How long did it take them to get organized and attack? I would think a couple of minutes? Did they get into the cockpit? I would think so, particularly if the plane crashed at 10:06am (as shown by a seismic signal).

[seatnineb]

17. Woody is not putting words into your mouth.

Did you see this TV documentary?

Flight 93:A reconstruction(2002)



In the documentary the actor reciting the role of Jeremy Glick says:

"What do you mean theres nothin left?........they could'nt have demolished the whole of the World trade centre!"

Followed by the real Lyz Glick who adds:
"It was valuable information for him to have"

John Doe II proved along time ago that the Flight 93's timeline is well and truly screwed.

[seatnineb]

8. You cannot have it both ways.

Either the passenger revolt began after 9:59(when WTC2 collpased).

Or......

The WTC2 collapsed before 9:57am(the time the Ommission Report says the passenger revolt began).

The fact is that the official chronology of FL93 is well and truly fucked up.

[Kevin Fenton]

12. Did she really tell him that?

I just looked at John Doe's thread about Glick and he has a quote from an interview on ABC:
“LYZ GLICK: He began to ask me, 'Are they crashing planes into the World Trade Center?' I guess one of the other passengers had spoken to his mother, I believe it might have been, and that message might have been relayed. So he asked that. And then I am watching on the big screen television in front of me the World Trade Centers collapsing.”
So he asked whether they were crashing planes into the WTC and then (a short time later, one or two minutes and half an hour respectively) she saw the towers collapse. I fail to see how this is inconsistent with an attack time of 9:58.

Are you saying there was a plane, but no passengers calling off it, or there was no plane?

[John Doe II]

14. Glick was on

the phone till 10:00 with his wife.
So how could he have participated in the attack? Please see for all further details the mentioned thread.

[Kevin Fenton]

19. Glick

You write:
"If we keep in mind that the call still continued after Lyz Glick told her husband of the collapse Glick can’t have left the phone before 10:00 or even 10:00:30."
Why do you think the call was in progress at all when the towers collapsed?
This is not supported by the ABC quote:
"So he asked that. And then I am watching on the big screen television in front of me the World Trade Centers collapsing."
There is nothing here to indicate she told JG that the towers had already collapsed. This quote does not indicate whether she saw the "Centers" collapse before or after the call ended.

Jere Longman's acount is second hand. There is the problem LG may have remembered it wrong, there is the problem that LG may be embellishing it, there is the problem Longman may have remembered it wrong and there is also the problem that Longman may have embellished what LG told him (for example to make the book more dramatic). As there were over 30 calls made from the plane and he only heard a "couple" of tapes (which I use to mean two, but he might mean more) then it is actually unlikely that he heard the tape of that specific call. I have serious problems accepting as gospel anything Longman writes.

My position is not that you are necessarily wrong, but that the evidence, as we see it now, admits two explanations. Therefore, you legitimately think that you are right, but I legitimately think that I am right. Wouldn't it be great if the tapes were released?

I don't believe the official timeline anyway.

[Woody Box]

26. Lisa Beamer confirms the Glick/South Tower collapse story

in her book "Let's roll!". It's not only Longman.

[John Doe II]

28. The last 20 minutes of the call were recorded

FBI was listening in and Miss Glick mentioned the WTC collapse a couple of days in an interview which I've quoted. So, certainly this does not rely on Longman.
Interesting to note that the Commission DIDN'T listen to the recording but only read the transcript. Hm. What an investigative work...

[Kevin Fenton]

32. More Glick

If the interview you're referring to is the one with ABC, then I don't think that shows she thinks she was still talking to him at 10:00; I've given my reasons above.

Could I wring an admission from you that the Commission might distort the story of United 93 just because it was shot down?

[John Doe II]

64. I disagree

The ABC interview clearly implies that she told her husband that the WTC collapsed. So the call at least lasted to 9:59 which alone suffice to contradict the official timeline. But following the interview it is clear (as in Longman's account) that the call didn't end after her passing this information. In fact all accounts how their call ended are very similar.
I agree that one has to be very careful about Longman. I have the suspicion that he covered up the Felt call. See my thread on Felt for further information.

It might be possible that the Commission covers up a shoot down.
But let me make it clear that this can't have been a last minute shoot down.
General problems with UA 93

First off all:
How to explain the contradictions in all phone calls especially in Beamer's?
Compare the calls and answer the basic questions:
Are dead people on the floor of the plane and if yes, how many?
Is somebody guarding the passengers?
Have the passengers been herded to the back of the plane? If yes, how many?

Look for the info in the calls and you'll come up with surpringly contradicting answers.

Second:
How do you explain the raining debris that was found on Indian Lake? What everybody fails to see is that the plane that 15 eyewitnesses saw coming in from northwest did never come near Indian Lake. Therefore the explanation that it was shot and the raining debris is a proof that it was shot doesn't work out.
For further info:
http://www.democraticunderground.com/discuss/duboard.php?az=view_all&address=125x37066

[Kevin Fenton]

71. Yet more Glick

You said "The ABC interview clearly implies that she told her husband that the WTC collapsed."
First, you have admitted that the LG did not specifically say that the call continued until 9:59. Second, it don't see how you can say it "clearly implies" this. I think the passage:
“LYZ GLICK: He began to ask me, 'Are they crashing planes into the World Trade Center?' I guess one of the other passengers had spoken to his mother, I believe it might have been, and that message might have been relayed. So he asked that. And then I am watching on the big screen television in front of me the World Trade Centers collapsing.”
admits two explanations - that the "World Trade Centers" collapsed during the call - or after it. Clearly, one of the "World Trade Centers" collapsed after the end of the call, at 10:28. LG uses the word "then" in the last sentence; this clearly denotes the passage of time, but we cannot know for sure if she means a couple of seconds or a couple of minutes. Given that one of the events in the period denoted by "then" clearly happened after the call end, would it not be correct to suppose that the other did as well? At any rate, the passage is ambiguous and admits both explanations (but I think mine's right).

I haven't read Longman yet (just excerpts), so I won't go into that now.

Why can't it have been a last minute shootdown?

Your phone call posts are on my list of things to do, don't worry.

As for the flight path, as I have said many times, I don't believe eyewitnesses. Also, my understanding is that a jet holed by a missile may not fly in a straight line.

[John Doe II]

81. Still more on Glick

The important ABC interview of Miss Glick:
Ms. GLICK: He began to ask me, 'Are they crashing planes into the World Trade Center?' I guess one of the other passengers had spoken to his mother, I believe it might have been, and that message might have been relayed. So he asked that. And then I am watching on the big screen television in front of me the World Trade Centers collapsing.
SAWYER: (VO) Those huddled in the back began to make a plan.
Ms. BURNETT: He told me they were getting ready to do something, and I pleaded with him to please sit down and not draw attention to himself. And he said, 'No, no. If they're going to run this into the ground, we're going to have to do something. We're going to do something.' And he hung up.
(ABC, 9/18/01)

I think it is pretty clear that she told him during the call and doesn't insert for no reason an experience she had alone after the call finshed.


And here Longman's account:
Were they going to crash his plane into the World Trade Center? Jeremy wanted to know.
“No,” Lyz said, almost laughing. “They are not going there.”
Why? Jeremy asked.
One of the towers had just fallen.
“They knocked it down,” Lyz told him.
(p. 207)
They were problem-solving. Lyz asked Jeremy about the United pilots. Were they alive? He didn’t know. Had the real pilots said anything to the passengers over the public address system? No.
Did the hijackers have any automatic weapons? Lyz asked. Even a former judo champion like Jeremy would be no match for guns.
No guns, Jeremy said. “They have knives.”
How could people have gotten on the plane with knives and a bomb? He wanted to know. And then he made a joke that was typical Jeremy. “We just had breakfast and we have our butter knives.”
He said that they were taking a vote. There were three other guys as big as him. Was that a good idea? What should they do?
(p. 216)

Lyz shook as she talked to her husband, but when she heard that the hijackers didn’t have guns, she thought Jeremy would be okay. He could get stabbed, or get his hand slice, but he might not even feel it in the adrenaline rush. Getting stabbed wouldn’t kill him. The only hope is if they take these people over and get control of the plane.
“I think you need to do it,” Lyz told Jeremy.
“Okay,” he said. “Stay on the phone, I’ll be right back.”
There was a sound of conviction in his voice. Not anger, but a sense of purpose. He wanted to get home to wife and daughter.
They were going to jump on the hijackers and attack them, Jeremy said.
(p.216f)

Put a picture of me and the baby in your head, Lyz said to Jeremy.
He went away, and it sounded as if he were talking to people.
(p. 217)

The account of Longman is very precise and it is based on an interview with Lyz Glick.

As I already said:
The FBI listened in the call, taped the last 20 minutes and interviewed Lyz Glick stil on 911.
For very strange reasons the Commission didnt listen to the call but only read the transcrit.

All in all I don't see how all account shall have been made up.
For further info:
http://team8plus.org/content.php?article.12


I share your scepticism concerning eyewitnesses. Yet, if all eyewitnesses (fifteen) agree in the important details then why really has to wonder how on earth they all are supposed to have had halluciinations especially given the fact that most were interviewed rigth after the crash.

[Kevin Fenton]

84. Plural

LG uses the phrase "World Trade Centers". She uses the plural, not the singular. This clearly refers to both the North and South Towers. If you think her statement is accurate and that she saw this whilst on the phone to her husband, then the call must have continued until after the North Tower fell, until around 10:30. Right?

[John Doe II]

88. Plural

Yes, she used the plural but this might simply be explained by the fact that her memory mixes up the moment. This is likely and given the very accurate account of Longman and that neither Liz Glick nor the FBI pointed out that Longman simply made up the dialoge stress that she saw indeed the collapse.
To use the plural is possible. To mix up seeing the collapse at the TV during the call although it was in fact afterwards s extremely unlikely. And as I said there are several sources for the collapse happening during the call. Do you believe Longman made up a whole conversation in his book and neither Liz Glick nor the FBI protested?

[Kevin Fenton]

95. Quality of witness

LG is your "star witness" upon whom this part of your case is based. In your previous post you said that "her memory mixes up the moment." Do I really need to continue? Given that we've established that her account is not consistent with the facts, should we regard it as 100% reliable? No, we should not.

You say that Longman's account is "very accurate". How do you know? Have you listened to the tape? I think that Longman's account (note: I haven't read the book yet, so this is only an initial impression) is a second-hand one based on testimony of an emotionally-disturbed witness, who, as you have admitted, didn't always remember the details right. Further, I suspect that he was embellishing it to make it more dramatic.

[John Doe II]

96. One thing

It's one thing to mix up that you saw the first tower collapse while talking with your husband and using the plural cause you saw the second tower afterwards or to completely invent the watching of the collapse while talking to your husband.
It is clear from the WBC interview that the call continued after her witnessing the crash.
I already said that one has to be careful using Longman.
Yet, he quotes a dialoge. He doesn't summarize it. (as he does with other calls). Do you seriously believe he invented a dialoge t make things more dramatic? (While other accounts he gives of other calls are very close to media accounts we have of them. Glick's call the only invention? Come on!)

Keep in mind that the FBI recorded the last 20 minutes and interviewed Liz Glick on 911.

And nowhere I admitted that Liz Glick got details (plural) wrong! The using of the plural is a slip that could happen to anybody. Completely inventing a story is a different thing.

You say: Liz Glick is so emotionally-disturbed witness simply invents the watching of the collapse.
But this already is hardly possible as she was interviewed by the FBI on 911. In case she falsly believed to have watched this surely the FBI would have told her that this wasn't what they heard while listening to the call.

[Kevin Fenton]

98. Mixed up witness

At no point in the ABC interview does she say she saw the towers collapse whilst talking to her husband. She describes the call, finishing as they were about to attack the hijackers, she says that she then saw the "World Trade Centers" collapse. The interviewer then goes back over some details of the call.

I don't see how you can interpret the word "then" solely to mean "later, but during the call". I think the word "then" means either "later, but during the call" or "later, after the call". There is no way to tell based on the excerpt from the ABC interview I have seen.

I very much doubt that the words Longman says they spoke were actually spoken. I imagine he interviewed LG and got the basics of the conversation, then embellished it for dramatic effect, as writers and filmakers are wont to do.

If she saw one tower collapse during the call, then "World Trade Centers" is a slip. If she saw both towers collapse after the call, it is not.

[John Doe II]

99. See above

Kevin, please see above where I quoted a longer part of the ABC interview. For me it is clear that it was part of the phone call.

Longman give direct quotes of the dialoge. It is really hard to see how you can believe that he invented the part that she watched the WTC tower collapse while being on the phone. And this is not a dramatic Hollywood production that of course takes dramatic liberty but supposed to be a non-fictional writing. Do you seriously believe that Longman could simply invent this detail? Do you seriously believe Liz Glick wouldn't protest? Why does no other detailed account of other calls by Longman have such a big invention? The FBI that was listening in as was also one 911 dispatcher would say nothing and still his book would even be used as a source by the Commission?
Another source that mentions the detail of the collapsing tower:
http://observer.guardian.co.uk/waronterrorism/story/0,1373,610355,00.html


Btw two other phone calls strongly question the 9:57 attack time: Wainio and CeeCee Lyles. For further info check out the thread on Deconstructing the lesser phone calls.

[Kevin Fenton]

100. Another installment of Glick

Is this the longer part of the ABC interview to which you referred?
"Ms. GLICK: He began to ask me, 'Are they crashing planes into the World Trade Center?' I guess one of the other passengers had spoken to his mother, I believe it might have been, and that message might have been relayed. So he asked that. And then I am watching on the big screen television in front of me the World Trade Centers collapsing.
SAWYER: (VO) Those huddled in the back began to make a plan.
Ms. BURNETT: He told me they were getting ready to do something, and I pleaded with him to please sit down and not draw attention to himself. And he said, 'No, no. If they're going to run this into the ground, we're going to have to do something. We're going to do something.' And he hung up.
(ABC, 9/18/01)

As I have said before, I think the statement, "And then I am watching on the big screen television in front of me the World Trade Centers collapsing" is ambiguous. Why do you think that "then" must mean "then, but during the phone call"? Why is the second interpretation I suggest completely impossible? And what has the subsequent statement by Ms. Burnett got to do with anything?

I'm not suggesting that Longman "invented" the detail, I'm suggesting that he may have embellished something LG told him when he interviewed her, or that LG may have been confused about the exact sequence of events, as she was during the ABC interview. Given that it's a second-hand account, we cannot assume that it is 100% accurate.

Perhaps the hijacking of United 93 was faked, perhaps it wasn't (actually I think it wasn't). I just don't think that the LG interview and the passage in ATH are a smoking gun, as the interview can be interpreted in two ways and there are doubts about Longman's accuracy.

[John Doe II]

105. Glick and Glick and many others

You write:I'm not suggesting that Longman "invented" the detail, I'm suggesting that he may have embellished something LG told him when he interviewed her

I mean Longman writes a dialgoe he doesn't summarize. Either he invents this detail or Liz Glick told him. It's hard to see a third way.


Btw I nowhere said the Glick story was a smoking gun. In fact it is a proof that the passenger attack can't have happened at 9:57 and therefore the plane can't have crashed at 10:03 (or the CVR recording would have been manipulated).
Reasons to assume is not only the Glick story (which in itself can only be refute if one assumes an innumerous number of high inprobabilities) the Wainio call, the CeeCee Lyles call and the seismic recording.

[seatnineb]

90. This refers to the singular..........

One of the towers had just fallen.
“They knocked it down,” Lyz told him.

[Zaphod 36]

23. What if the passengers regained control before

Lyz Glick told Jeremy about the South Tower collapse?
The pilot of the passengers (name?) could have done the flight plan request at 10:00am also.

[John Doe II]

16. How do you

explain the innumerous contradictions in
Beamer's call
Burnett's call
Glick's call
Bingham's call

not to mention all the contradictions between theses calls?

Please check out the detailed threads on each call for further information.

[rman]

13. To which we could add - Indira Singh re Flight 93

http://www.democraticunderground.com/discuss/duboard.php?az=view_all&address=125x50693

[petgoat]

10. Interesting Analysis, Kevin

If the hijackers were rolling the plane side to side to disrupt the
attack on the door, I would expect any crockery to get thrown off the
cart, perhaps thrown out of the galley too, then collect along the sides
of the fuselage as it was kicked aside from the doorway area.

So I'd suggest that what you're hearing is people rolling around in the
crockery on the floor at the exterior doorway area--which as you say
suggests that the cockpit door was open.

Dr. Griffin suggests that the reason the plane was shot down was because
the passengers were succeeding in regaining control, and among the
passengers was a pilot qualified to land the plane.

[spooked911]

22. The problem is the crash of flight 93 doesn't even make sense with

a plane being shot down.

If you click on my blog, I've put up a long post on the flight 93 crash and why it can't be real.

[Kevin Fenton]

27. Cool drawings

"1) That the front of the plane broke up up while the rest of the plane went in the ground. By normal physical principles, either the nose went into the ground first followed by the fuselage or the plane didn't go into the ground period. I don't see any way around it. A good comparison would be with the planes crashing into the WTC: the nose didn't break off as the planes hit and broke through the wall-- the nose went in first. Moreover, the front of the plane smashing into bits should slow down the momentum of the plane quite a bit and thus it is not clear what drove the rest of the plane into the ground."
Maybe the nose hit a rock. Maybe it's because the nose was going faster when it hit the ground than the other bits.
Maybe the other bits slowed down a bit, but not enough from going into the ground.

"2) How did the front of the plane that supposedly didn't go into the ground break entirely into very small pieces? There wasn't even large sections of seats-- it's as if the front of the plane totally disintegrated. How would smashing into soft ground do this? Even an explosion doesn't rip everything into small unrecognizable pieces."
Maybe the front section broke into pieces because it hit the ground going real fast. Remember the fighter smashing into a wall.

"3) I can see bodies vaporizing to some degree if they were outside the crater and were subjected to the full force of the explosion and fire, but I don't understand why more intact bodies weren't recovered from the crumpled plane in the crater. What force shredded even these bodies to such an extreme degree?"
Bodies can't vaporise in that sort of heat. Maybe they weren't recovered because they were underground.

"4) What caused some debris from the plane to be found miles away? Some significant debris, including human remains and pieces of seats were found two miles away at Indian Lake."
A missile impact.
If the plane was a non-existant false-flag hologram loaded with DU explosives, how do you explain the pieces of debris, including the in-flight magazine? Were they from the current month?

Seriously, do you have a link for the "front bit exploded" thing?

[spooked911]

33. Link is Jere Longman's "Among the Heroes", a book-- it is basically the

most detailed description of the crash available. Not online though. If you PM your address to me, I can send you photocopies of the relevant pages.

The nose: there was no rock that big-- it was soft ground that the rest of the plane disappeared into. The ground was soft, not like a concrete wall. So, it makes no sense.

I see you can't explain the lack of human remains outside the crater. As far as the remains underground: the rest of the plane was supposedly excavated along with all the human remains. If there were bodies underground, I'm sure they would have pulled them out.

No point in responding to the hologram DU bit.

If you can't explain the crash scene, then it must have been faked. FWIW, I think there was some real plane debris there. I just can't explain the overall pattern with the crater and dispersed debris.

[Kevin Fenton]

37. Thanks for the offer

I'll think I'll buy "Among the Heroes" at some point and read the whole damn thing. However, having read bits by Longman, I am moderately suspicious of anything he writes.

The debris elsewhere indicate the plane was holed by a missile (or bomb - doubt that). If the crash scene was faked then the the debris elsewhere indicating a missile were too. This would mean a false-flag operation front-loaded with a whole raft of deceptions to confuse us poor CTers. Why not just do it right?

"If you can't explain the crash scene, then it must have been faked." You must have mistaken me for an experienced crash scene investigator, rather than an itinerant translator. The more I look at the physical evidence regarding 9/11, the more I think it's random, at least to some degree. For example I was looking today at the impact damage to the South Tower and apparently the damage to the core depends to a large amount on whether the engines hit a floor slab or not when they penetrated the perimeter. A foot or two either way would have made a whole lot of difference. So I'm not too concerned about the debris pattern. Just because it doesn't look the way you might expect it to do at first, doesn't mean it's not right.

What's the point of faking a plane crash in a field anyway?
If it's faked so badly, why?

What does "FWIW" mean?

[spooked911]

40. "why not do it right?" is a good question, for which I don't have a good

answer. Except that covert operations often seem to have conflicting clues built into them that confound investigators, the JFK assassination, the RFK assassination, the MLK assassination, the OK city bombing, the TWA flight 800 crash and 9/11 being good examples. Why this is the case is not clear, except it is very good at muddying the waters that when the official story is synthesized it is so much easier for people to hold onto that naturally they cling to it and ignore other explanations.

And certainly there are clues that flight 93 was shot down, but the crash scene does not look like a shot down plane at all, since a seemingly intact plane disappeared into a hole in the ground.

FWIW= for what it is worth

[Robb]

69. There were plenty of remains outside the crater.

I've spoken off-the-record with someone who helped collect them into little tupperware.

The words that stuck with me were "hamburger meat hanging from branches."

[John Doe II]

92. As i wrote to MercutioATC

Not a single eyewitness saw any human remains.
The coroner Wallace Miller needed one hour to find the first human remains.
The story of the trees in nowhere in the media in September 2001 is I researched correctly nor any eyewitness mentions it.

[Robb]

101. As I write to many here

Try talking to people, as real investigation dictates.

The world is not online. Yet. ;)

[demodewd]

11. rolling the plane

I've always wondered why the option of the pilot rolling the plane before the hijackers would have entered is never discussed. The crew were notified of a hijack alert by United at 9:00. And yet we have the hijackers gaining control of the plane anyway. Very suspicious.

[spooked911]

21. flight 93 should never have been hijacked for several reasons we've

discussed on this board before. I strongly suspect the hijack was fake.

[MercutioATC]

24. So why did it fly off course, descend and crash?

:shrug:

[rman]

25. The question is whether it flew, descended and crashed at all.

And if it did, where and when exactly it did so.

[MercutioATC]

29. I'd LOVE to see the scenario for that...

People boarded a plane. That plane was monitored both visually and by ground radar until it took off. From takeoff, it was monitored by radar until it crashed.

PLEASE explain how anything else happened.

[spooked911]

31. explain the crash site then-- it makes no sense.

[MercutioATC]

34. You're a crash analyst?

No, you're not.

I'm not either.

So let's leave the crash analysis to the experts.


Regardless of the state of the crash site, the plane was STILL observed, either visually or by radar, from the gate to a couple of thousand of feet off of the ground.

You've claimed that you don't believe the plane was hijacked. Please explain why the plane (which was observed constantly from the time it boarded until right before it crashed) deviated from its flight plan, descended and crashed if it wasn't hijacked.

[spooked911]

35. Come on, look at the pictures. Use common sense.

We've all seen lots of pictures of crashes. It doesn't take a degree in crashology to see that it doesn't add up.

Simple question: what happened to the tail of flight 93? Where did it go?

[MercutioATC]

36. That's not the issue at hand. Explain why the plane turned, descended,

and crashed. We KNOW that the plane that took on passengers was the same one that took off. We KNOW that THAT plane was constantly observed up to and while it turned without an ATC clearance and descended without an ATC clearance. Why did it turn and descend if it wasn't hijacked?

[spooked911]

38. I'm not sure why this is the issue at hand, but there are two real

possibilities:
1) it was really hijacked as according to the official version
2) the pilots/hijackers were acting as if there was a hijack-- they were really entering the hijacking exercise going on that morning

The plane was probably not taken over by remote control nor swapped with another plane before the turn was made, since there was still radio communication going on and the transponder wasn't shut off until six minutes after the turn.

Reasons why the hijacking was fake:
1) there was in fact a live-fly hijacking exercise happening on 9/11

2) the pilots really should not have been taken by surprise by the hijackers-- they should have alerted air traffic control of the hijackers long before the hijackers entered the cockpit:

a) the pilots and flight attendants of the flight had a special procedure planned for a hijacking, they were aware of the possibility of a hijacking

b) at least 8 minutes elapsed between when the hijack was first reported (Tom Burnett's phone call) and when the struggle in the cockpit occurred. This should have given the flight attendants plenty of time to warn the pilots of the hijacking. The pilots could have easily radioed Air Traffic Control or pushed the hijacking signal on the transponder-- but they didn't!

c) the pilots should have known about the WTC attacks and hijackings shortly after 9am, almost a half hour before the cockpit struggle

d) United Airlines was warning all its flights of hijackings after the WTC attacks, the flight 93 pilots should have received the warning

3) the passenger phone calls have seriously conflicting accounts of the hijacking, suggesting that the passengers may have been "making up" details of the hijackings, that some of the calls were pre-recorded, or that the "passengers" were working from an intentionally misleading script

4) the fact that shortly before 10am, someone piloting flight 93 requested a flight path to go to Washington DC. Why would a hijacker do this? This sounds more like a pilot decided to call off the hijacking exercise and pilot a normal course.

5) the fact that NORAD suspected flight 93 of being a hijack at 9:16am (http://justicefor911.org/iiA1_AirDefense_111904.php), long before the hijack officially occurred. Why would they suspect it of a hijacking unless they already knew something about the flight?

[MercutioATC]

39. O.K., replies by the numbers (some of them, anyway).

(start at your third paragraph - the second number sequence)

1) Which had nothing to do with civilian ATC. There's absolutely zero proof that UAL93 (or any of the other flights) were involved in any military exercise. In fact, there's a lot of evidence that they weren't.

2a) Not questioning its existance...what was the special hijack procedure that was worked out for UAL93? I honestly haven't seen it.

2b) How are you setting the time of the "struggle in the cockpit"? Hijackers just MIGHT not have notified ATC the minute they took control of the plane.

2c&d) Granted. There were, however, over 4500 planes in the air over the continental U.S. at the time. UAL93 would have been notified of 2 hijackings (none from the same departure airport...none with the same arrival airport). Security was probably a concern, but there was absolutely nothing to lead the flight crew of UAL93 to believe that the were a target, especially because they were already well into their flight before the hijack occurred.

3) Conflicting reports are common in emergency situations. I'm not completely disregarding the discrepancies, but I don't believe the degree of inconsistency is unusual.

4) I need documentation for this claim. If you're using the flight plan change (and nothing else) as evidence, I've discussed possible explanations for this before...but I'd be happy to go over them again if needed.

5) DAL1989 was also a suspected hijack risk...as were many other flights. Long-range flights from the northeast were all suspect because of the known flight profiles of the other hijacked aircraft.

You still haven't answered how UAL93 managed to board civilian passengers at the terminal, depart, fly its route, suddenly deviate from its clearance, descend and crash without being hijacked. I'm really interested in your explanation.

[spooked911]

41. Answers and questions

what is the "lot of evidence" that the four 9/11 flight weren't involved in the hijacking military exercise? I don't know of any evidence to this effect.

The special hijack procedure was established by the flight attendant and the pilot on the flight. The cockpit door would remain locked and the pilopt would only open it for the special knock. If there was a hijacking, the flight attendant would call the pilot and alert him to a hijacking with a special password.

The struggle in the cockpit apparently occured at 9:28 am as that is when it was heard over the radio.

"Long-range flights from the northeast were all suspect because of the known flight profiles of the other hijacked aircraft."

REALLY! I never heard that before. Why did they only suspect long-range flights from the northeast? How did they know there wouldn't be other hijacking from other locations????? This is quite interesting information!

"You still haven't answered how UAL93 managed to board civilian passengers at the terminal, depart, fly its route, suddenly deviate from its clearance, descend and crash without being hijacked."

I think that some of the people on the plane were not ordinary civilians but were special agents participating in a hijack drill (there were probably ordinary civilians on the plane as well who may or may not have been forewarned). The hijackers were part of this drill as well. Thus the plane took off like normal, then went through a mock hijacking. That is why it descended, changed course, etc.

The crash scene is what doesn't make sense. It is not an ordinary crash, and why would an ordinary flight crash in this unusual way?

[MercutioATC]

42. Responding by paragraph:

1) Perhaps the greatest evidence is the civilian passengers. The military is perfectly capable of carrying out wargames without the use of civilian passengers and planes. WHY would they risk the fallout if word ever got out?

2) You're assuming that the flight attendants weren't incapacitated before they could warn the flight deck.

3) No real question there.

4&5) That's why DAL1989 was also a suspect aircraft. After the first two hijackings (and crashes) longe-range northeastern seaboard departures all became suspect because they would match the profile of the existing hijackings. There could have been hijackings from other departure points, but that would make all 4500 planes in the sky suspect. They narrowed it down, I assume, by range and departure point.

6&7) When has the military ever used an unsuspecting civilian aircraft loaded with ordinary citizens in a wargame? When have they ever mislead civilian ATC for the sake of a wargame? There's absolutely NO reason to do so, and it would create an unacceptable potential for loss of civilian life (not to mention the repercussions if it was ever made public). The military is more than able to carry out simulations without the needless risk to civilians.

8) I have no idea.

[spooked911]

48. Rebuttal

1) I thought you said there was a lot of evidence that flight 93 wasn't an exercise plane. Sure, "the military is perfectly capable of carrying out wargames without the use of civilian passengers and planes." But in fact, NORAD had run multiple hijacking exercises using commercial craft. Anti-terror drills involving airplanes were also run before 9/11 using civilians. (see here: http://positiontoknow.com/S-11//html/ErieCountyConductsAiportDisasterDrill.htm

Additionally, there was the fact that flight 93 was a new flight and a large number of people on board transferred to that flight that morning from flight 91, which was cancelled. It makes you wonder who initially was on flight 93 besides (apparently) the hijackers.

2) All FIVE flight attendants were incapacitated? Wouldn't it be important for ONE of them to alert the cockpit of a hijacking?

4&5) That may be why DAL1989 was also suspected of a hijacking, but it seems awfully strange to me that assuming they knew nothing of the 9/11 plot beforehand, that they would only suspect long-range flights from the northeast. Moreover, why did NORAD later deny that they suspected fligh 93 so early if this was such an innocent explanation?

6&7) presumably they did this on 9/11. Just because it may not have been done before hardly means it wasn't done on 9/11. Also, we don't know that there weren't military personnel on flight 93 and some civilians got on board by mistake (transferred from flight 91).

8) I still maintain the flight 93 crash site does not look like a normal plane crash, and it doesn't even look like the crash of a shot-down plane. It looks like a fake crash site. Are you telling me nothing about the flight 93 crash site is odd to you?

[MercutioATC]

55. A rebuttal to the rebuttal...

1) Your link it so a report of an emergency drill. If you'll notice, the "civilian plane" is parked on the tarmac by itself (not in service). The "civilian passengers" are volunteer "actors" who are all were of the drill and assigned a part to play. To present this is as anything similar to using an in-service aircraft with unsuspecting passengers is ridiculous.

Todd Beamer was one of the passengers on UAL93. I met his best friend a couple of years ago. Google him. See if you REALLY think he was anything but an uninvolved civilian.

2) You've flown before, right? Put one hijacker at the phone by the cockpit door, one in the galley and one at the phone in the rear of the aircraft while the attendants are elsewhere. How are those attendants now supposed to alert the pilot? You don't have to simultaneously incapacitate 5 people, you just have to get between them and three phones.

4&5) When you have limited information, you run with what you DO have. Both WTC crashes were by northeastern seaboard departures destined for the west coast. There's no more than 15 or so of those in the morning push. It's a simple matter to keep an extra eye on those planes to determine if they do anything odd. I make no explanations for NORAD's behavior, I'm civilian ATC. However, watching a certain set of aircraft based on departure and arrival points is different than "suspecting" UAL93.

6&7) Civilians got on board a plane used in a military exercise by MISTAKE??? How ridiculous is that?

The real issue, however, is the fact that ATC believed it was a real flight. The military would NEVER inject a training flight into the civilian system without warning the FAA first. There's simply too much at risk...too many things that can go wrong...and there's ABSOLUTELY NO REASON TO DO IT.

8) I'm saying that I'm not a crash expert. If UAL93 was last seen on radar less than 800 feet above the ground descending rapidly and there are plane and body parts on the ground and UAL93 was not seen flying away either by eyewitnesses or radar and Neither UAL93 nor the passengers turned up anyplace else, the evidence seems to suggest that UAL93 crashed there.

[petgoat]

56. " If UAL93 was last seen on radar"

If the transponder was turned off, how do you know it was UAL93?
Didn't flight 93 go far out of its way, apparently for no reason but to
find some kind of radar shadow near Cleveland?

[Kevin Fenton]

57. Transponder

The transponder apparently came back on from 10:00 to 10:03.

[petgoat]

58. "transponder apparently came back on"

Which may be taken as evidence that the passengers regained control of the cockpit, or may be taken as evidence that the gov't desired that a drone be imprinted as flight 93.

You know what? All this suppression of evidence (the WTC steel, the
Pentagon videos, the Flight 93 tapes) is starting to make me wonder if
all this is a government experiment to see what we all do with these
questions--kind of like the CIA spreading LSD around in the 1960's to
see what happened.

See what we do and who does it.

[MercutioATC]

60. Wait!

Let me adjust the chin strap on my :tinfoilhat:.

A government experiment? Please...

[MercutioATC]

59. The transponder was turned off at 9:40 - well into the hijacking.

The plane was then tracked by primary radar until the transponder came on again briefly at 10:00am. The plane was in radar contact the entire time. There is/was no "radar shadow" as you call it on UAL93's route of flight between 9:40 and 10:03 (or 10:06).

How did UAL93 "go far out of its way"? It continued on its filed route for about 8 minutes before turning toward Washington D.C.

[petgoat]

67. "How did UAL93 "go far out of its way"?"

It took off from Newark, then flew to Cleveland on its way to
Washington. They were already late--the takeoff was forty minutes
behind schedule. So why did they wait until they were in Ohio before
turning back toward Washington?

[MercutioATC]

68. If one was going to hijack a plane:

Wouldn't one want a few things to happen first?

1) Have the plane in level flight at cruising altitude with the autopilot on.

2) Have the flight attendants positioned correctly so they could be prevented from warning the flight deck.

Maybe that's why they waited. I don't know, but it sounds reasonable to me.

[Kevin Fenton]

70. Radar gap

JackRiddler suggested last week that the hijack times were related to radar gaps. This appears to be true of American 77 but not of United 175 (which had been diverted before the hijacking anyway, so it would have been a long way from its preassigned gap). Do you know any more about the supposed gaps for United 93 and American 11?

I guess that if the hijackers were hanging out all the time with drug smugglers they could find out about the gaps from them. It has been documented that Atta made a large overpayment for his and Al Shehhi's flying lessons at a flying school connected to drug running. Maybe the extra money was for information about radar gaps.

The delay on United 93 makes no sense. My original explanation was that it was a mistake (I figured the "missing" fifth hijacker must have been the smart one or that they just screwed it up under pressure), but the radar gap explanation would make more sense if it were true.

[MercutioATC]

72. Again, there was/is no "radar gap" near Cleveland.

POSSIBLY near the Ohio/Kentucky/West Virginia border, but even that's debatable.

The idea that UAL93 was part of some military hijacking exercise is what makes no sense. There's simply NO reason for the military to have done that.

[Kevin Fenton]

73. Gap

I don't know, maybe the hijackers on United 93 were aiming for a gap, but missed it. To my mind it makes a lot of sense for a hijacker to fly into a primary radar gap at cruising altitude, turn the transponder off and then descend to a lower altitude (say 7,000 feet) and come out of the gap heading in a different direction - I guess this is the best way to make ATC lose the plane. It did actually work once - for American 77.

I'd like to know more about the military exercises, but I wouldn't draw any conclusions from them yet. They did involve hijackings in the continental US in the form of false inserts at NORAD (at least), but I'm not so sure they involved live-fly exercises - AFAIK only a single NORAD officer confirmed this on condition anonymity to Mike Ruppert, which is hardly cast-iron evidence. Even if there were live-fly exercises, there is no reason to assume United 93 was part of them.

[MercutioATC]

77. You're right, that would have made sense.

I just don't see any evidence that UAL93 was ever in the vicinity of a place without primary radar coverage.

As far as AAL77, I don't know whether it was intentional or not, but primary radar coverage where it shut off its transponder IS spotty.

[John Doe II]

65. Questions

You write:
"If UAL93 was last seen on radar less than 800 feet above the ground descending rapidly and there are plane and body parts on the ground"

Do you have a link for the 800 feet? I only know of Stacey Taylor's interview where she only mentions that the transponder came back for a moment.

What plane parts are you talking about?

What body parts are you talking about?

[MercutioATC]

66. I can't find the link. I'll talk with Stacey this week.

The plane and body parts I'm talking about are the ones found at the UAL93 crash site.

[John Doe II]

80. That'd be great

Would you mind also asking Stacey Taylor (she gives 6000 feet for altitude when transponder came back)where the plane was in relation to the crash site? And if she recalls at what time the transponder disappeared again.
I'd very luhc appreciate this.


My question which body parts you were talking about has the simple background that basically no body parts were found. Coroner Wallace Miller is quoted:

"There was just nothing visible," he says. "It was the strangest feeling." It would be nearly an hour before Miller came upon his first trace of a body part.
http://www.washingtonpost.com/ac2/wp-dyn?pagename=article&node=&contentId=A56110-2002May8¬Found=true

My question concerning plane parts is simply based on the fact that eyewitnesses agreed that there was nothing that reminded them of an airplane. And besides the famous engine part that was never photographed what other plane parts are you talking about?

[MercutioATC]

82. I'll do that.

As far as body parts, I have a second-hand account from an NTSB investigator. He talked about body parts all over...in the trees...

I doubt I'll ever ever get a cited source for this, but I'll see what I can do.

[John Doe II]

89. That would be really great

because it would help a lot to better understand the last minutes of UA 93.
The human remains hanging in the trees is first mentioned by Longman in his book. Yet, not a single eyewitness recalled having seen any human remains. Anywhere. As I quoted the coroner needed one hour looking around. But of course, it would be very helpful again if you could get your hand on the account.

[spooked911]

91. Yeah, also it is not clear why body parts ended up in the trees

but not next to the crash site.

If the plane exploded, sending human remains all over (up to two miles away), how did the black boxes end up in the hole that most of the plane (supposedly) went into?

[MercutioATC]

104. I think we're on opposite schedules right now, but I will make an effort

to talk to her as soon as I can.

I actually talked to an investigator who had been to the site (yes, I know that's completely unsubstantiated). I think his phrase was "meat hanging from the trees" (he didn't mean it in a callous manner, the remains were just that unrecognizable).

Again, I will talk to Stacey as soon as I see her.

[spooked911]

93. Continuing...

1) the point is that civilains were used in a terror drill. It seems possible they could have been used in a live-fly drill.

I've read about Todd Beamer, maybe he was a unwitting civilan, maybe he was a participant in a drill, maybe he was an undercover agent that no one knew about. What's the point?

All I am saying is that it is conceivable there was special live-fly drill that day using civilians, putting together the fact that there was a live-fly drill that day and there were previous anti-terror drills using civilians.

2) putting all those hijackers by the phones is a good idea except no one ever said they hijackers did such a thing on flight 93 (one account was that they stood up, screamed and ran into the cockpit). Practically, it would be harder to coordinate the hijacking like that and an individual hijacker armed with a knife is going to be fairly vulnerable to passenger attack.

6&7) You have to wonder how many people besides the hijackers were on the original flight 93 as so many of the flight 93 passengers came from another cancelled flight (that we know of-- there may be more). Anyway, mistakes obviously could happen. Many mistakes did happen on 9/11.

[Kevin Fenton]

43. Cockpit key

If the door to the cockpit was locked, why couldn't the hijackers open it with a key?

[spooked911]

45. Never said they couldn't. They'd have to find the key of course, and

while they did that it seems like one of the five flight attendants on board could alert the cockpit to what is going on.

[Kevin Fenton]

47. Osama

Maybe Osama lent them one of his.

[spooked911]

49. I assume you find the idea that the hijackers used a key unlikely then?

[Kevin Fenton]

50. More Osama

Why wouldn't Osama have lent them one of his keys - he had lots? They could have made copies and then returned it to him.

[spooked911]

51. what on earth are you talking about?

[Kevin Fenton]

52. Multiple choice question

(a) All cockpit doors on Boeing aircraft have different locks and a different set of keys.
(b) Boeing has only one cockpit door lock, which it uses on all aircraft. Therefore, any Boeing cockpit door key can open the cockpit door on any Boeing aircraft.
Which is correct?

[spooked911]

61. I don't know. I would suspect (a) but it could be (b)

(b) would be awfully stupid security-wise.

Do you know?

[Kevin Fenton]

62. Universal Boeing key

Yes, it's (b).

There's a reference to it here, for example: ttp://www.boston.com/news/packages/underattack/news/planes_reconstruction.htm
"They probably used the universal "Boeing key" to unlock the cockpit door and kill the pilots before they could even touch their radios."

Al Qaeda controlled Ariana and Ariana had Boeings and therefore universal Boeing keys:
"During the Taliban regime Ariana operated two Boeing 727-100 and one Boeing 727-200 for International routes,"
http://www.flyariana.com/history.htm
So I guess Osama had a couple dozen cockpit keys. I doubt it's difficult to copy them.

Also, during the recon flights the hijackers might have been able to figure out the special knocks flight attendants have.

[spooked911]

75. Interesting. But I thought the story was that the hijackers could just

knock in the cockpit door because it was so flimsy. This is why there was so much talk of "hardening" cockpit doors after 9/11.


Perhaps this universal Boeing key story was nixed because of legal issues? It seems incredibly stupid for Boeing to have universal key. Either the story is bogus, or Boeing is highly liable and this has been covered up.

[Kevin Fenton]

76. Nobody really knows

how the hijackers got into the cockpit. They either (1) waited until it was open anyway, (2) opened it with a key they got from Osama, (3) opened it with a key they got illegitimately in the US, (4) knew where the keys were on the planes - with the flight attendants on American Airlines (maybe that's why they stabbed one) and in the locker by the cockpit on United Airlines - they could have found this out during recon, or (5) they worked out the special knocks (which seems to have been company specific) during the recon and the pilots opened it thinking they were cabin crew.

I'm sure the universal Boeing key thing was in the Commission Report, but unfortunately I can't remember where - maybe one of the endnotes to Chapter 1.

I don't think Boeing can be liable because the planes were operated by United and American, so it's their problem. The hardening of cockpit doors is crap. The airlines didn't expect suicide hijackers, so the pilots would have opened the door anyway if a hijacker threatened a passenger or attendant. Ralph Nader proposed hardening cockpit doors ages ago and some of his supporters (including, I think, Michael Moore) tried to spin this to his benefit. The airline industry killed the move because it would have increased prices by a couple of cents per flight.

I don't think hardening cockpit doors and making them unlockable from the outside is the solution. I think the best strategy would be to put all terrorists on the no-fly list, pull out of Iraq and catch Osama. At least that'd be a decent start.

[spooked911]

78. Well, if you want to stop suicide hijackers, making stronger cockpit doors

and more secure locks wouldn't hurt.

But, obviously, that is only going to do so much. The fact is, I don't think any passengers would allow suicide hijackers to take over control of the plane-- they would know to fight back-- at least if the hijackers only had simple weapons.

Stopping terrorism in the first place is a whole other issue. And terrorists have controllers of who are often controlled by state intelligence agencies.

So, in my opinion, the 9/11 hijackers didn't succeed through cunning, practice and hard work-- they had help, at several steps along the way.

In fact, I still wonder at the incredible coincidence of live-fly hijacking drills being run on the morning of 9/11, and I have to wonder if the 9/11 hijackings were somehow part of this drill.

[Kevin Fenton]

79. Live-fly hijackings

What is the evidence of this? I've heard a NORAD officer told Ruppert this and that there were supposed to be two American 11s at Boston. Plus the Phantom American 11 invested/discovered by the Commission. Is there anything else?

As for the terrorists having help, that's a pretty complicated issue.
(1) There's no doubt that they had help with finance - much of it coming from Saudi, to which the supposedly pro-American royal family and establishment turns a blind eye. There's also the amusing case of the Bush who actually financed the hijackers out of his own pocket when they were in the States.
(2) There's also no doubt that there was a lot of logistical help from Pakistan and its ISI and that the US actually turned a blind eye to this and encouraged the Taliban initially; the Albright State Department even hampered humanitarian aid to Massood.
(3) There's the money the CIA poured in to radical Islamist organisations when they were fighting the Soviets, even if Osama didn't actually get any of this money to fight in Afghanistan. In addition, there's evidence suggesting western agencies collaborated with Islamist extermists after the Afghan war on other projects, such as Bosnia.
(4) There's the fact that the visas are crap and somebody was paid off.
(5) There's the question of how the hijackers evaded capture in the US when the CIA was turning over so many Al Qaeda cells around the world. Especially given that Tenet was looking for explosives being run into the US; after all, they were assocaited with smugglers (mostly of drugs, but you can put explosives on a plane that usually carries drugs).

The first four don't indicate specific advance knowledge by US officials in high places, just that they were making poor ends/means decisions behind closed doors and keeping people in the dark. The fifth one is tricky, but I don't think the evidence currently available clearly indicates that the government knew what the hijackers were going to do, even though that would be one explanation. In general, I'd be happy to accept the "incompetence defence" as to why a country's intelligence services didn't frustrate a terrorist plot, but it just doesn't seem like the right answer in this specific set of circumstances. Nevertheless, my thinking is that the hijackers somehow got the better of the US intelligence community, not that they were allowed to do what they did.

[spooked911]

85. was it or was it not in the interests of the Bush administration to have a

pretext to invade the middle east?

9/11 also allowed the cover-up of financial fraud with the destruction of the WTC buildings, a huge distraction from other political issues, a moment for national unity, a reason for military-industrial build-up, a reason for military action (and a standing military always wants some war to fight) and a mechanism for the right-wing to ram-through their program.

What your analysis leaves out is the strong motivation the Bushies, Anglo-American oligarchs and general US national interests had in a major attack like 9/11.

I think it is ludicrous to think Al Qaeda pulled off 9/11 themselves. In fact, since we know the WTC complex was taken out by demolition and Al Qaeda can't have done that, it automatically shows that they had help.

Cui bono. Cui bono. Cui bono.

[Kevin Fenton]

86. For whose benefit (I don't speak Latin)

Did it not actually also benefit organisations other than the Bush administation? For example Al Qaeda and Islamist radicalism in general? It certainly raised their media profile. How many times had you heard the name Osama bin Laden before 9/11? I don't know myself, but I think I had heard the name before (in connection with the development of Islamist radicalism in general and the bases in Afghanistan), but it wasn't one that tripped off my tongue.

Paul O'Niell, a member of the cabinet, NSC and war cabinet, has said clearly that the US was planning to manipulate events to justify a war in Iraq by means other than 9/11 (an incident where a US fighter was shot down over the no-fly zone in Iraq). If Rummy knew he was going to do 9/11, why was he planning to arrange another incident just a few months before?

Given that the Neocons clearly wanted to invade Iraq, not Afghanistan (Wolfowitz actually argued against invading Afghanistan at the key meeting of the war council), why was Al Qaeda framed? If the evidence is fake, why not frame Iraqi intelligence?

As for help, the key question I'm asking is in what form and from when? I think the significant help started after the attacks began and I've pointed to facts that indicate this.

I think I have at least shown that there is another explanation for the facts under discussion on the site. If the WTC was demolished by explosives, how come the wrong tower fell first?

[spooked911]

87. Responses

Did it not actually also benefit organisations other than the Bush administation? For example Al Qaeda and Islamist radicalism in general? It certainly raised their media profile. How many times had you heard the name Osama bin Laden before 9/11? I don't know myself, but I think I had heard the name before (in connection with the development of Islamist radicalism in general and the bases in Afghanistan), but it wasn't one that tripped off my tongue.

Certainly it makes sense that they had some sort of working relationship and that the US was using Osama and he was using them.

Paul O'Niell, a member of the cabinet, NSC and war cabinet, has said clearly that the US was planning to manipulate events to justify a war in Iraq by means other than 9/11 (an incident where a US fighter was shot down over the no-fly zone in Iraq). If Rummy knew he was going to do 9/11, why was he planning to arrange another incident just a few months before?

First, who said Rummy "did" 9/11? Second, clearly there was pressure within the administration to create a new Pearl Harbor that would justify invading the middle east. So maybe someone took Rummy's idea a little too far. Your point here hardly rules out that the US aided in the 9/11 attacks.

Given that the Neocons clearly wanted to invade Iraq, not Afghanistan (Wolfowitz actually argued against invading Afghanistan at the key meeting of the war council), why was Al Qaeda framed? If the evidence is fake, why not frame Iraqi intelligence?

This is complicated, but basically Al Qaeda had agents in the US they could use for the attacks, 9/11 was probably planned for a while, the CIA and other entities wanted to go into Afghanistan, it would have been much harder to frame Iraq, 9/11 was big enough to jusitfy a broad range of retaliations. I think the anthrax attacks were meant to implicate Iraq. Some of the 9/11 events were faked, but it is hard to fake the Al Qaeda patsies that were in place for a long time.

As for help, the key question I'm asking is in what form and from when?

I think the "help" came from the very beginning with getting the hijacker patsies into the US and setting them up. The help also consisted of wiring up the WTC towers for demolition, making sure the air force was distracted/ineffective, probably flying the actual planes, etc. I think the "help" was very extensive, and that the Al Qaeda agents were really there for show and had little to do with the actual attacks.

I think the significant help started after the attacks began and I've pointed to facts that indicate this.

Could you please be a little more specific here?

I think I have at least shown that there is another explanation for the facts under discussion on the site.

There are always other possible explanations, but which facts under discussion?

If the WTC was demolished by explosives, how come the wrong tower fell first?

What do you mean the wrong tower fell first?

[petgoat]

97. "the wrong tower fell first"

The south tower was hit later and had smaller fires that had almost burned out at the time of the collapse.

[spooked911]

30. well put.

[OmmmSweetOmmm]

44. Early reports of flight 93 landing in Cleveland.

First, this article said that this plane was out of Boston, which as we know, Flight 93 wasn't. The second, it mentions UA's concern about the outcome of Flight 175, which we know went into the South Tower.. so did UA have two flights out of Boston that at some point were unaccounted for? If so, what was the flight that they are confusing with 93? Does anyone know?


This report had been scrubbed from the WCPO site, but had been available by cache.

http://www.911inplanesite.com/bomb_threat.html

Plane Lands In Cleveland; Bomb Feared Aboard

Reported by: 9News Staff
Web produced by: Liz Foreman
9/11/01 11:43:57 AM

A Boeing 767 out of Boston made an emergency landing Tuesday at Cleveland Hopkins International Airport due to concerns that it may have a bomb aboard, said Mayor Michael R. White.

White said the plane had been moved to a secure area of the airport, and was evacuated.

United identified the plane as Flight 93. The airline did say how many people were aboard the flight.

United said it was also "deeply concerned" about another flight, Flight 175, a Boeing 767, which was bound from Boston to Los Angeles.

On behalf of the airline CEO James Goodwin said: "The thoughts of everyone at United are with the passengers and crew of these flights. Our prayers are also with everyone on the ground who may have been involved.

"United is working with all the relevant authorities, including the FBI, to obtain further information on these flights," he said.

[spooked911]

46. Interesting, except flight 93 was a 757 and the flight they describe was a

767. Also Flight 93 was out of Newark.

Was this really flight 175, a 767 out of Boston?

I always found it odd how United had trouble deciding the fate of flight 175.

[MercutioATC]

54. That was DAL1989, not UAL93.

Once again, the media screwed up details. DAL1989 DID land at Cleveland.

[philb]

74. But as Woody has documented, plane in question wasn't D1989.

The two planes landed in entirely different areas at different times,
had different numbers of passengers, and were checked out in different manners.

We've been through this before. Why are people still acting as if this hasn't already been fully debated here before.

[MercutioATC]

83. Do you have any idea how many planes were rerouted that day?

DAL1989 was landed at Cleveland at about the same time as UAL93's hijacking. It was thought there was a bomb threat and because it was a coast-to-coast flight originating in the northeast, it was given special attention.

A LOT more planes were also landed at airports (including Cleveland) where they weren't originally destined.

That complete data doesn't exist (especially to the media) for every flight that was rerouted isn't anything of consequence.

This issue is complete B.S.

[Woody Box]

102. You miss the point

There were TWO planes with an alleged bomb threat, not one. One was Delta 1989. The other one was ...?

Here's the link - for the gentle reader to judge if it'S BS or not:

http://inn.globalfreepress.com/modules/news/article.php?storyid=323

[MercutioATC]

103. I've seen that presentation before...

It's a conglomeration of innacuracies (absolutely not yours).

Yes, all of those quotes are probably accurate. The fact is that things like Mike White saying controllers heard screaming from DAL1989 was innacurate (well, he DID say it, but he was confusing reports of UAL93 with DAL1989).

There were DOZENS of unscheduled landings at Hopkins on 9/11. Even before the FAA closed the airspace, some companies were grounding their planes enroute. When the airspace was closed, planes were landed at the nearest airport that could accomodate them. Recordkeeping at those times takes a distant back seat to getting the planes where they need to be. Times can be easily off by 10-15 minutes.

Taken from a certain perspective, things COULD look like something suspicious was going on, but that's (IMO) due mostly to a lack of understanding of what really was going on. We move thousands of planes at a time in an orderly manner WHEN most of them are doing what they're supposed to. Grounding 4500 planes in 2 1/2 hours, many of them at airports they weren't originally destined for is a HUGE task...the last thing we were worried about was keeping to-the-minute records of when each plane did what.

In short, I understand the argument, but I feel it's based on two basic flawed premises: 1) that completely accurate records were kept and 2) early reports of what individual plane did what were all factual.

[John Doe II]

63. Only one version is official

This is the second one.
But the strange thing is the first one is the account of the family members listening to the CVR, Newsweek that had obtained a transcriped of the CVR and an official quoted by the New York Times.
As theses accounts differ extremely it is hard to believe that the recording the Commission listened to is actually the same that the family members listened to.
This point I believe needs official explanation.