Robert K. Preston (February 1974). On February 17, 1974, Robert Preston, a private in the Army, stole an Army helicopter from Fort Meade, Maryland, and flew it to the White House Complex. He passed over the Executive Mansion and then returned to the south grounds, where he hovered for about 6 minutes and touched down briefly approximately 150 feet from the West Wing. Members of the EPS did not know who was piloting the aircraft and were not aware that it had been stolen from Fort Meade. They made no attempt to shoot down the helicopter.
Preston left the area of the White House and flew the helicopter back toward Fort Meade. He was chased by two Maryland State Police helicopters, one of which he forced down through his erratic maneuvers. Preston then returned to the White House Complex. As he lowered himself to about 30 feet above the south grounds, EPS officers barraged the helicopter with shotgun and submachine gunfire. Preston immediately set the riddled aircraft down. He was injured slightly.
Samuel Byck (February 1974).
Samuel Byck, a failed businessman with a history of mental illness, was investigated by the Secret Service in 1972 on the basis of reports that he had threatened President Nixon. In 1974, he hatched a plan called "Operation Pandora's Box" to hijack a commercial airliner and crash it into the Executive Mansion. On February 22, less than a week after the Preston incident, Byck went to Baltimore/Washington International Airport carrying a pistol and a gasoline bomb. He forced his way onto a Delta flight destined for Atlanta by shooting a guard at the security checkpoint. He entered the cockpit and ordered the crew to take off. After the crew informed him that they could not depart without removing the wheel blocks, Byck shot the pilot twice and the co-pilot three times (the co-pilot died). Police outside the airplane shot into the cockpit and hit Byck twice. Byck fell to the floor, put the revolver to his head, and killed himself. -
PUBLIC REPORT OF THE WHITE HOUSE SECURITY REVIEW
Washington, D.C., Nov. 3, 2000 The fire and smoke from the downed passenger aircraft billows from the Pentagon courtyard. Defense Protective Services Police seal the crash sight. Army medics, nurses and doctors scramble to organize aid. An Arlington Fire Department chief dispatches his equipment to the affected areas.
Don Abbott, of Command Emergency Response Training, walks over to the Pentagon and extinguishes the flames. The Pentagon was a model and the "plane crash" was a simulated one.
"...It is a truth that a terrorist can attack any time, any place, using any technique and it's
physically impossible to defend at every time and every place against every conceivable technique.
Here we're talking about plastic knives and using an American Airlines flight filed with our citizens,
and the missile to damage this building and similar (inaudible) that damaged the World Trade Center.
The only way to deal with this problem is by taking the battle to the terrorists, wherever they are,
and dealing with them. ...."
According to two civilian defense contractor employees working at commercial corporate facilities at Fort Collins-Loveland Municipal Airport (left), in the months before the September 11 attacks U.S. Air Force defense contractors brought in A-3 Sky Warrior aircraft under cover of darkness to be completely refitted and modified at the small civilian airport in Colorado.
The revelations are important evidence for a reportedly ongoing secret 9/11 probe because widely available Federal Emergency Management Administration (FEMA) photographs taken during the attacks clearly show that the few aircraft parts found at the Pentagon belonged to a small jet very similar to a modified A-3 Sky Warrior--not the American Airlines Boeing 757.
It is not known whether all members of Congress are aware of the under-the-radar-screen grand jury proceedings, who has already testified, and whether the probe is purposefully being kept from public knowledge, according to government intelligence sources.
The two witnesses say that separate military contractor teams--working independently at different times--refitted Douglas A-3 Sky Warriors (left) with updated missiles, Raytheon's Global Hawk unmanned aerial vehicle (UAV) remote control systems, fire control systems, engines, transponders, and radio-radar-navigation systems--a total makeover, seemingly for an operation more important than use as a simple missile testing platform for defense contractor Hughes-Raytheon.
The employees asked not to be identified for personal safety reasons and fear of job retaliation; but both told 2008 independent presidential candidate Karl Schwarz (left) "the Air Force brought in separate teams to do top-secret military work unrelated to commercial aviation at our airport, and we were told by our bosses not to discuss what we had seen with anyone."
The witnesses were quite fearful about several recent "suicides, car wrecks--mysterious deaths--directly related to the aviation experts" working on the systems that were installed on the A-3's at Fort Collins-Loveland--having breached the government-blocked information flow at great personal risk, according to Schwarz--but providing more evidence for a New York 9/11 investigation.
Schwarz, a former Republican from Arkansas now living in Georgia and running as an independent to clean up government corruption and crime told TomFlocco.com that he met with the employees for about an hour in February to discuss the issue.
The witnesses told Schwarz that each jet was placed in a hanger just big enough for a work crew and one A-3 Sky Warrior; and "we were under strict orders not to discuss what the military teams were doing or what we saw."
This photo [above] has generated more controversy than almost any other. It has been put forth that this is the military smuggling evidence out of the Pentagon. The following review should put that to rest. The first clue is that the photo was taken by the military, reviewed and then "RELEASED" to the public.
I believe what has been portrayed to be a mystery object being removed from the Pentagon is actually a service tent being carried into the Pentagon grounds after being assembled on the highway.
Russell Pickering
Other government officials who looked more like FBI agents than rescue workers were also photographed moving evidence around immediately after the crash; but none have been subpoenaed to publicly testify as to whether they were bringing evidence to or removing it from a mass murder crime scene.
As if they had prior knowledge, within minutes after the Pentagon crash--FBI agents quickly confiscated a) video tape from a gas station security camera aimed directly at the exact point of impact while recording the size of the plane and/or missile, b) security camera video film from a nearby Sheraton hotel and c) film from a Virginia Transportation Department freeway overpass camera.
What if the whole scenario of a plane/misslie hitting the Pentagon is a military/media perpetuated hoax?
a cover, for some other type of event
In 1993, the Clinton administration decided to upgrade the Pentagon, for many reasons, not least of which was the growing concern over terrorist attacks. In addition to new plumbing, the upgrade included putting in heavy duty fireproofing in the walls, reinforcing the walls, and improving security in general.
The final reconstruction strategy called for the work to be divided into five "wedges," each wedge encompassing a corner and a rectangle of the Building.
The first wedge to be tackled was the one facing west, covering 1.2 million square feet. By September 2000, work on this wedge was about 70% complete. The wedge was supposed to have been completely done by July 2001, but, as with rebuilding any old "house," more problems kept being uncovered. For example, all sorts of interesting goodies were found in the walls: a secure vault no one knew about, old whiskey bottles (hmm, wonder who went to such lengths to hide their booze!), and other items. Then of course, there were supports that needed more reinforcement, asbestos to be removed, etc.
Among the improvements made to Wedge One: Blast resistant windows and brick backup walls behind the building's limestone outer facade. These inner walls contain a metal fabric mesh similar to the mesh used in vehicle air bags. This mesh was designed specifically to CONTAIN DEBRIS FRAGMENTS in the event of a blast. Cheryl Seal
Construction work exactly where the plane hits?
".... That side of the Pentagon was virtually empty and had been for some time because the building had been under reconstruction quite visibly on that side for 5-6 years and part of that was to reinforce the building from external attack. In fact some photos show the difference in damage on either side of that reinforcement work and it is striking. That plane went 270 degrees out of its way at high speed, a very sophisticated maneuver with no possible military advantage, to hit the empty side of the Pentagon. There, as in New York, I would argue that they minimized the number of deaths by timing and method of attack. ...."
- Flight of Fantasy: Flight 77 Didn't Hit the Pentagon
- John Judge -
was a bomb set off to destroy crucial evidence?
Was this crucial evidence the command and control center for the whole operation?
This diagram from the NIST report
shows the trajectory of the impact
through the walls of the Pentagon
Take a look at this photo: in the top right there is evidence of damage to the roof of the Pentagon which is nowhere near the asserted line of impact...
just how reinforced was this building?
Can building automation systems overcome interoperability problems to assert control over our offices, hotels, and airports?
If only you could work in a building where you could keep your office as you like it, icicle-cold, while your neighbor turns hers into a sauna. If only your office lights and computer could flicker on every morning when you swiped your security card in your building's lobby, so that you would be ready to work when you sat down with your first cup of coffee. And while we're on this flight of fancy, wouldn't it be reassuring to know that your building would shield you from harm in the event of an earthquake, or even a chemical or biological attack?
Buildings could do all these things and more, if only they had brains.
As it happens, a few buildings already do, and they're getting smarter. The brainiac of buildings, the U.S. Pentagon, opened for business on 12 September 2001, the day after terrorists crashed a plane into it. Thanks to a network of digital sensors and controllers that let operators close dampers and turn off fans, the fire from the crash was confined to one wedge of the building.
[For more details, see "Saving the Pentagon"] which states that in 2001 - the Pentagon had a 'laptop accessable' automation system in place:
On the morning of 11 September 2001, Steve Carter was in his office at the Pentagon. Carter, an electrical engineer who is the real estate and facilities liaison to the Pentagon's US $1.85 billion renovation program, has worked in the building for 17 years.
Carter's office is in the newly renovated area called Wedge 1, in the Building Operations Command Center (BOCC), which opened 8 June 2001. If the Pentagon's building systems-heating, ventilation, and air conditioning (HVAC), fire safety, lighting, and security-are its nerves, then the BOCC is its brain. It's the place where all these systems come together through a network of thousands of sensors, actuators, and controllers.
Rather than dispatching technicians to fix a problem, operators in the BOCC can fine-tune many building systems remotely-for instance, raising the set point on a thermostat or turning off a fan in an air-conditioning duct to prevent smoke from a fire from spreading.
Carter and his colleagues were watching the World Trade Center's twin towers in New York City burning on television when a plane struck Wedge 1. "All the control boards in the BOCC went to the fire alarm system, and the alarms came up bright red," Carter says. "We immediately started shutting down some of the air handlers; our first thought was, nothing could be this massive." Shortly afterward, the BOCC lost power-and the operators their ability to make adjustments to the building systems from there.
Carter grabbed a two-way radio and a laptop and headed to neighboring Wedge 5 to a mechanical room housing HVAC equipment. From his laptop, he tapped into the Pentagon's automation network and sent out commands that closed dampers and turned off fans around the building to contain the smoke and starve the raging fire of oxygen.
When he learned that a break in a water main had dropped water pressure to a point too low for firefighting, Carter dispatched engineers to the bowels of the building to remedy the problem. All in all, eight people stayed in the Pentagon that day, controlling the fire damage remotely via workstations from various mechanical rooms in the building, with Carter directing the effort by radio.
The next day, the Pentagon reopened. In all, 189 people had been killed, 125 on the ground, and the building suffered $501 million in damages. But the Secretary of Defense's office, the National Military Command Center, and other mission-critical areas like data storage centers and wiring and switch rooms were spared.
None of this was possible back in 1997, when Carter convinced his superiors to build the BOCC to streamline day-to-day operations. He also convinced them that, while they were installing brand-new HVAC equipment in Wedge 1-the first area to be renovated-they should also retrofit the 55-year-old HVAC equipment throughout the rest of the Pentagon with new digital controls.
Not only would the new equipment, and the old equipment with new controls, be automated and operated through the BOCC, but it could be programmed to work more efficiently, which would help slash energy use by 35 percent by 2010, saving up to $5 million per year.
Johnson Controls Inc. (Milwaukee, Wis.) designed and installed the new HVAC system, linking it to the fire safety system. Engineers also added leak detectors to the natural gas system and to the air chillers, and linked them to the BOCC. Johnson's equipment uses Metasys, the company's own control language.
"In 1997, we couldn't find a vendor with a fully interoperable system for either BACnet or LonWorks," says Carter, adding that these protocols could be used in the Pentagon as the renovation progresses. The BOCC itself is linked via fiber-optic cable to network control modules in each mechanical room, which allows for remote (laptop) control.
New capabilities will be added to the Pentagon's building automation system over time. Next up is an improved lighting control system, which may incorporate Internet protocol-addressable fixtures and occupancy and day-lighting sensors.
remote access to building controls? Any questions???
The Pentagon's costly, proprietary automation system isn't likely to find its way into ordinary office buildings any time soon. But that doesn't mean that we'll be stuck with "dumb" buildings for the foreseeable future. The good news is that two open communications standards for building automation are finally taking hold in the marketplace. One, known as BACnet (for Building Automation and Control Networks), has been endorsed by the American Society of Heating, Refrigerating, and Air-Conditioning Engineers, Atlanta, Ga. The other, called LonWorks, was developed by Echelon Corp., San Jose, Calif. ("Lon" stands for local operating network.) These two standards have the best chance yet to turn the tide of the long, disappointing history of smart building control and automation.
In the meantime, technologies like those deployed in the Pentagon, along with some even more advanced, are being tested in government and university research labs. Among other things, they'll let future buildings minimize damage when an earthquake hits by automatically changing the way weight is carried by internal structures. Or upon detecting a harmful chemical substance in the building's air ducts, the system would instantly seal them off and contact authorities [see "The Road Ahead"].
For now, though, efforts to make buildings smarter are focusing on cutting costs by streamlining building operations like air conditioning and lighting. Building automation is critical to these efforts, mainly because it could reduce the annual operating costs of buildings by a whopping 3.6 to 7 cents per square meter, according to a 1999 study conducted by the U.S. National Institute of Standards and Technology - [see Getting a Handle on Costs]
Now think about this situation:
There is evidence that contingency planning has been in place for a plane hitting the Pentagon. But all these reports are just 'there': available on the internet...
Hmmm...what if the plan was to place the concept of a plane hitting the
Pentagon through Corporate media, then the 9-11 skeptics 'movement' can be steered into believing it wasn't just a plane because of the lack of debris, but a smaller jet, a missile or a drone or, anything.
What thing is never considered in the Pentagon scenario?
The simple fact that there was construction work going on in exactly the same location as the 'strike'...
question: If it was a bomb - what happened to the hijacked plane & all the passengers on board?...and round and round we go!
The Exit hole
The exit hole has many discrepancies with the official story. Some have even tried to say later that it was man made to assist in rescue. The earliest photo shows that it was not. There was no equipment, hose lines, or personnel and the opening was obstructed by debris. Some have also claimed that the term "punch out" and/or the arrows were to direct a backhoe where to break an opening. As you can see the painting was progressive over 3 days and the meanings clearly defined. The final blow to this theory is that the arrow on the left goes into the broken brick which would be impossible if it was there first.
The next VERY curious thing is that ALL official reports neglect to explain the hole. The Building Performance Report, the Shoring Report, the Arlington County After-Action fire report, and the 9/11 Commission Report. I have offered engineers a page on this site to explain it and they flat out refuse and say something like, "a plane hit the building".
To the members of the Scientific Panel Investigating Nine-Eleven:
I would like to give you my input as to the events on September 11, and why it is a physically provable fact that some of the damage done to the Pentagon could not have occurred from a Boeing 757 impact, and therefore the 9/11 Commission report is not complete and arguably a cover-up. I will not speculate about what may have been covered up, I will only speak from my professional opinion. But I will explain why I do not believe the Pentagon was hit by a Boeing 757.
I am a Mechanical Engineer who spent many years in Aerospace, including structural design, and in the design, and use of shaped charge explosives (like those that would be used in missile warheads).
The structural design of a large aircraft like a 757 is based around managing the structural loads of a pressurized vessel, the cabin, to near-atmospheric conditions while at the lower pressure region of cruising altitudes, and to handle the structural and aerodynamic loads of the wings, control surfaces, and the fuel load. It is made as light as possible, and is certainly not made to handle impact loads of any kind.
If a 757 were to strike a reinforced concrete wall, the energy from the speed and weight of the aircraft will be transferred, in part into the wall, and to the structural failure of the aircraft. It is not too far of an analogy as if you had an empty aluminum can, traveling at high speed hitting a reinforced concrete wall. The aluminum can would crumple (the proper engineering term is buckle) and, depending on the structural integrity of the wall, crack, crumble or fail completely. The wall failure would not be a neat little hole, as the energy of the impact would be spread throughout the wall by the reinforcing steel.
This is difficult to model accurately, as any high speed, high energy, impact of a complex structure like an aircraft, into a discontinuous wall with windows etc. is difficult. What is known is that nearly all of the energy from this event would be dissipated in the initial impact, and subsequent buckling of the aircraft.
We are lead to believe that not only did the 757 penetrate the outer wall, but continued on to penetrate separate internal walls totaling 9 feet of reinforced concrete. The final breach of concrete was a nearly perfectly cut circular hole (see below) in a reinforced concrete wall, with no subsequent damage to the rest of the wall. (If we are to believe that somehow this aluminum aircraft did in fact reach this sixth final wall.)
EXIT HOLE IN PENTAGON RING-C
American Airlines Flight 77, a Boeing 757, is alleged to have punched through 6 blast-resistant concrete walls a total of nine feet of reinforced concrete before exiting through this hole.
It is physically impossible for the wall to have failed in a neat clean cut circle, period. When I first saw this hole, a chill went down my spine because I knew it was not possible to have a reinforced concrete wall fail in this manner, it should have caved in, in some fashion.
How do you create a nice clean hole in a reinforced concrete wall? with an explosive shaped charge. An explosive shaped charge, or cutting charge is used in various military warhead devices. You design the geometry of the explosive charge so that you create a focused line of energy. You essentially focus nearly all of the explosive energy in what is referred to as a jet. You use this jet to cut and penetrate armor on a tank, or the walls of a bunker. The signature is clear and unmistakable. In a missile, the explosive charge is circular to allow the payload behind the initial shaped charge to enter whatever has been penetrated.
I do not know what happened on 9/11, I do not know how politics works in this country, I can not explain why the mainstream media does not report on the problems with the 9/11 Commission. But I am an engineer, and I know what happens in high speed impacts, and how shaped charges are used to "cut" through materials.
I have not addressed several other major gaps in the Pentagon/757 incident. The fact that this aircraft somehow ripped several light towers clean out of the ground without any damage to the aircraft (which I also feel is impossible), the fact that the two main engines were never recovered from the wreckage, and the fact that our government has direct video coverage of the flight path, and impact, from at least a gas station and hotel, which they have refused to release.
You can call me a "tin hat", crazy, conspiracy theory, etc, but I can say from my expertise that the damage at the Pentagon was not caused by a Boeing 757.
Sincerely,
Michael Meyer
More tales of horror in 9/11 trial
By GREG GORDON McClatchy Newspapers Apr 12, 2006, 00:30
Army Lt. Col. John Thurman said that when he was blown back from his desk, he first thought terrorists had planted bombs in the Pentagon _ not smashed it with a Boeing 757 jetliner. Thurman, now 39, and two colleagues lay in the darkness on Sept. 11, 2001, their heads on the carpet to avoid choking smoke and the searing heat from a "curtain of fire" nearby, he told a riveted federal jury Tuesday. He credited his harrowing escape to a wave of anger that swept over him just as he was succumbing to the smoke _ anger that terrorists would kill him and that his parents would lose their eldest child on the same day their first grandchild was to be born. His colleagues weren't so lucky.
Thurman, other Pentagon employees and a Navy officer's widow shared their stories and their grief, some for the first time publicly, as federal prosecutors neared completion of their case for the execution of confessed al Qaeda conspirator Zacarias Moussaoui.
On Wednesday, prosecutors plan to air for the first time publicly the cockpit voice recording of passengers of United Airlines Flight 93 who rushed to take back that plane before it crashed in a Pennsylvania field.
Thirteen more Sept. 11 victims and family members strode to the witness stand Tuesday as jurors endured a third day of graphic evidence of the horrors and haunting impact of the nation's worst terror attack.
While the material was supposedly toned down in response to defense lawyers' complaints, it included videos of American Airlines Flight 77 hitting the building at 530 miles per hour and photos of charred bodies - one on a stretcher and another sitting upright in an office _ of some of the 64 airline passengers and crew and 125 Pentagon workers who died that day.
[My note: relatives & jurors were shown VIDEOS OF THE PLANE HITTING THE PENTAGON - what of the five (5) frames released to the public immediately after the attack allegedly showing a 767 striking the Pentagon but which show nothing more than a fireball exploding?
[story continues]...
Moussaoui, who was found eligible for the death penalty last week, seemed unfazed. He smiled as an FBI agent summarized the damage to the military's headquarters, and during a recess shouted: "Burn all Pentagon next time!"
Prosecutors also played air traffic control tapes in which a pilot of United Flight 93 shouted "Mayday! Mayday! Get out of here!" moments before his apparent stabbing death as hijackers seized the cockpit.
Moussaoui's court-appointed lawyers, who will begin their last push to spare his life on Thursday, asked U.S. District Judge Leonie Brinkema to subpoena testimony from attempted shoe-bomber Richard Reid, who is in a federal prison in Colorado. Brinkema issued a sealed writ for a witness not identified publicly. Defense lawyers are seeking to show that Moussaoui lied in testifying that, before his Aug. 16, 2001 arrest in the Twin Cities, he was training to pilot a fifth plane on Sept. 11 with Reid in his crew.
As witnesses told of the Pentagon strike, Alice Fisher, chief of the Justice Department's Criminal Division, sat teary-eyed in the front row.
Pentagon police officer Jose Rojas Jr., 43, described rushing to his boss' office upon learning that morning that a plane had hit the World Trade Center. Then a jet hit the other tower. "All of us just said together . . . 'We're next,' " Rojas said. Moments later, he said, the building shook and he looked out at "a mushroom cloud of fire." Rojas said he ran around the perimeter of the building and heard "moaning, groaning, screaming" through blown-out windows. He shouted to people to come "to the sound of my voice," he said, and a man approached. But when Rojas grabbed his hands, his skin was so burned it came off. "I had to dig my fingernails into his flesh," Rojas said. "He screamed. I carried him as far as I could." Rojas said he rescued nine people, eight of whom survived.
Thurman, a major who was working on Pentagon promotion policies on Sept. 11, said the initial blast may have temporarily deafened him, because he could not hear two colleagues _ Lt. Col. Karen Wagner and William Ruth _ as they crawled to him in the dark. Ruth soon stopped talking, and Wagner did so later, he said. As he nearly drifted off to sleep, he said, he suddenly "got very angry that this was the method that I was going to die . . . that terrorism was going to take my life." He said he mustered his strength, pushed some file cabinets and opened a door into a smoke-free hallway. A senior Pentagon official tried to go back inside to search for Wagner and Ruth, but the heat was too intense, he said. Thurman said he knew 26 of the dead and now feels "guilt about getting the lucky break."
Navy Lt. Nancy McKeown, a 42-year-old meteorologist, similarly groped her way to a hallway where she was carried to safety. Sobbing, she said she later escorted the body of one of her two dead aides, Petty Officer Tom Earhart, home to Kentucky for his funeral, ensuring that "his buttons were buttoned and his medals were straight."
Shari Tolbert, 37, of California, was also in tears as she described life without her husband, Navy Lt. Cmdr. Vincent Tolbert, of Lemoore, Calif. "I get to raise three kids alone. I get to never have a 50th anniversary. I get to go to church alone. I get to go to bed alone. That's what I get." - capitolhillblue.com
Pentagon releases even more spurious evidence after Trial of Moussaoui: a psyop on the 'conspiracy theorists'
Pentagon Releases Video of Plane Hitting Building on 9/11
Conspiracy theorists may or may not be disappointed Tuesday when they see footage released from the Pentagon showing two angles of American Flight 77 hitting the western wall of the building on Sept. 11, 2001.
The Department of Justice released the videotape after a Freedom of Information Act request by Judicial Watch, a government watchdog. The request was made to quiet claims by some that pictures from that day never showed an airplane, only the "alleged" impact of the plane. Those claims spawned theories that the U.S. government faked the crash at the Pentagon.
"We fought hard to obtain this video because we felt that it was very important to complete the public record with respect to the terrorist attacks of September 11," said Judicial Watch President Tom Fitton. "Finally, we hope that this video will put to rest the conspiracy theories involving American Airlines Flight 77. As always, our prayers remain with all those who suffered as a result of those murderous attacks."
One of the tapes is from a security camera that was used to produce five still shots on that day. That video, which takes pictures in half-second increments, shows the nose cone of the plane clearly entering the picture, then a blur and then a fireball.
The other camera shot that hasn't been seen before shows more of the plane before the fireball.
Several other cameras throughout the years supposedly caught part of the attack on tape, but none of these leads have panned out.
Tom Bortner, a Pentagon attack survivor, said he thinks the speed of the plane is what prevented the attack from being captured on more surveillance cameras on the premises
"I think it's conclusive that plane hit the Pentagon and I don't think the tape really adds or detracts from that," Bortner said.
American Airlines Flight 77 left Dulles Airport outside Washington, D.C., around 8:51 a.m. EDT on Tuesday, Sept. 11, 2001. On its way to Los Angeles, the plane was hijacked and crashed into the Pentagon at 9:37 a.m. EDT; 184 people died in that attack.
Three other planes were hijacked that day. Two hit the North and South towers of the World Trade Center and one — United Flight 93 — believed to be headed to Washington, D.C., was stopped by passengers who fought the hijackers. The plane crashed into a field in Shanksville, Pa. Nearly 3,000 people died that day as a result of the attacks.
"I think it's appropriate that the American people be reminded from time to time about the horror of that day, be reminded about the fact we need to remain vigilant, we need to take the rest of the steps the commission recommended," James Thompson, the former Illinois governor who sat on the Sept. 11 commission, told FOX News.
A dramatic film, "United 93," is currently in wide release depicting that day. The film borrows heavily from taped phone conversations that passengers and crew had with their families and air traffic controllers before the fight for control of the plane.
Judicial Watch first filed the FOIA request in February 2004. It received a letter from the Pentagon in January 2005 that it possessed a videotape responsive to the request but wouldn't release it since it was "part of an ongoing investigation involving Zacarias Moussaoui." Judicial Watch filed a lawsuit in February 2006, arguing that the Defense Department had "no legal basis" to withhold the tape.
Moussaoui, the only person formally charged with his role in the attacks, was recently sentenced to six consecutive life terms in prison.
Defense Department Releases September 11 Pentagon Video to Judicial Watch
Department of Defense Responds to Judicial Watch Freedom of Information Act Request and Related Lawsuit
(Washington, DC) Judicial Watch, the public interest group that investigates and prosecutes government corruption, announced today that Department of Defense released a videotape to Judicial Watch at 1:00 p.m. this afternoon that shows American Airlines Flight 77 striking the Pentagon on September 11, 2001. The Department of Defense released the videotape in response to a Judicial Watch Freedom of Information Act request and related lawsuit.
"This is in response to your December 14, 2004 Freedom of Information Act Request, FOIA appeal of March 27, 2005, and complaint filed in the United States District Court for the District of Columbia," wrote William Kammer, Chief of the Department of Defense, Office of Freedom of Information. "Now that the trial of Zacarias Moussaoui is over, we are able to complete your request and provide the video."
Judicial Watch originally filed a Freedom of Information Act request on December 15, 2004, seeking all records pertaining to September 11, 2001 camera recordings of the Pentagon attack from the Sheraton National Hotel, the Nexcomm/Citgo gas station, Pentagon security cameras and the Virginia Department of Transportation. The Department of Defense admitted in a January 26, 2005 letter that it possessed a videotape responsive to Judicial Watch's request. However, the Pentagon refused to release the videotape because it was, "part of an ongoing investigation involving Zacarias Moussaoui." Judicial Watch filed a lawsuit on February 22, 2006 arguing that there was "no legal basis" for the Defense Department's refusal to release the tape.
"We fought hard to obtain this video because we felt that it was very important to complete the public record with respect to the terrorist attacks of September 11," said Judicial Watch President Tom Fitton.
"Finally, we hope that this video will put to rest the conspiracy theories involving American Airlines Flight 77. As always, our prayers remain with all those who suffered as a result of those murderous attacks."
A copy of the video is available on Judicial Watch's Internet site, www.judicialwatch.org
Main Stream media have released stills which
are too small or in black & white... why?
Where is the video footage from the Citgo gas station, the Sheraton Hotel, and the Virginia Dempartment of Transportation cameras?
examine this headline! & then the assertions it makes
The final moments of American Flight 77 are no longer a mystery, dispelling the dark conspiracy theory that it was a U.S. missile that struck the Pentagon at 9:38 a.m. on September 11.
Military officials yesterday yielded to a Freedom of Information Act lawsuit and released two videotapes that show the aircraft striking the building -- killing 125 persons inside, 59 passengers and crew, and the five terrorists who had hijacked the Boeing 757 jet at Washington Dulles International Airport.
The two minutes of footage taken from security cameras adjacent to the Pentagon is halting, brief and grainy. But the pale fuselage of the aircraft and the fireball that followed are clearly visible in several of the frames.
"We fought hard to obtain this video because we felt that it was very important to complete the public record with respect to the terrorist attacks of September 11," said Tom Fitton, president of Judicial Watch, the government watchdog group, which filed the FOIA request with the Pentagon on Dec. 14, 2004, seeking video from security cameras at the Pentagon, a nearby Citgo gas station, a Sheraton hotel and Virginia Department of Transportation traffic camera.
Footage from the gas station and hotel yielded nothing, and there was no film in the traffic camera. But the images from the Pentagon are enough.
"We hope that this video will put to rest the conspiracy theories involving American Airlines Flight 77," Mr. Fitton said.
Multiple, unsavory speculations have surfaced about the September 11 attacks in the past five years. One of the most enduring was "9/11: The Big Lie," a 2002 book by French author Thierry Meyssan who claimed that the "American military-industrial lobby" orchestrated the Pentagon destruction, using a satellite-guided missile.
"This attack could only be committed by United States military personnel against other U.S. military personnel," Mr. Meyssan wrote, building his case around the fact that no video footage of the impact had been released to the public and that eyewitness accounts were suspect.
Footage did exist, confirmed in a letter to Judicial Watch by the Pentagon in early 2005. But Defense Department officials told the group that the videos were exempt from release because they were evidence in the investigation of Zacarias Moussaoui, the only person tried in this country in association with the September 11 attacks. He was sentenced this month to a life sentence at a federal prison in Colorado.
"Now that the trial of Zacarias Moussaoui is over, we are able to complete your request and provide the video," wrote William Kammer of department's freedom of information office, in a letter to Judicial Watch last month.
But conspiracy theories about September 11 persist.
Missouri-based 9/11 Truth, an advocacy group founded to investigate the possibilities, will host a convention in Chicago in June that includes a workshop called "Flights of Fancy: 11, 15, 77 and 93 (an Inside Job)" -- which "highlights the many inconsistencies between The 9/11 Commission Report versus the NORAD [North American Aerospace Defense Command] timeline, the testimony of expert witnesses and the presumed facts," according to organizers.
take another look at these stills
still have doubts? ...yeah! me too!
The history re-rewrite!
now view the gif animated picture: which was assembled from the original footage of 5 frames released after 911
which seems to show a plane...
now why would the Pentagon release
a video with less detail in than this?
they are rewriting history...a history which was rewritten the first time!
see: web fairys analysis of Media released original footage
85 tapes of CCTV were seized by the FBI where are they?
what is this white shape?
This is angle 2 from the Pentagon CCTV: notice the 'nose cone' - is that too small for a 757?
This is the full video version of the 5 frames that were released in 2002
watch out for the white pobject skimming in... is that too small for a 757?... notice the flash which happens well after the first explosion
what is this white shape?
How Flight 77 Hitting The Pentagon Would Really Look?
Is this what Flight 77 hitting the Pentagon would really look like from nearby security cameras instead of the nondescript blur footage we have been subject to?
This is obviously a crude collection of doctored frames but if the government had released something similar yesterday would you have believed it? Many would.
Wary therefore we are of the potential for the government to eventually release clear footage of the impact from the 84 other cameras that were dotted around the Pentagon and would have easily documented the event to debunk 9/11 skeptics.
The government claims all 84 cameras either didn't capture the impact or that tape in the cameras was mysteriously empty and yet returned as normal to film the cleanup operations.
Judicial Watch has said it will continue to pursue footage from the other 84 cameras. If the government is telling the truth in saying that the tapes show nothing of interest then what are they trying to hide by not releasing them?
what is the white blob? a global hawk drone?
how big is this thing?
The Northrop Grumman Global Hawk is a robotized American military jet that has a wingspan of a Boeing 737. The excerpt below were taken from an article entitled: "Robot plane flies Pacific unmanned," which appeared in the April 24, 2001 edition of Britain's International Television News:
"'The aircraft essentially flies itself, right from takeoff, right
through to landing, and even taxiing off the runway,' according to
the Global Hawk's Australian manager Rod Smith. - Global Hawk and 911 -Carol Valentine
Take a look at this report filed 5 days after the attacks!
Remote pilots could steer planes to safety
Special report: terrorism in the US
Robin McKie and Antony Barnett Sunday September 16, 2001 The Observer
It remains the single most effective act of war ever committed. Armed only with knives, a collective death wish and a limited ability to fly a plane, a few individuals caused devastation equivalent to the detonation of a tactical nuclear device.
The terrorists' trick was simple, of course: they turned the West's technology on itself, using our own sophistication to carry out an act of slaughter unmatched since World War II. The question that must now be asked is therefore simple: how can we ensure that our own technology is never used this way again?
Obvious answers involve improving security and intelligence gathering. But what about the technology itself? If a plane is hijacked, can we stop it from being flown into a skyscraper again? And if that level of protection fails, can we ensure such a building withstands the impact?
In the first case, aviation experts are surprisingly confident. They say devices that would allow air traffic controllers to override the controls of a hijacked plane are close to development. Boeing has made one such system and used it to steer military aircraft remotely.
An overrider fitted in a passenger jet, when activated, would send it on a pre-programmed route to a military airbase or another safe landing area. Either it would be turned on in the cockpit by the pilot as soon as he or she realised an attempted hijack was under way or it could be triggered by air traffic control. It could even be switched on automatically if a plane steered too far from its flight path. Once the overrider was activated it could not itself be overridden.
'The technology is pretty much there and I don't believe there would be too many problems in fitting it,' said Frank Taylor, a safety expert at Cranfield School of Aeronautics. Certainly it is now possible to use autopilots to land planes safely, though they still have design flaws that need tackling.
Terrorists, realising they could no longer control their plane, could still cause it to crash. 'It wouldn't save the passengers on board but it would prevent the plane being smashed into a building,' said Taylor.
But such developments raise other questions. Terrorists might no longer target aircraft, but go straight to an air traffic control centre, or hack into an override control system and guide hundreds of planes at the same time, thus raising the slaughter stakes to a new level of magnitude.
'Obviously we would have to be very careful how we fitted such an overrider,' said one air traffic expert. 'Nevertheless, if we install them carefully, with the proper safeguards, they could be the answer.'
Other problems could be encountered - such as those involved in clearing airspace around a remotely controlled plane so that other aircraft were not endangered. Nevertheless, aircraft designers remain confident. A spokeswoman for plane manufacturer Airbus said the overrider idea had merits and would be a key area for the company to study in future.
Similarly, researchers are examining pilot recognition devices - to identify an individual by voice or iris of the eye - which would only allow authorised pilots to fly a particular plane. Again this would not provide foolproof protection for passengers, but it would - if the worst came to the worst - give a pilot the chance to crash instead of allowing a plane to be steered into an office block.
Other systems being investigated include the use of anaesthetic gas, which could be released in the cabin from a switch in the cockpit or in an air traffic control centre. Airlines including El Al are developing guns which will disable hijackers but not pierce the skin of an aircraft.
In short, several counter-terrorist systems that could prevent a repeat of last week's carnage are being worked on. But what if they still prove ineffective?
Is it possible to build mammoth office blocks - like those now being constructed in London, Paris, the rest of Europe and of course America - and make them terrorist-proof?
Here engineers are less sanguine. 'Both World Trade Centre towers withstood the impacts of the planes that struck them,' said Gordon Masterton of the Institute of Civil Engineers. 'The force at the base of each building was about twice that of the worst possible hurricane that could have hit them. These were sound structures.'
The real trouble came afterwards. Each plane spilled 30 tonnes of burning aviation fuel down each tower. Within an hour this fuel, burning at almost 1,000 C, softened each tower's outer steel shell so that it could no longer support the building's upper floors. One gave way, and sent the rest crashing downwards.
'There is simply no protection against that,' said Masterton. 'You could cover buildings in dense, impenetrable steel, of course. But they would be windowless edifices, nuclear bunkers in the sky. No one would live or work in them.
'In short, you can't protect buildings against flying bombs. You have to stop them long before they get near your skyscraper.'- Guardian
If an over-rider can be used to fly planes to safety
then one could be utilised for a fake hijacking
Flashback:
The Lone Gunmen Episode 1: Pilot
"World Trade Center -- they're going to Crash the Plane into the World Trade Center"
In March of 2001 Fox TV aired Episode One of a new show spun-off from The X-Files. In the first episode of this new show, The Lone Gunmen, an inside faction of the government posing as terrorists hijacks a 727 by remote control. They do this because the cold war is over they need an excuse for war to increase arm sales. They target the World Trade Center, but their plot is foiled at the last minute.
- infowars
how do they do it in this TV show? A top secret computer chip is a key 'backdoor acces' to the Airliner, which is remotely hijacked and steered towards the Twin Towers...but hey! it's only a movie!
automated buildings - control of access - loyalty cards - RFID - ID cards
- cashless & card less society
- mobile phones as credit card
- satellite based surveillance state
- DNA database
- mall based behavioural control
and the ultimate uber-capitalist control freaks dream
The security industry needs terror for its trillions of dollar paycheck
and the reward of a global prison state
which criminalises non-consumerism
as non-conformity
as dissent
as terrorism
