The 9/11 Conspiracy: Part II
"Hunt the Boeing!" is a provocative display of smoke and mirrors, but there's little else to recommend the site. Its authors present a fraction of the available evidence in a highly selective, distorted, titillating way, proving absolutely nothing — except, perhaps, that there's always room for another conspiracy theory.
While making few explicit allegations, the authors argue, in effect, that based on photographic and physical evidence, the damage sustained by the Pentagon on September 11, 2001 could not have been caused by a crashing jetliner, contrary to the official and overwhelmingly accepted explanation.
The argument is weak. For starters, it conveniently ignores some of the most obvious, compelling evidence. For example:
Eyewitness testimony (1) of bystanders who saw and/or heard American Airlines Flight 77 approach and collide with the Pentagon
The recovery of both black boxes (2) belonging to the Boeing 757 from the Pentagon wreckage
The recovery and identification (3) of the remains of all but one of the people known to be aboard Flight 77
Of course, evading bedrock evidence is standard procedure for conspiracy theorists. If pressed, they would doubtless claim that all of the above must have been planted or manufactured, but they can't even prove such a claim plausible, let alone true beyond a reasonable doubt.
An improbably successful cover-up
Make no mistake, the burden of proof is on the conspiracy theorists, whose case presupposes that all of the hundreds of people who participated in the clean-up, recovery and investigation following the 9/11 Pentagon attack — including scientists, engineers, coroners and professional air disaster investigators — are either dead wrong or participating in a massive, improbably successful government cover-up.
Eschewing plain facts and common sense, the conspiracy theorists ask us to focus instead on misleadingly posed conundrums such as the following:
Question: "Can you explain how a Boeing 757-200, weighing nearly 100 tons and traveling at a minimum speed of 250 miles an hour only damaged the outside of the Pentagon?"
Answer: It didn't only damage the outside. According to the Washington Post, structural damage extended at least 150 feet inside, well into the third ("C") ring of the building.
Question: "Can you explain how a Boeing 14.9 yards high, 51.7 yards long, with a wingspan of 41.6 yards and a cockpit 3.8 yards high, could crash into just the ground floor of this building?"
Answer: It didn't just crash into the ground floor. According to official statements and news reports, it took out both the first and second floors on impact.
Question: "Can you find debris of a Boeing 757-200 in this photograph?"
Answer: No, but we can in this one (below) credited to a U.S. Navy photographer [enlarged version]. Bear in mind, eyewitnesses say the Boeing 757 virtually disintegrated when it struck the reinforced wall of the building. Given that, and the tremendous forward momentum of the aircraft on impact, the assumption that a significant amount of debris ought to be visible in front of the Pentagon wouldn't seem justified.
According to a CNN article published the day after the attack, Michael Tamillow, a battalion chief of the Fairfax County, Virginia Fire Department, reported that parts of the Boeing 757 fuselage had indeed been recovered from the wreckage by FBI investigators (the same team that later found the black boxes). "No large pieces apparently survived," the article said.
One visitor who surveyed the crash site a few days later, Representative Judy Biggert of Illinois, told reporters she saw remnants of the jetliner: "There was a seat from a plane," she said, "there was part of the tail and then there was a part of green metal, I could not tell what it was, a part of the outside of the plane." (Chicago Sun-Times, 16 Sep, 2001)
Here's one obvious question the conspiracy theorists don't ask and certainly could not answer in any compelling way: If American Airlines Flight 77 didn't crash into the Pentagon, what did happen to the jetliner and all its passengers? Did it vanish into thin air?
(For a more detailed consideration of these and other "Hunt the Boeing" puzzles, please read the excellent commentary by engineer Paul Boutin and astrophysicist Patrick Di Justo.)
A conspiracy theory in the grand tradition
You're no doubt wondering who's behind these flights of fancy and what, exactly, they're driving at. Well, according to the French newspaper Le Monde, the culprit is Thierry Meyssan, well-known leftist radical and president of the Voltaire Network, a controversial site devoted to "the fight for freedom and secularity." His son, Raphaël Meyssan, is credited as the Webmaster of both the Voltaire Network and Utopian Asylum, which, uncoincidentally, hosts "Hunt the Boeing!"
What are they trying to prove? That the attacks of September 11 were perpetrated not by foreign terrorists, but by the U.S. government upon its own citizens — a conspiracy theory in the grand tradition.
To quote the late Carl Sagan, "Extraordinary claims require extraordinary proof."
So far we haven't seen any proof at all.
( 1 )
Some Eyewitness Accounts
Flight 77 Crash at the Pentagon, Sept. 11, 2001
"On a Metro train to National Airport, Allen Cleveland looked out the window to see a jet heading down toward the Pentagon. 'I thought, "There's no landing strip on that side of the subway tracks,"' he said. Before he could process that thought, he saw 'a huge mushroom cloud. The lady next to me was in absolute hysterics.'" - "Our Plane Is Being Hijacked." Washington Post, 12 Sep 2001
"I was supposed to have been going to the Pentagon Tuesday morning at about 11:00am (EDT) and was getting ready, and thank goodness I wasn't going to be going until later. It was so shocking, I was listening to the news on what had happened in New York, and just happened to look out the window because I heard a low flying plane and then I saw it hit the Pentagon. It happened so fast... it was in the air one moment and in the building the next..." - "U.S. Under Attack: Your Eyewitness Accounts." BBC News, 14 Sep 2001
"As I approached the Pentagon, which was still not quite in view, listening on the radio to the first reports about the World Trade Center disaster in New York, a jetliner, apparently at full throttle and not more than a couple of hundred yards above the ground, screamed overhead. ... Seconds before the Pentagon came into view a huge black cloud of smoke rose above the road ahead. I came around the bend and there was the Pentagon billowing smoke, flames and debris, blackened on one side and with a gaping hole where the airplane had hit it." - "Eyewitness at the Pentagon." Human Events, 17 Sep 2001
"Frank Probst, an information management specialist for the Pentagon Renovation Program, left his office trailer near the Pentagon's south parking lot at 9:36 a.m. Sept. 11. Walking north beside Route 27, he suddenly saw a commercial airliner crest the hilltop Navy Annex. American Airlines Flight 77 reached him so fast and flew so low that Probst dropped to the ground, fearing he'd lose his head to its right engine." - "A Defiant Recovery." The Retired Officer Magazine, January 2002
"USAToday.com Editor Joel Sucherman saw it all: an American Airlines jetliner fly left to right across his field of vision as he commuted to work Tuesday morning. It was highly unusual. The large plane was 20 feet off the ground and a mere 50 to 75 yards from his windshield. Two seconds later and before he could see if the landing gear was down or any of the horror-struck faces inside, the plane slammed into the west wall of the Pentagon 100 yards away. 'My first thought was he's not going to make it across the river to [Reagan] National Airport. But whoever was flying the plane made no attempt to change direction,' Sucherman said. 'It was coming in at a high rate of speed, but not at a steep angle—almost like a heat-seeking missile was locked onto its target and staying dead on course.'" - "Journalist Witnesses Pentagon Crash." eWeek.com, 13 Sep 2001
"'I mean it was like a cruise missile with wings, went right there and slammed into the Pentagon,' eyewitness Mike Walter said of the plane that hit the military complex. 'Huge explosion, great ball of fire, smoke started billowing out, and then it was just chaos on the highway as people either tried to move around the traffic and go down either forward or backwards,' he said." - "Witnesses and Leaders on Terrorist Attacks." CNN, 11 Sep 2001
"'(The plane) was flying fast and low and the Pentagon was the obvious target,' said Fred Gaskins, who was driving to his job as a national editor at USA Today near the Pentagon when the plane passed about 150 feet overhead. 'It was flying very smoothly and calmly, without any hint that anything was wrong.'" - "Bush Vows Retaliation for 'Evil Acts'." USA Today, 11 Sep 2001
"Aydan Kizildrgli, an English language student who is a native of Turkey, saw the jetliner bank slightly then strike a western wall of the huge five-sided building that is the headquarters of the nation's military. 'There was a big boom,' he said. 'Everybody was in shock. I turned around to the car behind me and yelled "Did you see that?" Nobody could believe it.'" - "Bush Vows Retaliation for 'Evil Acts'." USA Today, 11 Sep 2001
"'I saw the tail of a large airliner. ... It plowed right into the Pentagon," said an Associated Press Radio reporter who witnessed the crash. 'There is billowing black smoke.'" - "America's Morning of Terror." ChannelOne.com, 2001
"Omar Campo, a Salvadorean, was cutting the grass on the other side of the road when the plane flew over his head. 'It was a passenger plane. I think an American Airways plane,' Mr Campo said. 'I was cutting the grass and it came in screaming over my head. I felt the impact. The whole ground shook and the whole area was full of fire. I could never imagine I would see anything like that here.'" - "Pentagon Eyewitness Accounts." The Guardian, 12 Sep 2001
"Afework Hagos, a computer programmer, was on his way to work but stuck in a traffic jam near the Pentagon when the plane flew over. 'There was a huge screaming noise and I got out of the car as the plane came over. Everybody was running away in different directions. It was tilting its wings up and down like it was trying to balance. It hit some lampposts on the way in.'" - "Pentagon Eyewitness Accounts." The Guardian, 12 Sep 2001
"A pilot who saw the impact, Tim Timmerman, said it had been an American Airways 757. "'It added power on its way in,' he said. 'The nose hit, and the wings came forward and it went up in a fireball.'" - "Pentagon Eyewitness Accounts." The Guardian, 12 Sep 2001
"Steve Eiden, a truck driver, had picked up his cargo that Tuesday morning in Williamsburg, Va., and was en route to New York City and witnessed the aftermath. ... He took the Highway 95 loop in the area of the Pentagon and thought it odd to see a plane in restricted airspace, thinking to himself it was odd that it was flying so low. 'You could almost see the people in the windows,' he said as he watched the plane disappear behind a line of trees, followed by a tall plume of black smoke. Then he saw the Pentagon on fire, and an announcement came over the radio that the Pentagon had been hit." - "Sept. 11, the Day America Changed." The Baxter Bulletin, 2001
"Traffic is normally slow right around the Pentagon as the road winds and we line up to cross the 14th Street bridge heading into the District of Columbia. I don’t know what made me look up, but I did and I saw a very low-flying American Airlines plane that seemed to be accelerating. My first thought was just 'No, no, no, no,' because it was obvious the plane was not heading to nearby Reagan National Airport. It was going to crash." - "September 11 Remembered." University Week, 4 Oct 2001
( 2 )
Black Boxes Found at Pentagon
MATT KELLEYAssociated Press Writer
WASHINGTON (AP) -- Searchers on Friday found the flight data and cockpit voice recorders from the hijacked plane that flew into the Pentagon and exploded, Department of Defense officials said.
The two ``black boxes,'' crucial to uncovering details about the doomed flight's last moments, were recovered at about 4 a.m., said Army Lt. Col. George Rhynedance, a Pentagon spokesman.
Rhynedance said the recorders were in the possession of the FBI, and that officials from the National Transportation Safety Board were providing technical assistance in reading any data they contain.
Dick Bridges, deputy manager for Arlington County, Va., said the voice recorder was damaged on the outside and the flight data recorder was charred. But he said the FBI still was confident the data can be recovered from both.
Bridges said the recorders were found ``right where the plane came into the building.''
Earlier, a fire that flared in the debris had set back search efforts following the crash of American Airlines Flight 77. Government authorities said 190 people -- a combination of military and civilian employees on the ground and the passengers in the plane -- were believed to have died.
Rescuers worked to stabilize unsteady parts of the still-shaking building, said Jerry Crawford, leader of a Memphis, Tenn., search team.
The instability prevented Pentagon intelligence workers from trying to gather classified papers and other information strewn throughout the rubble.
``We have the FBI with us and nobody is touching anything they're not supposed to touch,'' Crawford said. He said that when rescue workers ``see something marked secret or sensitive, we leave it alone.''
A flare-up late Thursday sent black smoke billowing hundreds of feet into the air over Washington, but firefighters put out the blaze within 20 minutes.
Human remains pulled from the Pentagon were being taken to Dover Air Force Base in Delaware to be identified. The first two helicopters carrying remains arrived at the base Thursday afternoon.
During a Pentagon service Friday morning, men and women wiped tears from their cheeks as they sang ``God Bless America.''
A women in her camouflaged field uniform sang hymns and another played the piano. A civilian worker wore a tie that looked like the American flag, while another simply pinned a flag to her blouse.
Army Maj. Gen. Robert Van Antwerp Jr. sat with a Bible on his lap until it was his turn to speak.
``My heart pains for you and I pray that God will comfort you,'' Van Antwerp, assistant chief of staff for installation management, told an auditorium packed with some 250 people in the first of three services planned Friday.
Van Antwerp said his secretary and administrative assistant were killed in the attack.
``I am experiencing some of the same emotions that many of you are,'' he said.
( 3 )
Forensic feat IDs nearly all Pentagon victims
by Christopher C. Kelly Armed Forces Institute of Pathology
What some experts have called "the most comprehensive forensic investigation in U.S. history" ended Nov. 16 with the identification of 184 of the 189 who died in the terrorist attack on the Pentagon.
A multidisciplinary team of more than 50 forensic specialists, scientists, and support personnel from the Armed Forces Institute of Pathology, with headquarters at Walter Reed, played a major role in Operation Noble Eagle investigations, officials said.
Many of the casualties were badly burned and difficult to identify, an official said. Of the 189 killed, 125 worked at the Pentagon and 64 were passengers on American Airlines Flight 77. Only one of those who died made it to the hospital. The rest were killed on site, and for some, only pieces of tissue could be found.
AFIP's team of forensic pathologists, odontologists, a forensic anthropologist, DNA experts, investigators, and support personnel worked for over two weeks in the mortuary at Dover Air Force Base, Del., and for weeks at the DNA lab in Rockville, to identify the victims of the attack.
"Our staff represented every branch of the service," said AFIP Director Navy Capt. Glenn N. Wagner. "We also received tremendous support from the doctors, nurses, and technicians stationed at Dover who participated in the investigation."
The investigation mobilized AFIP assets in many ways. In the hours following the crash Sept. 11, the acting armed forces medical examiner, Air Force Col. AbuBakr Marzouk, worked with FBI and local Virginia law enforcement officials to create a plan for recovering and identifying the victims.
At the same time, personnel from the Office of the Armed Forces Medical Examiner positioned and staged equipment to begin operations at Dover. Air Force Maj. Bruce Ensign served as AFIP's team leader at the site.
"We immediately called in regional medical examiners from as far away as San Diego to participate," Ensign said. A total of 12 forensic pathologists, assisted by two AFIP staff pathologists, headed the investigation team. Also arriving at Dover during those early critical hours were two other key AFIP groups: forensic scientists from OAFME's Armed Forces DNA Identification Laboratory and oral pathologists from the Department of Oral and Maxillofacial Pathology.
AFDIL scientists ensured data systems and records were available to make DNA identifications, while the oral pathology group created a triage area to conduct positive dental identifications. Contacts were also made with family services in each branch of the military to obtain ante-mortem information and reference material. Mortuary operations were fully underway by the evening of Sept. 13. AFIP used a well-defined and tested system for conducting the identifications of the Pentagon victims. When remains arrived at the morgue, a scanning device searched for the presence of unexploded ordnance or metallic foreign bodies. A computerized tracking system assigned numbers to each victim for efficient tracking.
FBI experts collected trace evidence to search for chemicals from explosive devices and conducted fingerprint identifications. Forensic dentistry experts from the Department of Oral and Maxillofacial Pathology performed dental charting and comparison with ante-mortem dental records. Full-body radiographs followed to document skeletal fractures and assist in the identification process, followed by autopsy inspection.
At autopsy, forensic pathologists determined the cause and manner of death, aided by forensic anthropologist Dr. William C. Rodriguez in determining the race, sex, and stature of victims. A board-certified epidemiologist managed the tracking system for data collected during the autopsy process, and tissue samples were collected for DNA identification and further toxicology studies. Forensic photographers, essential to any forensic investigation, documented injuries and personal effects. Mortuary specialists then embalmed, dressed, and casketed remains prior to release to next-of-kin.
For eight days a full complement of AFIP forensic specialists worked 12-hour shifts to complete the operation.
"This is the largest mass fatality we've dealt with in recent years," Ensign said. "We have modalities today that we didn't have before. Our investigation was much more technology-intensive." Ensign noted the entire team worked well together. "Because of the combined effort of all three services and the FBI, we were very pleased with the speed of the identification process. Essential records and references were submitted to us in a timely way."
Logistical help from AFIP also played an important role. "We had tremendous logistical issues obtaining equipment, especially with additional demands in New York City and Somerset County, Pa.," he said. "Fortunately our logistical support was terrific in helping us get material in." The Dover mortuary sent specimens back to the Armed Forces DNA Identification Laboratory in Rockville.
Teams of forensic scientists, under the direction of Demris Lee, technical leader of the Nuclear DNA Section, took over the difficult chore of generating a DNA profile of the victims. Their work included not only the Pentagon crash victims, but the victims of the Somerset County crash as well. Every one of the organization's 102 DNA analysts, sample processors, logistics staff, and administrative personnel were involved -- from collecting, tracking, analyzing DNA samples, and gathering and logging DNA reference material to preparing DNA reports. For 18 days following the terrorist attacks, AFDIL employees worked on 12-hour shifts, seven days a week to meet the mission requirements.
While making few explicit allegations, the authors argue, in effect, that based on photographic and physical evidence, the damage sustained by the Pentagon on September 11, 2001 could not have been caused by a crashing jetliner, contrary to the official and overwhelmingly accepted explanation.
The argument is weak. For starters, it conveniently ignores some of the most obvious, compelling evidence. For example:
Eyewitness testimony (1) of bystanders who saw and/or heard American Airlines Flight 77 approach and collide with the Pentagon
The recovery of both black boxes (2) belonging to the Boeing 757 from the Pentagon wreckage
The recovery and identification (3) of the remains of all but one of the people known to be aboard Flight 77
Of course, evading bedrock evidence is standard procedure for conspiracy theorists. If pressed, they would doubtless claim that all of the above must have been planted or manufactured, but they can't even prove such a claim plausible, let alone true beyond a reasonable doubt.
An improbably successful cover-up
Make no mistake, the burden of proof is on the conspiracy theorists, whose case presupposes that all of the hundreds of people who participated in the clean-up, recovery and investigation following the 9/11 Pentagon attack — including scientists, engineers, coroners and professional air disaster investigators — are either dead wrong or participating in a massive, improbably successful government cover-up.
Eschewing plain facts and common sense, the conspiracy theorists ask us to focus instead on misleadingly posed conundrums such as the following:
Question: "Can you explain how a Boeing 757-200, weighing nearly 100 tons and traveling at a minimum speed of 250 miles an hour only damaged the outside of the Pentagon?"
Answer: It didn't only damage the outside. According to the Washington Post, structural damage extended at least 150 feet inside, well into the third ("C") ring of the building.
Question: "Can you explain how a Boeing 14.9 yards high, 51.7 yards long, with a wingspan of 41.6 yards and a cockpit 3.8 yards high, could crash into just the ground floor of this building?"
Answer: It didn't just crash into the ground floor. According to official statements and news reports, it took out both the first and second floors on impact.
Question: "Can you find debris of a Boeing 757-200 in this photograph?"
Answer: No, but we can in this one (below) credited to a U.S. Navy photographer [enlarged version]. Bear in mind, eyewitnesses say the Boeing 757 virtually disintegrated when it struck the reinforced wall of the building. Given that, and the tremendous forward momentum of the aircraft on impact, the assumption that a significant amount of debris ought to be visible in front of the Pentagon wouldn't seem justified.
According to a CNN article published the day after the attack, Michael Tamillow, a battalion chief of the Fairfax County, Virginia Fire Department, reported that parts of the Boeing 757 fuselage had indeed been recovered from the wreckage by FBI investigators (the same team that later found the black boxes). "No large pieces apparently survived," the article said.
One visitor who surveyed the crash site a few days later, Representative Judy Biggert of Illinois, told reporters she saw remnants of the jetliner: "There was a seat from a plane," she said, "there was part of the tail and then there was a part of green metal, I could not tell what it was, a part of the outside of the plane." (Chicago Sun-Times, 16 Sep, 2001)
Here's one obvious question the conspiracy theorists don't ask and certainly could not answer in any compelling way: If American Airlines Flight 77 didn't crash into the Pentagon, what did happen to the jetliner and all its passengers? Did it vanish into thin air?
(For a more detailed consideration of these and other "Hunt the Boeing" puzzles, please read the excellent commentary by engineer Paul Boutin and astrophysicist Patrick Di Justo.)
A conspiracy theory in the grand tradition
You're no doubt wondering who's behind these flights of fancy and what, exactly, they're driving at. Well, according to the French newspaper Le Monde, the culprit is Thierry Meyssan, well-known leftist radical and president of the Voltaire Network, a controversial site devoted to "the fight for freedom and secularity." His son, Raphaël Meyssan, is credited as the Webmaster of both the Voltaire Network and Utopian Asylum, which, uncoincidentally, hosts "Hunt the Boeing!"
What are they trying to prove? That the attacks of September 11 were perpetrated not by foreign terrorists, but by the U.S. government upon its own citizens — a conspiracy theory in the grand tradition.
To quote the late Carl Sagan, "Extraordinary claims require extraordinary proof."
So far we haven't seen any proof at all.
( 1 )
Some Eyewitness Accounts
Flight 77 Crash at the Pentagon, Sept. 11, 2001
"On a Metro train to National Airport, Allen Cleveland looked out the window to see a jet heading down toward the Pentagon. 'I thought, "There's no landing strip on that side of the subway tracks,"' he said. Before he could process that thought, he saw 'a huge mushroom cloud. The lady next to me was in absolute hysterics.'" - "Our Plane Is Being Hijacked." Washington Post, 12 Sep 2001
"I was supposed to have been going to the Pentagon Tuesday morning at about 11:00am (EDT) and was getting ready, and thank goodness I wasn't going to be going until later. It was so shocking, I was listening to the news on what had happened in New York, and just happened to look out the window because I heard a low flying plane and then I saw it hit the Pentagon. It happened so fast... it was in the air one moment and in the building the next..." - "U.S. Under Attack: Your Eyewitness Accounts." BBC News, 14 Sep 2001
"As I approached the Pentagon, which was still not quite in view, listening on the radio to the first reports about the World Trade Center disaster in New York, a jetliner, apparently at full throttle and not more than a couple of hundred yards above the ground, screamed overhead. ... Seconds before the Pentagon came into view a huge black cloud of smoke rose above the road ahead. I came around the bend and there was the Pentagon billowing smoke, flames and debris, blackened on one side and with a gaping hole where the airplane had hit it." - "Eyewitness at the Pentagon." Human Events, 17 Sep 2001
"Frank Probst, an information management specialist for the Pentagon Renovation Program, left his office trailer near the Pentagon's south parking lot at 9:36 a.m. Sept. 11. Walking north beside Route 27, he suddenly saw a commercial airliner crest the hilltop Navy Annex. American Airlines Flight 77 reached him so fast and flew so low that Probst dropped to the ground, fearing he'd lose his head to its right engine." - "A Defiant Recovery." The Retired Officer Magazine, January 2002
"USAToday.com Editor Joel Sucherman saw it all: an American Airlines jetliner fly left to right across his field of vision as he commuted to work Tuesday morning. It was highly unusual. The large plane was 20 feet off the ground and a mere 50 to 75 yards from his windshield. Two seconds later and before he could see if the landing gear was down or any of the horror-struck faces inside, the plane slammed into the west wall of the Pentagon 100 yards away. 'My first thought was he's not going to make it across the river to [Reagan] National Airport. But whoever was flying the plane made no attempt to change direction,' Sucherman said. 'It was coming in at a high rate of speed, but not at a steep angle—almost like a heat-seeking missile was locked onto its target and staying dead on course.'" - "Journalist Witnesses Pentagon Crash." eWeek.com, 13 Sep 2001
"'I mean it was like a cruise missile with wings, went right there and slammed into the Pentagon,' eyewitness Mike Walter said of the plane that hit the military complex. 'Huge explosion, great ball of fire, smoke started billowing out, and then it was just chaos on the highway as people either tried to move around the traffic and go down either forward or backwards,' he said." - "Witnesses and Leaders on Terrorist Attacks." CNN, 11 Sep 2001
"'(The plane) was flying fast and low and the Pentagon was the obvious target,' said Fred Gaskins, who was driving to his job as a national editor at USA Today near the Pentagon when the plane passed about 150 feet overhead. 'It was flying very smoothly and calmly, without any hint that anything was wrong.'" - "Bush Vows Retaliation for 'Evil Acts'." USA Today, 11 Sep 2001
"Aydan Kizildrgli, an English language student who is a native of Turkey, saw the jetliner bank slightly then strike a western wall of the huge five-sided building that is the headquarters of the nation's military. 'There was a big boom,' he said. 'Everybody was in shock. I turned around to the car behind me and yelled "Did you see that?" Nobody could believe it.'" - "Bush Vows Retaliation for 'Evil Acts'." USA Today, 11 Sep 2001
"'I saw the tail of a large airliner. ... It plowed right into the Pentagon," said an Associated Press Radio reporter who witnessed the crash. 'There is billowing black smoke.'" - "America's Morning of Terror." ChannelOne.com, 2001
"Omar Campo, a Salvadorean, was cutting the grass on the other side of the road when the plane flew over his head. 'It was a passenger plane. I think an American Airways plane,' Mr Campo said. 'I was cutting the grass and it came in screaming over my head. I felt the impact. The whole ground shook and the whole area was full of fire. I could never imagine I would see anything like that here.'" - "Pentagon Eyewitness Accounts." The Guardian, 12 Sep 2001
"Afework Hagos, a computer programmer, was on his way to work but stuck in a traffic jam near the Pentagon when the plane flew over. 'There was a huge screaming noise and I got out of the car as the plane came over. Everybody was running away in different directions. It was tilting its wings up and down like it was trying to balance. It hit some lampposts on the way in.'" - "Pentagon Eyewitness Accounts." The Guardian, 12 Sep 2001
"A pilot who saw the impact, Tim Timmerman, said it had been an American Airways 757. "'It added power on its way in,' he said. 'The nose hit, and the wings came forward and it went up in a fireball.'" - "Pentagon Eyewitness Accounts." The Guardian, 12 Sep 2001
"Steve Eiden, a truck driver, had picked up his cargo that Tuesday morning in Williamsburg, Va., and was en route to New York City and witnessed the aftermath. ... He took the Highway 95 loop in the area of the Pentagon and thought it odd to see a plane in restricted airspace, thinking to himself it was odd that it was flying so low. 'You could almost see the people in the windows,' he said as he watched the plane disappear behind a line of trees, followed by a tall plume of black smoke. Then he saw the Pentagon on fire, and an announcement came over the radio that the Pentagon had been hit." - "Sept. 11, the Day America Changed." The Baxter Bulletin, 2001
"Traffic is normally slow right around the Pentagon as the road winds and we line up to cross the 14th Street bridge heading into the District of Columbia. I don’t know what made me look up, but I did and I saw a very low-flying American Airlines plane that seemed to be accelerating. My first thought was just 'No, no, no, no,' because it was obvious the plane was not heading to nearby Reagan National Airport. It was going to crash." - "September 11 Remembered." University Week, 4 Oct 2001
( 2 )
Black Boxes Found at Pentagon
MATT KELLEYAssociated Press Writer
WASHINGTON (AP) -- Searchers on Friday found the flight data and cockpit voice recorders from the hijacked plane that flew into the Pentagon and exploded, Department of Defense officials said.
The two ``black boxes,'' crucial to uncovering details about the doomed flight's last moments, were recovered at about 4 a.m., said Army Lt. Col. George Rhynedance, a Pentagon spokesman.
Rhynedance said the recorders were in the possession of the FBI, and that officials from the National Transportation Safety Board were providing technical assistance in reading any data they contain.
Dick Bridges, deputy manager for Arlington County, Va., said the voice recorder was damaged on the outside and the flight data recorder was charred. But he said the FBI still was confident the data can be recovered from both.
Bridges said the recorders were found ``right where the plane came into the building.''
Earlier, a fire that flared in the debris had set back search efforts following the crash of American Airlines Flight 77. Government authorities said 190 people -- a combination of military and civilian employees on the ground and the passengers in the plane -- were believed to have died.
Rescuers worked to stabilize unsteady parts of the still-shaking building, said Jerry Crawford, leader of a Memphis, Tenn., search team.
The instability prevented Pentagon intelligence workers from trying to gather classified papers and other information strewn throughout the rubble.
``We have the FBI with us and nobody is touching anything they're not supposed to touch,'' Crawford said. He said that when rescue workers ``see something marked secret or sensitive, we leave it alone.''
A flare-up late Thursday sent black smoke billowing hundreds of feet into the air over Washington, but firefighters put out the blaze within 20 minutes.
Human remains pulled from the Pentagon were being taken to Dover Air Force Base in Delaware to be identified. The first two helicopters carrying remains arrived at the base Thursday afternoon.
During a Pentagon service Friday morning, men and women wiped tears from their cheeks as they sang ``God Bless America.''
A women in her camouflaged field uniform sang hymns and another played the piano. A civilian worker wore a tie that looked like the American flag, while another simply pinned a flag to her blouse.
Army Maj. Gen. Robert Van Antwerp Jr. sat with a Bible on his lap until it was his turn to speak.
``My heart pains for you and I pray that God will comfort you,'' Van Antwerp, assistant chief of staff for installation management, told an auditorium packed with some 250 people in the first of three services planned Friday.
Van Antwerp said his secretary and administrative assistant were killed in the attack.
``I am experiencing some of the same emotions that many of you are,'' he said.
( 3 )
Forensic feat IDs nearly all Pentagon victims
by Christopher C. Kelly Armed Forces Institute of Pathology
What some experts have called "the most comprehensive forensic investigation in U.S. history" ended Nov. 16 with the identification of 184 of the 189 who died in the terrorist attack on the Pentagon.
A multidisciplinary team of more than 50 forensic specialists, scientists, and support personnel from the Armed Forces Institute of Pathology, with headquarters at Walter Reed, played a major role in Operation Noble Eagle investigations, officials said.
Many of the casualties were badly burned and difficult to identify, an official said. Of the 189 killed, 125 worked at the Pentagon and 64 were passengers on American Airlines Flight 77. Only one of those who died made it to the hospital. The rest were killed on site, and for some, only pieces of tissue could be found.
AFIP's team of forensic pathologists, odontologists, a forensic anthropologist, DNA experts, investigators, and support personnel worked for over two weeks in the mortuary at Dover Air Force Base, Del., and for weeks at the DNA lab in Rockville, to identify the victims of the attack.
"Our staff represented every branch of the service," said AFIP Director Navy Capt. Glenn N. Wagner. "We also received tremendous support from the doctors, nurses, and technicians stationed at Dover who participated in the investigation."
The investigation mobilized AFIP assets in many ways. In the hours following the crash Sept. 11, the acting armed forces medical examiner, Air Force Col. AbuBakr Marzouk, worked with FBI and local Virginia law enforcement officials to create a plan for recovering and identifying the victims.
At the same time, personnel from the Office of the Armed Forces Medical Examiner positioned and staged equipment to begin operations at Dover. Air Force Maj. Bruce Ensign served as AFIP's team leader at the site.
"We immediately called in regional medical examiners from as far away as San Diego to participate," Ensign said. A total of 12 forensic pathologists, assisted by two AFIP staff pathologists, headed the investigation team. Also arriving at Dover during those early critical hours were two other key AFIP groups: forensic scientists from OAFME's Armed Forces DNA Identification Laboratory and oral pathologists from the Department of Oral and Maxillofacial Pathology.
AFDIL scientists ensured data systems and records were available to make DNA identifications, while the oral pathology group created a triage area to conduct positive dental identifications. Contacts were also made with family services in each branch of the military to obtain ante-mortem information and reference material. Mortuary operations were fully underway by the evening of Sept. 13. AFIP used a well-defined and tested system for conducting the identifications of the Pentagon victims. When remains arrived at the morgue, a scanning device searched for the presence of unexploded ordnance or metallic foreign bodies. A computerized tracking system assigned numbers to each victim for efficient tracking.
FBI experts collected trace evidence to search for chemicals from explosive devices and conducted fingerprint identifications. Forensic dentistry experts from the Department of Oral and Maxillofacial Pathology performed dental charting and comparison with ante-mortem dental records. Full-body radiographs followed to document skeletal fractures and assist in the identification process, followed by autopsy inspection.
At autopsy, forensic pathologists determined the cause and manner of death, aided by forensic anthropologist Dr. William C. Rodriguez in determining the race, sex, and stature of victims. A board-certified epidemiologist managed the tracking system for data collected during the autopsy process, and tissue samples were collected for DNA identification and further toxicology studies. Forensic photographers, essential to any forensic investigation, documented injuries and personal effects. Mortuary specialists then embalmed, dressed, and casketed remains prior to release to next-of-kin.
For eight days a full complement of AFIP forensic specialists worked 12-hour shifts to complete the operation.
"This is the largest mass fatality we've dealt with in recent years," Ensign said. "We have modalities today that we didn't have before. Our investigation was much more technology-intensive." Ensign noted the entire team worked well together. "Because of the combined effort of all three services and the FBI, we were very pleased with the speed of the identification process. Essential records and references were submitted to us in a timely way."
Logistical help from AFIP also played an important role. "We had tremendous logistical issues obtaining equipment, especially with additional demands in New York City and Somerset County, Pa.," he said. "Fortunately our logistical support was terrific in helping us get material in." The Dover mortuary sent specimens back to the Armed Forces DNA Identification Laboratory in Rockville.
Teams of forensic scientists, under the direction of Demris Lee, technical leader of the Nuclear DNA Section, took over the difficult chore of generating a DNA profile of the victims. Their work included not only the Pentagon crash victims, but the victims of the Somerset County crash as well. Every one of the organization's 102 DNA analysts, sample processors, logistics staff, and administrative personnel were involved -- from collecting, tracking, analyzing DNA samples, and gathering and logging DNA reference material to preparing DNA reports. For 18 days following the terrorist attacks, AFDIL employees worked on 12-hour shifts, seven days a week to meet the mission requirements.
posted by Logan VanLandingham | 12:14 PM
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