GZ went back to these days of that board and tried to sum up the most important doubts of these days- and before.
Technical expressions are explained in extra sections marked with **.

GZ also found a very impressive route animation of all these four planes with the help of the professional program "Flight Explorer".
It shows the disturbing routes, which obviously went out of control once (almost collision) and
shows, that there was a communication between the four hijacker pilots (or a remote control system?)

Please check this out first:
http://www.avweb.com/other/911flightexplorer.html
(Flight Explorer Tracks Tragic Flights)

Source: http://www.pprune.org (Archives)

It is interesting to know, what also happened before September 11th.
Some eye-witnesses told us, that the security measures have been increased on the small airport of
Portland, much more military than ususal. Later this was the check-in airport for Mohammad Atta.

On September 6th, a TCAS-Unit was stolen in Miami.
=========================================================

http://www.pprune.org/ubb/NonCGI/ultimatebb.php?ubb=get_topic&f=1&t=015330
posted 06 September 2001 19:23
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Just watching the BBC doc about Miami. I thought I was difficult to surprise, but someone stole a TCAS unit from an aeroplane. Blimey!

** The TCAS is the "Traffic Alert and Collision Avoidance System".
A good diagram which shows the threat detection concepts of the TCAS system can be seen at
http://www.rannoch.com/tcasf.html

"GottheShirt", another member replied with this opinion:

posted 06 September 2001 20:16
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Losing (expensive) Avionic equipment is not uncommon. Miami is particularly popular due to lots of aircraft over a large area.
In once recent situation American Airlines suddenly found serial numbers that had been reported missing back in the system !! They had purchased their own equipment back !!
If you look at aircraft parked out in the back areas you will see a long steel cable, with a padlock, looped through all the avionic equipment in the rack.
Not fool proof but slows em down!

The next reply:

Ontheairwaves

Member # 33306
posted 06 September 2001 22:11
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------
I'm not surprised at all.....at one of the crew hotels near the airport there is a high security fence about 10ft away from a dedicated running track beside said hotel to stop guests being held up by the natives.
One would think that with the local police looking after the airport that security would be tighter but evidently not....
Having said that an airfield boundary at night is very easy to get through....so my advice for the airlines is a have a BIG chat with your corporate security guys/gals and see what the hell they are being paid for.

Then in these days, they also discussed the "warning" for Salman Rushdie, not to fly with the airplanes.
=========================================================

Actually this is based on that original story:

".. Salman Rushdie, who was returning to a normal life after years of hiding,faces new travel restrictions now that Washington has banned him from flights in and out of the United States.
The internationally renowned author was
forced to cancel a trip into Canada after U.S. airline authorities imposed extreme
security measures.
Mr. Rushdie, an Indian-born author who angered Islamic fundamentalists more than 10 years ago with his book The Satanic Verses, is currently promoting a new novel entitled Fury. He is scheduled to hold public readings of his latest work in Vancouver and Toronto next week.
On Thursday, the U.S. Federal Aviation Authority in Washington issued an emergency directive banning Mr. Rushdie from all flights in and out of the United States, reflecting a heightened state of alert.
The FAA never explains why such directives are issued, and the authority did not return phone calls yesterday. Mr. Rushdie's publicist at Random House did not return calls either, and the reasons for restricting the author's travels remain unknown.

Air Canada was supposed to fly Mr. Rushdie into Canada on Friday, but was forced to cancel his booking because of the FAA directive. "It orders that extreme, constraining security measures be implemented on all flights on which Mr. Rushdie is booked to travel," Air Canada spokeswoman Priscille LeBlanc said in an interview. The company sent a letter to the author and human-rights figure explaining the situation.

"As a result of security measures imposed by civil-aviation authorities on any flight on which you hold a reservation, the implementation of which would likely cause considerable disruption to our operations and great inconvenience to our passengers, we regret to inform you that Air Canada cannot accept you as a passenger on its flights or that of its regional carriers," said an Air Canada document obtained by The Globe and Mail.

A violation of the FAA order would have meant the cancellation of Air Canada's flying licence in the United States. The carrier sent out a note to its front-line staff, warning them to block Mr. Rushdie from its planes. "Should author Salman Rushdie attempt a reservation or present himself at an airport, he is not — repeat not — to be accepted for carriage," the document said.

Ms. LeBlanc said that another one of Mr. Rushdie's flights, booked on a U.S. carrier, was cancelled last week..."

What we learn is that the FAA didn't explain why they forbid Salman Rushdie to fly. The rest is speculation.

The first aircraft to hit the Twin Towers is first believed to be American Airlines flight 11, BOS-LAX, a B762.

One member later wonders:
http://www.pprune.org/cgibin/ultimatebb.cgi?ubb=get_topic&f=1&t=015387&p=

posted 11 September 2001 16:13
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Hard to believe that foreign nationals could breach security at IAD, EWR and BOS simultaneously

**
IAD= Washington Dulles Airport
EWR=Newark International Airport
BOS=Boston Logan Airport

posted 11 September 2001 17:12
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Huck---have you been to a US airport recently? Very little security.

posted 11 September 2001 19:16
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------
there must have been accomplises among ground staff
Shouldn't be too hard to make a database of everyone who has been in a 75/76 sim worldwide within the last year or so....
The second plane hit very fast - 300 kts or so, in a ~30 deg bank. Definitely knew what they were doing. He almost came out the other side - most of his fuel did, and one engine core streaked across the sky, still producing thrust after passing through

*we know that the "database" obviously was checked. Later the FBI was at SimCenter in Miami.
The pilot describes here, how deep the knowledge of the hijackers must have been.

Then the part, which many people wondered:

"..Do you think the CVR will give a lead to the language being used or maybe even the dialect?.."

**CVR= Cockpit Voice Recorder

*We know, that the FBI never released one recorder

Another interesting detail -Slow Travel days:
=========================================================

"..The perpetraitors chose a Tuesday morning which would be one of the slowest travel days of the year as summer unofficialy ended last Monday in the US. This would ensure the fewest possible pax to resist their efforts.
Several news organizations showed the tracks of the a/c fron BOS to New York. There had to be either direct communication between the a/c or some ground control to turn the second a/c on to the target at an approriate time to ensure maximum coverage by the news media. OK, this last point is largely conjecture on my part. Perhaps they were just lucky..."

* we know the hijackers had much luck. All 4 planes had been almost empty. Is that proof enough for
accomplices? The pilot on that board also wonders about the communication oddities

Another try to think about the purpose of low passenger loads for the hijacking:

"...Low passenger loads (enabling small number of hijackers to overpower/hold off pax; I suspect several hijackers/plane as a half-dozen guys with knives would likely succumb to a couple hundred seriously agitated pax).."

About the Cockpit Voice Recorder:
=========================================================

"RatherBeFlying":
"..CVRs will be valuable unless hijackers knew how to pull CB (digging usable CVRs out of WTC rubble may be problematic, but Pentagon and Pittsburgh CVR likely retrievable).."

F16s in air
=========================================================

Then another witness, that F16s had been in the air and once again about the coincidence of all "light" flights:

"Overhead, an F-16 jet circled low round the building. A few moments later, a man with a megaphone ran down the line of uniformed workers yelling: "There's another plane on the way in. The F-16 is here to shoot it down. You cannot get far enough away from the Pentagon. Keep moving."

The loads were all extremely light - 45, 67 etc, highest count on one flight was 94. For a 767 or even a 757, these are light loads. This would have made it much easier to control the pax and get them to the back of the plane. Would have been much harder if there'd been 230 on board. Did the attackers have access to res systems to target these flights?

I think the light loads were a function of the sharp slowdown in US domestic air travel. I cannot believe that those who planned to kill up to 50,000 in the WTC would give a damn about how many were in the aircraft. I expect weather was a factor, not least to ensure the most dramatic TV coverage - also probably a factor in deciding the 20 minutes between the two WTC attacks..."

"..13 sep

About two Months ago, an American Airline crew in Rome, Italy, had their room broken into and had their I.D. badges stolen. It's undetermind if it's related to this act of terrorism or not.AA put out a memo three weeks ago to be on the lookout for "Immitation" aircrew..."

The strange fact, that a flight manual was found in a rental car of Mohammad Atta.
=========================================================

It wasn't much the detail, that it was "lost" or "placed" in that car or how easy it was to be found.
More interesting is the fact, that there are no official flight manuals in arabic language!!! :

(sorry for the Cabs)

A dialogue:

"DON'T YOU THINK IT WOULD BE EASIER TO LEARN ENGLISH THAN TRANSLATE A FLIGHT MANUAL TO ARABIC? THERE ARE ENGLISH WORDS THAT ARE UNTRANSLATABLE TO ARABIC... HOW WOULD THEY GET AROUND THAT? IF THEY DID IT THEY DID IT THEMSELVES BECAUSE BOEING ONLY SUPPLIES MANUALS IN ENGLISH AND FRENCH. HMMMM, MAYBE THAT IS IT... ALGERIANS ALL KNOW FRENCH! PLUS WE HAVE PROOF THAT THE HYJACKERS SPOKE PERFECT ENGLISH.."

"..You are probably correct in saying that manuals are not officially available in Arabic but that doesn't mean to say they have not been translated..."

"..The flight manuals for the 767's, 747's, 737's, and 777's operated by Japanese airlines are in Japanese (Kanji), except for non/untranslatable words, which are printed in English. I'm unsure WHO does the translation - Boeing, a contractor to Boeing, or the individual airline companies.

http://www.avweb.com/other/911flightexplorer.html "

*So what do we know now?
1) It doesn't make sense to translate flight manuals, if they are able to get in english and also easy to organise.
2) An arabic translation would have been way too complicated and another problem is that most of the abbreviations are in english anyway.
3) The hijackers were able to speak and understand english
4) Why did we never see that flight manual?

One member mentioned, that some of the hijackers are still alive and pointed on the correction at CNN:
=========================================================

http://www.cnn.com/2001/US/09/13/america.attack/

CORRECTION
"..We would like to correct a report that appeared on CNN. Based on information from multiple law enforcement sources, CNN reported that Adnan Bukhari and Ameer Bukhari of Vero Beach Florida, were suspected to be two of the pilots who crashed planes into the World Trade Center. CNN later learned that Adnan Bukhari is still in Florida, where he was questioned by the FBI. We are sorry for the misinformation. A federal law enforcement source now tells CNN that Bukhari passed an FBI polygraph and is not considered a suspect. Through his attorney, Bukhari says that he is helping authorities. Ameer Bukhari died in a small plane crash last year..."

The black boxes:
=========================================================

13 sep
"..Searchers found one of the so-called "black boxes" from United Airlines Flight 93, the hijacked airliner that crashed in western Pennsylvania, according to the FBI..."

Story from Sky News reports that the FBI have not ruled out the fact that United Airlines Flight 93 may have been shot down! http://www.sky.com/skynews/storytemplate/storytoppic/0,,30000-1029252,00.html

The debris from Pennsylvannia:
=========================================================

"..B747 wideboy Debris field now appears to be 6 miles long, not exactly high level break up, Pan Am was about 90 miles long..." **Pan AM=Bomb

"..Wouldn't the relative height have a bearing on the debris field? I thought that this plane was relatively low before the final impact?

What I said in my previous was that the debris field, even at six miles in length, was far too small for the aircraft to have broken up at cruise altitude as would have been the case if it were shot down.
The aircraft was clearly out of control, probably due to a struggle in the flight deck. There is a possibility that the hijackers did have a bomb managed to detonate it which would explain why it now seems that the debris field was bigger than initially thought..."

The second debris side:
=========================================================
"B747wideboy":

"..Second debris site was shown about 6 hours, the story is on CNN.."
http://www.cnn.com/2001/US/09/13/penn.attack/

"A second debris field was around Indian Lake about 3 miles from the crash scene. Some debris was in the lake and some was adjacent to the lake.

More debris from the plane was found in New Baltimore, some 8 miles away from the crash.

State police and the FBI initially said they didn't want to speculate whether the debris was from the crash, or if the plane could have broken up in midair.

Investigators later said the debris was all very light material, such as paper and thin nylon the wind would easily blow. The wind was blowing towards Indian Lake and New Baltimore at 9 knots. "According to the NTSB, it is not only possible that the debris is from the crash, it is probable," Crowley said..."

*The explanation of the second debris field is still not very helpful. We know, that even heavy magazines from
board have been found at that second debris. Just by wind? And what about the other parts of the plane at the same area?

George Bush confirmed, he tried to shutdown the Pennsylvannia machine:
=========================================================
Cheney: Bush OK'd shootdown of rogue planes
September 16, 2001 Posted: 11:42 AM EDT (1542 GMT)

Vice President Cheney and President Bush at Camp David on Saturday

WASHINGTON (CNN) -- "..In the moments after it became apparent that the United States was under attack Tuesday, President Bush authorized the military to shoot down any unauthorized civilian aircraft that might have been heading toward the White House or the Capitol, Vice President Dick Cheney said Sunday.

"We decided to do it," Cheney declared on NBC's "Meet the Press."

The chance never materialized..."

* Building 7 of WTC also collapsed in the same way. There is also a video, which shows an explosion in
Building 7, while the Twin Towers still had been burning. Please look "Collapsed Control of Twin Towers"

**
ASI= Air Security International
IAS max= maximum Indicated Air Speed
Source: http://www.janes.com/defence/glossary/index.shtml

All details about the 4 machines:
=========================================================

American 011 Boston to Los Angeles - Crashed into the World Trade Center- Aircraft = B767-223ER - N334AA
American 077 Washington Dulles to Los Angeles - Crashed into the Pentagon - Aircraft = B757-223 - N644AA
United 093 Newark to San Francisco - Crashed near Sommerset, PA - Aircraft = B757-222 - N591UA
United 175 Boston to Los Angeles - Crashed into the World Trade Center - Aircraft = B767-222 - N612UA

Missing Air Traffic Reports:
=========================================================
12 sep

"..As a controller, when an aircraft reverses course almost 180 degree and then starts descending, one starts to ask himself questions. Why has no information about ATC come out yet, I know some of the aircraft did not turn off their transponders. Did these aircraft just proceed to NYC without any communication? This infomation is out there, can anyone comment??

Washington center tracked both 757's, alerting the White House that the plane that eventually struck the Pentagon was headed for the White House, and also the 757 that crashed in Pennsylvania (while it was still airborne and headed east) was the cause of the emergency evacuation of Federal government buildings in Washington.."

**ATC= Air Traffic Control

Turn off of machines:
=========================================================
I saw an animation of the ATC plot for the aircraft last night on TV. XPDRS were reportedly turned off.

** XPDRS= expanded Deficiency Reporting System (or Diagnostic/Retrieval Systems Inc?)
Also Deficiency Reporting System

Secret Messages of Pilot:
=========================================================

BOSTON (Reuters) - "..The pilot of American Airlines Flight 11, which crashed into New York's World Trade Centre on Tuesday, secretly sent messages to controllers on the ground during much of the flight, the Christian Science Monitor has reported.

The paper, citing interviews with two unnamed air traffic controllers, said the pilot was apparently triggering a "push to talk" switch in the cockpit, probably on the plane's steering wheel, known as a yoke.

"The button was being pushed intermittently most of the way to New York," one of the controllers told the newspaper's Thursday edition. "He wanted us to know something was wrong. When he pushed the button and the terrorist spoke, we knew. There was this voice that was threatening the pilot and it was clearly threatening."

During the transmissions, the pilot's voice and the heavily accented voice of a hijacker were clearly audible, the controllers told the paper.

The transmissions were all recorded and the paper said the tapes were turned over to federal law enforcement officials.

The paper said controllers were first tipped off that something was wrong on Flight 11 when the aircraft failed to follow an instruction to climb to its cruising altitude of 31,000 feet (9,449 metres).

"He was cleared to continue his climb and he did not," the paper quoted one of the controllers as saying. "He was given permission to turn to go around (other airplane) traffic at 29,000 (feet/8,839 metres). So he issued a further climb, and (the plane) does not respond. That was the first indication we had of a problem," the controller told the newspaper.

The controller handling the plane then tried repeatedly to raise the aircraft on the radio but got no response. He then switched to an emergency frequency but again failed to establish contact.

At about the same time, some 20 minutes into American Airlines Flight 11's trip, the aircraft's transponder stopped working, making its altitude a matter of guesswork. Without the transponder, the plane was still visible on radar.

"Then the plane turned (south toward New York), and then they heard the transmission with the terrorist in the background," the controller told the paper.

"The voice upset him because he knew right then that he was working a hijack. Several other people heard the voice, and they could tell by the sound of it, intuitively, that this was a bad situation," the controller said.

The controllers also said that they heard a hijacker say something like "We have more planes, we have other planes," although the statement's import was not understood.

Another controller in the Federal Aviation Administration Control Center in Nashua, New Hampshire, confirmed the events to the newspaper.

"The person in the cockpit was speaking in English. He was saying something like, 'Don't do anything foolish. You're not going to get hurt,'" the second controller told the paper...."

* We never heard about that information again. No report released by FBI yet

By Associated Press, 09/13/01

NASHUA, N.H. -- "..The two hijacked jets that demolished the World Trade Center nearly
crashed into each other while heading to their target, according to a Federal Aviation
Administration employee at a regional control center.

"The two aircraft got too close to each other down by Stewart International Airport in New Windsor, N.Y., about 55 miles north of New York City, the employee told The Telegraph of Nashua. It wasn't clear how
close they got after they left Boston 15 minutes apart Tuesday morning, both headed
for Los Angeles.

Hijackers gained control of American Airlines Flight 11 around Gardner, Mass., said the employee, who spoke on condition of anonymity. Gardner is about 45 miles
northwest of Boston.

"American was just flying around, doing what it wanted," the employee said of the jet's
approach to New York.

United Airlines Flight 175 remained in the hands of its pilots until it reached Albany,
N.Y., the employee said. Albany is about 140 miles north of New York.

The controller noticed American Flight 11 was having difficulties when its transponder, the device that sends an electrical radar pulse to air traffic control centers, shut off, the employee said. At that point, the plane veered
from its course, the employee said.

Soon after, the controller realized a hijacker stood in the cockpit when the plane's captain, John Ogonowski of Dracut, Mass., turned on his microphone, the employee
said.

The pilot was apparently triggering a "push-to-talk button" on the aircraft's steering wheel, a feature that enables pilots to have their hands on the controls while
communicating, another employee told The Christian Science Monitor. That let
controllers hear much of what was said and other cockpit noises.

"The button was being pushed intermittently most of the way to New York," the employee
said. "He wanted us to know something was wrong. When he pushed the button and the
terrorist spoke, we knew. There was this voice that was threatening the pilot, and it was clearly threatening."

Through the radio connection, the controller heard someone instruct, "`Nobody do anything
stupid"' and no one would get hurt, the employee said. The controller heard no more
conversations, The Telegraph reported.

FAA controllers notified concerned government
organizations, such as the military, the employee said. Controllers also shut down all
other air traffic quickly to get other planes away from the rogue aircraft, the employee said.

The Nashua controllers have learned through discussions with other controllers that an F-16 fighter stayed in hot pursuit of another hijacked commercial airliner until it crashed in Pennsylvania, the employee said.

Although controllers don't have complete details of the Air Force's chase of the Boeing 757, they have learned the F-16 made 360-degree turns to remain close to the commercial jet, the employee said.

"He must've seen the whole thing," the employee said of the F-16 pilot's view of United Flight 93's crash near Pittsburgh.
The flight took off from Newark Airport for San Francisco, and authorities say the hijackers were headed for another target in
Washington, D.C.

The employee said the controller spoke with United Airlines Flight 175 for quite some time after terrorists took command of
American Airlines Flight 11, the employee said.

Many controllers also watched events unfold on the Nashua control center's television, but never expected Flight 175 to hit the second World Trade Center tower because of that sustained contact with the crew, the employee said.

"After the first plane hit, nobody imagined it would happen again," the employee said. "We all thought that was it. It
totally caught everybody off guard.

"It's not in anyone's mind they're hitting a target," the employee said. "When somebody takes a plane over, they try to negotiate a release with money."

One air traffic controller with the help of an assistant monitored the two Boeing 767s that toppled the World Trade Center, the employee said.

The same controller handled Egypt Air Flight 990 when it crashed off the coast of Massachusetts in 1999, the employee said. The controller is "pretty disturbed" that he lost both planes, the employee said..."

A member of the board:

Member # 3756
posted 18 September 2001 21:36
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------
"At least one news story I read (sorry, forgot the source -- I've read so much in the last week -- but it was a credible source, eg NYT or Wash Post) indicated that fighters were scrambled: F-15s from Hyannis, on Cape Cod, in reaction to the hijacks from Boston. They apparently didn't reach New York until a few minutes after the second crash. F-16s were also scrambled from Norfolk, Virginia, in response to the AA hijacking from Dulles. Apparently they went supersonic most of the way, but still got to DC after the Pentagon had been hit. But presumably they would have been in position to intercept the UA 757 had it in fact reached the city."

posted 15 September 2001 00:41
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------
I received this notice from a US Coast Guard bulletin board that I subscribe to. You may find it interesting. Some of it may not print out properly.
SCATANA Measures: As you are aware, the NORAD COMMAND CENTER implemented SCATANA measures. What is SCATANA? This acronym stands for Security Control of Air Traffic and Air Navigation Aids. This plan was originally developed in the 1960's and authorizes NORAD, the FAA, and the FCC to impose flight restrictions in order to clear the skies of all non-essential air traffic and shut down all navigation aids. The implementation of this system also allows the air defense network to identify aircraft tracks and have only mission essential aircraft airborne. On 9 Nov 1979 SCATANA was erroneously triggered when a technician at NORAD inserted a computer tape to simulate a nuclear attack into the on-line warning system. FAA controllers at some locations were ordered to land aircraft immediately.

This went on for six minutes until the error was recognized and SCATANA was lifted. On 11 Sep 2001 the SCATANA implementation was no error. While G-OCA (US Coast Guard Aviation directorate)understood everyone’s frustration, realize this, the forest fires in the West grew and burned yet the fire-fighting aircraft were grounded. Organ transplants could not be performed since aircraft were not allowed to fly organs to the patients who desperately needed them. This event affected more than just Coast Guard aviation. Our staff worked tirelessly with Cheyenne Mountain Operation Center to get the best information out to the fleet on how to continue Coast Guard Operations. While we hope this never happens again, this was the first full-scale implementation of SCATANA, and not unexpectedly, there are some bugs in the plan that NORAD needs to resolve..."

But:

posted 20 September 2001 02:20
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------
"..Lu, apparently this went out shortly after the airspace became prohibited...
FDC 1/9746 FDC SPECIAL NOTICE - EFFECTIVE IMMEDIATELY. SCATANA HAS NOT BEEN IMPLEMENTED, HOWEVER, DOD AIRCREWS ONLY WILL FOLLOW SCATANA PROCEDURES FOR FILING FLIGHT PLANS IN ORDER TO GAIN DEPARTURE APPROVAL. REPEAT: SCATANA HAS NOT BEEN IMPLEMENTED.

So was it or wasn't it?.."

Which means, still many questions open, especially for the specialists=the pilots.