Killtown's

Did Flight 93 Crash in Shanksville?

Do you see any evidence of a 100 ton Boeing 757 in these crater photos?

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What, no Boeing 757 crashed here either???

FLIGHT 93
American Free Press visited Somerset County to look into some of the questions surrounding United Airlines Flight 93, which allegedly turned over and crashed in a refilled strip mine between Lambertsville and Shanksville, Pa., taking 44 lives with it.
Many local residents believe the plane was shot down, which they say would explain why parts of the plane and its contents were found strewn over a large area.
One question, “is what happened to the physical wreckage of the plane?”
“There was no plane,” Ernie Stull, mayor of Shanksville, told German television in March 2003:
“My sister and a good friend of mine were the first ones there,” Stull said. “They were standing on a street corner in Shanksville talking. Their car was nearby, so they were the first here—and the fire department came. Everyone was puzzled, because the call had been that a plane had crashed. But there was no plane.”
“They had been sent here because of a crash, but there was no plane?” the reporter asked.
“No. Nothing. Only this hole.”
When AFP asked Stull about his comments, he disagreed about when he had gone to the crash site. “A day or two later,” Stull said, was about when he went to the site. But he reiterated the fact that they saw little evidence of a plane crash.
Nena Lensbouer, who had prepared lunch for the workers at the scrap yard overlooking the crash site, was the first person to go up to the smoking crater.
Lensbouer told AFP that the hole was five to six feet deep and smaller than the 24-foot trailer in her front yard. She described hearing “an explosion, like an atomic bomb”—not a crash.
Lensbouer called 911 and stayed on the line as she ran across the reclaimed land of the former strip mine to within 15 feet of the smoking crater.
Lensbouer told AFP that she did not see any evidence of a plane then or at any time during the excavation at the site, an effort that reportedly recovered 95 percent of the plane and 10 percent of the human remains.
While specific details vary, the explanation for the disappearance of the plane is that the reclaimed land acted like liquid and absorbed the aircraft, which is said to have impacted at between 450 and 600 miles per hour.
This explanation is also used to explain why there was only a brief explosion with one short-lived smoke cloud, not unlike a bomb blast.
“I never saw that smoke,” Paula Long, an eyewitness, told AFP. Long ran “immediately” after hearing the crash but did not see the cloud of smoke caught in the now-famous photograph by Valencia McClatchey, she said.
“It [the ground] liquefied,” Bob Leverknight, an active member of the Air National Guard and correspondent with Somerset’s Daily American, told AFP regarding how the wreck and much of the fuel disappeared. One of the massive engines, Leverknight said, however, bounced off the ground and was found in the woods.
Jim Svonavec, whose company worked at the site and provided excavation equipment, told AFP that the recovery of the engine “at least 1,800 feet into the woods,” was done solely by FBI agents using his equipment." -American Free Press (09/17/04)

 Check out these video clips of the crash site and see it you can identify any plane wreckage...

When he got to the scene, about 65 miles southeast of Pittsburgh, there was little evidence that what crashed had been a plane.

The Boeing 757 hurtled into the ground at 580 mph, leaving a 20-by-10-foot deep gouge in the earth.

"I can just remember seeing very small bits of debris everywhere. There really wasn't any large sections of debris or aircraft," he says. "The thing that really struck my mind the most was hearing the melted plastic dripping out of the trees."

http://www.phillyburbs.com/pb-dyn/news/103-09102005-539399.html

Is the smoke plume in the famous Val McClatchey photo from Flight 93 crashing or is it from an ordnance blast?

If Flight 93 was a cross country flight that was fully loaded with jet fuel, the why isn't there a huge fire with thick black smoke come from the crater where it supposedly crashed?

The impact of the crash of Flight #93 left almost no trace above ground. Photo by S.C. Spangler/Tribune-Review

Compare

By today, Environmental Resources Management Inc. of Pine, a contractor hired by United, expects to return 5,000 to 6,000 cubic yards of soil to the 50-foot hole dug around the crater left by the crash.

http://www.postgazette.com/headlines/20011003crash1003p3.asp

A Fence Surrounds the Crash Site of Flight 93

The Somerset County Police maintain the Memorial and have an officer on site twenty-four hours a day.

Mike Svonavec, owner of Svonavec Inc., a coal company that owns 270 acres -- including the impact site -- said he intends to donate the land as soon as it is appraised.

http://www.9news.com/storyfull/911ann.asp?id=18056

It was a day the world will never forget, and as the events of Sept. 11, 2001, began to unfold, the last thing Somerset County Coroner Wallace "Wally" Miller ever expected was to be thrust into the middle of the fray.

But when United Airlines Flight 93 crashed into a field in Stonycreek Township, near Shanksville, Miller's life as he had known it — like the lives of so many others — was put on hold. And in the months since, his every day has been consumed by the aftermath of that tragedy.

Addressing a group of Scottdale area clergy Wednesday during a seminar at West Overton Museums, sponsored by the Robert B. Ferguson Funeral Home, Miller talked about the past 8 1/2 months.

Miller recalled his arrival at the crash site about 20 minutes after the plane plummeted to the earth and described how the aircraft came down at a 45-degree angle. He explained how the cockpit broke off at impact, bouncing into a wooded area of about 60 acres. The resulting fireball scorched about eight acres of trees, he said.

http://www.pittsburghlive.com/x/tribune-review/terrorism/s_73907.html

Interview: Wallace Miller
Somerset County Coroner
Somerset, Pennsylvania
August 2, 2005
Dane and I entered the mortuary and the confrontational attitude by Miller was up close and in our face. As I handed Mr. Miller my business card, I tried to introduce myself and Dane.
DK: I write investigative columns, and uh...
WM: If you're, let, let me stop you right there.
DK: Oh?
WM: If you're looking for any kind of conspiracy theory, you're talking to the wrong guy.
Dane: It's the other way around. We're here to dispel...
WM: Okay.
Dane: ...that kind of stuff.
WM: Okay.
DK: Here are my references. It's three members of three different state legislatures. And, I'm not really here looking for conspiracy theories.
WM: Okay.
DK: ...Looking to interview people to try to get rid of some of these myths that are floating around.
WM: Well.....I'm going to tell you right now, as I've said for the last four years, I got called after the plane hit the ground. I cleaned it up. I, I recovered the remains. I notified the next of kin and restored the site and determined the cause and manner of death...all I do. I'm not going to speculate about who did what.
DK: I didn't ask you for any speculation.
WM: Right.
DK: I've done many investigations and I do...
WM: Right.
DK: ....is buy autopsy reports and supporting material.
WM: Yeah, but that stuff....
DK: And, I didn't come in here with the...
WM: ...yeah, there's, there's....
DK: ....intention of...
WM: ....there were no autopsies.
DK: Oh. Did you have any reports that you filed as the County Coroner to the FAA...
WM: I only...
DK: ...or, the NTSB, or anybody?
WM: No, they never asked me for any of them.
DK: They didn't ask you for any reports on the recovery...
WM: No.
DK: ...of the remains?
WM: Actually, probably DMORT. You, you want to talk to DMORT or the FBI.
DK: So, is that where you submitted your....
WM: Yes.
DK: ...final reports? DMORT?
WM: DMORT's uh, it's uh, the uh, they were, they're based out of uh, D.C., I think. They're part of the Justice Department.
(DMORT is an acronym for Disaster Mortuary Operations Response Team)
DK: Okay.
WM: The FBI, the FBI. Uh. uh, they, the FBI paid for all the testing. So, essentially, they are the clients, of, of that dealing.
DK: All right.
Dane: Thank you for your time.
WM: Okay, you're welcome.
End of interview.

http://www.devvy.com/pdf/Flight93/miller_interview_080205.pdf

Hallowed Ground

"Wally Miller hits the siren on his dark Ford Excursion. He's alerting the Somerset County sheriffs that he is once again entering the restricted area surrounded by dense forest and enclosed by an eight-foot metal fence. Inside his truck is the familiar stale smell of the wilted flowers that he brings back from the 90 or so funerals he conducts every year. Death has been the family business at Miller Funeral Home in Somerset, Pa., for nearly half a century. Never, though, anything that even remotely resembles this.

Before Miller can even unfold his lanky 6-foot-4 body from the vehicle, a deputy sheriff thrusts at him a plastic baggie containing a handful of jagged metallic nuggets, mangled and melted into irregular shapes, little bigger than children's marbles. They are the latest of the shreds to be recovered -- nearly six months later -- of what remains of United Airlines Flight 93. Miller holds up the bag and says that virtually the entire airplane, including its 44 human occupants, disintegrated in similar fashion.

"I'm just a hick," Miller says when he considers the enormity of what he does. "I'm a country coroner." He is a youthful 44, with dark hair and a long, angular face that sometimes suggests a young, shaven version of Abe Lincoln. He is quite comfortable talking about death, most of the time. He grew up watching his father, Wilbur, deal with the grief of countless friends and neighbors, and then Wally succeeded Wilbur, both in running the funeral home and becoming Somerset County's elected coroner.

The Boeing 757 still heavily laden with jet fuel slammed at about 575 mph almost straight down into a rolling patch of grassy land that had long ago been strip-mined for coal. The impact spewed a fireball of horrific force across hundreds of acres of towering hemlocks and other trees, setting many ablaze. The fuselage burrowed straight into the earth so forcefully that one of the "black boxes" was recovered at a depth of 25 feet under the ground.

As coroner, responsible for returning human remains, Miller has been forced to share with the families information that is unimaginable. As he clinically recounts to them, holding back very few details, the 33 passengers, seven crew and four hijackers together weighed roughly 7,000 pounds. They were essentially cremated together upon impact. Hundreds of searchers who climbed the hemlocks and combed the woods for weeks were able to find about 1,500 mostly scorched samples of human tissue totaling less than 600 pounds, or about 8 percent of the total.

Miller was among the very first to arrive after 10:06 on the magnificently sunny morning of September 11. He was stunned at how small the smoking crater looked, he says, "like someone took a scrap truck, dug a 10-foot ditch and dumped all this trash into it." Once he was able to absorb the scene, Miller says, "I stopped being coroner after about 20 minutes, because there were no bodies there. It became like a giant funeral service."

Thousands of people -- the locals estimate up to 1,000 a week -- have arrived at an old coal-mining access trail called Skyline Road, where finally they can see what remains of Flight 93: nothing. "There's not really much to it, is there?" Wally Miller often says to families and other visitors who are bewildered by what they don't see.

Immediately after the crash, the seeming absence of human remains led the mind of coroner Wally Miller to a surreal fantasy: that Flight 93 had somehow stopped in mid-flight and discharged all of its passengers before crashing. "There was just nothing visible," he says. "It was the strangest feeling." It would be nearly an hour before Miller came upon his first trace of a body part. The emotionally wrenching impact of what happened to the bodies caused Miller to resolve to seek out and talk personally to every one of the victims' families.

Miller says he is often asked how he copes emotionally with the work he must do. He says he is not sure. Then he tells the church audience that, remarkably, two heavily damaged Bibles were found in the wreckage of the flight; a white one at the crash site that belonged to a passenger who was a practicing Buddhist; and a second one, black, of uncertain ownership. Miller says he ran across the second one on the floor of the warehouse where victims' belongings were being kept. The second Bible was scrunched up and was lying open, he says, to the 121st Psalm, which is customarily read at funerals. He says he has no idea who left the Bible in that position." - Washington Post (05/12/02)

Newsmaker: Coroner's quiet unflappability helps him take charge of Somerset tragedy

"Even in the middle of it all, where trees were scorched and the Boeing 757's fuselage disintegrated in a crater that collapsed on itself to leave a gouge maybe 14 feet across, the destruction was so complete that it was hard to imagine what happened.
"It was as if the plane had stopped and let the passengers off before it crashed," Miller said.
The FBI took control of the crash scene. Miller had charge of a provisional morgue six miles away." - Pittsburg Post Gazette (10/15/01)

The day that changed America

"The plane hit at about 575 mph. The cockpit and first-class cabin collapsed; the rest crumpled into it, the rivets giving, the fireball scorching everything.
Investigators crawled through the debris field, bagging bolts and bone fragments. They found chunks of seat cushion foam, and honeycombed sound insulators. Then a shoelace, some shirt buttons, and a wedding ring. Then part of a passport, and a necktie, still knotted.
Wallace Miller, the lanky, Civil War-studying county coroner, did see it. He sat at the family funeral home, his father, Wilbur, with him. They watched the second plane sweep in low, from nowhere. They winced when it hit.
He couldn't believe the scene. He saw the burnt trees, and some debris smoking in the dirt. He saw half a window frame. He saw shreds of that white cloth they put over the headrests.
He saw things in the trees.
He takes off his glasses, cleans them with his T-shirt. "This is the most eerie thing," he says. "I have not, to this day, seen a single drop of blood. Not a drop."
On Sept. 11, though, he simply tried to make sense of the crash site. He went home about 2 a.m., too tired to think straight. He'd start fresh in the morning. The federal mortuary team would be there then. The light would be better." - Pittsburg Live (09/11/02)

Somerset coroner recalls Sept. 11, 2001

"On Sept. 11, 2001, a person couldn't have gotten much closer than Wallace Miller did to the crash site of United Flight 93 in Somerset County.
Just 20 minutes after the crash, Miller, a funeral director and the Somerset County Coroner, arrived at the scene.

According to Miller, there were 600 samples for 40 people, which was not a lot of samples because the size of the fragments were very small." - Daily Courier/Pittsburg Live (05/30/02)

Did Flight 93 land safely on 9/11 at Cleveland Hopkins International Airport?

Plane Lands In Cleveland; Bomb Feared Aboard
Reported by: 9News Staff
Web produced by: Liz Foreman
9/11/01 11:43:57 AM
"A Boeing 767 out of Boston made an emergency landing Tuesday at Cleveland Hopkins International Airport due to concerns that it may have a bomb aboard, said Mayor Michael R. White.
White said the plane had been moved to a secure area of the airport, and was evacuated.
United identified the plane as Flight 93. The airline [didn't] say how many people were aboard the flight.
United said it was also "deeply concerned" about another flight, Flight 175, a Boeing 767, which was bound from Boston to Los Angeles.
On behalf of the airline CEO James Goodwin said: "The thoughts of everyone at United are with the passengers and crew of these flights. Our prayers are also with everyone on the ground who may have been involved.
"United is working with all the relevant authorities, including the FBI, to obtain further information on these flights," he said." -WCPO-TV (09/11/01) [Reprinted at:  911Truth.org, Global Free Press, Rense.com]

Flight 93: Forty lives, one destiny

"At some point -- the best estimation is about 40 minutes into the flight west -- at least three of the hijackers stood up and put red bandanas around their heads. Two of them forced their way into the cockpit. One took the loudspeaker microphone, unaware it could also be heard by air traffic controllers, and announced that someone had a bomb onboard and the flight was returning to the airport. He told them he was the pilot, but spoke with an accent.
U.S. Rep. John P. Murtha, D-Johnstown, a ranking Democrat on the Defense Appropriations Subcommittee, described the announcement this way: "As they got toward Cleveland, the hijackers said 'Look, just be calm, we're going to land this plane.'" -Pittsburg Post-Gazette (10/28/01)

What Happened on Flight 93?

"Suddenly Flight 93's transponder, which sends controllers a radar signal with identifying information, switched off. That got Cleveland Center's attention.
It was just after 9:30. As the president was appearing before cameras in Florida, Cleveland air traffic controllers were hearing an American voice aboard Flight 93 yell, "Get out of here!"
"Someone had keyed the mic," says Feith. "They had an open microphone when all this commotion was going on."
Perhaps it was Captain Dahl or his co-pilot, LeRoy Homer. Then Cleveland heard screaming. Investigators can only speculate whether it was Dahl and Homer fighting to defend the aircraft, or being murdered.
But at 9:32 a.m., a chilling radio transmission - intended for the passengers. It said:
Hijacker: "Ladies and gentlemen, here it's the captain, please sit down. Keep remaining sitting. We have a bomb aboard."

Two minutes later, Cleveland control picked up another bizarre transmission from one of two hijackers now locked in the cockpit. It said:
Hijacker: "Hi, this is the captain. We'd like you all to remain seated. There is a bomb aboard, and we are going to turn back to the airport. And they have our demands so please remain quiet." - MSNBC (09/03/02) [Reprinted at:  billstclair.com]

Notice that the flight path of Flight 93 makes a hard turn very close to Cleveland Hopkins International Airport which the NASA Glenn Research Center is located right next to.  (Click maps for source.)

Plane makes emergency landing
by Paul Singer
"A Boeing 767 out of Boston made an emergency landing Tuesday at Cleveland Hopkins International Airport because of concerns that it may have a bomb aboard, said Mayor Michael R. White.
The plane was sitting on a runway at the airport's west end with approximately 200 passengers on board. The mayor had said earlier that the plane was being evacuated, but an airport spokeswoman said the passengers remained inside.
It was unclear whether any passengers had been taken off the plane.
A SWAT team and bomb unit were at the scene. However, White said, "As of this moment we do not know that this plane is in stress or duress."
The airplane landed at about 10:45 a.m., but the airport released no information about the plane's intended destination. Normally, planes of this size do not land at Hopkins.
"We have no confirmed information that this was a hijacking," the mayor said. But White said authorities are still concerned that there may be a bomb aboard the plane.
Cleveland police blocked off all entrances to the airport terminal, and bomb-sniffing dogs were brought in to the baggage pickup areas.
He said airport officials reported that a second airplane in distress had passed through Cleveland airspace earlier Tuesday morning before being handed off to Toledo. Officials at Toledo Express Airport did not immediately have any information about a plane headed from Cleveland.
Six other planes were diverted to Akron-Canton Airport, said airport aviation director Fred Krum. "They were told to get down," Krum said. The planes were bound for Pittsburgh, Cleveland and Boston when they were asked to land at Akron.
White said air traffic controllers said they could hear screaming within the Boeing 767. Additional details were not available.
WTAM radio reported that NASA had closed its Glenn Research Center, which is located near the airport.
The mayor ordered the evacuation of all major public buildings downtown, including City Hall, the Justice Center and the convention center. He has asked owners of large commercial high-rises downtown to evacuate. Federal buildings downtown also were closed.
Traffic in downtown Cleveland was backed up for blocks as people tried to get home.
The Rock and Roll Hall of Fame, Jacobs Field, Gund Arena and Browns Stadium also were closed, and the mayor said he asked two downtown college campuses to close.
White said there would be a parking ban on downtown streets." -AP (09/11/04) [Reprinted at: 911truth.org, Global Free Press]

Hijack Ends in Pennsylvania Crash

"ABCNEWS has learned that shortly before changing directions, someone in the cockpit radioed in and asked the FAA for a new flight plan, with a final destination of Washington.
An FBI official said the crash "appears" to be an act of terrorism, but Pentagon officials firmly denied to ABCNEWS rumors that the U.S. military shot down the aircraft to prevent it from being crashed into Camp David, the presidential retreat in Maryland, or another government facility." - ABC (09/11/01) [Reprinted at:  newsmine.org]

Was this original news article from WCPO-TV about Flight 93 landing at Hopkins airport taken off it's website because it was "factually incorrect", or was it taken off because it was correct?  If this story was "factually incorrect", why didn't they correct the article instead of removing it?

► Plane Lands In Cleveland; Bomb Feared Aboard
Reported by: 9News Staff
Web produced by: Liz Foreman
9/11/01 11:43:57 AM
"This story has been removed from WCPO.com.
It was a preliminary AP story, and was factually incorrect." -WCPO-TV

Was it Delta flight 1989 and not Flight 93 that landed at Hopkins airport or did both planes land there?

► No explosives found on Cleveland plane
by Paul Singer
CLEVELAND - No explosives were found aboard a Delta flight from Boston that was forced to land at Cleveland Hopkins International  Airport because of fears it had been hijacked, city officials said.
The Federal Aviation Administration had been informed at 9:45 a.m. of a possible hijacking of a plane headed for Cleveland, said FBI spokesman Mark Bullock.
Flight 1989 to Los Angeles was not hijacked but was grounded by Delta because it was in the same flight pattern as a plane that was hijacked and struck the World Trade Center in New York, Bullock said.
The plane landed about 10:45 a.m. today with 78 passengers aboard, airport officials said.
The Boeing 767 was evacuated and searched, said Della Homenik, spokeswoman for Mayor Michael R. White. Passengers were taken to a nearby NASA facility.
FBI spokesman Bob Hawk said that since the Delta plane left Boston about the same time as the hijacked plane, passengers were being interviewed to see if they saw anything unusual this morning.
After the plane landed, the airport was closed and bomb-sniffing dogs were brought to baggage pickup areas.
Meanwhile, White said a second airplane in distress had passed through Cleveland airspace Tuesday morning before being handed off to Toledo.
Officials at Toledo Express Airport did not immediately have any information about the plane." -The Post (Ohio Univ.)/AP (09/11/01)

► CHAOS SPREADS TO OHIO BOEING JET MAKES EMERGENCY LANDING IN CLEVELAND. BUILDINGS EVACUATED, OFFICES SHUT, MEETINGS CANCELED
"The mind-numbing chaos that descended with the terrorist attacks on the Northeast United States spread this morning to Northeast Ohio.  Cleveland Mayor Michael White said at a news conference this morning that a Boeing 767 out of Boston made an emergency landing at Cleveland Hopkins International Airport because of fears a bomb was aboard.  He reported that air traffic controllers could hear screaming aboard the plane.  The 200 passengers were reportedly released from the plane at 11:15"
Published on September 11, 2001, Page AE3, Akron Beacon Journal (OH) [Reprint at:  globalfreepress]

See also:  The Cleveland Airport Mystery, by Woody Box - INN World Report

Was it just a coincidence that a simulated terrorist attack was being conducted in Westmoreland county, which borders Somerset county, just 2 1/2 months before that attacks?

► COUNTY OF WESTMORELAND, PENNSYLVANIA; COMPREHENSIVE ANNUAL FINANCIAL REPORT, For the Year Ended December 31, 2001

"On June 16, 2001 the Department of Public Safety and the County Local Emergency Planning Committee conducted the largest full-scale emergency exercise ever conducted in the County. The exercise, called Mall Strike 2001, occurred at Greengate Mall and involved over 600 emergency first responders and emergency managers who responded to a weapons of mass destruction event involving the simulated release of a toxic chemical agent and the simulated release of radiation and radiological contamination. The exercise was a major training success.
The department dedicated its new Public Safety and 9-1-1 Center, located at 911 Public Safety Road in Hempfield Township, on September 11, 2001. This long awaited day was marred, however, by the terrorist attacks on the United States that also occurred on that date. In response to those attacks, the first official action at the new Center involved several days of 24 hour operations in the new County Emergency Operations Center.
The 9-1-1 Center was the only Center that had direct cell-phone communications with a passenger on United Flight 93. United Flight 93 was the aircraft that crashed in Somerset County." - Westmoreland County

► In the wake of Sept. 11, just how safe are we?

"...officials with Westmoreland and Fayette counties and local municipalities say security hasn't been increased. Rather, security plans were in place before Sept. 11 and communications channels exist between Fayette, Westmoreland and its neighboring counties in preparation for a terrorist attack.

Daniel Stevens, public information officer for Westmoreland County's Department of Public Safety, said the department has held trainings for fire departments and municipal officials when these are requested. The department, just 2 1/2 months before the terrorist attacks, held a training drill simulating a terrorist attack. "When the terrorists struck the World Trade Center, Flight 93 was above Westmoreland County and actually wound up in Shanksville," stated Stevens.
Stevens said that Westmoreland County is one of 13 southwestern Pennsylvania counties and the City of Pittsburgh that make up a regional task force on terrorism and weapons of mass destruction. Also included is Fayette County, according to Roy Shipley, director of Fayette County's Emergency Management agency." - PittsburghLive.com/Daily Courier (09/11/02)

► U.S. Department of Homeland Security FEMA Preparedness Smart Practices Spotlight

A Regional Approach to Terrorism and All-Hazards Preparedness Pennsylvania Region 13 Working Group
"Summary: In 1998, 12 Pennsylvania counties and the City of Pittsburgh together became the first group in the state to try a regional approach to terrorism preparedness.

While attending a Pennsylvania emergency management conference in 1998, a number of county emergency managers began to discuss threats of terrorism and the resources needed to respond effectively should a weapons of mass destruction incident occur in their region. In searching for a way to pool their resources, they created the Pennsylvania Region 13 Working Group.
Since formalizing the mutual aid and inter-government agreements, the Region 13 Working Group has established an incident command system for response operations, created a Metropolitan Medical Response System (MMRS), and developed plans and procedures for surveillance and notifications, and mass immunization and fatality management. They have organized major training exercises such as "Mall Strike 2001," a simulated nerve agent and radiological incident; a simulated gas attack exercise in the Pittsburgh subway system; and a full-scale exercise testing the ability of 27 hospitals in three of the 13 counties to decontaminate victims of a chemical attack.
When United Airlines Flight 93 crashed in rural Somerset County on Sept.11, 2001, the chair of the working group was immediately in touch with other members of the group and emergency teams were deployed swiftly to the site. The group's four years of working together and preparing for terrorist events allowed them to develop and train teams that could work efficiently together during an event of this magnitude." - FEMA (03/12/03)

Any coincidence that a Raytheon and Northrop defense contractor is in the same county where Flight 93 crashed?

Kuchera Defense Systems, 345 Hillside Drive, Windber, PA 15963 - (Driving distance from Windber, PA to Shanksville, PA = 22.1 miles)

Our Customers:

NORTHROP GRUMMAN CORPORATION
RAYTHEON

► Pitt program takes first-response technologies from lab to market

"For a dozen years, Kuchera Defense Systems in Somerset County has built a robust business producing high-tech equipment for military defense customers such as Northrop Grumman, Raytheon and McDonnell Douglas." - Pittsburg Post Gazette (10/14/05)

A Mysterious Small White Jet Was Seen

"The unmarked military-style jet swooped down at high speed through the valley, twice circled the smoldering black scar where Flight 93 had careered into the ground just seconds earlier and then hurtled off over the horizon.
At least six eyewitnesses saw the mysterious aircraft on the morning of September 11 last year. But the US authorities deny it ever existed.
What was the white jet doing there and why won't they admit to its presence? Why did other witnesses see smoke and flames trailing from Flight 93 as it fell from the sky, indicating a possible explosion aboard?
Or - and this is proving to be the most uncomfortable question of all - in the moments before the airliner piled into the black, spongy earth at 575mph did an American fighter pilot have to do the unthinkable and shoot down a US civil airliner?
Susan Mcelwain, 51, who lives two miles from the site, knows what she saw - the white plane rocketed directly over her head.
"It came right over me, I reckon just 40 or 50ft above my mini-van," she recalled. "It was so low I ducked instinctively. It was traveling real fast, but hardly made any sound.
"Then it disappeared behind some trees. A few seconds later I heard this great explosion and saw this fireball rise up over the trees, so I figured the jet had crashed. The ground really shook. So I dialled 911 and told them what happened.
"I'd heard nothing about the other attacks and it was only when I got home and saw the TV that I realized it wasn't the white jet, but Flight 93.
I didn't think much more about it until the authorities started to say there had been no other plane. The plane I saw was heading right to the point where Flight 93 crashed and must have been there at the very moment it came down.
"There's no way I imagined this plane - it was so low it was virtually on top of me. It was white with no markings but it was definitely military, it just had that look.
"It had two rear engines, a big fin on the back like a spoiler on the back of a car and with two upright fins at the side. I haven't found one like it on the internet. It definitely wasn't one of those executive jets. The FBI came and talked to me and said there was no plane around.
"Then they changed their story and tried to say it was a plane taking pictures of the crash 3,000ft up.
"But I saw it and it was there before the crash and it was 40ft above my head. They did not want my story - nobody here did."
Mrs Mcelwain, who looks after special needs children, is further convinced the whole truth has yet to come out because of a phone call she had within hours from the wife of an air force friend of the family.
"She said her husband had called her that morning and said 'I can't talk, but we've just shot a plane down,' " Susan said. "I presumed they meant Flight 93. I have no doubt those brave people on board tried to do something, but I don't believe what happened on the plane brought it down.
Lee Purbaugh, 32, was the only person to see the last seconds of Flight 93 as it came down on former strip-mining land at precisely 10.06am - and he also saw the white jet.
"Yes, there was another plane," Lee said. "I didn't get a good look but it was white and it circled the area about twice and then it flew off over the horizon."
Tom Spinelli, 28, was working at India Lake Marina, a mile and a half away. "I saw the white plane," he said.
"It was flying around all over the place like it was looking for something. I saw it before and after the crash."
The FBI's later explanation for the white jet was that a passing civilian Fairchild Falcon 20 jet was asked to descend from 34,000ft to 5,000ft some minutes after the crash to give co-ordinates for the site. The plane and pilot have never been produced or identified. Susan Mcelwain says a Falcon 20 was not the plane she saw." -Daily Mirror (9/13/02)

"At least four witnesses who were at the crash scene within five minutes of the crash told WTAE's Paul Van Osdol that they saw another plane in the area.
Somerset County resident Jim Brandt said that he saw another plane in the area. He said it stayed there for one or two minutes before leaving.
Another Somerset County resident, Tom Spinello, said that he saw the plane. He said that it had high back wings.
Both men said that the plane had no markings on it, either civilian or military. The FBI said that it does not think that it was a military plane, but it would not rule out the possibility of it being a civilian plane. -The Pittsburgh Channel (9/12/01)

"In separate interviews Thursday, five residents who live and work less than four miles from the crash site said they saw a second plane flying erratically within minutes of the crash of the Boeing 757 that took off from Newark two hours earlier Tuesday morning.
Susan Mcelwain of Stonycreek Township said a small white jet with rear engines and no discernible markings swooped low over her minivan near an intersection and disappeared over a hilltop, nearly clipping the tops of trees lining the ridge.
It was less than a minute later, Mcelwain said, that the ground shook and a white plume of smoke appeared over the ridge. "It was so close to me I ducked," Mcelwain said. "I heard it hit and saw the smoke. All I could think of was how close I came to dying. "
"As soon as we looked up, we saw a midsized jet flying low and fast," Decker said. "It appeared to make a loop or part of a circle, and then it turned fast and headed out. " Decker and Chaney described the plane as a Lear-jet type, with engines mounted near the tail and painted white with no identifying markings.
Earlier Thursday, FBI Special Agent William Crowley said investigators could not rule out that a second plane was nearby during the crash. He later said he had misspoken. He dismissed rumors that a U.S. military jet had intercepted the plane before it could strike a target in Washington, D.C. In testimony before the Senate Armed Services Committee, President Bush's nominee for chairman of the joint chiefs of staff rejected rumors that the military had shot down the hijacked plane.
"The armed forces did not shoot down any aircraft," Air Force Gen. Richard Myers said.
An official at the Cleveland Air Traffic Control Center in Oberlin, Ohio, which tracked Flight 93 as it turned in the sky and tracked eastward from the Cleveland area, said "no comment" when asked if there was any record of a second plane over the crash site.
"That's something that the FBI is working on and I cannot talk about," said Richard Kettel, head of tower operations at the Cleveland center. He spoke shortly before the FBI announced it had no evidence of a second jet.
Susan Custer said she saw a small white jet streaking overhead.
"Then I heard the boom and saw the mushroom cloud. " Robin Doppstadt was working inside her family food-and-supply store when she heard the crash. When she went outside, she said, she saw a small white jet that looked like it was making a single circle over the crash site.
"Then it climbed very quickly and took off. " "It's the damndest darn thing," said Dale Browning, a farmer.
"Everybody's seen this thing in the sky, but no one can tell us what it is." -The Bergen Record (9/14/01)

"Two other airplanes were flying near the hijacked United Airlines jet when it crashed in Somerset County, but neither had anything to do with the airliner's fate, the FBI said yesterday.
In fact, one of the planes, a Fairchild Falcon 20 business jet, was directed to the crash site to help rescuers. The request for the jet to fly low and obtain the coordinates for the crash explains reports by people in the vicinity who said a white or silver jet flew by moments after the crash.
"There was a hole in the ground -- that was it," said Yates Caldwell, the pilot who was at the controls of the 10-passenger corporate jet for Greensboro, N.C.-based apparel maker VF Corp. "There was no way to know what it was .... I didn't know there had been a crash until I landed, until I was on the ground in Johnstown." -Pittsburgh Post-Gazette (9/16/01)

Why was this "Falcon 20" plane directed by authorities to give "coordinates" to the crash site and this single-engine Piper plane told to immediately turn away and land without explanation?

"A few minutes before the crash Bill Wright, piloting a single-engine Piper, could see Flight 93 three miles away, but was suddenly told to turn away and land immediately without explanation."  -Daily Mirror (9/13/02)

Why was an executive jet owned by Omaha billionaire Warren Buffett "tracking" Flight 93 instead of a military jet intercepting it?

"Additional recordings would be played from the cockpit of an executive jet that tracked Flight 93 on Sept. 11...
An official for NetJets, a company that sells shares in private business aircraft, confirmed that the plane tracking Flight 93 belonged to the company.
The official, who asked not to be identified by name, said the company was asked not to comment on the Sept. 11 flight but would not say who made the request." -Holland Sentinel/AP (8/09/02)

In 1995, world-renowned financier Warren Buffett purchased his first fractional share in the NetJets® program. Three-and-a-half years later, Buffett's Berkshire Hathaway purchased NetJets Inc.
"As a NetJets fractional aircraft Owner, I had Three-and-a-half years to examine the service of NetJets before Berkshire Hathaway purchased NetJets Inc. We knew we were purchasing the premier provider of aviation solutions in the world. And you can quote me to the world on that."
- WARREN BUFFETT Chairman and CEO Berkshire Hathaway Inc.

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 More about Warren Buffett and his connections with 9/11

Shoot Down Orders Were Given

U.S. military pilots were told to shoot down hijacked commercial airplanes over Washington, Vice President Dick Cheney said today.
Speaking on NBC's "Meet the Press," the vice president said President Bush "made the decision ... that if the plane would not divert, if they wouldn't pay any attention to instructions to move away from the city, as a last resort, our pilots were authorized to take them out."
"As it turned out, we did not have to execute on that authorization." Cheney said. "But there were a few moments when we thought we might."
Questions of U.S. military action have surrounded the crash of a hijacked airliner in rural Pennsylvania. But although the government was authorized to shoot down the errant planes, Deputy Defense Secretary Paul Wolfowitz told the NewsHour he believes that crash came instead as a result of a passenger uprising.
"We responded awfully quickly I might say on Tuesday," Wolfowitz said. "And in fact we were already tracking in on that plane that crashed in Pennsylvania. I think it was the heroism of the passengers on board that brought it down, but the Air Force was in a position to do so if we had had to." -PBS (9/16/01)

U.S. officials were considering shooting down the hijacked airliner that crashed in western Pennsylvania, but it crashed first.
"The president made the decision ... that if the plane would not divert, if they wouldn't pay any attention to instructions to move away from the city, as a last resort, our pilots were authorized to take them out," Vice President Dick Cheney told NBC's "Meet the Press" program Sunday.
No decision had to be made, but administration officials say that, had the jetliner continued toward Washington, the fighter jets would have shot it down. The rationale, say the sources, was that the government was willing to "kill 100 to save a thousand". -CBS (9/16/01)

"Above Washington, F-16s flown by crews of the 119th FW from Fargo, N.D.--which had been pulling Norad alert duty at Langley AFB--were prepared to shoot down United 93, if it came toward the capital city." - Aviation Week (06/03/02)

Contradictions

"In fact, military commanders were never notified of the need to intercept hijacked United Airlines Flight 93, even after it turned abruptly from Ohio toward Pennsylvania, so there were no U.S. military jets in the air nearby, said Maj. Gen. Paul A. Weaver Jr., director of the Air National Guard.
Weaver went further Friday, saying planes had scrambled to intercept three other hijacked jets over New York and Washington - but that no such notification ever was made to commanders about the flight that crashed in Pennsylvania, apparently because it initially stayed on its flight plan toward Ohio and was the last to crash.
When it crashed in Pennsylvania, no U.S. military jets were in the sky nearby, simply because they had never been notified to scramble, Weaver said." -Newsday (9/15/01)

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Military Aircraft Were in Range

U.S. officials were considering shooting down the hijacked airliner that crashed in western Pennsylvania, but it crashed first.
"The president made the decision ... that if the plane would not divert, if they wouldn't pay any attention to instructions to move away from the city, as a last resort, our pilots were authorized to take them out," Vice President Dick Cheney told NBC's "Meet the Press" program Sunday.
"As it turned out, we did not have to execute on that decision," Cheney said.
In addition, a Korean Air jetliner en route to Anchorage signaled that it was being hijacked, though that proved to be a false alarm.
As the fourth hijacked plane was over Pennsylvania, seemingly headed for Washington, military commanders, the FAA, and White House officials were on a conference call discussing options.
At the time, there were two F-16s armed with air-to-air missiles within 60 miles of Flight 93. But the fighters were still out of missile range when the jetliner crashed, sources said.
No decision had to be made, but administration officials say that, had the jetliner continued toward Washington, the fighter jets would have shot it down. The rationale, say the sources, was that the government was willing to "kill 100 to save a thousand".
Also on Tuesday, the FAA and military officials were alarmed when a Korean Air jetliner inbound to Anchorage sent a radio signal that it too had been hijacked. Before it got to Alaska, jet fighters were trailing it, and the plane eventually landed at a remote base in Canada. -CBS (9/16/01)

In the White House bunker, a military aide approached the vice president.
"There is a plane 80 miles out," he said. "There is a fighter in the area. Should we engage?"
"Yes," Cheney replied without hesitation.
Around the vice president, Rice, deputy White House chief of staff Joshua Bolten and I. Lewis "Scooter" Libby, Cheney's chief of staff, tensed as the military aide repeated the question, this time with even more urgency. The plane was now 60 miles out. "Should we engage?" Cheney was asked.
"Yes," he replied again.
As the plane came closer, the aide repeated the question. Does the order still stand?
"Of course it does," Cheney snapped.
Within minutes, there was a report that a plane had crashed in southwestern Pennsylvania-what turned out to be United Flight 93, a Boeing 757 that had been hijacked after leaving Newark International Airport. Many of those in the PEOC feared that Cheney's order had brought down a civilian aircraft. Rice demanded that someone check with the Pentagon.
On Air Force One, Bush inquired, "Did we shoot it down or did it crash?"
It took the Pentagon almost two hours to confirm that the plane had not been shot down, an enormous relief. "I think an act of heroism occurred on board that plane," Cheney said. Later, reports of cell phone conversations before the plane crashed indicated that some passengers had fought with the hijackers. - Washington Post (1/27/02)

Also on Tuesday, the FAA and military officials were alarmed when a Korean Air jetliner inbound to Anchorage sent a radio signal that it too had been hijacked. Before it got to Alaska, jet fighters were trailing it, and the plane eventually landed at a remote base in Canada.
That plane had not been hijacked, and there's been no explanation as to why it was sending out the hijacking signal. But in light of what had already happened in New York and Washington, sources say, that jetliner was also in serious jeopardy of being shot down. -CBS (9/16/01)

The 180th Fighter Wing's primary mission is to provide combat ready F16C and support units capable of deploying world-wide in minimum response time.

Military A-10 "Warthog"

The 111th Fighter Wing mission:  To maintain highly trained, well-equipped, and motivated military forces in order to provide combat-ready OA-10/A-10 aircraft and support elements in response to wartime and peacetime tasking under state or federal authority, and to do so with Loyalty, Honor, and Pride.  Willow Grove Air Reserve Station Pennsylvania.

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"FURTHER verification that some kind of military aircraft was operating in the area is scientifically irrefutable.
At 9.22am a sonic boom - caused by supersonic flight - was picked up by an earthquake monitoring station in southern Pennsylvania, 60 miles from Shanksville.
UA93 was identified as a hijack at 9.16am. At 9.35am three F-16s were ordered to "protect the White House at all costs" when it turned towards the capital. At 10.06am it crashed at Shanksville, less than 10mins flying time from Washington. -Daily Mirror (9/13/02)

"Witnesses reported seeing military aircraft in the air just after the crash, and there were rumors that Flight 93 was shot down." -The Pittsburgh Channel (9/12/01)

Is it just a coincidence that the C-130 military plane seen flying near the Pennsylvania crash site was the same C-130 plane that saw Flight 77 flying in the air before it supposedly crashed into the Pentagon?

"A C-130 military cargo plane was also within 25 miles of the passenger jet when it crashed, FBI spokesman Bill Crowley said yesterday, but was not diverted." -Pittsburgh Post-Gazette (9/16/01)

"Lt. Col. Steve O'Brien started his day at the controls of a Minnesota National Guard C-130 cargo plane. He and his crew were heading back to the Twin Cities after moving military supplies around the Caribbean. About 9:30 a.m., O'Brien throttled the lumbering plane down a runway at Andrews Air Force Base, just southeast of the District of Columbia.
"When we took off, we headed north and west and had a beautiful view of the Mall," he said. "I noticed this airplane up and to the left of us, at 10 o'clock. He was descending to our altitude, four miles away or so. That's awful close, so I was surprised he wasn't calling out to us.
"It was like coming up to an intersection. When air traffic control asked me if we had him in sight, I told him that was an understatement - by then, he had pretty much filled our windscreen. Then he made a pretty aggressive turn so he was moving right in front of us, a mile and a half, two miles away. I said we had him in sight, then the controller asked me what kind of plane it was.
"That caught us up, because normally they have all that information. The controller didn't seem to know anything."
O'Brien reported that the plane was either a 757 or 767 and its silver fuselage meant it was probably an American Airlines jet. "They told us to turn and follow that aircraft - in 20-plus years of flying, I've never been asked to do something like that. With all of the East Coast haze, I had a hard time picking him out.
"The next thing I saw was the fireball. It was huge. I told Washington the airplane has impacted the ground. Shook everyone up pretty good. I told them the approximate location was close to the Potomac. I figured he'd had some in-flight emergency and was trying to get back on the ground to Washington National. Suddenly, I could see the outline of the Pentagon. It was horrible. I told Washington this thing has impacted the west side of the Pentagon."
O'Brien asked the controller whether he should set up a low orbit around the building but was told to get out of the area as quickly as possible. "I took the plane once through the plume of smoke and thought if this was a terrorist attack, it probably wasn't a good idea to be flying through that plume."
He flew west, not exactly sure where he was supposed to land. Somewhere over western Pennsylvania, O'Brien looked down at a blackened, smoldering field. "I hoped it was just a tire fire or something, but when I checked with Cleveland center, he told me he'd just lost a guy off the scope pretty close to where we saw it. By then, we were able to patch in AM radio, so we heard about all the planes. It was like a domino effect - a really bad day for airplanes."
He finally landed at the Youngstown, Ohio, airport. "For awhile there, almost every night, I found myself stone awake at 2 or 3 o'clock in the morning. Took awhile to get over it." - Minnesota Star-Tribune (09/11/02) [Reprint at:  Cooperative Research]

"Northern Virginia resident John O’Keefe was one of the many commuters who witnessed the attack on the Pentagon.
“The eeriest thing about it, was that it was like you were watching a movie. There was no huge explosion, no huge rumbling on ground, it just went ‘pfff.’ It wasn’t what I would have expected for a plane that was not much more than a football field away from me.
“The first thing I did was pull over onto the shoulder, and when I got out of the car I saw another plane flying over my head, and it scared ...me, because I knew there had been two planes that hit the World Trade Center. And I started jogging up the ramp to get as far away as possible.
“Then the plane -- it looked like a C-130 cargo plane -- started turning away from the Pentagon, it did a complete turnaround." -  New York Law Journal (09/12/01)

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Contradictions

"U.S. fighter-jets couldn't have had any involvement in the crash of a hijacked airliner in Pennsylvania because the closest airborne jets at the time were over the Washington area, more than 100 miles away, a defense official said Friday.
In fact, military commanders were never notified of the need to intercept hijacked United Airlines Flight 93, even after it turned abruptly from Ohio toward Pennsylvania, so there were no U.S. military jets in the air nearby, said Maj. Gen. Paul A. Weaver Jr., director of the Air National Guard.
That means the U.S. fighter-jets in the air closest to the site at Shanksville, Pa., in the southwestern part of the state actually were over Washington, those sent up to defend the airspace over the nation's capital, Weaver said.
The Pentagon has sought to knock down persistent rumors that the Pennsylvania flight was shot down or intercepted by U.S. fighter-jets and driven down.
The Pentagon's top spokesman, Rear Adm. Craig Quigley, said Thursday that military officials had "triple-checked" and could state categorically that the United States didn't shoot down the plane. He couldn't say whether any U.S. military planes ever had the doomed plane in sight.
When it crashed in Pennsylvania, no U.S. military jets were in the sky nearby, simply because they had never been notified to scramble, Weaver said." -Newsday (9/15/01)

Debris Field Stretched 6-8 Miles from Crash

(Photo source:  thepittsburghchannel.com)

(Photo source:  thepittsburghchannel.com)

America Under Attack: FBI and State Police Cordon Off Debris Area Six to Eight Miles from Crater Where Plane Went Down
"DARYN KAGAN, CNN ANCHOR: Yes, we want to take our viewers live to Shanksville, Pennsylvania. Our Brian Cabell is standing by. This of course is the site where United Airlines flight 93 crashed on its way from Newark to San Francisco, crashed on Tuesday, and I understand, in this investigation, there's some breaking news.  Brian, what can you tell us?
BRIAN CABELL, CNN CORRESPONDENT: Well, Daryn, in the last hour or so, the FBI and the state police here have confirmed that have they cordoned off a second area about six to eight miles away from the crater here where plane went down. This is apparently another debris site, which raises a number of questions. Why would debris from the plane -- and they identified it specifically as being from this plane -- why would debris be located 6 miles away. Could it have blown that far away. It seems highly unlikely. Almost all the debris found at this site is within 100 yards, 200 yards, so it raises some question. We don't want to overspeculate of course. But there were some cell phone callers, one cell phone caller in particular, who said saw a bomb, or something that looked like a bomb with one of the hijackers. Also, the man who took over the plane apparently announced at one point, he had -- there was a bomb on board the plane.
Again, we don't want to speculate, we don't want to jump to conclusions. But what we do know is that there's a site about half mile behind me, where the plane went down, where most of the debris is, and then about six miles away up by a lake, there is another area that's been cordoned off, and state police and the FBI have said definitely there is debris from the plane located there. We have a crew on the way right now. We should have pictures of that a little bit later on.
KAGAN: Which was first question, so I'll move on to my next one, Brian.
WE don't want to speculate about this large debris field. But it seems to me from covering a number of plane crashes on the scene, that if nothing else, this is not typical for a plane crash to be spread across an area this large.
CABELL: It's certainly doesn't make sense, because most of the debris has been found in a very compact area, within 100 yards, 200 yards, maybe a little bit beyond that. Then all of a sudden they're telling us six miles away, they have another concentration of debris, very small pieces. Most peoples here no bigger than the size of briefcase. The debris six miles away may be smaller. We have talked to a number of individuals here. They say they have talked to people who saw this plane during the final moments. They haven't confirmed whether they saw -- whether they talked to anybody who saw this plane actually land, or crash rather, and as to whether it broke up on the way, we don't know that. The FBI being very tight-lipped about that.
But again, at It leads to that possibility. It certainly leads to a number of questions.
KAGAN: You mentioned they have yet to find the black box. It would seems to me when you compare the four plane crashes of Tuesday, this would be the site where they would be most likely to find a black box.
CABELL: That's what they told us initially, and I think they're somewhat disappointed they haven't found it. It's been 48 hours, but they are still hopeful they will find it. There is a pond nearby this particular site. They may have to send divers into the pond. They haven't done that yet, but conceivably, it could be in the pond, it could be anywhere, it could be at this other debris side. They've also found some other debris scattered around this area. They say in fact some individuals have been collecting it. Again, we're talking about very, very tiny parts. The biggest part they found at this site is an engine, an engine part, and most of the other pieces are probably no bigger than this particular notebook.
So again, very small pieces. They had hoped to find the black box by now. They're still voicing optimism they will find it." -CNN (09/13/01)

"India Lake also contributes to the view there was an explosion on board before the Newark-San Francisco flight came down. Debris rained down on the lake - a curious feat if, as the US government insists, there was no mid-air explosion and the plane was intact until it hit the ground.
"It was mainly mail, bits of in-flight magazine and scraps of seat cloth," Tom said. "The authorities say it was blown here by the wind." But there was only a 10mph breeze and you were a mile and a half away? Tom raised his eyebrows, rolled his eyes and said: "Yeah, that's what they reckon."
Light debris was also found eight miles away in New Baltimore. A section of engine weighing a ton was located 2,000 yards - over a mile -from the crash site. Theorists point out a Sidewinder heat-seeking missile attacks the hottest part of aircraft - the engine.
The authorities say the impact bounced it there. But the few pieces of surviving fuselage, local coroner Wallace Miller told us, were "no bigger than a carrier bag". -Daily Mirror (9/13/02)

"Bill Crowley, FBI, has told reporters in Pittsburg, that debris from the hi-jacked plane which crashed there has been found six miles away." -TCM Breaking News (9/13/01)

"Finding any substantial evidence from the plane will be difficult. Any remaining debris is very small. WTAE-TV's Paul Van Osdol also reports that some debris has been spotted up to two miles away from the crash scene. Some has been washing up on shore at nearby Indian Lake." -The Pittsburgh Channel (9/12/01)

"Debris from the crash has been found up to 8 miles from the crash site, but searchers are concentrating on the crater where most of the remains are located. Papers and other light objects were carried aloft by the explosion after impact of the plane and they were transported by a nine-knot wind." -Pittsburgh Post-Gazette (9/16/01)

Mid-air Explosion

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"A witness said he heard two loud bangs before watching the plane take a downward turn of nearly 90 degrees. A large crater, from which none of the plane could be seen, was left in the ground."
Another witness, Michael Merringer, said he was out on a mountain bike ride with his wife, Amy, about two miles from the crash site.
"(I) heard the engine gun two different times," he said. "(I) heard a loud bang and the windows of the houses all around rattled."
FBI Agent Wells Morrison said that Westmoreland County 911 received a call at 9:58 a.m. from a man who said he was on the plane. The FBI had the tape but would not discuss its contents.
The caller said he was locked in the plane's bathroom and that the flight had been hijacked, according to Glenn Cramer of Westmoreland County 911. A loud noise was then heard and the caller reported seeing white smoke, Cramer said.
Connection with the man's cellular telephone was then lost. The crash was reported soon after." -NewsNet5.com (9/11/01)

"According to The Associated Press, the man told officials, "We are being hijacked, we are being hijacked!"
Emergency dispatcher Glenn Cramer said the man on board reported the plane "was going down. He heard some sort of explosion and saw white smoke coming from the plane and we lost contact with him."
An FBI official said the crash "appears" to be an act of terrorism, but Pentagon officials firmly denied to ABCNEWS rumors that the U.S. military shot down the aircraft to prevent it from being crashed into Camp David, the presidential retreat in Maryland, or another government facility.
Adm. Craig Quigley told reporters the cause of the accident "was not engagement by a U.S. fighter aircraft."
One eyewitness to the Pennsylvania crash, Linda Shepley, told television station KDKA in Pittsburgh that she heard a loud bang and saw the plane bank to the side before crashing." -ABC (9/11/01)

"India Lake also contributes to the view there was an explosion on board before the Newark-San Francisco flight came down. Debris rained down on the lake - a curious feat if, as the US government insists, there was no mid-air explosion and the plane was intact until it hit the ground." -Daily Mirror (9/13/02)

Rumored of Being Shot Down

4:28:14 PM
"A Boeing 767 has crashed near Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania.
It is not known if this air crash is related to the three other jets used in today’s spate of terrorist attacks on the US.
The plane came down just north of the Somerset county airport, about 80 miles south east of Pittsburgh.
US anti-aircraft fighters are in place - unconfirmed reports say this plane was shot out of the sky by US defence.
It remains unclear whether this aircraft was the fourth to be hijacked in Boston earlier today." -TCM Breaking News (9/11/01)

"Within minutes, there was a report that a plane had crashed in southwestern Pennsylvania-what turned out to be United Flight 93, a Boeing 757 that had been hijacked after leaving Newark International Airport. Many of those in the PEOC feared that Cheney's order had brought down a civilian aircraft. Rice demanded that someone check with the Pentagon.
On Air Force One, Bush inquired, "Did we shoot it down or did it crash?"
It took the Pentagon almost two hours to confirm that the plane had not been shot down, an enormous relief. "I think an act of heroism occurred on board that plane," Cheney said. Later, reports of cell phone conversations before the plane crashed indicated that some passengers had fought with the hijackers." - Washington Post (1/27/02)

"Q: Ari, can you rule out that there was any decision to shoot down the plane over Pennsylvania? There are still continuing questions that the government may have decided that that was necessary. Do you have any information about that crash?
MR. FLEISCHER: I don't have information about the cause of that crash.
Q: But can you rule out that it was shot down by the U.S. military?
MR. FLEISCHER: That would be the first I've heard of anything like that. I have not heard anything like that at all." -White House/KnoxNews (9/11/01)

"Q: Mr. Secretary, there were rumors earlier in the day that the plane which crashed in Pennsylvania had been brought down by the United States, either shot down or in some other manner.
Rumsfeld: We have absolutely no information that any U.S. aircraft shot down any other aircraft today." -DoD (9/11/01)

"...there were rumors that Flight 93 was shot down. Secretary of State Donald Rumsfeld said that was not the case..." -The Pittsburgh Channel (9/12/01)

"He dismissed rumors that a U.S. military jet had intercepted the plane before it could strike a target in Washington, D.C. In testimony before the Senate Armed Services Committee, President Bush's nominee for chairman of the joint chiefs of staff rejected rumors that the military had shot down the hijacked plane.
"The armed forces did not shoot down any aircraft," Air Force Gen. Richard Myers said." -The Bergen Record (9/14/01)

"Responding to persistent rumors that have circulated around the nation, the North American Aerospace Defense Command disputed accounts yesterday that U.S. military aircraft shot down United Airlines Flight 93 in Somerset County.
"Contrary to media reports that speculate that United Airlines Flight 93 was 'downed' by a U.S. fighter aircraft, NORAD-allocated forces have not engaged with weapons any aircraft, including Flight 93."
It was the second such statement NORAD released on the incident since the plane crashed Tuesday morning on a hilltop outside Shanksville.
"There was no military involvement here. I hope that ends that speculation," FBI agent Bill Crowley told reporters yesterday during an afternoon briefing at the crash site.
Asked if there were any military aircraft flying in the vicinity of Flight 93 or activated in response to the hijacking of the plane, Capt. Adriane Craig, a NORAD spokeswoman, declined comment." -Post-Gazette (9/14/01)

"As soon as he climbed off his jet, Nasty was told by a crew member on the ground that another airliner had smashed into the Pentagon. And he was told that a military F-16 had shot down a fourth airliner in Pennsylvania, a report that turned out to be incorrect." -Cape Cod Times (8/21/02)

"Mrs Mcelwain is further convinced the whole truth has yet to come out because of a phone call she had within hours from the wife of an air force friend of the family.
"She said her husband had called her that morning and said 'I can't talk, but we've just shot a plane down,' " Susan said. "I presumed they meant Flight 93. I have no doubt those brave people on board tried to do something, but I don't believe what happened on the plane brought it down." -Daily Mirror (9/13/02)

"DONALD RUMSFELD, SECRETARY OF DEFENSE: And to change that way of living, would strike at the very essence of our country.
And I think all of us have a sense if we imagine the kind of world we would face if the people who bombed the mess hall in Mosul, or the people who did the bombing in Spain, or the people who attacked the United States in New York, shot down the plane over Pennsylvania and attacked the Pentagon, the people who cut off peoples' heads on television to intimidate, to frighten -- indeed the word "terrorized" is just that. Its purpose is to terrorize, to alter behavior, to make people be something other than that which they want to be." - CNN (12/24/04)

Timeline Discrepancy

 From takeoff to takeover; Putting it all together

(Click photo for source.)

"The following timeline is for United Airlines flight 93, scheduled to fly from Newark International Airport to San Francisco. The flight crashed in Pennsylvania.
--8:42 a.m.: United Airlines flight 93 takes off from Newark International Airport.
--9:16 a.m.: FAA informs NORAD that United Airlines flight 93 may have been hijacked.
--9:40 a.m.: Transponder signal from United flight 93 ceases and radar contact is lost.
--10:02 a.m.: After a review of radar tapes, a radar signal is detected near Shanksville, Pennsylvania." - CNN (9/17/01)

What was the real reason the FBI didn't want to release Flight 93's cockpit recordings?

"The FBI has turned down family requests that it release the cockpit voice recording from an airliner hijacked on Sept. 11 that crashed in a Pennsylvania field, saying the horror captured on the tape would do little to assuage their grief.
"(FBI) Director (Robert) Mueller has personally listened to the recording from the hijacked flight and advised that the FBI will not be releasing the tape at this time," an FBI spokesman said in a letter to U.S. Rep. Ellen Tauscher.
"While we empathize with the grieving families, we do not believe that the horror captured on the cockpit voice recording will console them in any way," the spokesman said.
Tauscher, a California Democrat, had written to the FBI on behalf of Deena Burnett, whose husband Thomas was among those aboard the plane when it was hijacked on Sept. 11.
Unlike three other passenger jets hijacked that day that crashed into the World Trade Center and the Pentagon, United Flight 93 crashed into a field in Pennsylvania, apparently brought down amid a passenger revolt against the hijackers." -Houston Chronicle/Reuters (12/20/01)

"THE FINAL three minutes of hijacked United Flight 93 are still a mystery more than a year after it crashed in western Pennsylvania - even to grieving relatives who sought comfort in listening to its cockpit tapes in April.
A Daily News investigation has found a roughly three-minute gap between the time the tape goes silent - according to government-prepared transcripts - and the time that top scientists have pinpointed for the crash.
Several leading seismologists agree that Flight 93 crashed last Sept. 11 at 10:06:05 a.m., give or take a couple of seconds. Family members allowed to hear the cockpit voice recorder in Princeton, N.J., last spring were told it stopped just after 10:03.
The FBI and other agencies refused repeated requests to explain the discrepancy.
Aviation experts said there could be several explanations for the gap.
...President Bush and other top government officials continue to invoke the story - based largely on the cell-phone calls - of fighting between the passengers and the hijackers as a "Let's roll" rallying cry to continue the war against global terrorism.
But the FBI has clamped a tight lid of secrecy on the flight data recorder - which could best show how Flight 93 actually crashed - and on the cockpit voice recorder.
An FBI spokesman, Steven Berry, said the bureau continues to officially list the time of the Flight 93 crash as 10:03 a.m. The NTSB referred all questions to the FBI.
But the relatives of Flight 93 passengers who heard the cockpit tape April 18 at a Princeton hotel said government officials laid out a timetable for the crash in a briefing and in a transcript that accompanied the recording. Relatives later reported they heard sounds of an on-board struggle beginning at 9:58 a.m., but there was a final "rushing sound" at 10:03, and the tape fell silent.
"There is no sound of the impact," said Kenneth Nacke, whose brother, Lou Nacke Jr., is one of the passengers believed to have fought with the hijackers. Nacke confirmed that the government said the tape ended at 10:03 a.m.
"The seismic signals are consistent with impact at 10:06:05," plus or minus two seconds, said Terry Wallace, who heads the Southern Arizona Seismic Observatory and is considered the leading expert on the seismology of man-made events. "I don't know where the 10:03 time comes from."
None of the family members interviewed for this story recalls any explanation of a discrepancy between the times on the tape recording and the actual crash at 10:06.
Investigators typically nail down the correct times very early in a probe, experts said. Todd Curtis, who runs the Web site AirSafe.com, said the three-minute gap "does not make sense."
But the three-minute gap is certain to fuel ongoing debates on the Internet over how Flight 93 really crashed, and whether the plane could have been shot down by military jet fighters that were sent aloft as the Sept. 11 hijackings unfolded. The government insists there was no shoot down.
Numerous witnesses in the Shanksville area have told the Daily News and other publications since last September that a mysterious, low-flying unmarked white jet, military in nature, circled the area at the time of the crash. The FBI has claimed this was a business jet that had been asked by air-traffic controllers to inspect the Flight 93 crater.
The debate has also been driven by the wide debris field from Flight 93 - including papers found eight miles away - and by conflicting accounts over whether a 911 caller reported an explosion and white smoke on board.
Grose, the former NTSB member, said he doubts the entire story of Flight 93 will ever be told.
"I don't think so," he said. "It's like David Crockett at the Alamo. We need heroes." -Philadelphia Daily News (9/16/02) [Reprinted at:  newsmine.org]

NORAD's Flight 93 Response Time Missing

Note:  On October 27, 2004, NORAD took this timeline off their website with no explanation as to why.

NORAD'S Response Times, Sept. 11, 2001  [Reprinted at:  WayBack Machine]

***** The FAA and NEADS established a line of open communication discussing AA Flt 77 and UA Flt 93

Hero Theory Reported

"Questions of U.S. military action have surrounded the crash of a hijacked airliner in rural Pennsylvania. But although the government was authorized to shoot down the errant planes, Deputy Defense Secretary Paul Wolfowitz told the NewsHour he believes that crash came instead as a result of a passenger uprising.
"We responded awfully quickly I might say on Tuesday," Wolfowitz said. "And in fact we were already tracking in on that plane that crashed in Pennsylvania. I think it was the heroism of the passengers on board that brought it down, but the Air Force was in a position to do so if we had had to." - PBS (9/16/01)

Passengers Breaching Cockpit Dismissed

Investigators: Sept. 11 Hijackers, Not Passengers, Deliberately Crashed Flight 93

"One of the hijackers in the cockpit of United Airlines Flight 93 ordered the terrorist-pilot Ziad Jarrah to crash the plane into a field in Pennsylvania because of a passenger uprising in the cabin, U.S. investigators now believe.
Thirty-three passengers, seven crew members and the four hijackers died in the horrific, heroic crash.
The new theory, based on the government's analysis of cockpit recordings, discounts the popular perception of insurgent passengers grappling with terrorists to seize the plane's controls.
The government's findings -- laid out deep within the report on the Sept. 11, 2001, attacks that was sent to Congress last month -- aim to resolve one of the enduring mysteries of the deadliest terror attacks in U.S. history: What happened in the final minutes aboard Flight 93?" - Fox (8/08/03)

Relatives of some of those who died on United Airlines Flight 93 during the Sept. 11 attacks say their family members are still heroes, even if an FBI report that claims the terrorist hijackers deliberately crashed the jetliner into a Pennsylvania field before passengers could seize control is true.
Since Sept. 11, 2001, it has been widely accepted that the passengers on the plane, having learned of the other terror attacks on the World Trade Center that morning, stormed the cockpit of the plane, where hijackers had taken the controls, and in overpowering the terrorists, crashed the airliner themselves into a Pennsylvania field.
However, the analysis of what happened on Flight 93 contained in a report sent to Congress last month tells a slightly different story.
Based on analysis of recordings from the cockpit, investigators concluded that while the passengers managed to get into the cockpit, they never took control of the plane from the hijackers.
Instead, investigators believe that a hijacker in the cockpit ordered Ziad Jarrah, the only one of the terrorists on the plane with a pilot's license, to crash the jetliner.
Hoglan said she does not believe the FBI's analysis of what happened on Flight 93 is accurate. The voice recording of the flight's final minutes tells her there was a passenger struggle before the crash, she said.
"It was the last five to seven minutes of the cockpit voice recording that would convince any rational person that yes, indeed, the passengers did make it into the cockpit," she said. "And yes, indeed, a struggle ensued for the controls."
Jerry and Beatrice Guadagno, whose son Richard died on the flight, find the suggestion that the hijackers deliberately crashed the plane unbelievable.
"It sort of implies the aircraft was deliberately crashed, which makes no sense to me," Jerry Guadagno said. "I have never been told or had any reason to believe that the aircraft wasn't taken over by the passengers and as a result of the conflict, control of the aircraft was lost either by the terrorists, or the passengers. … I am quite surprised and amazed by this new interpretation."
"I doubt that any of our loved ones would have deliberately downed the plane," she said. "What I think happened is that there was a struggle at the controls and because the plane was flying so low, and so fast, any little tweak on the controls could put it into the ground and that is indeed what happened." -ABC (8/08/03)

"Passengers aboard United Airlines Flight 93 fought back against the hijackers but never actually made it into the cockpit, the Sept. 11 commission concluded.
The assertion, included in the panel's dramatic summary of the harrowing flight, contradicts the firmly held belief by some victims' families that passengers breached the cockpit and fought with hijackers inside during their final moments.
Relying on the cockpit recorder and flight data, the commission said terrorist-pilot Ziad Jarrah violently rocked the jet's wings and told another hijacker to block the door. With the sounds of fighting outside the cockpit, Jarrah asked, "Is that it? Shall we finish it off?"
Another hijacker, who wasn't identified, replied, "No, not yet. When they all come, we finish it off."
Jarrah then began pitching the nose of the plane up and down to throw passengers off balance.
Seconds later, a passenger who wasn't identified yelled, "In the cockpit! If we don't, we die!" And 16 seconds afterward, another passenger yelled, "Roll it!" Investigators previously have said they believe passengers tried to use a food cart to break the cockpit door.
Jarrah said, "Allah is the greatest! Allah is the greatest!", and he asked his fellow hijacker, "Is that it? I mean, shall we put it down?"
The other hijacker answered, "Yes, put it in, and pull it down."
Roughly 90 seconds later, the jet rolled onto its back and crashed into a Pennsylvania field at more than 580 mph, killing everyone aboard.
The commission concluded that the hijackers remained at the controls of the plane, "but must have judged that the passengers were only seconds from overcoming them."
The Associated Press reported last year that the government's theory about Flight 93 described by FBI Director Robert Mueller to congressional investigators in closed testimony also concluded that passengers grappled with terrorists but never actually got into the cockpit." -ABC (07/22/04)

Witnesses

More - Susan Mcelwain of Stonycreek Township said a small white jet with rear engines and no discernible markings swooped low over her minivan near an intersection and disappeared over a hilltop, nearly clipping the tops of trees lining the ridge.
It was less than a minute later, Mcelwain said, that the ground shook and a white plume of smoke appeared over the ridge. "It was so close to me I ducked," Mcelwain said. "I heard it hit and saw the smoke. All I could think of was how close I came to dying. " -The Bergen Record (9/14/01)

More - Another Somerset County resident, Tom Spinello, said that he saw the plane. He said that it had high back wings. -The Pittsburgh Channel (9/12/01)

Alleged Hijackers

1) Saeed Alghamdi
-Possible residence: Delray Beach, Florida

Reported alive - "Meanwhile, Asharq Al Awsat newspaper, a London-based Arabic daily, says it has interviewed Saeed Alghamdi.  He was listed by the FBI as a hijacker in the United flight that crashed in Pennsylvania.
FBI Director Robert Mueller acknowledged on Thursday that the identity of several of the suicide hijackers is in doubt." -BBC (9/23/01)

"FBI Chief Raises New Doubts Over Hijackers' Identities
* Saeed Alghamdi, a name used by one of the alleged hijackers on United Airlines Flight 93, the plane that crashed in Pennsylvania.
A Saudi Arabian pilot, currently on a mission to Tunisia, has the same name." -LA Times (9/21/01)

"It's impossible for us to believe [the United States] anymore," said Taha Alghamdi, a salesman in Jeddah whose brother Saeed was mistakenly confused with another man by the same name who hijacked United Flight 93, which crashed into a field in Pennsylvania.
"What sort of intelligence agency doesn't know that there are thousands of Saeed Alghamdis in Saudi Arabia?" Alghamdi said. "It is like accusing Tom from New York."
Like others, Alghamdi said his family would be pursuing legal action against the U.S. government for defamation." -Chicago Tribune (10/04/01)

2) Ahmed Ibrahim A. Al Haznawi - Possible Saudi national
-Date of birth used: October 11, 1980
-Possible residence: Delray Beach, Florida

Four hijackers of Flight 93 eluded grasp of authorities

"Al Haznawi was Jarrah's roommate when they lived in Delray Beach. It is believed he may have trained in Afghanistan to fight in Chechnya against the Russians. He made a "video will" six months before the attacks in which he talked about plans to attack this country and send a "bloodied message" to the world.
"It is time to kill Americans on their own soil among their sons and next to their soldiers and intelligence agencies. <#201> We killed them outside their country, praise is to God, and today we kill them on their own soil." -Pittsburg Live (09/08/02)

3) Ahmed Alnami
-Possible residence: Delray Beach, Florida

Reported alive - "FBI Chief Raises New Doubts Over Hijackers' Identities
* Ahmed Alnami, a name used by another suspected hijacker on Flight 93.
A 33-year-old Saudi Arabian pilot with the same name is alive in Riyadh." -LA Times (9/21/01)

4) Ziad Samir Jarrah
-Believed to be a pilot

More about Jarrah:  The Two Ziad Jarrahs by Paul Thompson

- Photos source:  FBI (9/27/01)

Jarrah stopped by CIA in January 2001 in United Arab Emirates, stopped by Maryland police Sept. 9th for speeding, and a fragment of his passport was supposedly found at Shanksville crash site!

"One of the September 11 hijackers was stopped and questioned in the United Arab Emirates in January 2001 at the request of the CIA, nearly nine months before the attacks, sources in the government of the UAE, and other Middle Eastern and European sources told CNN.
The CIA suspected Ziad Jarrah had been in Afghanistan and wanted him questioned because of "his suspected involvement in terrorist activities," UAE sources said.
The FBI believes Jarrah, a Lebanese national, was at the controls of United Airlines Flight 93, which crashed in rural Pennsylvania shortly after 10 a.m. on September 11. U.S. officials believe the plane's target was the White House.
A CIA spokesman vigorously denied that the CIA knew anything about Jarrah before September 11 or had anything do with his questioning in Dubai.
U.S. and UAE officials say Jarrah was stopped at the airport in Dubai on January 30, 2001, after the CIA notified UAE officials that he would be arriving from Pakistan on his way back to Europe. UAE sources say the CIA wanted to know where he had been in Afghanistan and how long he had been there.
Told of the CIA's denial, UAE government officials repeated to CNN that Jarrah was questioned at the request of the United States. Senior UAE sources said they had no reason to question him for their own purposes because he was in transit.
Jarrah was questioned after he had already spent six months in the United States learning to fly. He had a valid U.S. multiple-entry visa in his passport, a fragment of which was found at the Flight 93 crash site. Investigators have confirmed that Jarrah had spent at least three weeks in January 2001 at an al Qaeda training camp in Afghanistan.
He was released because U.S. officials were satisfied, according to sources. The CIA spokesman repeated the agency's denial that there was any such contact.
After his release, Jarrah boarded a KLM flight in the early hours of January 31 and flew to Europe. Between then and September, Jarrah traveled to the United States, Lebanon and Germany before returning to the United States. There is no sign that he ever again drew the interest of any intelligence agency.
On September 9, two days before the hijackings, a Maryland state trooper cited Jarrah for speeding on Interstate 95 in Cecil County, near the Delaware state line. Registration showed that the red 2001 Mitsubishi Galant that Jarrah drove that night was owned by Garden State Car Rental at Newark International Airport in New Jersey. After the September 11 hijackings, the car was found at the airport with the speeding citation was still in the glove box.
Baltimore Mayor Martin O'Malley has said local law enforcement officials should have been told by the FBI that Jarrah was on a CIA watch list. The FBI disputes his criticism, which came during O'Malley's testimony at a Senate Judiciary Committee hearing last fall.
A month after the hijackings, U.S. authorities also discovered a letter written by Jarrah to his girlfriend in Germany and postmarked September 10. In the letter -- which was mistakenly addressed and returned to the United States, where authorities found it -- Jarrah told his girlfriend he had done his duty.
"I have done what I had to do," he wrote. "You should be very proud. It is an honor, and you will see the result, and everyone will be happy." -CNN (08/01/02)

Four hijackers of Flight 93 eluded grasp of authorities

"Ziad Samir Jarrah didn't fit the profile of an Islamic terrorist.

He liked women. He drank. He didn't pray or attend a mosque. He didn't wear a beard. He acted more like a Westerner than someone from the Middle East, according to published reports on his background.

Jarrah, 26, of Lebanon, was able to travel between the United States and Middle East even though his name was on a watch list of suspected terrorists. And twice, law enforcement authorities had him in their grasp and let him go.

On Sept. 9, 2001, a Maryland state trooper stopped Jarrah for speeding on Interstate 95. He had a valid Virginia driver's license, so the trooper let him continue driving to Newark, N.J., where he boarded United Airlines Flight 93 two days later.

When the jetliner crashed, Jarrah was believed to have been at the controls.

Seven months before Jarrah and three others — Saeed Alghamdi, 25, Ahmed Ibrahim A. Al Haznawi, 20, and Ahmed Alnami, 23, all of Saudi Arabia —- hijacked the plane, Jarrah was detained by authorities in the United Arab Emirates on a request from the United States for being a suspected terrorist.

Jarrah lived in Delray Beach and later in Lauderdale-by-the-Sea, Fla. He trained at a flight school in Florida, where he also worked out at a gym and studied martial arts, kickboxing and knife fighting." -Pittsburg Live (09/08/02)

"Mr Glick is said to have explained to his wife that the plane had been taken over by three men of Middle Eastern appearance wearing red headbands."
The microphone went off again, then on, and a voice in broken English - an Arabic accent, according to a source who heard the tape - said: "There is a bomb on board. This is the captain speaking. Remain in your seat. There is a bomb on board. Stay quiet. We are meeting with their demands. We are returning to the airport."
The hijacked United Airlines flight was the only plane to crash without causing damage to structures on the ground." -BBC (9/13/01)

"While visiting the crash site Thursday, FBI Director Robert Mueller said translators were helping to work on a transcript of the tape -- confirming that more than one language is heard on the tape. Officials say there are shouts heard in Arabic and English." -CNN (9/22/01)

Passengers

Something Strange about Flight 93
Were any of the passengers supposed to be on the flight?
by FrankL at Team 8+

Flight 93 passenger phone calls

Strange Finds

How were the remains of the passengers, including the four alleged hijackers, able to be recovered at the crash site when hardly any plane debris survived?  Were the bodies and their personal belongings recovered somewhere else?

Flight 93 Remains Returned
"The remains and belongings of 40 people who died when United Airlines Flight 93 crashed into a western Pennsylvania field Sept. 11 will be returned to their survivors, the county coroner said.
The remains of all but the plane's four hijackers will be placed into caskets. The first sets of remains were shipped Monday and the rest will be delivered when the victims' survivors are contacted, Somerset County Coroner Wallace Miller said.
Officials identified remains through fingerprints, dental records and DNA. They had been stored at a temporary morgue in Somerset.
The hijackers' remains will stay in the county, Miller said, and may eventually be turned over to FBI investigators." -CBS (08/17/02)

"United Airlines Flight 93 slammed into the earth Sept. 11 near Shanksville, Somerset County, at more than 500 mph, with a ferocity that disintegrated metal, bone and flesh. It took more than three months to identify the remains of the 40 passengers and crew, and, by process of elimination, the four hijackers.
Those remains were gathered by the FBI and other investigators from the 50-foot-deep pit the Boeing 757 jet gouged in a reclaimed strip mine, and from the woods adjoining the crash site.
But searchers also gathered surprisingly intact mementos of lives lost.
Those items, such as a wedding ring and other jewelry, photos, credit cards, purses and their contents, shoes, a wallet and currency, are among seven boxes of identified personal effects salvaged from the site.
For example, about two weeks ago, FBI agents presented the wedding ring and wallet of passenger Andrew Garcia to his wife, Dorothy, in Portola Valley, Calif.
Around Thanksgiving, Jerry and Beatrice Guadagno of Ewing, N.J., received word that their son Richard's credentials and badge from the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service had been found by the FBI at the crash site.
"It was practically intact," Richard's sister, Lori, said of the credentials, which were returned in their wallet. "It just looked like it wasn't damaged or hadn't gone through much of anything at all, which is so bizarre and ironic.
The families of college student Toshiya Kuge of Tokyo and computer specialist Waleska Martinez of Jersey City, N.J., already have claimed some of their remains. Miller said Martinez's family took possession of her remains within weeks of the crash -- she was one of the first victims identified -- and Kuge's did the same before Thanksgiving.
Miller identified the last of the bodies Dec. 19. He is still doing DNA tests on additional tissue samples.
Hendrix said the personal effects that survived the crash were ejected from the plane at the moment of impact.
In the meantime, Douglass is refurbishing jewelry, straightening credit cards and photos with steam heat, and topically disinfecting most other items.
When the FBI releases to Douglass the "unassociated" material gathered from the crash site -- items that haven't been matched to an individual on Flight 93 -- the company will photograph each item and compile a catalog for victims' families. Members can then make claims for items they recognize.
Miller said Douglass also was helping with the disposition of unidentifiable remains from the site." -Pittsburgh Post-Gazette (12/30/01)

Who's remains from Flight 93 weren't able to be identified?

"While identification information on military personnel is stored and centrally available, information on the 64 civilians on Flight 77 took weeks to arrive. By November 16, 2001, all but five sets of remains had been identified prior to mortuary specialists taking care of them before release to next-of-kin. “Because of the combined effort of all three services and the FBI” the process worked quickly. It was “the most comprehensive forensic investigation in U.S. history.”
Personnel from the AFME [Armed Forces Medical Examiner] supported, including acting as team leader, the identification of remains from United Airlines Flight 93 that crashed in Somerset, PA. All but one of the passengers and crew were identified. Armed Forces DNA Identification Laboratory personnel were crucial in identifying victims." - Soldiers to the Rescue/Armed Forces Medical Examiner

Was a copy of Mohamed Atta's alleged letter really found at the crash site of Flight 93, or was it planted?

In Atta's alleged letter, which was written in Arabic, it tells the hijackers to shout "Allahu Akbar" (Arabic for "God is great") when the "confrontation begins."  One or more of alleged hijackers on Flight 93 reportedly yelled out in English, "Allah is the greatest!  Allah is the greatest!," two times right before their plane crashed.  Wouldn't it seem more natural for Arab hijackers who are under the sever stress and pumping adrenaline from knowing they are about to die to yell out a religious phrase in their native and more comfortable Arabic language then it is to shout it out in an awkward foreign language?

Flight 93: Forty lives, one destiny

"The night before boarding Flight 93, in their hotel rooms, Jarrah would have opened a list of instructions, kept in a notebook that apparently was written by his old friend Atta.
It instructed them to bathe, wear cologne, shave excess hair from their bodies and check the knives they carried.
"You must make your knife sharp and you must not discomfort your animal during the slaughter," it read.
"Completely forget something called 'this life.' The time for play is over and the serious time is upon us." -Pittsburg Post-Gazette (10/28/01)

What Happened on Flight 93?

"At least one of the four young Middle Eastern men in first class was carrying a knife hidden in a cigarette lighter and also a copy of a letter.

United States Attorney Genernal John Ashcroft said in a news conference: "It is a disturbing and shocking view into the mindset of these terrorists. The letter provides instructions to the terrorists to be carried out both prior and during their terrorist attacks."

His written instructions said to scream "Allahu Akbar" - Arabic for "God is great" - because this was sure to terrify everyone." - MSNBC (09/03/02) [Reprinted at:  billstclair.com]

'We Have Some Planes'

"Five seconds later, Jarrah asked, "Is that it? Shall we finish it off?" A hijacker responded, "No. Not yet. When they all come, we finish it off." The sounds of fighting continued outside the cockpit. Again, Jarrah pitched the nose of the aircraft up and down. At 10:00:26, a passenger in the background said, "In the cockpit. If we don't we'll die!" Sixteen seconds later, a passenger yelled, "Roll it!" Jarrah stopped the violent maneuvers at about 10:01:00 and said, "Allah is the greatest! Allah is the greatest!" He then asked another hijacker in the cock-pit, "Is that it? I mean, shall we put it down?" to which the other replied, "Yes, put it in it, and pull it down."⁸⁸

The passengers continued their assault and at 10:02:23, a hijacker said, "Pull it down! Pull it down!" The hijackers remained at the controls but must have judged that the passengers were only seconds from overcoming them. The airplane headed down; the control wheel was turned hard to the right. The airplane rolled onto its back, and one of the hijackers began shouting "Allah is the greatest. Allah is the greatest." With the sounds of the passenger counterattack continuing, the aircraft plowed into an empty field in Shanksville, Pennsylvania, at 580 miles per hour, about 20 minutes' flying time from Washington, D.C.⁸⁹" -9/11 Commission [Local]

Was this serrated fighting knife found at the crash site on Flight 93?

'Fighting' knife found in Flight 93 wreckage

FBI investigators found a stout "fighting" knife among the wreckage at the United Airlines Flight 93 crash site in western Pennsylvania, says a federal official who reviewed photographs of evidence at FBI headquarters here.
It's no secret that Islamic terrorists carried knives on board Flight 93 and the three other planes they hijacked on Sept. 11, but they were widely thought to be box cutters and possibly other short-bladed knives.
Any knife with a blade less than four inches, including box cutters, was allowed on planes under Federal Aviation Administration rules before the attacks.
"One of the knives found at the crash site in Pennsylvania was one of those belt-clip, serrated, locking-blade knives," the official said. "Its design is purely and simply a fighting knife."
He added: "Knives such as these should not have been allowed through (airport) checkpoints," assuming the knife was not stowed in checked baggage.
The FBI declined to comment on the Flight 93 knife.
"That would be considered evidence in an active investigation, so we can't comment," said FBI spokesman Paul Bresson." -WorldNetDaily (03/22/02)

► Crews Begin Investigation Into Somerset County 757 Crash
"We (were) literally surrounded by debris, and there's a very strong odor of scorched earth," Parsons reported. "It doesn't smell like jet fuel, it smells like ... How do you describe it? Burned earth. It smells like burned earth."
A witness told WTAE-TV's Paul Van Osdol that she saw the plane overhead. It made a high-pitched, screeching sound. The plane then made a sharp, 90-degree downward turn and crashed.
Officials said that they believed that the plane took a dip and nose-dived into an abandoned strip mine.
WTAE-TV's Michelle Wright toured the crash scene and said that a crater of about 30 to 40 feet long, 15 to 20 feet wide and 18 feet deep was created by the crash.
Officials told WTAE's Marcie Cipriani that it looked like the plane was headed south when it hit the ground. Most of the plane's debris kept traveling after the plane hit and landed in the woods past the mine. Most of the debris is small." - The Pittsburgh Channel (09/11/01)

► Cell calls from planes reveal horror

"At 10 a.m., the plane suddenly went down, crashing into rural western Pennsylvania, where it created a crater 30 feet across and 20 feet deep, and scattered debris for half a mile." - MSNBC (09/12/01)

► 'Black box' from Pennsylvania crash found

"Searchers Thursday found one of the so-called black boxes from United Airlines Flight 93, the hijacked airliner that crashed Tuesday in western Pennsylvania.
The flight data recorder was found in the crater the plane created when it slammed into the ground Tuesday morning, according to FBI spokesman Bill Crowley.

They are still searching for the voice data recorder." - CNN (09/13/01)

► Data box found from plane downed in Pa.

"Federal investigators yesterday found the flight data recorder of the hijacked plane that crashed near Pittsburgh, a discovery that could yield important clues in understanding the plane's final moments.
The other so-called black box, the cockpit voice recorder, still hasn't been found.

As the authorities piece together the story of United Airlines Flight 93, which reportedly tore into a southwestern Pennsylvania field at a 45-degree angle..." - Boston Globe (09/14/01)

► On hallowed ground

"This is the place where, on Sept. 11, 2001, United Airlines Flight 93, scene of a desperate airborne battle pitting passengers and crew against terrorist hijackers, came hurtling out of the sky, turning upside down and slamming into the earth at more than 500 mph." - Miami Herald (09/07/02)

► Families of Flight 93 victims visit crash site

"Shanksville, Pennsylvania -- population 245 --" - CTV (09/10/02)

► Town embraces role it never sought
"When Flight 93 came down, eyewitnesses agreed on a few facts: the Boeing 757 was headed southeast very fast. It was flying erratically and wobbling right and left, at a low altitude of roughly 2,500 feet. Its right wing dipped down suddenly and the jetliner plunged into the earth at nearly a 90-degree angle.
"I had just finished shoveling coal into the cellar (in preparation) for the winter, and was sittin' right on this front porch when I saw the plane coming down at a 45-degree angle," Nevin Lambert says. "I said to myself, 'Boy, that plane's in big trouble.' It was flippin' from one side to the other. I did not hear no engines on the plane. I didn't see no smoke. When it went nose down straight into the ground, I looked at my watch, and it was 10:07 a.m. Boy, I was scared."

After it stopped raining dirt and smoke and fiery debris, he later found a couple of pieces of metal from the aircraft in his yard.
While the FBI and other authorities have said the plane was mostly obliterated by the 500 mph impact, they also said a 1,000-pound piece of one of the engines was found "a considerable distance" from the crater in the wide open spaces of the Svonavec Coal Co.
The strip mine is composed of very soft black soil, and searchers said much of the wreckage was found buried 20 to 25 feet below the large crater. Debris washed up more than two miles away at Indian Lake, and a canceled check and brokerage statement from the plane were found in a valley 8 miles away.
Immediately following the crash, rumors surfaced that Flight 93 had been shot down. The Pentagon categorically denies that military aircraft downed the jet.
Most Americans are quite secure in their belief that a struggle between the passengers and the hijackers caused the crash.
Folks differ as to where the crash site actually is. Some call it Shanksville because that's where the media were kept, a mile away from the actual explosion. Some say it's actually in Stoystown. Others maintain it should be called Stony Creek Township." - Standard-Times (09/11/02)

► Small town shoulders a nation's grief

"The point of impact is near the end of a pockmarked little lane, in a shallow basin next to a pond at the edge of a stand of pine trees charred by the initial blast.

The site had been mined for coal, then refilled with dirt. It was still soft when Flight 93 crashed, and firefighters said the Boeing 757 tunneled right in. They had to dig 15 feet to find it.

The impact was such that few human remains were found, and the site is considered hallowed ground, a heroes' graveyard. It is surrounded by a chain-link fence, with a single American flag hanging from it. The Sheriff's Department added 15 deputies to provide 24-hour security." - St. Petersburg Times (09/10/03)

► Flight 93 hijacker: 'Shall we finish it off?'

"Who actually put United Flight 93 into a death dive, causing it to slam into the Pennsylvania countryside on September 11, 2001, is revealed in the 9/11 commission report released Thursday.

The passenger revolt began at 9:57 a.m., nearly 30 minutes after the four terrorists aboard launched their takeover of the Boeing 757 loaded with more than 11,000 gallons of jet fuel.

"The airplane headed down; the control wheel was turned hard to the right. The airplane rolled onto its back..."

"...the aircraft plowed into an empty field in Shanksville, Pennsylvania, at 580 miles per hour, about 20 minutes' flying time from Washington, D.C."

The report says at least 10 passengers and two crew members contacted family, friends or others on the ground. They reported the hijackers were wearing red bandanas, forced passengers to the back of the plane and claimed a bomb was aboard, according to the report.
Flight 93 was the only hijacked plane that day with four hijackers aboard. All other flights had five hijackers." -CNN (07/23/04)

► Last seconds of United Flight 93

"Again and again, the heroic passengers and crew of United Flight 93 fought back against the hijackers, continuing their assault even when the plane was turned upside down." - New York Daily (07/23/04)

► Report sheds light on Flight 93 heroics

"The aircraft struck the earth at 580 mph outside Shanksville, 20 minutes' flying time from Washington. A passing National Guard cargo plane, which had earlier seen American Airlines Flight 77 strike the Pentagon, was passing over the Johnstown area at that point. It reported seeing black smoke rising from the ground near Johnstown." - Pittsburgh Post-Gazette (07/23/04)

► "WE HAVE SOME PLANES"

"The airplane headed down; the control wheel was turned hard to the right. The airplane rolled onto its back, and one of the hijackers began shouting "Allah is the greatest. Allah is the greatest." With the sounds of the passenger counterattack continuing, the aircraft plowed into an empty field in Shanksville, Pennsylvania, at 580 miles per hour, about 20 minutes' flying time from Washington, D.C." - 9/11 Commission [local]

► September 11, 2001 - The FAA Responds

"Horak, along with many others, used picks and shovels to scour the crash site for aircraft parts, including the voice and data recorders and any other material that would help in the investigation.
At one point, searchers stopped using hand tools and brought in a backhoe to assist with the search. Thursday night, as the backhoe was moving mounds of dirt in a crater that was about 30 feet deep, the flight data recorder fell to the ground. The cockpit voice recorder was found later." - FAA

► Flight 93 stats

Airline:                United Airlines

Aircraft:               Boeing 757-222

Location:               Somerset, Pennsylvania, USA

Registration:           N591UA

Previous Registrations: ---

Flight Number:          93

Fatalities:             45:45

MSN:                    28142

Line Number:            718

Engine Manufacturer:    Pratt & Whitney

Engine Model:           PW2037

Year of Delivery:       1996

- Airdisaster.com

► Boeing 757 Specifications

Dimensions           Feet
Wing Span            124.10
Tail Height          44.6
Interior Cabin Width 11.7
Length               155.3
Crew & Passengers    2 Pilots 192 Passengers
Cruise Speed         530 mph
Max Fuel Capacity    11,489 gal
Max Takeoff Weight   255,000 lb (115,680 kg) [115 tons]

Sources:  Boeing, FOX

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