Was Flight 11 a "real world exercise" ?

Source: Newhouse News

In an old Democratic Underground posting the esteemed colleague Shoestring expressed doubts about the customary interpretation of the term "real world" which pops up on the NEADS tapes a couple of times. Here's his quote in its entirety:

The quote of Major James Fox saying, "I've never seen so much real-world stuff happen during an exercise" is really suspicious. I wonder if the staff at NEADS understood "real-world" to mean a live-fly field training exercise, as opposed to a purely simulated command post exercise?

So when Sgt. Jeremy Powell asked Boston flight control center "Is this real-world or exercise?" he could have been asking if the exercise was live-fly or not. And when Boston replied "this is not an exercise, not a test," he took it to mean that it was indeed a live-fly exercise, involving a plane under the control of the military pretending to be hijacked.

This would certainly explain the bizarre conversation between the NEADS "ID techs —Stacia Rountree, Shelley Watson, and Maureen Dooley—when they heard of the reported hijacking:

8:37:56
WATSON: What?
DOOLEY: Whoa!
WATSON: What was that?
ROUNTREE: Is that real-world?
DOOLEY: Real-world hijack.
WATSON: Cool!

I find it hard to believe Shelley Watson would have responded, "Cool!" if she thought "Real-world hijack" did really mean a genuine hijacking. Might she instead have believed it to have meant a "live-fly," with a real plane pretending to be hijacked, for which they could launch fighers in response?

Shoestring surmises that the term "real world" indicates a "live-fly exercise" with real airborne planes as opposed to a "command post exercise" which is only played on the desks and screens of the participating military units. I agree with him that this interpretation is far more plausible than the official version (that "real world" meant an actual, genuine hijacking).

A statement of Lt. Col. Dawne Deskins of NEADS shows that Shoestring is right with his conjecture:

Deskins noted that NEADS had a hijack checklist and a variety of exercises depending on higher authority involvement and direction prior to 9/11. Some of those exercises involved NORAD coordination. She does not recall ever personally designing an exercise in which a decision would be made to shoot down the hij acked aircraft. A typical design would include course deviation in which the hijacker forces the pilot to fly to a designated landing point. They would not do these hijacks exercises real world. They had a cell that would play the FAA in the exercise. Deskins noted that there really were not the assets to do a large scale real world exercise to practice hijack response. The scenarios for the exercises are created by exercise designers in the exercise shop. Sgt. Mark Stanford and Sgt. Mike Quigley, both retired, designed the exercises when she was the head of the shop. NEADS' hijack shop would not design exercises for other sectors.

Exercises that are designed on the NORAD level are created at planning conferences. NORAD planning exercises are mostly held at Peterson, or at CONR at Tindle. There is intelligence representation at the conferences, but the sector shops are more concerned with the individual exercise of the sector floor and Battle Cab. She does not personally recall the design of a hijack with multiple hijacks or terrorist take over.

http://www.scribd.com/doc/19988140/Mfr-Nara-t8-neads-Deskins-Dawne-103003-00778

For the first time, the term "real-world exercise" emerges here in the context of the 9/11 wargames, and according to Deskins, it means a voluminous large-scale exercise with the need to involve the FAA. In smaller (not "real-world" exercises) the FAA was not needed because NEADS had its own cell playing their role. A corollary of Deskins' statement is that real-world exercises were not designed by NEADS itself, but one level above, at NORAD planning conferences.

The reader can easily verify Shoestring's interpretation by searching for "real world exercise", maybe narrowed down with "air force" or "military". The output will quickly convince him that "real world exercise" is a common concept in the military world.

So whenever the term "real world" is used, it indicates that NEADS personnel are believing they are confronted with a large-scale, live-fly exercise with participation of the FAA. NEADS was prepared for these exercises, but not actual, genuine hijackings. It is not known how the air defense used to label such (very rare) genuine hijackings, but it was certainly not "real world" lest to confound it with the ongoing real world exercises.

Flight 11 was apparently viewed as a real-world exercise.

Was Flight 93 part of a military hijack exercise?

FAA delayed alerting of NEADS on the hijacking of Flight 93



Since 2002, when Jared Israel was the first one to point out the lame reaction of the US air defense to the hijackings (not being able to intercept leastwise one of the airliners), there's still no satisfying answer to the question for those who were responsible for the fatal delays.

The 9/11 Commission basically argues that the existing protocol for the collaboration between the FAA and NORAD in the case of a hijacking was "unsuited in every respect" because it was designed for "traditional hijackings" rather than suicide terrorists using hijacked planes as missiles. The Commission Report describes meticulously how the information "Flight X is hijacked" was ought to be processed from the basic FAA controller who spots the plane, upward the FAA hierarchy to the "hijack coordinator" who contacts the NMCC (National Military Command Center), and - after seeking approval from the Secretary of Defense - down the NORAD chain of command.

There is an entire section on this subject ("Interagency collaboration", p. 17/18), which is copied word by word from the Commission's Staff Statement No. 17, a working paper from June 2004, with one remarkable exception. The sentence "Most FAA centers had a civilian employee to coordinate with NORAD, for situations like training exercises", which is written down in the statement, didn't manage it into the final report.

It should have, however. On 9/11, these civilian employees, also known as "military liaisons", were in direct contact to the NEADS air defenders. So the regional FAA Centers were by all means able to shortcut the intricate protocol by simply telling their own military liaison to call up NEADS. And this is exactly what happened:

Flight..................................................11.........175.........77.........93
Controller realizes flight is hijacked.......8:25.......8:55.......----........9:32
Notification of NEADS.........................8:37.......9:03.......----.......10:07
Delay in minutes..................................12...........8..........----.........35

While 8 or 12 minutes look to be a reasonable time for controllers to figure out the situation, discuss various options and get clearance from higher-ranking FAA managers, the outstanding 35 minutes delay for Flight 93 requires a closer look at Cleveland Center, the facility responsible for Flight 93. (Flight 77 is a special case because it was not believed to be hijacked, but missed; it completely vanished from the radar scopes of FAA controllers.)

The "Flight 93 is a hijack with a bomb on board" information needed only two minutes from the basic controller to FAA headquarters:

At 9:32, a third radio transmission came over the frequency: "Keep remaining sitting. We have a bomb on board." The controller understood, but chose to respond: "Calling Cleveland Center, you're unreadable. Say again, slowly." He notified his supervisor, who passed the notice up the chain of command. By 9:34, word of the hijacking had reached FAA headquarters. (911 CR, p. 28)

However: NEADS first received a call about United 93 from the military liaison at Cleveland Center at 10:07. We know his name from transcripts of NEADS radio messages: that was Mr. Dukelin - first name unknown. Dukelin was in direct contact to Stacia Rountree from NEADS, he spoke with her at 9:45 and again at 10:00. At both occasions, he alerted her to Delta 1989 - but not one single word on United 93.

Did Dukelin not know about the hijacking of Flight 93? This can be precluded. He was certainly in contact with the Traffic Management Unit and Ed Wolbers, the operations manager:

They are speaking to the pilot, Dukelin talks to Ed and tells him he is talking to HUNTRESS. Ed says D1989 is not being hijacked, he is landing as a precaution in Cleveland.

So Dukelin, like the Cleveland Center management, was certainly aware of the Flight 93 problem. Maybe he was eagerly waiting for an order from above to inform NEADS:

Cleveland even told the Command Center [at 9:36] it was prepared to contact a nearby military base to make the request. The Command Center told Cleveland that FAA personnel well above them in the chain of command had to make the decision to seek military assistance and were working on the issue. (911 CR, p. 28/29)

But the upper FAA management shied away from requesting the help of NEADS:

At 9:49, 13 minutes after Cleveland Center had asked about getting military help, the Command Center suggested that someone at headquarters should decide whether to request military assistance:

FAA Headquarters: They're pulling Jeff away to go talk about United 93.
Command Center: Uh, do we want to think, uh, about scrambling aircraft?
FAA Headquarters: Oh, God, I don't know.
Command Center: Uh, that's a decision somebody's gonna have to make probably in the next ten minutes.
FAA Headquarters: Uh, ya know everybody just left the room.
(911 CR, p. 29)

Everybody left the room. The Headquarters and the Command Center were tracking Flight 93 as it turned around and headed toward Washington. They got the information that it was hijacked and had a bomb on board. They knew that two airliners had already been used as guided missiles - yet nobody of the leading FAA personnel bothered to follow Cleveland Center's suggestion and tell NEADS (via Dukelin) to scramble fighters. What was going on there?

Additionally, at 9:45 the FAA issued the general grounding order for all aircraft. Who ordered it? The official story has it that it was Ben Sliney, director of the Command Center, but there are also reports that it was Monte Belger, deputy director of the Headquarters - not to forget that Norman Mineta claims the glory for himself. No matter who was it - why did this hero make the risky, unprecedented, precautionary decision to "get all the birds down", but failed to make the acute, urgent, if well-rehearsed and operationally easy decision to alert NEADS about a hijacked airliner on his way to Washington with a bomb on board?

There seems to be only one realistic recourse: Flight 93 was part of a military exercise, probably a hijack simulation, and the exercise plot included a delayed alerting of NEADS. The behavior of Belger, Sliney & co. indicates that they didn't view the plane as a threat, but were told (possibly from the Secret Service who - according to Mike Ruppert - had direct access to FAA data) that it was a "special", i.e. a military exercise flight. The purpose of the delayed alert might have been to test NEADS - to make it more difficult for them to intercept the flight in time.

To substantiate this thesis, I take a look at the function of the so-called military liaisons. I've already mentioned that the 9/11 Commission describes their job as "to coordinate with NORAD, for situations like training exercises". An analysis paper from 2001, examining the structure of Air Traffic Control, confirms that the military liaisons dealt with exercises. Moreover it looks that the exercises were the only job of the liaisons.

Military Coordinator: coordinates paper work and flight data for all military exercises within Boston Center airspace.

This certainly applies to the other FAA Centers as well. Also FAA directive 7610.4K ("Special Military Operations") shows up the central role of the military liaisons for the exercises:

FAA Military Liaison Officers’ Responsibilities

1−6−1. ACTIONS

Liaison officers shall take the following actions in connection with proposed military exercises:

a. Encourage mission planning officers to include assigned airspace requirements in the information disseminated with the request for exercise approval.

b. Recommend the use of planning conferences to mission planning officers for the resolution of problems when it is evident that the exercise requirements will generate sufficient traffic to create untenable air traffic or airspace user situations.c. Provide early notification and information to the affected ARTCCs and CARF on any exercises which are classified under subparagraph b.

So by dropping the "military liaisons" from the final report, the Commission avoided questions about their function. Their function was to coordinate military exercises with civilian air traffic. It was not to assist the FAA in the case of a hijacking. Interestingly, there is an interview with the military liaison of Boston Center, Colin Scoggins (as his alias "Cheap Shot"):

As the military specialist I am responsible for all military procedures between Boston Center and the military units in my airspace, and any visiting military units that participate in any of our Special Use Airspace (SUA).

http://sites.google.com/site/911guide/cs

Q: What can you tell about the military exercises of that day, and if they had any effect whatsoever on the response?

Cheap Shot: I never knew anything about them. Vigilant Guardian is an exercise that we don’t participate at Boston Center. We normally are involved in Fertile Spades, Fertile Angels, and Amalgam Virgo’s. Occasionally we will get involved in large-scale exercises such as a while back Amalgam Warrior, and Global Yankee.

http://sites.google.com/site/911guide/cs3

"Cheap Shot" denies any knowledge of or involvement in the ongoing exercises. This comes as a big surprise, because NORAD was conducting several large-scale exercises, Vigilant Guardian being only one of them. Other exercises, not mentioned by Scoggins, were Global Guardian, Northern Guardian, or Vigilant Warrior. NORAD covers the entire airspace of Boston Center. When Boston Center called NEADS, the air defenders thought it was the begin of Vigilant Guardian. Scoggins' "I never knew" claim would imply that NORAD conducted its exercises in Boston Center airspace without any coordination with civilian air traffic control - bypassing Scoggins, the scheduled coordinator.

This is hard to believe and entails the search for an alternative explanation. Here is one: Scoggins was involved in the exercises, but to admit this fact would have opened the doors for more gnawing questions. Many suspect Scoggins of being a gatekeeper, and the job of a gatekeeper is to absorb dangerous questions. This is exactly what he's doing.

A military liaison was not only assigned to the FAA field facilities, but to the Command Center and the Headquarters, too. There is little information available for the latter. The military liaison at the Command Center was the "Air Traffic Services Cell", consisting of Col. John Czabaranek, Lt. Col. Michael-Anne Cherry and Maj. Kevin Bridges. Mike Williams of 911myths.com speculates that the job of the "cell" on 9/11 was to help with the communication infrastructure (teleconferences etc.):

From this description the cell officers earliest task appears to have been to set up the various teleconferences. They were assisting with communications in general, and there's nothing here to say the officers would take it upon themselves to monitor FAA information and pass it on to NORAD, especially if they believed (like Sliney) NORAD had already been informed. It wasn't their job, and they had other things to do.

Other sources suggest, however, that the task of the Air Traffic Services Cell was to coordinate civilian with military aircraft movement, like their counterparts at the field facilities:

Military Air Traffic Services Cell
–Housed within the System Command Center
–Mission -To coordinate all priority military aircraft movement and airspace issues during times of tension, warfare, natural disasters or civil unrest.
–Warfare Support
–Deployment of forces
–Sensitive, specialized, or classified mission coordination
–Military training exercise support
–Natural or environmental disaster assistance
–Civil exercise collaboration involving military participation

On 9/11, there was no tension, warfare, natural disaster or civil unrest, leaving the "military training exercise support" as the residual task of the "cell". This is confirmed by an article of Aviation Week & Space Technology from December 2001, describing the job of the cell as "refresher training", i.e. conducting exercises:

In a fluke, so was what Herndon calls "the military cell"--the Air Traffic Services Cell, created by the FAA and the Defense Dept. for use when needed to coordinate priority aircraft movement during warfare or emergencies. The Pentagon staffs it only three days per month for refresher training, but Sept. 11 happened to be one of those days.

It is unclear if the Air Traffic Services Cell was in direct contact to the military liaisons at the FAA field facilities, but there is reason to assume that. The cell was able to communicate with other military facilities via SIPRNET, the military's Internet:

The ATSC’s response to the terrorist attacks benefits from the fact that, six weeks earlier, the cell had a secure terminal to access the SIPRNET—the military’s classified version of the Internet—installed, along with other hardware, which significantly enhances the movement of vital information. According to Meenan, because the cell has the SIPRNET terminal, “we could immediately look at NORAD and [Defense Department] plans as they evolved; filter, package, and format them, then walk out to the [FAA] national operations manager—who had control of the entire national airspace system—and give him current visibility into… fighter, tanker, and support aircraft activities. It cut down our response time tremendously.”

http://web.archive.org/web/20020913090602/http://www.aviationnow.com/content/publication/awst/20020610/aw52.htm

The last sentence - "it cut down our response time tremendously" - deserves only scorn and derision, considering the 35-minute delay of alerting NEADS to Flight 93. Instead, SIPRNET seems to have been the central tool to conduct the various exercises. Moreover, it was a valuable tool for "interested circles" to make the exercises a springboard for performing the 9/11 crimes.

Source of the Delta 1989 hijack rumor: the FAA teleconference

The FAA Command Center (source:caasd.org)




Why indeed was Delta 1989 believed to be hijacked? And who was the source for this misinformation? The answers appear to change everytime when a new report on the aircraft is published.

According to USA Today (2002), the FBI was the source. Delta 1989 simply fit the "hijack profile" of American 11 and United 175 (i.e. a Boeing 767 from Boston going from East Coast to West Coast).

http://www.usatoday.com/news/sept11/2002-08-12-hijacker-daytwo_x.htm


The 9/11 Commission Report (2004) mentions the same reason (the hijack profile), but identifies Boston Center as the source. Just recently, Commission staffer Miles Kara has repeated this version.

http://www.oredigger61.org/?cat=18


But Colin Scoggins, the controller from Boston Center who called NEADS to warn them about Delta 1989, explains in an interview from 2007 that the plane became suspicious because it missed a frequency transfer from Boston Center to Cleveland Center:

http://sites.google.com/site/911guide/cs2


Lynn Spencer ("Touching History", 2008) also mentions a failed frequency transfer, but this time within Cleveland Center (i.e. from sector to sector).

http://911woodybox.blogspot.com/2009/07/lynn-spencer-spreads-misinformation-on.html


Something doesn't add up here.

But here's a document that expels all of these accounts into the land of hearsay. It's the written account of Colin Scoggins, the said Boston Center controller, from 9/20/2001. According to Scoggins, it was the FAA Open Teleconference which was established by the Command Center after Flight 11 was reported being hijacked:

Open TELCON reports that DAL1889 is NORDO in ZOB airspace. ASD indicates aircraft is near Cleveland.

Call NEADS to advise of DAL1889, possible hijack.

http://www.scribd.com/doc/13950342/T8-B3-Boston-Center-Colin-Scoggins-Fdr-Chronology-of-Events-and-FAA-Personnel-Statement-Wasnt-in-a-Rush-Went-to-the-Credit-Union-First

In plain language: One participant of the teleconference reported that Delta 1989 (Scoggins remembered the flight number incorrectly) had lost radio contact while flying over Cleveland.

Here are three annotations to this surprising message:

1 - Delta 1989 was never out of radio contact, i.e. the message is flagrant misinformation.

2 - it's Scoggins 2001 vs. Scoggins 2007; when determining which account is more reliable, just look at the date. Memories use to be more accurate after nine days than after six years.

3 - who participated on the teleconference? At least the FAA Command Center and the three facilities Boston Center, New York Center and Cleveland Center, if we follow the 9/11 Commission. Cleveland Center was in continous contact with Delta 1989, Boston Center and New York Center were not responsible for Cleveland Center airspace. Therefore these three facilities are out of the question when it comes to the source of the misinformation.

Is there any reason that someone at the Command Center spreaded misinformation on the teleconference? Just note that Scoggins was not a regular air traffic controller, but the military liaison at Boston Center, and that there was a military liaison (or military cell) at the Command Center, too, who also participated in various teleconferences. This needs further research.

The passengers of Flight 11 embarked on the wrong plane: CONFIRMED

Memorial flag at Gate 32, Boston Logan Airport, Terminal B, American Airlines (Source: patrickmadrid.blogspot.com)



When did the passengers of Flight 11 embark on the plane? After nine years, this seemingly easy question is still lacking an answer. The 9/11 Commission Report doesn't deliver one, instead it confronts us with surprising boarding data:

See TSA report, "Selectee Status of September 11th Hijackers," undated. For boarding and seating information, see AAL record, SABRE information on Flight 11, Sept. 11, 2001. These boarding times from the American system are approximate only; for flight 11 they indicated that some passengers boarded after the aircraft had pushed back from the gate. See AAL response to the Commission's February 3, 2004, requests, Mar. 15, 2004. (9/11 Commisson Report, note #9 of Chapter 1)

It is, of course, impossible that any passenger boarded Flight 11 after it had moved off the gate. The concise explanation of the Commission: the boarding times are "approximate only". This sounds like as if the actual boarding times were spaciously rounded up by American Airlines' SABRE system which records and processes the boarding data.

Example: Given that Flight 11 pushed back at 7:40*** (see appendix). Now the Commission claims: if a passenger passed the gate at 7:37 (before the push-back), the system logged his boarding time as 7:50 (or 8:00 or whatever time after the push-back). This sizeable time gap smells funny and shows that the Commission's explanation for the oddity is concise, but far from conclusive. And indeed it doesn't withstand a closer scrutiny.

The cited note indicates that the Commission sent a request to American Airlines on February 3, 2004, which was answered at March 15, 2004. In 2009, this response was released to the public.

American previously has provided the Commission with documents that indicate the approximate times that passengers boarded AA Flights 11 and 77 and the approximate check-in times at the main ticket counters at the respective airports. These documents are Kean Commission Bates numbers 004658-004675 (Flight 77) and 004483-004518 (Flight 11) and are from American's Electronic Gate Reader ("EGR") records. The EGR records do not provide the exact time of individual passenger check-in, the check-in location (ticket counter vs. departure gate), or the identification of the check-in agent.

The EGR system for a particular flight is manually initiated by the gate agent usually several hours prior to boarding. The initation of the EGR system is done at the discretion of the gate agent. At initiation, the system downloads information for the flight, such as the names of all passengers holding reservations, check in status, seat assignment (if pre-reserved), booking class, and destination city.

Following system initation, the EGR system "polls" the Sabre passenger reservation system for any updates to this data. Prior to the start of boarding, the updates occur at approximately 15-minute intervals and provide a "snapshot" of any changes in information since the last update. For this reason, the ticket counter check-in times from the EGR system reflect only "approximate" times. During actual boarding of the flights, the "polling" process occurs more frequently, at approximately 15-second intervals. The EGR records the time that a passenger's boarding pass goes through the EGR and, provides an accurate record of when the passenger boards the aircraft.

http://www.911myths.com/index.php/Image:Team7_Box18_AAL-QFR-Responses.pdf

So the boarding times are recorded fairly accurate, with an uncertainty of +-15 seconds. In our example: if a passenger passed the gate at 7:37:48, the system might round up the time to 7:37:50 or 7:38:00, but certainly not a time after 7:40 (the push-back). While the system checks the passenger's reservation status every 15 minutes only, it doesn't create minute-long gaps between actual and recorded boarding time.

The 9/11 Commissioners ignore this difference. Why does their report insinuate that the inaccurate boarding times are inherent in the SABRE system if American Airlines declares in plain language that the system "provides an accurate record of when the passenger boards the aircraft"? Either the gentlemen did not read AA's answer (?), or didn't understand it (???), or they decided to cease further inquiries and try to get away with a half-baked explanation ("approximate only"). An internal working draft from May 2004 shows that likely the latter is the case:

At 7:31 a.m. Wail Al-Shehri and Waleed Al-Shehri boarded American Flight #11. At 7:39 a.m. Atta and al Omari embarked on the aircraft and al Suqami boarded at 7:40 a.m. (PLACEHOLDER: THESE TIMES, WHICH ARE PULLED FROM AA'S SABRE RESPONSE SYSTEM, NEED FURTHER VERIFICATION BECAUSE THAT REPORT HAS SOME OTHER PASSENGERS "BOARDING" AFTER THE FLIGHT HAD PUSHED BACK).

http://www.scribd.com/doc/15121435/FO-B4-Commission-Meeting-33004-Fdr-Tab-C-32504-Working-Draft-Narrative-2-The-Terrorist-Hijackings-of-September-11-166

The doubtfullness and need for further inquiry expressed in this paper is not reflected in the Commission report at all which was released three months later. The (too) late boarding is confirmed by two passengers of Flight 11 (Albert Filipov and Richard Ross) as well as flight attendant Madeleine "Amy" Sweeney. They called their spouse from the airport to tell her/him that the flight was delayed. Furthermore, there are conflicting reports of the gate where Flight 11 started from. Apparently the passengers embarked on a plane at gate 26, not at gate 32 as claimed by the 9/11 Commission. More about this here:

http://911wideopen.com/mirror/twin11-1/twin-11-mod.htm


*** This is not 100% correct; at 7:40, Flight 11's doors were closed. The actual push-back ocurred at 7:45, as documented by the radio transcript between Boston Tower and Flight 11. However, this inaccuracy doesn't matter for the subject.

The mysterious United 177 from Boston

In this blog entry I postulated a duplicated United 175 at Logan Airport that took off at 8:23 besides the official one departing at 8:14. Moreover, the 8:23 flight was apparently tracked by United Airlines as Flight 175 while the FAA tracked the 8:14 flight, as I have shown here.

For obvious reasons, tracking two different planes with the same call sign is an absurdity in the world of air traffic controllers. It would inevitably lead to confusion and raise the danger of accidents.

It is therefore reasonable to establish the working hypothesis that the clandestine United 175 (take-off 8:23) identified itself to the controllers with a different flight number. Unfortunately, this hypothesis, if true, looks hard to verify.

This being said, I spotted a possible candidate. On 9/11, Mark Randol was manager of the Civil Aviation Security Field Office (CASFO) in Washington, DC, a subdivision of the FAA. He reported to the Commission:

By 9:25 AM, Marcus Arroyo (Regional manager) called to report several hijackings, including AAL #77, UAL #175 and UAL #177, and he made it clear that this was a terrorist act. Randol then immediately tasked his staff to find out everything they could about the flights. Randol remembers that the whole day was hectic. By 9:45 AM, they had identified that AAL #77 had departed from Dulles, but they could not confirm whether it had been hijacked, while they discovered that UAL #177 was being held at the gate in Boston.

http://media.nara.gov/9-11/MFR/t-0148-911MFR-00969.pdf

The BTS database tells us that United 177 was scheduled to depart at 6:55 pm from Boston, destination Los Angeles.

http://www.bts.gov/xml/ontimesummarystatistics/src/dstat/OntimeSummaryDepaturesData.xml

This raises two questions:

1) Why was it reported hijacked?
2) Why was it reported "held at the gate" if its departure was only in the evening?

Misinformation #1 alone could be dismissed as a transmission error induced by the confusion that day, but putting it together with misinformation #2 creates the impression that the existence of the plane posing as "United 177" was being smothered up.

Most remarkably, the hijacking of United 177 was reported at 9:25, two minutes after Ed Ballinger, United flight dispatcher, sent the last message to "his" Flight 175 while it was over Pittsburgh. It is therefore legitimate to specify the above working hypothesis: The plane that was tracked by United Airlines as Flight 175 was tracked by the FAA as United Flight 177.

Flight 175 was duplicated: Threefold Confirmation

DDLXCXA CHIAK CH158R
.CHIAKUA DA 111323/ED
CMD
AN N612UA/GL PIT
- QUCHIYRUA 1UA175 BOSLAX- MESSAGE FROM CHIDD -
/BEWARE ANY COCKPIT INTROUSION: TWO AIRCAFT IN NY . HIT TRADE C
NTER BUILDS...
CHIDD ED BALLINGER
;09111323 108575 0574

As I've shown in the last blog entry, the ACARS radio messages sent from United Airlines dispatchers to Flight 93 are clear evidence that the plane was over Fort Wayne, Indiana and later Champaign, Illinois when it received its last messages. This doesn't mean that the "official" Flight 93 which turned around over Cleveland didn't exist; there is plenty of FAA material showing that it did exist. Hence the conclusion that United Airlines tracked a different Flight 93 than the FAA is inevitable - a case for duplicated planes and 9/11 being an Operation Northwoods-like maneuver.

Likewise, United dispatchers sent ACARS messages to Flight 175 locating it near Harrisburg, Pennsylvania just when the South Tower was hit (by whatever plane) and near Pittsburgh 20 minutes later. Hence the Flight 175 that was tracked by United Airlines was not identical to the plane that hit the South Tower.

Before featuring the ACARS messages in particular, I'd like to repeat why it's possible to deduce the approximate position of a plane by means of the transmitting ground station that is attached to each message:

Mr. Winter explained the Aircraft Condition and Reporting System ACARS uses radio ground stations (RGS) at various locations throughout the United States for communication. The messages from the aircraft utilize the RGS in a downlink operating system. A central router determines the strongest signal received from the aircraft and routes the signal/message to UAL flight dispatch.
http://www.911myths.com/images/1/1c/Team7_Box11_FBI302s_ACARS.pdf

In other words: if the message denotes (for example) PIT, this means that the Pittsburgh RGS has received the strongest signal and that the plane is in the vicinity of Pittsburgh (usually up to 70 miles, depending on the distance to other RGS's). A map of the RGS's of the relevant part of the United States is here:








Now to the ACARS messages. They have generously been scanned and published by Mike Williams of 911myths.com:http://www.911myths.com/images/8/82/Team7_Box13_UAL_ACARS.pdf
I have transcribed them and added brief comments. The crucial informations are highlighted in red. The last three letters in the fourth line denote the active RGS, and the last line denotes the date and time which is given in zulu format (09111259 = September 11th, 8:59 EDT).

At 8:59, United aircraft maintenance employee Jerry Tsen sent an ACARS message to Flight 175 via the radio ground station MDT (Harrisburg), indicating that the plane was near Harrisburg, not New York.

DDLXCXA SFOLM CHI58R SFOFRSAM
.SFOLMUA 111259/JER
CMD
AN N612UA/GL MDT
- QUSFOLMUA 1UA175 BOSLAX
I HEARD OF A REPORTED INCIDENT ABOARD YOUR ACFT. PLZ VERIFY ALL
IS NORMAL....THX 777SAM
SFOLM JERRY TSEN

;09111259 108575 0543

At 9:03, United flight dispatcher Ed Ballinger sent an ACARS message to Flight 175 when it was still in the vicinity of Harrisburg - exactly when another plane (later believed to be Flight 175) crashed into the WTC South Tower:

DDLXCXA CHIAK CH158R
.CHIAKUA 111303/ED
CMD
AN N612UA/GL MDT
- QUCHIYRUA 1UA175 BOSLAX- MESSAGE FROM CHIDD -
HOW IS THE RIDE. ANY THING DISPATCH CAN DO FOR YOU...
CHIDD ED BALLINGER
;09111303 108575 0545

Also at 9:03, United flight dispatcher Sandy Rogers sent another ACARS message to Flight 175.

DDLXCXA CHIYR CH158R
.CHIYRUA 111303/AD
CMD
AN N612UA/GL MDT
- QUCHIYRUA 1UA175 BOSLAX
- MESSAGE FROM CHIDD -
NY APROACH LOOKIN FOR YA ON 127.4
CHIDD AD ROGERS

;09111303 108575 0546

Finally, at 9:23, Ed Ballinger sent the last ACARS message to Flight 175. The message was received while the plane was near Pittsburgh (PIT). This was 20 minutes after the South Tower was hit.

DDLXCXA CHIAK CH158R
.CHIAKUA DA 111323/ED
CMD
AN N612UA/GL PIT
- QUCHIYRUA 1UA175 BOSLAX
- MESSAGE FROM CHIDD -
/BEWARE ANY COCKPIT INTROUSION: TWO AIRCAFT IN NY . HIT TRADE C
NTER BUILDS...
CHIDD ED BALLINGER

;09111323 108575 0574

The existence of the "official" Flight 175 is undoubtedly substantiated by FAA documents (ATC/pilot transcripts etc.) So like Flight 93, United Airlines tracked a different Flight 175 than the FAA. Another case of plane duplication. And for Flight 175 there is strong additional evidence that the plane was duplicated from start:

-two planes identifiable as United 175 took off from Logan ; one at 8:14 (the official one) and one at 8:23 (this one with tail number N612UA).

- the impossible phone call out of United 175: Peter Hanson, who was aboard the plane, called his father Lee Hanson at 9:00:03 through a satellite-based GTE airphone. The call lasted 192 seconds, hence ending at 9:03:15, 4 seconds after a plane later believed to be Flight 175 hit the South Tower (9:03:11, according to seismic data). With the detection of a second Flight 175, the phone call suddenly makes sense.

Disregarding the ACARS messages, the recordings of GTE phone calls, and the statement of US Airways pilot Steven Miller who observed United 175 taking off from Boston just before himself, is not an option.

The alternative explanation is straightforward and yields a consistent flight path: United 175, tail number N612UA, took off from Boston at 8:23. Peter Hanson talked with his father from 9:00 to 9:03 when the plane was in the skies over Harrisburg. It continued to fly westbound und was near Pittsburgh when it received its last message at 9:23. It is not clear yet what happened to this United 175 afterwards.

It is clear, however, that the "official" United 175 tracked by the FAA was a different plane. The research will continue.

United Airlines tracked a different Flight 93 than the FAA

Flight 93 was lost over Illinois - revealed by ACARS radio messages


ACARS (Aircraft Conditioning and Reporting System) is the basic radio-based tool for communication between an aircraft and its company. On 9/11, United Airlines flight dispatchers sent several ACARS text messages to the planes they were responsible for, including Flight 93 and Flight 175.

On January 28, 2002, Michael J. Winter of United Airlines was interviewed by the FBI to help them with the interpretation of the ACARS messages. The full FBI report is appended at the end of this article and can also be looked here (scroll down to the very last interview):

http://www.911myths.com/images/1/1c/Team7_Box11_FBI302s_ACARS.pdf

The actual content of the messages is already known and hardly interesting ("beware cockpit intrusion" etc.), but what makes them toxic for the official story is the plane's approximate position that is attached to each message:

Mr. Winter explained the Aircraft Condition and Reporting System ACARS uses radio ground stations (RGS) at various locations throughout the United States for communication. The messages from the aircraft utilize the RGS in a downlink operating system. A central router determines the strongest signal received from the aircraft and routes the signal/message to UAL flight dispatch.

In other words: if the message denotes (for example) PIT, this means that the Pittsburgh RGS has received the strongest signal and that the plane is in the vicinity of Pittsburgh (usually up to 70 miles, depending on the distance to other RGS's).

Now these position informations reveal shocking news: Winter explicitly confirms that United 93 received the last ACARS messages when it was near Fort Wayne (Indiana) and, some minutes later, near Champaign (Illinois):

Messages #16 and #17 were sent to the aircraft from CHIDD using the RGS near Ft. Wayne, IN, FWA as designated in the line "AN N591UA/GL FWA...". The messages were sent to the ACARS printer.

Messages #18 and #19 were sent to the aircraft from CHIDD using the RGS near Champaign, IL CMI as designated in the line "AN N591UA/GL CMI...". Both messages were sent to the printer and Message #19 also activated an audible signal in the aircraft.

The original ACARS messages can be found here:

http://www.911myths.com/images/8/82/Team7_Box13_UAL_ACARS.pdf

Not all of the messages enumerated by Winter are listed in the file, but messages #16-#19 are, together with the time when they were received. So it's possible to establish a rough flight path for United 93:

9:22 PIT (Pittsburgh)

9:32 CAK (Canton/Akron)

9:36 CLE (Cleveland)

9:47 TOL (Toledo)

9:51 FWY (Fort Wayne, IN)

10:10 CMI (Champaign, IL)

After Champaign, no message was received by United 93 anymore.

The authenticity of the ACARS messages is beyond doubt. The proper interpretation has been delivered by Michael J. Winter and confirmed by David Knerr, Manager Flight Dispatch Automation, United Airlines. The flight path is consistent with the speed of a commercial airliner (keeping in mind that the plane is up to 70 miles away from the respective radio station), and the tail number of the plane that received the messages was N591UA: United 93.

Does that mean that the official flight path, with United 93 making a U turn over Cleveland, is faked? No, not at all. The U turn is confirmed multiple times by air traffic control radio messages and personal statements from Cleveland Center controllers. I will take a closer look at these sources and their relation to the RADES radar data in forthcoming blog entries. I can already promise that this checkup will further damage the credibility of the RADES files.

In my past research, I have uncovered the duplication of several planes involved in 9/11, but the case of Flight 93 over Illinois is the strongest one due to the authentic power of the ACARS messages. The Flight 93 that was tracked by United Airlines was a different plane than the Flight 93 that was tracked by the FAA.

In my previous blog entry, I already have presented evidence that Flight 93 was duplicated right from the start. Also note the same dichotomy at Logan Airport: According to ACARS, Flight 175 took off at 8:28. According to the FAA, Flight 175 took off at 8:43.

A pattern emerges.




Appendix - FBI summary of the interview with Michael J. Winter

On January 28, 2002, Michael J. Winter was interviewed at United Airlines UAL, World Headquarters, 1200 E. Algonquin Road, Elk Grove Village, IL. The interviewing Agent indentified himself to Mr. Winter and told him, the interview concerned UAL flight 93 on September 11, 2001 and the communications between UAL flight 93 and the flight dispatchers. Mr. Winter voluntarily provided the following information regarding these communications.

In reviewing the Sanitized Time and Text of ACARS messages as provided by the FBI, Mr. Winter said Meassage #1 was from the aircraft to UAL Dispatch. Message #2 was to the aircraft from UAL Dispatch at John F. Kennedy International Airport, New York, NY and Message #3 was to the aircraft from UAL flight dispatcher ED BALLINGER. Message #4 was from the aircraft to UAL flight dispatcher ED BALLINGER. Message #5, listed as unreadable, was engine data advisory information. Message #6 was from UAL flight dispatcher A.D. "Sandy " ROGERS to the aircraft and Message #7 was from UAL flight dispatcher ROBERT BRITTAIN to the aircraft.

Message #8 was to the aircraft from BALLINGER and Message #9, listed as unreadable, was the engine data advisory information. Message #10 was from UAL flight Dispatcher CHAD McCURDY to the aircraft. Except for Message #13, which was to the aircraft from UAL SAn Francisco Maintenance, DAVID PRICE, all of the other messages listed were from UAL flight dispatcher BALLINGER.

Mr. Winter explained the Aircraft Condition and Reporting System ACARS uses radio ground stations RGS at various locations throughout the United States for communication. The messages from the aircraft utilize the RGS ina downlink operating system. A central router determines the strongest signal received from the aircraft and routes the signal/message to UAL flight dispatch.

Message #1 was routed from the aircraft through the RGS near Pittsburgh, PA PIT as designated in the line "DT DDL PIT...". Message #2, to the aircraft, was also routed through the RGS near Pittsburgh, A and was directed to the ACARS printer on the aircraft. The routing to the printer is designated by the letters "AGM" following "Smi=AGM" and "STX=AGM.."

Message #3 was a message to the aircraft from Chicago Dispatch CHIDD listed as a Command Respoinse MD type message. The CMD message, designated in the line "Smi=CMD Agy/Num=65535", was sent to the ACARS screen and utilized the RGS near Pittsburgh, PA. In this type of message, the flight dispatcher can also activate an audible signal to alert the flight crew of the sent message but this was not done.

Message #4 was sent from the aircraft to UAL flight dispatch using the RGS near Pittsburgh, PA. The designation "C4" appears just before the sentence "EWRSFO..." indicating the message was sent from the aircraft.

Message #5 was an engine data message which was sent automatically to UAL Chicago dispatch and a UAL maintenance computer. The information in the message as N41.20 W080.5" was the latitude and longitude of the aircraft when the date was sent.

Message #6 was a message to the aircraft from CHIDD using a RGS near Akron/Canton, OH CAK and was sent to the ACARS screen. The designation for Akron/Canton, OH CAK appears in the line beginning "AN N591UA/GL CAK..."

Message #7 was sent to the aircraft from CHIDD using a RGS near Akron/Canton, OH. The message was sent to the ACARS screen and was a CMD type message.

Message #8 was sent to the aircraft from CHIDD using the RGS near Akron/Canton, OH. The message ws a CMD message and also activated the audible signal. The audible signal designated as "BEL" in the line "QUCHIAKUA-1-BL>UA 93".

Message #9 was an engine data message. The latitude and longitude was also listed in the message as "N41.31 W081.06".

Message #10 was sent to the aircraft from CHIDD and was sent to the ACARS screen omly. The RGS in this instance was near Cleveand, OH CLE from the line "AN N591UA/GL CLE...".

Messages #11 and #12 were sent to the aircraft from CHIDD using the RGS near Cleveland, OH. These messages also activated the audible signal in the aircraft.

Message #13 was sent to the aircraft from UAL San Francisco, CA line maintenance to the ACARS screen and also activated the audible signal. The RGS for this message was near Toledo, OH as designated "TOL" in the oine "AN N591UA/GL TOL...".

Messages #14 and #15 were sent to the aircraft from CHIDD using the RGS near Toledo, OH. The messages were sent to the ACARS printer.

Messages #16 and #17 were sent to the aircraft from CHIDD using the RGS near Ft. Wayne, IN, FWA as designated in the line "AN N591UA/GL FWA...". The messages were sent to the ACARS printer.

Messages #18 and #19 were sent to the aircraft from CHIDD using the RGS near Champaign, IL CMI as designated in the line "AN N591UA/GL CMI...". Both messages were sent to the printer and Message #19 also activated an audible signal in the aircraft.

Messages #20 to #24 were sent to the aircraft from CHIDD. However, all of the messages were rejected indicating the aircraft did not receive them.

Also present during part of this interview was David Knerr, Manager Flight Dispatch Automation, UAL WHQ.

Who was the male in Flight 93's co-pilot seat?

Leroy Homer jr., co-pilot of United 93



Strange encounter at Newark Airport

On 9/11, Anthony F. Mazza was working at Newark Airport as a fueler. One of the planes he provided with fuel was United 93. In the cockpit of the plane, he met a person who was apparently neither Leroy Homer, jr, the co-pilot, nor Jason Dahl, the pilot. On Oct. 19, 2001, he was interviewed by the FBI. Here's the FBI report:

Mazza has worked as a fueler for Ogden Aviation Services at Newark International Airport since 1973. Mazza fueled United Airlines flight 93 on September 11, 2001 prior to its departure and crash in western Pennsylvania. Mazza stated that everything seemed normal on the flight including the amount of fuel that was pumped into flight 93's tank.

Mazza stated that prior to the passengers boarding flight 93, he had completed fueling the plane and proceeded to the cockpit to inform the co-pilot of the completed task. This has been the standard operating procedure for United flights out of Newark for many years. Mazza entered the cockpit where he handed the fueling sheet to a young Caucasian male, well groomed, brown hair and a white shirt, who was sitting in the co-pilot's seat. The male responded to Mazza by saying thank you and taking the paper from him. Mazza then departed flight 93 prior to the passengers boarding. Mazza stated that this was approximately 30 minutes prior to the scheduled departure time.

Mazza was interviewed by FAA employee John Patani shortly after the crash in western Pennsylvania. Mazza stated that he reported that there was nothing unusual on the day of the flight and that the plane had been fueled without incident.

On Friday, October 12, 2001 Mazza saw a memorial for the crew of flight 93 and saw pictures of the co-pilot of flight 93. The picture was the actual co-pilot of flight 93, who was Leroy Homer. Mazza stated that he was certain that the co-pilot he spoke with was not Mr. Homer.

http://www.911myths.com/images/e/ed/Team7_Box12_LeroyHomer.pdf

The FBI report ends here and leaves the reader to itself with the question: who was the "male" in the co-pilot's seat, if not Leroy Homer? Jason Dahl, the pilot? Given Mazza's report, this only "regular" explanation seems to be highly unlikely. After seeing the memorial, Mazza obviously took the initiative to contact the FBI. Had he identified Dahl - whose picture he certainly saw, too - as the "male", he would not have felt compelled to call the FBI.

When interviewing Mazza, the FBI surely asked him about this possibility and probably showed ihm photos of Dahl again. In any case, the absence of Dahl in the report makes clear that he was not the "male" either. And Dahl was 43, not really a young man like the "male" as described by Mazza.

Jere Longman ("Among the heroes") describes meticulously the United Airlines routine pre-flight procedures. Before the passengers board a plane, it has to be checked, of course. Basically the captain looks after the cockpit instruments along a pre-flight checklist while the first officer checks the plane outside (tires etc.). The fact that Mazza met neither Dahl nor Homer is even more disturbing than the presence of the "male".

This looks like another case of plane duplication. It is already known that according to United Airlines ACARS messages, Flight 93 took off at 8:28, other than the official take-off time 8:42. We have to accustom ourselves to two different "Flight 93" taking off from Newark Airport.

Official NEADS Tapes Transcript: Sketchy and misleading

According to 9/11 Commission staffer Miles Kara, the NEADS tapes transcripts were accomplished by Alderson Reporting, a "professional transcribing organization", based on the audio files provided to them by the Department of Defense.

I myself have already transcribed parts of the tapes here. But comparing the very first sample - Channel 21, 1:10:30 - to the "professional" version has produced an unsettling insight: the official transcripts, however professional they are supposed to be, are sketchy, misleading, and not to be trusted.

Here's the transcript of Alderson Reporting:

MALESPEAKER 2: (inaudible) range 53. All right, 288 for (inaudible)

MALE SPEAKER 3: 288 (inaudible)

MALE SPEAKER 2: (inaudible)

FEMALE SPEAKER 1: I have a 288 for (inaudible). I have a 287 for 97. Yup. Yup. (inaudible) I do. I have two real close to go, so (inaudible). One has a code of 7112, the one right next to them.

http://www.scribd.com/doc/14142026/NYC-Box-3-Neadsconrnorad-Fdr-Transcript-Atcscc-Channel-21-Tt-Op-010


And here's my transcript:

9:41:05 Another one. (Inaudible) I hear someone going from Boston going to Las Vegas - another one

9:41:11 As before is one missing. Start a search. (Inaudible) range out of 53

9:41:35 A 288 for 92 miles search only. 92 miles? 288 miles for 92 search only

9:41:46 I have a 280 for 97

9:41:58 I have a 287 for 97. Yup.Yup. What did I do -

9:42:23 The two real close together. Here we go you see. One used - one has a code of 7112 - the one we are next to 'em


As I've learned, transcribing noisy radio transmissions is not an easy job to do, and I never would condemn someone for a petty misinterpretation. But the official transcript omits significant and clearly understandable information:

- another one is reported going from Boston to Las Vegas

- A search is started (start a search)

- A position information is reported as 280 for 97

I'm not talking of odds and ends here. The omissions are crucial for the Delta 89 case, as I will show in a coming blog entry.

Request for the reader: Don't believe me blindly. Please check the audio file for yourself to verify these omissions!

Channel 21, 1:10:30

This part on Channel 21 is the first one where I checked the veracity of an official NEADS transcript, but this example shows that there is the need to review all other channels, too.

The official NEADS tapes transcripts are not to be trusted.

Delta 89, Code 7112: The Faker Hijack Exercise

The NORAD tapes are proof: Delta 89 was not Delta 1989.

Three minutes after the Pentagon was hit, a strange aircraft with call sign "Delta 89" popped up on the radar screens of air defense commander Kevin Nasypany's crew. It signaled a hijacking and was tracked by NEADS for three minutes before it suddenly disappeared again.

In the official story, Delta 89 doesn't exist. Better to say, for the 9/11 Commission as well as authors Michael Bronner and Lynn Spencer ("Touching History"), the plane tracked by NEADS as Delta 89 was in fact Delta 1989, i.e. a case of sloppy communication.

This, however, is impossible. It is easy to show that, apart from the different call sign, Delta 89's transponder code, flight plan and flight path differed from Delta 1989. The evidence is present on the NORAD tapes, a source of impeccable authenticity because you can virtually look over the shoulder of NEADS technicians while they're tracking Delta 89 on their displays.

To demonstrate why Delta 89 was not identical with Delta 1989, I will go through the NORAD tapes step by step and comment on them. But before starting the analysis, we need to get a rough understanding how NEADS radar works - it's quite different from the FAA radar. Lynn Spencer explains in her book "Touching History" (p.32):

Slow and cumbersome, and not nearly as user friendly as more modern equipment, the NEADS monochromic radar displays are not designed to take internal FAA radar data or to identify radar tracks originating from inside the United States. The system offers little, if any, such low-level coverage over the country.
...
Their radar scopes are filled with hundreds of radar returns not just from aircraft but from weather systems, ground interference. and what's called anomalous propagation - false returns caused by conditions in the atmosphere, or by such obstruction as flocks of birds.

So the NEADS radar screen is filled with countless radar blips from planes - without the identifying data block common to FAA radar, however - as well as irregular radar returns. Only on special occasions like emergency cases, a plane's blip is highlighted and provided with a data tag. Lynn Spencer (p. 25/26):

Pilots have three special transponder codes that they can dial in: 7500 for hijacking, 7600 for loss of radio, and 7700 for other emergencies. Any of them will cause the airplane's tag to light up on his radar screen, but he doesn't see any such tag.

Now we are ready to start with the analysis. The complete transcripts are here. It is highly recommended to listen to the original audio file of the following channels (scroll forward to the respective time):

Channel 4, 1:14:00

Channel 7, 1:09:00

Channel 21, 1:09:00

(Channel 7)

9:39:31 Colin Scoggins, Boston Center military. Hijacked aircraft Delta nineteen eighty-nine. I give you the code 1304, presently due south of Cleveland, heading westbound, destination Las Vegas. And is this one a hijack, Sir? We believe it is. Didn't it squawk hijack? We don't umm...I don't know - it's squawking 1304 if you want to crank him up. 767, altitude 350. Where did it take off? Out of Boston. We're trying to get a tail number on that if you want to get someone up.

90 seconds before Delta 89 appears on stage, NEADS receives a verbal message from Colin Scoggins, the military liaison controller at Boston Center, regarding Delta 1989. The message is affirmed with professional calm. NEADS knows now that one of the many anonymous radar blips near Cleveland is a possible hijack. Note that Scoggins is wrong on the destination of Delta 1989: that was Los Angeles, not Las Vegas.

(Channel 4)

9:41:00 Delta 89 is a hijack, they think it's a hijack, south of Cleveland, we have a code on him now

9:41:05 Good! Pick it up! Find it!

9:41:05 Another one. I hear someone going from Boston going to Las Vegas - another one

9:41:13 Eight-nine. Boeing 767 Boston-Las Vegas. Another one - same place - Las Vegas

In striking contrast to Delta 1989, the appearance of Delta 89 causes big excitement among the NEADS crew. It is echoed through all of the channels. Lynn Spencer interprets this passage as a prompt reaction to Scoggins's message, but there are several reasons why this cannot be the case:

- the different call sign: needless to say, transmitting the correct call sign of an aircraft is an absolute must in aeronautic communication. No air traffic controller would ever get the idea to abbreviate a flight number by omitting the first two digits because that will automatically lead to massive confusion.

- "we have a code on him now" - obviously, the plane has squawked a special emergency code that causes its blip to lighten up on the NEADS radar displays - just as explained above. This is immediately noticed by the NEADS crew and leads to their excited reactions. The data tag informs them about the call sign (Delta 89), the flight plan (Boston-Las Vegas), the type of the plane (Boeing 767) and the cause of the emergency: a hijacking.

- "Another one - same place - Las Vegas" - NEADS is already aware of Delta 1989 which was reported 90 seconds ago by Colin Scoggins. Now Delta 89 - "another one" - appears in the same vicinity. So NEADS does not identify Delta 89 with Delta 1989, but views it as a different plane.

Bottom line: Delta 89's blip suddenly flashes on the NEADS screens - making it easy to follow - and indicates a hijacking. In contrast, Delta 1989's blip is not spotted yet.

(Channel 21)

9:41:05 Another one. I hear someone going from Boston going to Las Vegas - another one

9:41:30 As before is one missing. Start a search. Range 53

9:41:35 288 for 92 miles search only

9:41:46 I have a 280 for 97

9:41:58 I have a 287 for 97

9:42:23 The two really close together. One used - one has a code of 7112 - the one we are next to him

To understand what's going on here, I cite Lynn Spencer again (p. 32):

To identify American 11, the surveillance and ID techs must go through a grueling process. (...) The technicians must first determine which radar data on their screens is for aircraft, which they do by monitoring its movement, which is distinctive for planes. The technician must observe for at least 36 seconds to a minute just to confirm that a blip is in fact an aircraft track. The tech must attach what's called a tactical display number to it, which tells the computer to start tracking and identifying the target. If the target is in fact a plane, then over a period of 12-20 seconds, the computer will start to generate information on the track: heading, speed, latitude, longitude, and the identifying information being transmitted by the transponder.

The NEADS technicians start a "search" for Delta 89, described by Lynn Spencer as a grueling process. But in contrast to American 11, which had turned the transponder off, Delta 89 is tagged, enabling them to curtail the procedure. In the course of the search, they detect two planes "really close together" - Delta 89 and Delta 1989 -, and obtain the squawk code of one of them: 7112. This is not Delta 1989's code, which is 1304, so it must be the code of Delta 89. The first digit "7" indicates that it's not the ID code of an usual civilian airliner - they never begin with a 7. Instead, the 7 is reserved for emergency cases like 7500, 7600, or 7700. By squawking 7112, Delta 89 manages to pop up on the NEADS radar screens and signals a hijacking.

(Channel 4)

9:42:43 Indy Center? Indianapolis Center: Delta eight-nine have you information on that aircraft? I want to give you a heads-up. This is another hijacked aircraft, Boston to Las Vegas with a Mode 3 of 1304. We do have contact. ((repeats informations)) .

9:43:04 I give you a latlong if you need that. Go ahead. 4121 North 08215 West. I'll give you a heads-up that's all we have right now, but he's a confirmed hijack

9:43:16 (Indianapolis Center) We don't show him in our system at this point - you are tracking him, you say? We have him on the radar, Sir - he's headed your way. He's headed our way, okay.

9:43:35 (Indianapolis Center) Boston to L-A-S, right? L-A-X. L-A-X? I've got Vegas, Sir, whatever Vegas says. L-A-S, okay, Las Vegas. Okay, cause we don't show him in the system anywhere. Do you have Mode 3 capability or anything? He's on a 1304 code? Okay, we bring that up.

Now NEADS contacts Indianapolis Center to inform them that Delta 89 is heading for their airspace. This is evidence that Delta 89 is flying southwest- or southbound at that point because the boundary to Indianapolis Center runs 40 miles south of Cleveland. In contrast, Delta 1989 never goes south, and especially at 9:43, it is flying westbound (direction 285) according to the Cleveland Center/Delta 1989 transcript:

9:40:57 (Lorain Radar) delta nineteen eighty nine fly heading two eight five

9:41:00 (Delta 1989) two eight five delta nineteen eighty nine

The next radio transmission between Cleveland Center and Delta 1989 occurs at 9:44. In between, there is no order to change the direction, which is proof that Delta 1989 is not heading towards Indianapolis Center at 9:43 like Delta 89 (according to Stacia Rountree from NEADS).

Back to NEADS:

(Channel 4)

9:44:03 Where did it go? Somebody dropped the aircraft. Who dropped the aircraft? I DON'T KNOW!

(Channel 21)

9:46:25 (?)52 on a 49 for 59 miles searching. We got a 1304 squawk this time

9:46:53 The 1304 guy. That's not the guy then

At 9:44, Delta 89 is suddenly "lost". NEADS doesn't know where it's gone and is unable to track it. Obviously the pilot has turned off the transponder, making himself virtually invisible. The radar technicians resume the search. At 9:46:25, they are able to identify an eligible blip, but it's Delta 1989 this time. Their comment: "that's not the guy then" - the 7112 guy they lost and were looking for.

Now it's time to sum up the data:

Call sign.................Delta 1989.......................Delta 89

Flight plan..............Boston-Los Angeles.........Boston-Las Vegas

Squawk code..........1304.................................7112

Direction at 9:43......westbound......................southwest/southbound

Transponder............continously working..........turned off at 9:44

Did the 9/11 Commission overlook these discrepancies? Unlikely. Did Commission staffers not check Channel 21 with the "code 7112" message? Oh yes, they did! On January 23, 2004, Miles Kara, Kevin Schaeffer, and Geoffrey Brown interviewed Sgt. Susan Marie Rose, whose voice is recorded on Channel 21 as she spots "code 7112":

Commission staff asked Rose is she recalled details on tracking Delta Airlines Flight 1989 or United Airlines Flight 93 (UAL 93). She replied that she and LaMarche tracked a specific suspected hijack that they believe was flight planned from Boston to Las Vegas through Cleveland and Minneapolis Center airspace. This flight, she believed, was headed to a specific airport, and he was maneuvering to turn into the airport to land.

Rose noted that she is uncertain whether the aircraft reflected in Commision staff's recording was one that was search only or one that was a mode three. She surmised there being two aircraft that they followed based on listening to the tapes in which she pointed out a mode three squawking code 1304.

The "surmise" of Susan Marie Rose is certainly correct, but squawk code 7112, evidence for a second plane, is simply omitted in the report. Miles Kara and his colleagues don't seem to be interested in this other aircraft, despite the strange code and the fact that it was considered a hijacking. Code 7112 and Delta 89 were simply glossed over.

The NORAD tapes belong to the most authentic sources for the events of 9/11, and they are certainly not faked, as everyone will attest who has listened to them. As matters stand, the tapes provide watertight proof that Delta 89 was NOT Delta 1989, Delta 89 being defined as the aircraft that was tracked by NEADS between 9:41 and 9:44.

The analysis must not stop at this point. What kind of plane was this Delta 89? Discarding exotic scenarios like a drunken pilot or a foreign intruder playing games with the air defense, the plane's known attributes allow only one reasonable explanation - Delta 89 was a simulated hijacking as part of a military exercise:

- "Delta 89" was a fake call sign. The regular Delta Airlines Flight 89 was sitting at JFK airport and scheduled to depart for Los Angeles at 3:00 p.m.

- The behavior of Delta 89 reminds of a hide-and-seek game. To facilitate the catcher's job, it left its cover and "cuckooed" for three minutes before disappearing in the dark again. Note that military exercises are often termed "war games".

- Delta 89 didn't squawk 7500, the emergency code for a "real world" hijacking, but another irregular code - 7112 - that was immediately interpreted as a hijacking by NEADS technicians.

- According to FAA directive 7110.65, certain beacon codes are regularly assigned to planes taking part in NORAD exercises - "7112" seems to have been one of them:

NORAD will ensure exercise FAKER aircraft flight plans are filed containing discrete beacon codes from the Department of Defense code allocation specified in FAAO 7610.4, Special Military Operations, Appendix 8.

Source

Delta 89 fulfills all conditions for an "exercise faker aircraft" whose job was to simulate a hijacking. Alternative explanations are hard to imagine. Therefore it's time now to establish the central thesis of this text: Delta 89 was a faker hijack exercise.

So what - the interested reader might ask - what impact has this insight on the official story of the 9/11 attacks? Indeed, Michael Ruppert has already pointed out the existence of at least one "live-fly exercise" (with real aircraft involved) in his book Crossing the Rubicon. Lynn Spencer notes: "Today's training exercise runs a number of scenarios, including a simulated hijacking in which the perpetrators overtake an aircraft for political purposes, directing it to an island in order to seek asylum". (p.24) So is the case of "Exercise Delta 89" important at all?

Yes, it is, because of Delta 1989, which was kind of a "doppelganger" plane with nearly identical call sign (promptly leading to confusion), identical aircraft type (Boeing 767), identical origin airport (Boston), and flying in close vicinity when Delta 89 exposed itself at 9:41. Clearly the designation "Delta 89" was carefully chosen by the wargame designers to create a mix-up with Delta 1989. This is the first indication that the ongoing exercises interfered with regular civilian air traffic.

In other words: Delta 1989, in spite of being a regular airliner, played a peripheral role in the exercise. It served as a cover-up for Delta 89. At first, NEADS was alerted by Delta 89, and when this plane stopped squawking and disappeared, the attention shifted to Delta 1989, which was closely observed until its landing in Cleveland.

Half an hour after Delta 1989, another mysterious airliner in distress landed at Cleveland Airport. Just like Delta 89, its existence seems to have been covered up through "merging" it with Delta 1989 - a doppelganger case again. This naturally leads to the question whether the eerie Cleveland plane was identical to Delta 89. Indeed, there are surprising congruences:

- Both planes were reportedly a 767
- Both planes were reportedly coming from Boston
- Both planes were suspected of being hijacked
- Both planes were covered up by Delta 1989

These coincidences allow the formulation of the working hypothesis that Delta 89 and the Cleveland mystery plane are identical. Confirmation pending.