The Twilight Zone Tower

[Daveparts]

You know America is such a funny place, land of the free home of the brave. Freest of the free but there are some topics that are strictly verboten! I can call the President a war criminal and a murderer and most people will just nod saying “Well, you’re entitled to your opinion.” But if you begin to present evidence to that affect, with apologies to Rod Serling you’ve just crossed over into the Twilight Zone. You are a conspiracy theorist and in America a conspiracy theorist is only one step above child abuser, scab or a racist.

Now understand at a murder investigation the police use detectives and technicians to gather evidence and formulate a theory as to who might have committed the crime. Then they take their case to our court systems the judge or jury decides by the weight of evidence whose theory they accept as most likely being true. Now the police detectives look for a motive, and for who would be capable of the crime and for who doesn’t have a good alibi or who’s stories don’t ring true. But now you’re no investigator heck you don’t even have a badge! But as Bart Simpson once asked “Do you have to get all A’s to be a policeman?” No, you’re a conspiracy theorist, your just looking for who might have had motive or the ability to commit the crime and who doesn’t have a good alibi and when their stories don’t ring true, see the difference?

It seems that every time I try to research some aspect of 9/11 I end up somewhere else.
I was trying to find out about the tapes of interviews with the New York tower air traffic controllers I was just being curious I wasn’t out looking for a conspiracy.

Washington Post Thursday, May 6, 2004
“Six air traffic controllers provided accounts of their communications with hijacked planes on Sept. 11, 2001, on a tape recording that was later destroyed by Federal Aviation Administration managers, according to a government investigative report issued today.
It is unclear what information was on the tape because no one ever listened to, transcribed or duplicated it, the report by the Department of Transportation inspector general said”
Hours after the hijacked planes flew into the World Trade Center Towers, the Pentagon and a Pennsylvania field, an FAA manager at the New York Air Route Traffic Control Center gathered six controllers who communicated or tracked two of the hijacked planes and recorded in a one-hour interview their personal accounts of what occurred, the report stated.

The manager, who is not named in the report, said that his intentions were to provide quick information to federal officials investigating the attack before the air traffic controllers involved took sick leave for the stress of their experiences, as is common practice.
According to the report, a second manager at the New York center promised a union official representing the controllers that he would "get rid of" the tape after controllers used it to provide written statements to federal officials about the events of the day.
Instead, the second manager said he destroyed the tape between December 2001 and January 2002 by crushing the tape with his hand, cutting it into small pieces and depositing the pieces into trash cans around the building, the report said.
Washington Post
Thursday, May 6, 2004

Now if you are the trusting sort you might say he just made a mistake. But now if you’re of a suspicious nature or a low down conspiracy theorist you might ask, why destroy the tape? What reason? Negligence? Do you suppose it went something like this?
“Bill when the first plane hit the tower what were you doing?” Well sir, I had just burnt my lip on my crack pipe so I went down to the bar to get another beer.” “And John is that how you remember it?” “I don’t know sir I was asleep at the time.” Under those conditions I could understand the FAA destroying a tape. But there is absolutely no evidence that the controllers did anything wrong, so why did they destroy this tape?

The official reason,

According to the report, a second manager at the New York center promised a union official representing the controllers that he would "get rid of" the tape after controllers the used it to provide written statements to federal officials about the events of the day. It is unclear what information was on the tape because no one ever listened to, transcribed or duplicated it, the report by the Department of Transportation inspector general said.

Well that makes perfect sense, everyone knows what a close relationship unions and management have. What it tells me a low down conspiracy theorist is the controllers in deed did nothing wrong. So, again why destroy the tape? Officially it was used it to provide written statements to federal officials about the events of the day. Why that answer makes perfect sense except as Colombo would say “Ah just one more thing
didn’t you say?

“It is unclear what information was on the tape because no one ever listened to, transcribed or duplicated it, the report by the Department of Transportation inspector general said”

Pea cue Lar ain’t it? So according to Federal officials, the air controllers that had communications with the highjacker's after the event then gave statements on tape for the purpose of supplying a basis for a written statement. But the tape was never listened to or transcribed but destroyed and then obliterated into irretrievable pieces and the controllers then gave written statements under the auspices of their government employer. Can anyone out there in Internet land give me a reason other than that the taped statements didn’t match the written statements? You see I have a suspicious nature and after all I’m a low down conspiracy theorist.

What does the government say?

"We believe the audiotape in question appears to be consistent with written statements and other materials provided to FBI investigators and would not have added in any significant way to the information contained in what has already been provided to investigators and members of the 9/11 commission," said FAA spokesman Greg Martin.

But how can you be so sure? I guess we’ll just have to take your word for it, besides what else could he say there is no evidence is there?

One controller said she asked to listen to the tape in order to prepare her written account of her experience, but one of the managers denied her request.

I wonder why? Wasn’t that the stated purpose of making the tape in the first place? But then you already know what I think; I’m a low down conspiracy theorist.

[quickesst]

1. Before it starts....

I just wanted to check to make sure you have your wading boots, and your anti-nitpicking armor on. Check? Check? Ok, get ready, and here's to ya. :toast:Thanks.
quickesst

[quickesst]

2. New York Times- May, 2004

Bothers me the extreme measures he took with the tape considering his reasoning for doing so. Why in little pieces? Why scattered throughout the terminal in seperate waste cans?

"A quality-assurance manager at the center destroyed the tape several months after it was made, crushing the cassette in his hand, cutting the tape into little pieces and dropping them in different trash cans around the building, according to the report. The tape had been made under an agreement with the union that it would be destroyed after it was superseded by written statements from the controllers, the report said.

The quality-assurance manager told investigators that he had destroyed the tape because he thought making it was contrary to Federal Aviation Administration policy, which calls for written statements, and because he felt that the controllers "were not in the correct frame of mind to have properly consented to the taping" because of the stress of the day."


http://www.commondreams.org/headlines04/0507-10.htm

[wildbilln864]

3. Great post Dave!

and welcome to the dungeon!

[JackRiddler]

4. "Air Defense on 9/11"

http://justicefor911.org/iiA1_AirDefense_111904.php

Toward New Criminal Investigations into the Events of September 11

PLEASE JOIN THE 13377 CITIZENS WHO HAVE SIGNED THE PETITION OF SOLIDARITY

COMPLAINT AND PETITION AS FILED WITH NY AG ELIOT SPITZER 11/19/04

APPENDIX A1

AIR DEFENSE ON 9/11

U.S. domestic air defense forces under the umbrella of the North American Aerospace Defense Command ("NORAD") failed to intercept the errant flights of September 11, 2001, as called for in routine operating procedures for situational reconnaissance and response.

1. Even before it became clear that the September 11 flights had been hijacked, or that the intent was to use these aircraft in kamikaze attacks, their diversions from flight plan should have activated routine responses for dealing with errant planes. Civilian and military regulations and longstanding working procedures for commercial passenger planes and other aircraft under Instrument Flight Rules ("IFR") call upon air traffic controllers under the Federal Aviation Administration ("FAA") to alert NORAD upon determining that a flight has veered significantly from the route assigned to it by controllers; has ceased responding to ground control; or is an "unknown." NORAD's role in that case is to issue "scramble orders" for interception of the errant flight by jet fighters from U.S. Air Force Bases ("AFBs"). Interception of an errant flight allows for visual reconnaissance of the situation and a graduated menu of possible further actions (these might include attempts at radio contact, looking into the cockpit of the errant aircraft, visual signals such as tipping wings, attempts to force a landing, etc.).

2. These standard procedures were activated on 67 occasions in the period from September 2000 to June 2001 (see, FAA news release, 8/9/02; AP, 8/13/02); and in 129 cases in the year 2000 (see, Calgary Herald, 10/13/01). These figures were released by FAA and NORAD officials to the press in 2002, but go completely unmentioned in The 9/11 Commission Report. The report does not indicate whether the Kean Commission requested comprehensive performance data on these prior interception orders from the military, or whether the military provided any such information. An analysis to determine the typical circumstances and response times for interception orders prior to 9/11 would require, in each case for which orders were issued, data on the times it took for air traffic control to determine that a flight was errant; for the FAA to alert NORAD; for NORAD to issue a scramble order and for the scrambled jet(s) to take to the air; and, subsequently, for the interception itself; as well as the location of the errant flight, and information on whether it was still broadcasting transponder data. (Transponder broadcasts from planes under IFR locate the craft and specify its altitude. When these are interrupted, craft can still be located by "skin paint" on primary radar, albeit without altitude data.) Also necessary would be data on cases of errant planes or unknowns in which no scramble orders were issued. Of special interest would be the prior performance within NORAD's Northeastern Air Defense Sector ("NEADS"), which is headquartered at Rome, New York. Such a cumulative analysis--with special attention to cases when passenger planes deviated from course in the air-traffic control zones within which the 9/11 attacks occurred--would provide indispensable context for serious research into the subject of air defense response on September 11. This data is currently unavailable to the public, and there is no indication such an analysis was undertaken by the Kean Commission.

3. Response by FAA and NORAD on 9/11/01 should have become more rapid as the intent of the plot became clear and forces accordingly went on alert. Instead, according to official timelines, response times became slower as the attacks proceeded. According to all official accounts, none of the four 9/11 flight diversions were intercepted. Would it have made a difference to the outcome of the day's events? Even presuming the determined suicide pilots identified and described by U.S. authorities were at the helm, there is no telling how they may have reacted to the sudden appearance of fighter jets. One thing is certain: the function of visual reconnaissance of potential attack aircraft went unfulfilled.

4. Two days after September 11, speaking under oath at his confirmation hearings as Chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, Gen. Richard Myers (acting Chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff on September 11) told the Senate that no military aircraft were scrambled to intercept the diverted passenger flights until after the Pentagon was hit (at 9:38 a.m., according to official timelines). (Myers testimony to Senate, 9/13/01, see also, Appendix A2, point 3b.) This was reiterated the next day by NORAD spokesman Maj. Mike Snyder (Boston Globe, 9/15/01).

(snip...)

11. "Staff Statement No. 17" is also the first government document to mention a "phantom aircraft." At an unspecified time after the first WTC crash at 8:46 a.m., the FAA sent out a false report that Flight 11 was still airborne and flying south over New Jersey, according to the Kean Commission staff. They say that the NORAD interceptors taking off from Langley AFB at 9:30 a.m. were not scrambled to intercept Flight 77, as NORAD and the FAA had claimed. Instead, these fighters were actually sent in pursuit of "Phantom 11," the Commission staff said. "Phantom 11" apparently did not correspond to any actual plane in the air. "We have been unable to identify the source of this mistaken FAA information," The 9/11 Commission Report concludes (p. 26). The report does not clarify how it came to be that this mistake was still being propagated 44 minutes after the Flight 11 crash (i.e., when the jets were scrambled from Langley AFB). The report does not ask how the misconception could have arisen at all, if no blip was visible on the FAA radar to be falsely identified as Flight 11 in the first place.

12. From the above, we draw a number of inescapable conclusions: Because the NORAD and FAA timelines were still in conflict as of May, 2003, officials of either NORAD or FAA (or both) were still upholding false accounts to the public more than 1½ years after September 11. Because the 9/11 Commission staff statement of June 2004 radically conflicts with both, either it is false, or both the NORAD and the FAA accounts were false. In whatever permutation, some combination of government officials must have been disseminating serious falsehoods over an extended period of months and years.

(...)

15. We must also consider the possibility that at least some of the false statements are not due to incompetence or honest mistakes made after September 11, but instead result from intentional attempts to hide wrongdoing or gross negligence on the day of 9/11 itself. Given that possibility, the need for accountability, investigation and redress is all the more urgent.

16. The following anomalies give rise to suspicion of such wrongdoing, and therefore demand investigation:

(...failure to intercept Flt. 77 ... lack of response from Andrews AFB ... wargames mirroring each aspect of the 9/11 scenario, held that morning and planned long in advance ... evidence these wargames hindered response and were in fact intended to do so, or to serve as cover and means to facilitate attack...)

l. Destruction of evidence relating to Flight 11 and Flight 175: Less than two hours after the attacks, at least six air traffic controllers at the New York Air Route Traffic Control Center in Ronkonkoma made an audio recording describing their immediate recollection of events. But the tape was later destroyed by an FAA supervisor, before anyone made a transcript or even listened to it--despite other, urgent orders to retain all evidence (New York Times, 5/6/04).

m. Gen. Ralph Eberhart, the commander of NORAD on September 11, is the only source cited in the 9/11 Commission Report specifically on the potential for confusion caused by the wargames held on that morning. He is quoted in a footnote (Ch. 1, fn 116) as saying that "it took about 30 seconds" to make the adjustment from the wargames to the real world situation. The report does not, however, specify the time when this adjustment was made. The report adds the opinion that the wargames if anything increased defense readiness on the day. This is a suspect conclusion, given the actual events.

Ø

(Forward to Appendix A2.)

PLEASE JOIN THE 13377 CITIZENS WHO HAVE SIGNED THE PETITION OF SOLIDARITY

[wildbilln864]

5. 13378 now!

when it shows up. :)