Bogus pilot story

The only bogus pilot here is the one Greg is talking to.

But one person in attendance not on the speaker’s list is commercial pilot and aeronautical engineer, Nila Sagedevan.

. . . .


Sagadevan was quick to point out one of the main problems with the government story is the low trajectory of the airplane, flying at high speeds and roughly only 20 feet off the ground for a long distance, another impossibility defying the standard principles of aviation.



“The evidence indicates that the airplane was flying low before it reached the Pentagon lawn since several light poles were sheared off several hundred yards away form the building,” explained Sagadevan. “With that in mind, the plane was traveling at about 400 knots at about 20 feet off the ground for a long distance prior to hitting the Pentagon.



“This in itself is an impossibility since the airplane would have been kept from hitting the ground by a cushion of air termed 'ground effect.' No pilot in the world would have been able to control the plane while maintained that air speed at 20 feet off the ground for that long a distance. Again, it’s just impossible but here I will admit that an expert is needed in order to explain the standards of lift and drag associated with flying a large airliner.

Apparently this pilot has never heard about ground effect. For a 757, ground effect starts at around 30 feet of altitude.

If you Search the FAA Commercial pilot registry for Nela Sagadevan, you won't find him.

How did you search for this man ? Through this link ?
Search Airmen Certificate Information

If yes then could you tell me his Street, City and Zip Code cause these are required field's for searching someone.

Originally posted by STolarZ
How did you search for this man ? Through this link ?
Search Airmen Certificate Information

If yes then could you tell me his Street, City and Zip Code cause these are required field's for searching someone.

No. You enter your Name, Street, City and Zip Code, then you go to a page where all you have to enter is a first and last name of the certificate holder that you are looking for. If the name is rather common, like "Tom Brown." or "Joe Smith," you will get over 50 hits, in which case you will need to enter a state or a country to narrow it down. Nila Sagedevan, is not a common name by any stretch of the imagination.

If the man's name was misspeled, in the article, then you have to question the competancy of the reporter.

[edit on 7-12-2005 by HowardRoark]

Damn.... I have to get some sleep before i'll check another site like this... My bad. Ok. I'll check it out. Thx.

[edit on 7-12-2005 by STolarZ]

I forgot to source the original quote.

www.arcticbeacon.com...

Too late to edit the original post, so I'll just add it here.

I like this bit:

“I am not sure if anyone has been in the cockpit of one of one of these big jets, but I will tell you there isn’t much space. How in the world would one man pull out two big pilots in cramped quarters while, at the same time, maintaining control of the airliner. Again, it’s just not going to happen.

I have been in one of those cockpits, unfortunately it was many years ago when I was a lot smaller (younger) and obviously before modern day paranoia prevented you from going into the cockpit (at the invitation of the Captain).

Anyway, there were more than 1 terrorist and the cramped conditions he describes would obviously help the terrorists by preventing the Pilots from being able to move easily, quickly and efficently - while their throats were more than likely cut.





The real corker though, is the bit when he says "at the same time, maintaining control of the airliner".

A 'professional pilot' would know that the aircraft would be under the operation of the autopilot, so that comment seems pretty dumb to me.

“First of all, the supposed pilot would have been overwhelmed just looking at the complexity of the cockpit controls,” said Sagadevan. “He would have had no idea what to do, but we are led to believe that he was able to turn the jet around, head back to Washington D.C. and then bank at high speeds and at a low altitude, hitting a target which would have looked as small as thimble from the air. Again, it’s impossible and you don’t really need an expert to make this final determination.”

He should know that the information can be easily acquired and it has already been shown that there are some flight simulators available for the PC which simulate the controls to a T.
Most of the instruments would be redundant to the task at hand anyway and all important ones would be pretty obvious and clear.

Just to prove how easy it is to get the info required:

www.impactink.com...

www.impactink.com...

Of course, being a professional pilot, our friend would know that anyone can get the information easily through pilot supply stores..

[edit on 7-12-2005 by AgentSmith]

Originally posted by HowardRoark
If the man's name was misspeled, in the article, then you have to question the competancy of the reporter.
[edit on 7-12-2005 by HowardRoark]

I would say that if this is a made up story...then you have to question more than just the competancy of the reporter. Very interesting to say the least.

That is interesting.

I wouldn't be surprised, though. There's a LOT of scam artists out there leeching off 9-11, selling bogus crap like pods, missiles at the Pentagon, missiles from the Woolworths Building, etc., some to make money, and some as part of the disinfo campaign. I believe Mr. Sagadevan is an advocate of the "no plane at the Pentagon" theory, which immediately makes him suspicious as a shill in my book.

Could it be that he is retired and his name wouldn't be listed? Does it list all pilots globally, or only pilots who fly in the USA?

Best way to confirm would be to email him or the radio show host, I guess.

Good find.

I sent an email to him and got a swift but short response.

The relevant part of my message:

"Recently I came across an article online which states that your name cannot be found in the Federal Aviation Administration Airmen Certification Registry. There is an online search function at the link below, and indeed your name does not come up in a search:
www.faa.gov...

I would be infinitely obliged if you could forward a quick explanation to me of why your name is not in the registry."


The reply:

"Dear xxxxx

Thank you. I haven't flown in almost 20 years.

Cheers

Nila"

So that makes him an expert on flying a 757?

He should stick to authoring religous books.

I think he's an aeronautical engineer as well.

Not sure, though.

Regardless of being in a list or not, most of his comments are plain wrong or pretty stupid.

I received a follow-up reply from Mr. Sagadevan:

==================================
Dear xxxxx,

I was "live" on Greg Szymanski's show when I replied to your message earlier today. I apologize for its brevity.

What I failed to add was that I became a US citizen in 1986 (which is when I
got married and gave up flying permanently). At the time I became a citizen,
I, like all new immigrants, was given one opportunity to officially adopt a
new "American" name. Rather than pick an entirely new moniker, I chose to
truncate my first and last Sri Lankan names to make them easier on the
American tongue. My issued FAA certificate was under my former name, and was never renewed after I became a naturalized citizen.

That said, I went to the site you recommended and plugged in my former name, but could NOT pull up any information. I can only presume it's been deleted due to inactivity. Hope this helps.

Cheers

Nila
===========================================

Another two emails from Mr Sagadevan:

1. ======================================

I am familiar with the site [ATS] to which you refer. I was directed to it about a month ago by an associate. I emailed the site’s editor countering many of the points made therein, but never received a response.

Re the thread to which you refer:

I hasten to point out that NOT ONE of the quotes attributed to me by Greg Szymanski was presented verbatim in his article, “Aeronautical engineer and commercial pilot...” which appeared in Rense.com and elsewhere. I only read the piece yesterday, and was appalled by the inaccuracies. He had paraphrased every quote “from memory and understanding”. I have requested Greg to remove the article from the sites until the quotes are corrected.

A person in the thread to which you refer suggests that my statement about “maintaining control” of the airplane reflects my ignorance of autopilots. He is wrong in leaping to that assumption. OF COURSE the aircraft would have been under the control of the autopilot (Rockwell-Collins FCS-700). However, the hijackers’ attempts to haul the pilots’ bodies out of the cockpit would surely have caused some degree of physical impact with the control yokes, which would have immediately DISENGAGED the autopilot. Autopilot systems on fly-by-wire systems are designed to do that (757s and 767s are both f-b-w types).

Cheers
Nila

2. =======================================

Yesterday, I addressed the point raised by the Autopilot expert on your thread. Today, I thought I’d take a moment to address your Aerodynamics guru who states: “Apparently this pilot has never heard about ground effect. For a 757, ground effect starts at around 30 feet of altitude.”

Utter nonsense. It is quite apparent that it is he who hasn’t heard about ground effect: A Boeing 757 will enter ground effect at about 125 feet AGL (not “altitude”, by the way).

I’ve no idea as to the basis of this person “calculations”. I happen to have a degree in aeronautical engineering with a major in Aerodynamics—a subject about which this “expert” clearly knows very little.

Instead of presenting intelligent arguments, these individuals seem to prefer attacking the credentials of those who have opposing views. It’s this sort of juvenile behavior that gives serious research a bad name.
===========================================

The 757 and 767 are NOT Fly-By-Wire airplanes. Boeings FIRST Fly-By-Wire aircraft was the 777.

The 777 was originally conceived as a stretched 767, but Boeing instead adopted an all new design. Notable 777 design features include a unique fuselage cross section, Boeing's first application of fly-by-wire, an advanced technology glass flightdeck with five liquid crystal displays, comparatively large scale use of composites (10% by weight), and advanced and extremely powerful engines. The 777 was also offered with optional folding wings where the outer 6m/21ft of each would fold upwards for operations at space restricted airports.
www.airliners.net...

emphasis added

I defer to your superior knowledge of aircraft, Zaph. On this forum, there's probably none your equal. I thought I remembered reading somewhere that the 757 and 767 have partial FBW, to control the flaps, slats, spoilers, etc, and of course have the FMCS. The B-777 is the first full FBW Boeing. But I think the point that he was making is that the autopilot is disengaged if there is any serious movement of the yoke. Correct me if I'm wrong.

[edit on 2005-12-14 by wecomeinpeace]

That's standard on all planes, FBW or not. But the range of motion required to disconnect it is pretty extreme. The autopilot on the F-14 requires a 45 degree wing bank before it will disengage. I'm not sure exactly what the settings are for a 757/767, and it's entirely possible that if they weren't careful they WOULD deactivate the autopilot when removing the pilots bodies from the seats. However, it's actually quite simple to reactivate the system.

Originally posted by wecomeinpeace
“Apparently this pilot has never heard about ground effect. For a 757, ground effect starts at around 30 feet of altitude.”

Utter nonsense. It is quite apparent that it is he who hasn’t heard about ground effect: A Boeing 757 will enter ground effect at about 125 feet AGL (not “altitude”, by the way).

I’ve no idea as to the basis of this person “calculations”. I happen to have a degree in aeronautical engineering with a major in Aerodynamics—a subject about which this “expert” clearly knows very little.

OK, it is the altitude above ground level. So what. However there does seem to be some question in regards to the height at which ground effect comes into play. This seems to vary depending on what source you read. I have found sources that say one wingspan (128 ft), half a wingspan (64 ft), and ¼ the wingspan (30 ft).

Anything that keeps the high-pressure air beneath the wing from trying to displace the air layer above the wing will reduce drag. When the airplane is less than a wingspan above the ground, the ground will break up the vortices and keep them from curling around the wing -- and that’s part of what we call ground effect. When the vortex is prevented from curling around the wing, the induced drag from lift is reduced.

www.avweb.com...

Aircraft obtain increased lift and therefore better efficiency by flying very close to the ground: on a fixed-wing monoplane, about half the distance from a wingtip to the fuselage.

en.wikipedia.org...
So the answer is in there somewhere. I took the lowest value, giving the conspiracy theorists the benefit of the doubt. However if you want to go with 128 feet, fine. In any case, there is nothing that would inhibit the ability of the airplane to fly at high speeds close to the ground.

Why would it be impossible for a plane to be flown into the ground at high speeds?

Originally posted by Zaphod58
it's entirely possible that if they weren't careful they WOULD deactivate the autopilot when removing the pilots bodies from the seats. However, it's actually quite simple to reactivate the system.

The L1011 Crash if Florida in 1974 was caused when the autopilot was accidentally disengaged when the yoke was bumped without the pilots noticing it until it was too late.

As a result of that crash, changes were made to the autopilot systems to prevent a reoccurance of that type of thing.

(not really pertinent to the thread, just a bit of trivia)


[edit on 14-12-2005 by HowardRoark]

However, the hijackers’ attempts to haul the pilots’ bodies out of the cockpit would surely have caused some degree of physical impact with the control yokes, which would have immediately DISENGAGED the autopilot. Autopilot systems on fly-by-wire systems are designed to do that (757s and 767s are both f-b-w types).

This assumes that the pilots did not get out of the seats on their own power. I won’t say voluntarily, because it was certainly under duress, however, at that point, pilot training stressed co-operation with the hijackers. Too assume that they were killed first, then removed from the seats is a bit of a stretch.