Flight 77 Final Flight Path

Originally posted by mirageofdeceit

Authorities contend that Hanjour was at the controls and that the plane may have been on autopilot.

?!?!?!

Why would they say that?

Wow... that's a good catch...

How could the "authorities" know who was flying the plane, or that it was on autopilot on 9/21/01?

Originally posted by nick7261
CL,

Here's an image I pulled from The Guardian's website from sometime near 9/11. This was the original flight path that was published back in 2001.

Also, here's an interesting article from Boston.com from Nov. 2001.

www.boston.com...

Because the plane's transponder was turned off, it was hard for controllers to track the plane precisely, but ultimately the controller who cleared the plane out of Dulles watched his scope as the aircraft flew back toward Washington.

Authorities contend that Hanjour was at the controls and that the plane may have been on autopilot.

Controllers say the plane crossed the Pentagon at 7,000 feet and then made a sweeping circle to the right, during which time it dropped down to near surface level.

Do any of these conflicting reports on the flight path make any sense in terms of your research?

I haven't studied the discreapncies a lot, but my understanding is the original map is based on vague reports like this, a loop to the right after "passing" the Pentagon, along with other stories that it had passed the White House or whatever. In other words it was guessed. The FDR data was basically secret at the time.

The 9/11 Commission had the (correct?) loop in its 2004 final report, but too tiny to see clearly. It clearly didn't have the grand loop over Washington, just a little extra drop of ink in the page. The Commission cited the NTSB's "Flight Path Study" of Flight 77, which shows the loop in more detail (the orange topo map with yellow path), but that wasn't released by the NTSB until last year.

If you read that Boston article again with this map in mind, it still makes sense.

[edit on 14-5-2007 by Caustic Logic]

from the horses' mouth. too high to knock over lightpoles.

Yes, and even this shows the right loop, tho its authenticity is in question. I just found a thread by the UK researcher "Snowygrouch" who obtained this animation from the NTSB and even he thinks:

I think this is very strong evidence that either the NTSB or the Pentagon VIDEO is faked or manipulated.
[...]
I think this MPEG video is fairly unique though, well obviously someone else in the world MUST have it but so far I havent spotted it anywhere else.

www.nineeleven.co.uk... opic.php?t=3308&view=previous&sid=3aa9a0fc78be39f7b69465f6557ab3f2

Originally posted by mirageofdeceit

Authorities contend that Hanjour was at the controls and that the plane may have been on autopilot.

?!?!?!

Why would they say that?

Because they knew they were going to have trouble explaining the precise turn and descent from 7000 feet into the Pentagon. It is my opinion that it was a missle or RPV that was being remotely flown.

No hijacker with Hani Hanjours experience would be able to make that kind of precise descending turn and hit the Pentagon for several reasons the most important of which is that Hanjour is supposedly sitting in the left seat of the cockpit and there is no way that he could see out and down to the right to visually fly this precise turn and descent into the Pentagon.

So, to explain the precision of the turn they started throwing out the "autopilot" story but to an experiened pilot the autoilot story is not going to fit simply because Hanojur is still going to have to see the Pentagon to direct the autopilot where to turn to and he can't do thqt sitting in the left seat. The Pentagon would be out of his view.

Of course, the Flight Data Recroder says that the autopilot was turned OFF at 7000 feet before the turn started. But of course Ari Fleischer didn't know or forgot that this fact would show up on the Flight Data Recorder. The trouble with lieing about Boeing 757 supposed crash into the Pentagon is the Flight Data Recorder says it never happened. The Flight Data Recorder says that the Boeing 757 overflew the Pentagon by about 400 feet.

Originally posted by nick7261

Also, if Flight 77 was circling directly over Reagan Airport, why did the controllers at Reagan Airport ask the C-130 that had taken off from Andrews AFB to visually locate Flight 77? Shouldn't the controllers at Reagan Airport have been able to see Flight 77 circling right in front of them?

Thee are 2 basic types of controllers. There is local control, those are the guys that are actually up in the control tower. They can see planes approach, takeoff and land and also planes maneuvering on the ground. They are looking at the planes with their eyeballs.

Then there is radar control, they are looking at the airplanes on radar in a darkened room. They have no way of looking outside. If someone says they were tracking the airplane over Reagan that meas he was tracking the airplane on radar. 7000 feet is way too high to track visually not to mentioned that control towers have roofs and that while the visibility is very good in all directions of the compass, you can't see straight up.

So when the controllers asked the C-130 if they could see the Boeing 757, no, the controllers could NOT see something right in front of them as they are looking at a radar scope.

The trouble with lieing about Boeing 757 supposed crash into the Pentagon is the Flight Data Recorder says it never happened. The Flight Data Recorder says that the Boeing 757 overflew the Pentagon by about 400 feet.

I remember discussing this in the other thread.

Whilst I agree that the controllers in the tower wouldn't be able to see the aircraft as it passed over-head, it was sufficiently far out to be seen as it flew away from them, then turned back towards them. They should have even been able to see it disappear low in the distance shortly before it crashed.

Anyone have a book to read whilst this maneuver is completed?

[edit on 15-5-2007 by mirageofdeceit]

Originally posted by johnlear

So when the controllers asked the C-130 if they could see the Boeing 757, no, the controllers could NOT see something right in front of them as they are looking at a radar scope.

John,

How would the C-130 get from Andrews AFB to the Pentagon in less than 5 minutes (9:32 to 9:37) without being vectored directly over Reagan airspace? Wouldn't it have been problematic for the Reagan controllers to vector a C-130 over this airspace where presumably commercial planes were landing one after another?

Originally posted by Caustic Logic


I haven't studied the discreapncies a lot, but my understanding is the original map is based on vague reports like this, a loop to the right after "passing" the Pentagon, along with other stories that it had passed the White House or whatever. In other words it was guessed. The FDR data was basically secret at the time.

I would agree with your conclusion entirely if not for the Danielle O'Brien interview you posted. She was pretty adamant about two things: the plane was heading for the White House and turned away at the 3 mile mark, and that she imagined the hijackers not being able to spot the White House, and instead flying over the Pentagon and looping back to hit it.

Now combine that with Ari Fleischer claiming that "their" radar had the plane heading directly to the White House, and the discrepencies between the PF911T video and the FDR, and to me it's looking like at least a possibility that something is very mysterious about FL 77's final approach.

Of course this is also in the context that FL 77 was totally lost from radar for 30 minutes, and that the FAA caused the fighters to be directed over the Atlantic instead of over Washington D.C. Plus, as John said in a previous post, how would Hanjour be able to visually line up the Pentagon while making the right turn sitting in the left pilot's seat? And then there's still the question of the hijackers resetting the altimer on descent.

To me, there are too many oddities at this point to buy the official version of FL 77's approach into D.C.

And then there's still the question of the hijackers resetting the altimer on descent.

This, and the DME has me doubting it.