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In the afternoon, Sasseville and Lucky were flying their second mission of the day--armed with AIM-9 missiles now--when they were told to contact an AWACS aircraft in the area and "expect special tasking." They were directed to fly a 280-deg. heading for 140 naut. mi.--almost due west of Washington. Unable to communicate by secure or encrypted means, the AWACS controller lowered his voice and told Sasseville via radio they were going to "escort Air Force One," President Bush's aircraft. Two Langley F-15s offered to go along, and Sasseville concurred. Soon, an AWACS controller reported a fast-moving, unidentified aircraft southwest of Air Force One, approximately 60 nautical miles away, but on a "cutoff vector" to the President's Boeing 747. It was above 40,000 ft. and the 747 was "in the 20,000-ft. range," but Sasseville sent the F-15s to intercept the unknown aircraft. It was a Learjet that had not yet landed after aircraft nationwide had been ordered out of the air.
Why the Washington-based F-16s were sent to shadow the President's aircraft back to Andrews AFB has not been disclosed. Apparently, someone in the Norad or Secret Service command loop had received information about a potential threat to the 747, prompting a request for additional armed escorts.
Originally posted by Craig Ranke CIT
You are the one trying to change the topic here to avoid discussing your own published claims in relation to the topic.
Originally posted by Boone 870
Did the F-16s come out of Ellington Field?
The fighters at Andrews were not on alert.
But no fighters.
Considering that these aircraft were developed to act as command and control during a nuclear attack, I would suppose that getting airborne quickly is part of their mission.
Launching those planes do cost more preparation time than fighter jets, I do suppose.
Btw, to add another suspected rogue plane to the 9/11 story:
The overseas flights of the Gulfstream V jet, apparently owned by a CIA front organization and used to transfer prisoners to countries for detention and interrogations, are stalled. [Guardian, 9/13/2004]
The Gulfstream V with tail number N379P used to rendition Jamil Qasim Saeed Mohammed and many others. [Source: Washington Post]
Before 6:42 p.m. September 11, 2001: Unknown Aircraft Racing Toward Air Force One.
As Air Force One is approaching Andrews Air Force Base, just outside Washington, with the president on board, the FAA reports an aircraft racing towards it. Fighters quickly intercept the aircraft, which turns out to be a Lear business jet, “in the wrong place at the wrong time.” [Filson, 2003, pp. 88]
Entity Tags: Federal Aviation Administration
Timeline Tags: Complete 911 Timeline, 9/11 Timeline
This review is from: Air War Over America: Sept. 11 Alters Face Of Air Defense Mission (Hardcover)
One would think that the defeat of the most powerful military in the world by 19 stumblebum jihadists armed with box cutters would inspire a degree of humility and soul searching by the US Air Force. But you won't find any of that in Air War Over America.
In fact, the amount of self congratulatory back slapping in the book is nauseating.
Nor is the book well written. Still, it has historical value for its content. The USAF commissioned the Air War Over America, and CONR's Maj.General Larry Arnold wrote the Foreword. So, the book may be regarded as the official USAF record of 9/11.
What is noteworthy is that it conflicts in a number of respects -- with the now official story presented in the 9/11 Commission Report. Bear in mind that Air War was published in 2003 -- about a year BEFORE the release of the 9/11 Commission report.
According to Air War Over America, the first notice from the FAA came at 8:30 AM -- which is 8 minutes earlier than what is stated in the 9/11 Commission Report. The difference is significant because this would easily have given NORAD time to intercept both Flights 11 and 175.
The book also mentions that Fl 77 was a possible hijack -- indicating that NORAD knew about Fl 77 long before it crashed. This admission also flatly contradicts the 9/11 Commission Report.
The account of the Langley scramble is particularly valuable. According to F-16 Pilot Borgstrom they received an order just after take off to fly NNE -- which means the F-16s were flying up the Chesapeake Bay -- what you would expect. Then they got an order to fly NW and according to the author were "vectored toward Washington -- instead of NY." Again, this flatly contradicts the 9/11 Commission Report.
Borgstrom also notes that the 3 fighters from Langley were on different frequencies and "we were getting orders from a lot of different people." This is important information and the 9/11 Commission should have followed up by interviewing the Langley pilots about their orders and conversations to reconstruct what happened. All the commission had to do was track the orders back up the food chain. But apparently this kind of simple detective work was too much for the official investigation to manage. There is scant mention of the Langley pilots' testimony in the 9/11 Commission Report.
Neither Air War nor the 9/11Commission Report explains how the F-16s from Langley ended up flying in circles over the Atlantic. This omission alone should stand your hair on end.
The Air War also mentions that Dawne Deskins at NEADS (NORAD) was watching the blip of an aircraft "that appeared to be going in a turn around DC." According to the author, Deskins got "6 or 7 radar returns on it before it faded and was just gone..." The author assumes this was Fl 77 -- but was it? This is doubtful since Fl 77 never flew over or around DC. In fact, Fl 77 never left Virginia. This blip may have been the E-4B command and control platform I documented in a carefully researched paper now posted on the internet. Simply google "911 mystery plane" and my name and you will easily find it.
Along these same lines: Air War mentions that NEADS was participating in an exercise on 9/11, Vigilant Guardian -- but there is no mention of Global Guardian, which as we know was also underway. In fact, Global Guardian was the BIGGER drill to which the others were tiered -- and we know it involved the E-4B.
This is consistent with the continuing blanket suppression of everything related to the E-4B that circled the White House at the time of the Pentagon attack. The question we should be asking is: What was it doing there? And why has its presence been covered up?
Air War also confirms what I learned from Barbara Honegger, a military journalist. The Air National Guard unit in Florida never even took off to escort Air Force One when Bush left Florida. No, instead Bush relied on a Texas Air National Guard unit -- part of the 147th fighter Wing. The Texas unit escorted him to Offutt AFB -- then later home to DC. Was this Bush's old ANG unit? If so, on 9/11 Bush clearly trusted no one except his own pretorian guard.
The book's last 50 pages is nothing but fluff about the "war on terror." Near the end the author cites General Ralph Eberhart that "military forces will be used when and where needed to augment and assist first responders.." What does this mean? It can only be a veiled reference to martial law in America. Which I suspect was the whole purpose of 9/11 -- to scare Americans into giving away their freedoms for the phony security of military rule - a concept as false as this book.
I went to the OR for lung surgery and my nurse informed me that the towers had collapsed. I began operating and the phone rang: There might be a set of lungs from a donor in Alaska.
Doctors once thought donor organs, such as the lungs, could only last four hours outside of the body. Now we are successful with organs that have been out eight hours or longer. Alaska is a stretch for us, but we've been doing retrievals from Alaska. --snip--
But the people coordinating the transplant, LifeCenter Northwest, stated that they were able to get flight clearance. I called my dad and he voiced his concern. He told me that the more people involved, the more room there is for error. "I really think you are going to be vulnerable," he said. Ultimately LifeCenter stated that the clearance was genuine and the window for flying was broad. I sought two additional assurances and then agreed to go.
We left Boeing Field in two separate planes. I was to do the heart and lung retrieval and Adam Levy the liver and kidney retrieval. It's standard procedure. Because the organs I retrieve are more fragile, I have to get back quickly. On the way up, the pilot was quite nervous. He informed me that we were the only civilian aircraft flying in U.S. air space. We reached the donor hospital and the procedure went perfectly. The donor was a young man who had died tragically. The lungs were pristine. The heart was perfect. --snip--
We returned to the airport and met an executive from Alaska Airlines who had been stranded and obtained clearance to fly to Seattle with us. Upon crossing into Canadian airspace we were intercepted by a Canadian Air Force jet. Minutes later we were also picked up by a U.S. fighter. About 12 minutes from Boeing Field we suddenly changed speed and veered off course. We were flying over places we couldn't recognize. At this point, the pilot wasn't talking to us.
We landed at an airport I didn't recognize. As we taxied closer I saw a sign: "Bellingham International Airport." My heart sank. We were well into the time limit for reimplatation and we were far from the University. We were told that we were diverted for security reasons and, as I looked up, I saw two F-16 fighter jets, circling just above us. We found out later that while Dr. Levy's return flight plan was OK'd, ours somehow got lost in the complicated events of the evening.
Originally posted by Boone 870
Then the giggling Center controller replied back, "all right sir."
During that two-day period of full lock-down, only the military and specially FAA-authorized flights that delivered life-saving medical necessities were in the air. The enforcement of the empty skies directive was so stringent that even after the United Network for Organ Sharing sought and gained FAA clearance to use charter aircraft on September 12 to effect time-critical deliveries of organs for transplant, one of its flights carrying a human heart was forced to the ground in Bellingham, Washington, 80 miles short of its Seattle destination, by two Navy F/A-18 fighters. (The organ completed its journey after being transferred to a helicopter.)
Source: freepages.military.rootsweb.ancestry.com...
Lifeguard flights were permitted to fly on 9/11, there is no way to know if the Alaska flight you mentioned is the same flight heard in the audio recording.
I am aware of a medical emergency flight on 9/11, coming from Alaska,
12:16 Airspace is clear of traffic-except for law enforcement, military, medivac, lifeguard and rescue operations. Source PDF
The article you quoted does not mention an encounter with Air Force One, it says that an F-15 was sent to check it out and it also says the "Learjet" was 60 nautical miles away from Air Force One with over 20,000 feet of vertical separation.
I have read and listened to an interview with that pilot in these and other forums, but as far as I know, he never mentioned an encounter with AF-1 in that interview,
I agree. Did you notice that there were no quotations around Learjet? Show me an Air Force pilot that says it was a Learjet instead of a journalist and I'll dig into it deeper.
Btw, fighter pilots interviewed shortly after 9/11 by other official Air Force personnel, will not mix up a Lear Jet with a Gulfstream, in my opinion.
The aircraft was unidentified to the AWACS, not Washington Center. I did not detect any concern in the air traffic controller's voice.
and so its where-abouts would have been well known to Washington handlers,
1218C is the aircraft tail number and it can be found in the FAA database. There you will find who owns the plane.
Or was it really hired or owned by www.cdc.gov...
Aviation Week is an "OFFICIAL" Air Force publication?
But both my sources were OFFICIAL Air Force sources, from the day of 9/11 or very shortly after.
The MP3 is published 7 years later, but seems to be an official source too.
Who do you believe more, the report from the day itself, or the possibly falsified data from 7 years later?
No. You have given the interpretations of an author and a journalist. Neither one of them quoted the pilot.
Now we have two reports from 9/11, indicating a Lear Jet and not a Gulfstream.
Did I give already ground enough for reasonable doubt regarding the validity of the FOIA requested data received from the US government entities?
Now this is not the same story I read and saved years ago, but it resembles it somehow in some of the details, like the pick-up from another person.
But it was different in its locations and designation.
Griff, I definitely didn't hear a giggling in that voice.
It's an awkward interpretation by Boone, in my opinion.
Boone : Show me an Air Force pilot that says it was a Lear Jet instead of a journalist and I'll dig into it deeper.
The USAF commissioned the Air War Over America, and CONR's Maj.General Larry Arnold wrote the Foreword. So, the book may be regarded as the official USAF record of 9/11.
but Sasseville sent the F-15s to intercept the unknown aircraft. It was a Lear Jet that had not yet landed after aircraft nationwide had been ordered out of the air.
Release Date: 09/14/2001
Organ Transport Available by Air; UNOS Contributes to Red Cross.
Since Wednesday, Sept. 12, the Federal Aviation Administration (FAA) has allowed charter flights to transport organs for transplantation. As of Friday, Sept. 14, several airlines have announced that they will accept onto their commercial flights donated organs and other vital medical supplies.
During that two-day period of full lock-down, only the military and specially FAA-authorized flights that delivered life-saving medical necessities were in the air. The enforcement of the empty skies directive was so stringent that even after the United Network for Organ Sharing sought and gained FAA clearance to use charter aircraft on September 12 to effect time-critical deliveries of organs for transplant, one of its flights carrying a human heart was forced to the ground in Bellingham, Washington, 80 miles short of its Seattle destination, by two Navy F/A-18 fighters. (The organ completed its journey after being transferred to a helicopter.)
Again, I emphasize the fact that the controller and the pilot considered this plane to be an UNKNOWN, which is very suspicious at that point in time.
Or, was the US Air Force so crippled in its Intelligence reports, that Air Force One with the president on board, and its flight controllers on the ground, had no idea what was flying around there? With "next to no aircraft in the sky"?