Context of 'September 5-11, 2001: 9/11 Hijackers’ Car Repeatedly Visits Boston’s Logan Airport'

A car rented by some of the 9/11 hijackers is recorded several times on surveillance cameras going in and out of the parking lot at Boston’s Logan Airport in the days before the attacks, and is finally left at the parking lot on the morning of September 11 (see (6:45 a.m.) September 11, 2001). The car is a white Mitsubishi sedan that has been leased from an Alamo franchise in Springfield, Massachusetts. It is found after the attacks, on the evening of September 11, and contains a “ramp pass” enabling access to restricted areas of Logan Airport. Time magazine will speculate that “someone was reconnoitering with accomplices who worked on the planes, who could plant weapons onboard.” [USA Today, 9/13/2001; Washington Post, 9/14/2001; Boston Globe, 9/17/2001; Time, 9/24/2001]

Flight 11 hijackers Waleed Alshehri, Wail Alshehri, and Satam Al Suqami arrive at Boston’s Logan Airport in a rental car, which they park in the airport’s central parking lot. [9/11 Commission, 8/26/2004, pp. 5 ] An unidentified man who arrives at Logan Airport at “about 6:30 a.m.” for an early flight has an argument with several Middle Eastern men over a parking space, before moving on, according to the News of the World. Some early press reports will say his confrontation is with five men. [Boston Herald, 9/12/2001; Daily Telegraph, 9/13/2001; ABC News, 9/14/2001; News of the World, 9/16/2001] However, the 9/11 Commission will later describe the incident differently. It will say there are just three Middle Eastern men, and the man ends up parked next to them. One of the Middle Eastern men opens his car door to get out and then spends time “fiddling with his things,” thus trapping the man in his car. Eventually the man has to force his way out, but the Middle Eastern men are completely unresponsive to him, saying nothing. The man will report the incident to authorities after hearing of the attacks. However, whether he identifies the men as Flight 11 hijackers is unstated. The hijackers’ car, which is associated with either Wail or Waleed Alshehri, will be found in the lot later in the day of 9/11. [9/11 Commission, 8/26/2004, pp. 85 ] Authorities will find Arabic-language flight training manuals inside the Mitsubishi rental. [Associated Press, 9/12/2001; Boston Herald, 9/12/2001; Daily Telegraph, 9/13/2001]

Madeline ‘Amy’ Sweeney. [Source: Nashua Telegraph / Getty Images]Madeline “Amy” Sweeney, a flight attendant on Flight 11, makes two unsuccessful attempts at calling the American Airlines flight services office at Logan International Airport in Boston. [9/11 Commission, 8/26/2004, pp. 9-10 ; US District Court for the Eastern District of Virginia, Alexandria Division, 7/31/2006] Flight 11 took off from Logan Airport at 7:59 a.m. (see (7:59 a.m.) September 11, 2001). [New York Times, 9/13/2001] The American Airlines flight services office at the airport manages the scheduling and operation of flight attendants. Attendants go there to check in for duty and fill in their pre-flight paperwork, among other things. The office’s phone number is well known to the American Airlines flight attendants who operate out of Logan Airport. [9/11 Commission, 1/25/2004 ; 9/11 Commission, 8/26/2004, pp. 9 ] Sweeney first tries phoning the flight services office at 8:22 a.m., but the call fails to connect. Her second attempted call, two minutes later, also fails to connect. [9/11 Commission, 8/26/2004, pp. 9-10 ; US District Court for the Eastern District of Virginia, Alexandria Division, 7/31/2006] Sweeney tries making the calls from a passenger seat in the next-to-last row of the coach section of the plane. She makes the attempted calls on an Airfone, using a calling card given to her by Sara Low, another of the plane’s flight attendants. [New York Observer, 2/15/2004; New York Observer, 6/20/2004; Arkansas Democrat-Gazette, 9/11/2011] Sweeney will finally reach the American Airlines flight services office on her third attempt to do so, at 8:25 a.m., and alert its staff to what is happening on her plane (see 8:25 a.m. September 11, 2001). [Federal Bureau of Investigation, 9/11/2001, pp. 57-58; 9/11 Commission, 8/26/2004, pp. 10 ]

Later in the day of 9/11, weapons are found planted on board three US airplanes. A US official will say, “These look like inside jobs.” Time magazine will later report, “Sources tell Time that US officials are investigating whether the hijackers had accomplices deep inside the airports’ ‘secure’ areas.” [Time, 9/22/2001] Penetrating airport security does not appear to have been that difficult: Argenbright, the company in charge of security at all the airports used by the hijackers, had virtually no security check on any of its employees, and even hired criminals and illegal immigrants. Security appears to be particularly abysmal at Boston’s Logan Airport, even after 9/11. [Boston Globe, 10/1/2001; CNN, 10/12/2001] An FAA official had similar concerns about two other security contractors at Logan Airport: Huntleigh USA, a subsidiary of ICTS International NV, a large Israeli security company, and Globe Aviation. [Associated Press, 9/11/2001; Christian Science Monitor, 1/8/2002; 9/11 Commission, 3/11/2004, pp. 6 ]