Complete 911 Timeline

All the alleged 9/11 hijackers reportedly check in at the airports from where they board Flights 11, 175, 77, and 93. [9/11 Commission, 7/24/2004, pp. 1-4; 9/11 Commission, 8/26/2004, pp. 27, 89, 93 ] Since 1998, the FAA has required air carriers to implement a program called the Computer Assisted Passenger Prescreening System (CAPPS). This identifies those passengers who might be a security risk, based upon suspicious behavior such as buying one-way tickets or paying with cash. CAPPS also randomly assigns some passengers to receive additional security scrutiny. If a particular passenger has been designated as a “selectee,” this information is transmitted to the airport’s check-in counter, where a code is printed on their boarding pass. At the airport’s security checkpoints, selectees are subjected to additional security measures. [US News and World Report, 4/1/2002; 9/11 Commission, 1/27/2004; US Congress, 3/17/2004; 9/11 Commission, 8/26/2004, pp. 2, 85 ] Their baggage is to be screened for explosives or held off the plane until they have boarded. Supposedly, the thinking behind this is that someone smuggling a bomb onto a plane won’t get onto that same flight. According to the 9/11 Commission, nine of the 19 hijackers are flagged by the CAPPS system before boarding Flights 11, 175, 77, and 93. [Washington Post, 1/28/2004; 9/11 Commission, 7/24/2004, pp. 84; United States of America v. Zacarias Moussaoui, a/k/a Shaqil, a/k/a Abu Khalid al Sahrawi, Defendant, 3/6/2006] In addition, Mohamed Atta was selected when he checked in at the airport in Portland, for his earlier connecting flight to Boston (see 5:33 a.m.-5:40 a.m. September 11, 2001). All of the hijackers subsequently pass through security checkpoints before boarding their flights. [9/11 Commission, 7/24/2004, pp. 1-4]

Entity Tags: Federal Aviation Administration, Computer Assisted Passenger Prescreening System

Timeline Tags: 9/11 Timeline

Category Tags: All Day of 9/11 Events, Flight AA 11, Flight UA 175, Flight AA 77, Flight UA 93, Key Day of 9/11 Events

All five Flight 175 hijackers reportedly check in at Boston’s Logan Airport, pass through a security checkpoint, and board their plane during this period. [9/11 Commission, 8/26/2004, pp. 89 ] The FAA has a program in place called CAPPS, which selects passengers for more thorough security screening based on suspicious behavior such as buying a one-way ticket or paying with cash (see (6:20 a.m.-7:48 a.m.) September 11, 2001). Although reports claim that between two and five of the Flight 175 hijackers have one-way tickets, none are selected by CAPPS. [WorldNetDaily, 4/24/2002; US Congress, 9/26/2002; US Congress, 9/26/2002; Washington Post, 1/28/2004; 9/11 Commission, 8/26/2004, pp. 18 ] Two of them have problems answering security questions at the ticket counter (see (6:20 a.m.-6:53 a.m.) September 11, 2001). At the security checkpoint, all five would pass through a walk-through metal detector, and an X-ray machine would screen their carry-on luggage. But Logan Airport has no video surveillance of its checkpoints (see 1991-2000), so there is no documentary evidence of exactly when they go through, or how they are processed. Jennifer Gore, the young supervisor overseeing the checkpoint, is later unable to recall seeing any of them. The Globe and Mail will explain, “[S]he was trained to look for metal bits in bags and in clothes, not people.” [Globe and Mail, 9/7/2002; 9/11 Commission, 7/24/2004, pp. 2; 9/11 Commission, 8/26/2004, pp. 18 ]

Entity Tags: Computer Assisted Passenger Prescreening System, Logan Airport, Jennifer Gore, Federal Aviation Administration

Timeline Tags: 9/11 Timeline

Category Tags: All Day of 9/11 Events, Flight UA 175

Two of the Flight 175 hijackers approach a customer service representative at the United Airlines ticket counter at Boston’s Logan Airport. The two appear unaccustomed to traveling. One tells the representative, Gail Jawahir, that he needs a ticket, though upon examining his documents she finds he already has one. Both men have problems answering standard security questions, which Jawahir has to repeat very slowly until they give the routine, reassuring answers. There is conflicting evidence over their identities. Jawahir will place her encounter with the men at “shortly before 7 a.m.” Shown photos of the alleged hijackers after 9/11, she will indicate that one of the two she encountered resembled Mohand Alshehri, suggesting the two were Alshehri and Fayez Ahmed Banihammad, who checked in at 6:53 a.m. Yet she recalls the two having the same last name and having assigned seats on Row 9 of the plane, suggesting they were Ahmed and Hamza Alghamdi, who checked in at 6:20 a.m. [9/11 Commission, 7/24/2004, pp. 2, 451; 9/11 Commission, 8/26/2004, pp. 17-18, 89 ]

Entity Tags: Logan Airport, United Airlines, Hamza Alghamdi, Mohand Alshehri, Fayez Ahmed Banihammad, Ahmed Alghamdi, Gail Jawahir

Timeline Tags: 9/11 Timeline

Category Tags: All Day of 9/11 Events, Flight UA 175

A three-minute call is made from a payphone at Boston’s Logan Airport, in the gate area from where Flight 175 will later depart, to Mohamed Atta’s cell phone. The 9/11 Commission will report, “We presume Shehhi [i.e., Marwan Alshehhi] made the call, but we cannot be sure.” According to the commission, this is Atta and Alshehhi’s final conversation. [9/11 Commission, 7/24/2004, pp. 1, 451; 9/11 Commission, 8/26/2004, pp. 4 ] According to other reports, though, they later speak again briefly by cellphone while waiting for their planes to take off (see (Before 7:59 a.m.) September 11, 2001). [New York Times, 11/4/2001; Time, 8/4/2002]

Entity Tags: Mohamed Atta, Marwan Alshehhi, Logan Airport

Timeline Tags: 9/11 Timeline

Category Tags: All Day of 9/11 Events, Flight AA 11, Flight UA 175

Sometime during this period, the hijackers pass through airport security checkpoints at the various airports. The FAA has a screening program in place called the Computer Assisted Passenger Prescreening System (CAPPS). CAPPS automatically targets passengers for additional screening based on suspicious behavior such as buying one-way tickets or paying with cash. If a passenger is selected, their bags are thoroughly screened for explosives, but their bodies are not searched. [Washington Post, 1/28/2004] CAPPS selects three of the five Flight 11 hijackers. Since Waleed Alshehri checked no bags, his selection had no consequences. Wail Alshehri and Satam Al Suqami have their bags scanned for explosives, but are not stopped. No Flight 175 hijackers are selected. Only Ahmad Alhaznawi is selected from Flight 93. His bag is screened for explosives, but he is not stopped. The 9/11 Commission later concludes that Alhaznawi and Ahmed Alnami, also headed to Flight 93, have suspicious indicators and that they could have been linked to al-Qaeda upon inspection, but it has not been explained why or how. [9/11 Commission, 1/27/2004; Baltimore Sun, 1/27/2004] Screening of the Flight 77 hijackers is described below.

Entity Tags: Waleed M. Alshehri, Al-Qaeda, Federal Aviation Administration, Wail Alshehri, Ahmed Alnami, Satam Al Suqami, Computer Assisted Passenger Prescreening System

Category Tags: All Day of 9/11 Events, Flight AA 11, Flight UA 175, Flight UA 93

Hijacker Mohamed Atta on Flight 11 calls hijacker Marwan Alshehhi in Flight 175 as both planes sit on the runway. They presumably confirm the plot is on. [Time, 8/4/2002]

Entity Tags: Marwan Alshehhi, Mohamed Atta

Timeline Tags: 9/11 Timeline

Category Tags: All Day of 9/11 Events, Flight AA 11, Flight UA 175

In the event of a hijacking, all airline pilots are trained to key an emergency four-digit code into their plane’s transponder. This would surreptitiously alert air traffic controllers, causing the letters “HJCK” to appear on their screens. [CNN, 9/13/2001; Newsday, 9/13/2001; News (Portugal), 8/3/2002; 9/11 Commission, 7/24/2004, pp. 17-18] The action, which pilots should take the moment a hijack situation is known, only takes seconds to perform. [Christian Science Monitor, 9/12/2001; CNN, 9/12/2001] Yet during the hijackings of flights 11, 175, 77, and 93, none of the pilots do this. [CNN, 9/11/2001]

Timeline Tags: 9/11 Timeline

Category Tags: All Day of 9/11 Events, Flight AA 11, Flight UA 175, Flight AA 77, Flight UA 93

Flight 175 takes off from Boston’s Logan Airport, 16 minutes after its scheduled 7:58 departure time. [Washington Post, 9/12/2001; CNN, 9/17/2001; Guardian, 10/17/2001; Associated Press, 8/21/2002; Newsday, 9/10/2002]

Entity Tags: Logan Airport

Timeline Tags: 9/11 Timeline

Category Tags: All Day of 9/11 Events, Flight UA 175

Boston flight control reportedly “notifies several air traffic control centers that a hijack is taking place.” [Guardian, 10/17/2001] This is immediately after Boston controllers heard a transmission from Flight 11, declaring, “We have some planes” (see 8:24 a.m. September 11, 2001), and would be consistent with a claim later made to the 9/11 Commission by Mike Canavan, the FAA’s associate administrator for civil aviation security. He says, “[M]y experience as soon as you know you had a hijacked aircraft, you notify everyone.… [W]hen you finally find out, yes, we do have a problem, then… the standard notification is it kind of gets broadcast out to all the regions.” [9/11 Commission, 5/23/2003] An early FAA report will say only that Boston controllers begin “inter-facility coordination” with New York air traffic control at this time [Federal Aviation Administration, 9/17/2001 ] , but the New York Times reports that controllers at Washington Center also know “about the hijacking of the first plane to crash, even before it hit the World Trade Center.” [New York Times, 9/13/2001] However, the Indianapolis flight controller monitoring Flight 77 claims to not know about this or Flight 175’s hijacking twenty minutes later at 8:56 a.m. (see 8:56 a.m. September 11, 2001). Additionally, the flight controllers at New York City’s La Guardia airport are never told about the hijacked planes and learn about them from watching the news. [Bergen Record, 1/4/2004] Boston Center also begins notifying the FAA chain of command of the suspected Flight 11 hijacking at this time (see 8:25 a.m. September 11, 2001), but it does not notify NORAD for another 6-15 minutes, depending on the account (see (8:37 a.m.) September 11, 2001).

Entity Tags: La Guardia Airport, Boston Air Route Traffic Control Center, North American Aerospace Defense Command

Timeline Tags: 9/11 Timeline

Category Tags: All Day of 9/11 Events, Flight AA 11, Flight UA 175, Flight AA 77

Flight controllers ask the United Airlines Flight 175 pilots to look for a lost American Airlines plane 10 miles to the south—a reference to Flight 11. They respond that they can see it. They are told to keep away from it. [Guardian, 10/17/2001; Boston Globe, 11/23/2001; 9/11 Commission, 6/17/2004] Apparently, Flight 175 is not told Flight 11 has been hijacked. Flight 175 itself is hijacked a few minutes later (see 8:41 a.m.-8:42 a.m. September 11, 2001).

Timeline Tags: 9/11 Timeline

Category Tags: All Day of 9/11 Events, Flight UA 175, Flight AA 11

Colin Scoggins, the military liaison at the FAA’s Boston Center, calls the FAA’s New York Center but is quickly cut off when the air traffic controller who answers says the center is busy dealing with a hijacking. According to author Lynn Spencer, Scoggins “calls New York Center to notify them that American 11 appears to be descending toward New York, most likely to land at JFK” International Airport. But the controller who takes the call snaps at him: “We’re too busy to talk. We’re working a hijack,” and then hangs up. According to Spencer, the New York Center controller is referring to Flight 175, but “Scoggins just figures that he’s talking about American 11. He has no idea that a second airliner is in crisis.” However, the timing of this call is unclear. If it is made while Flight 11 is descending toward New York, this would mean it occurs in the minutes before 8:46, when Flight 11 crashes (see 8:46 a.m. September 11, 2001). But in Spencer’s account, the call is made just after New York Center controller Dave Bottiglia notices that Flight 175’s transponder code has changed and he calls out to another controller, “I can’t get a hold of UAL 175 at all right now and I don’t know where he went to” (see 8:51 a.m.-8:53 a.m. September 11, 2001). [Spencer, 2008, pp. 48-49] The transcript of radio communications between the New York Center and Flight 175 shows that this would mean Scoggins’s call occurs around 8:53 a.m.-8:54 a.m., about seven minutes after Flight 11 crashes. [New York Times, 10/16/2001]

Entity Tags: Colin Scoggins, New York Air Route Traffic Control Center

Timeline Tags: 9/11 Timeline

Category Tags: All Day of 9/11 Events, Flight AA 11, Flight UA 175

Flight 175 passes from the airspace of the FAA’s Boston Center to the airspace of the New York Center, which is in Ronkonkoma, New York. [9/11 Commission, 8/26/2004, pp. 20 ] New York Center air traffic controller Dave Bottiglia takes over monitoring the flight from Boston Center controller John Hartling (see (8:34 a.m.) September 11, 2001). Flight 175 waits nearly 45 seconds to check in with Bottiglia. According to author Lynn Spencer, this is “rather long, and Bottiglia is just about to call the plane.” But then Captain Victor Saracini, the pilot of Flight 175, makes radio contact, saying, “New York, United 175 heavy.” [Gregor, 12/21/2001 ; Spencer, 2008, pp. 36]

Entity Tags: Dave Bottiglia, New York Air Route Traffic Control Center, Victor Saracini

Timeline Tags: 9/11 Timeline

Category Tags: All Day of 9/11 Events, Flight UA 175

Victor Saracini. [Source: Family photo]Just after Flight 175 enters the airspace of the FAA’s New York Center (see 8:40 a.m. September 11, 2001), its pilot reports to the air traffic controller now managing the flight a suspicious transmission he had heard on departing Boston’s Logan Airport. The pilot, Captain Victor Saracini, tells the controller, Dave Bottiglia: “We figured we’d wait to go to your center. Ah, we heard a suspicious transmission on our departure out of Boston, ah, with someone, ah, it sounded like someone keyed the mikes and said, ah, ‘Everyone, ah, stay in your seats.’” [New York Times, 10/16/2001; 9/11 Commission, 7/24/2004, pp. 21; Spencer, 2008, pp. 36] Saracini is presumably referring to one of the three radio transmissions from Flight 11, where the voice of a hijacker could be heard (see 8:24 a.m. September 11, 2001 and (8:34 a.m.) September 11, 2001). However, none of these had included the hijacker telling people to stay in their seats, as Saracini describes, although the second and third transmissions included the hijacker telling the passengers, “Nobody move.” [9/11 Commission, 7/24/2004, pp. 19] Bottiglia responds: “Oh, okay. I’ll pass that along.” Referring to the fact that this was the end of the transmission he heard, Saracini adds, “It cut out,” and then asks Bottiglia, “Did you copy that?” [Gregor, 12/21/2001 ; Spencer, 2008, pp. 36-37] This is the last radio transmission from Flight 175. The 9/11 Commission will conclude that the plane is hijacked within the next four minutes (see (Between 8:42 a.m. and 8:46 a.m.) September 11, 2001). [9/11 Commission, 8/26/2004, pp. 20 ] According to author Lynn Spencer, since controllers are only given information on a need-to-know basis, Bottiglia was unaware there were problems with Flight 11, which has not yet entered his airspace. He touches his computer screen to connect to the hotline for his sector controller, and then reports: “UAL 175 just came on my frequency and he said he heard a suspicious transmission when they were leaving Boston. ‘Everybody stay in your seats’—that’s what he heard… just to let you know.” [New York Times, 10/16/2001; Spencer, 2008, pp. 36-37]

Entity Tags: New York Air Route Traffic Control Center, Victor Saracini, Dave Bottiglia

Timeline Tags: 9/11 Timeline

Category Tags: All Day of 9/11 Events, Flight UA 175

Senior United Airlines personnel are, unusually, not informed about air traffic control communications with Flight 175. At 8:41, the pilots of United Airlines 175 report to air traffic controllers that they heard “a suspicious transmission” from another aircraft on their departure out of Boston (see 8:41 a.m.-8:42 a.m. September 11, 2001). Yet this information is not passed on to personnel at the United Airlines System Operations Control (SOC) center, just outside Chicago. Rich Miles, the manager there, will later tell the 9/11 Commission that, “though he normally received relevant information about United flights from FAA air traffic control, on September 11, 2001, he did not recall receiving information about any air traffic control communications with or from Flight 175, including the 8:41 a.m. report.” None of the other senior United Airlines officials at the SOC on this morning are told of the 8:41 communication, although they will tell the 9/11 Commission that air traffic controllers will “first and foremost” communicate directly with pilots. Furthermore, these officials will recall, “they never received any communication… from the FAA or the air traffic control system advising United to contact its aircraft about the hijackings.” The 9/11 Commission will not offer any explanation for this lack of communication between the FAA and United Airlines. [Wall Street Journal, 10/15/2001; 9/11 Commission, 8/26/2004, pp. 20 ]

Entity Tags: Federal Aviation Administration, Rich Miles, United Airlines

Timeline Tags: 9/11 Timeline

Category Tags: All Day of 9/11 Events, Flight UA 175

Dave Bottiglia. [Source: ABC News]After Flight 11 appears on his radar screen, Dave Bottiglia, an air traffic controller at the FAA’s New York Center, is informed that this aircraft is suspected of having been hijacked. Flight 175 entered Bottiglia’s airspace not long before this (see 8:40 a.m. September 11, 2001). [MSNBC, 9/11/2002; 9/11 Commission, 8/26/2004, pp. 20 ] Its pilot has just told Bottiglia about the “suspicious transmission” (presumably from Flight 11) he heard while departing Boston airport (see 8:41 a.m.-8:42 a.m. September 11, 2001). [Gregor, 12/21/2001 ] Seconds later, Flight 11 also enters the area Bottiglia is monitoring and its target appears on his radar screen. The controller sitting next to Bottiglia gets up and points to the radar blip. He says: “You see this target here? This is American 11. Boston Center thinks it’s a hijack.” Bottiglia will later recall that his initial thought about Flight 11, based on this information, is that the hijackers “were probably going to Cuba.” As its transponder has been turned off (see (Between 8:13 a.m. and 8:21 a.m.) September 11, 2001), he has no altitude information for Flight 11, but can tell from the radar scope that it appears to be descending. According to author Lynn Spencer: “Even without a transponder, controller radars calculate ground speed for all radar targets, and when a plane is descending, the ground speed decreases. The flight had been ‘grounding’ 600 knots, and now it has decreased to 320.” Bottiglia follows Flight 11’s target on his radar screen until it disappears over New York City. [MSNBC, 9/11/2002; Spencer, 2008, pp. 37] Because he is focused on Flight 11, Bottiglia will not notice when Flight 175’s transponder code changes at 8:47 (see 8:46 a.m.-8:47 a.m. September 11, 2001). [9/11 Commission, 7/24/2004, pp. 21; 9/11 Commission, 8/26/2004, pp. 21 ] The New York Center was first notified of Flight 11’s hijacking at 8:25 a.m. (see 8:25 a.m. September 11, 2001), though this information was not passed on to Bottiglia. [Federal Aviation Administration, 9/17/2001 ; Spencer, 2008, pp. 36-37]

Entity Tags: Dave Bottiglia, New York Air Route Traffic Control Center

Timeline Tags: 9/11 Timeline

Category Tags: All Day of 9/11 Events, Flight AA 11, Flight UA 175

According to the 9/11 Commission, Flight 175 is hijacked some time between 8:42—when its flight crew make their last communication with the ground—and 8:46. The Commission describes that the hijackers “used knives (as reported by two passengers and a flight attendant), Mace (reported by one passenger), and the threat of a bomb (reported by the same passenger). They stabbed members of the flight crew (reported by a flight attendant and one passenger). Both pilots had been killed (reported by one flight attendant).” These witness accounts come from phone calls made from the rear of the plane, from passengers who’d been assigned seats in the front or middle of the cabin. According to the Commission, this is “a sign that passengers and perhaps crew [are] moved to the back of the aircraft.” [9/11 Commission, 7/24/2004, pp. 7; 9/11 Commission, 8/26/2004, pp. 20 ] An employee at the FAA’s Boston Center later says the hijacking occurs when Flight 175 is above Albany, NY, about 140 miles north of New York City. [Associated Press, 9/13/2001; Telegraph (Nashua), 9/13/2001] The first “operational evidence” that something is wrong is at 8:47, when Flight 175’s transponder code changes twice within a minute (see 8:46 a.m.-8:47 a.m. September 11, 2001). [9/11 Commission, 7/24/2004, pp. 7]

Timeline Tags: 9/11 Timeline

Category Tags: Key Day of 9/11 Events, All Day of 9/11 Events, Flight UA 175

After 9/11, NORAD and other sources will claim that NORAD’s Northeast Air Defense Sector (NEADS) is notified at this time that Flight 175 has been hijacked. [Washington Post, 9/12/2001; CNN, 9/17/2001; North American Aerospace Defense Command, 9/18/2001; Associated Press, 8/19/2002; Newsday, 9/10/2002] However, the FAA’s New York Center, which is handling Flight 175, first alerts its military liaison about the hijacking at around 9:01 (see 9:01 a.m.-9:02 a.m. September 11, 2001). In addition, according to the 9/11 Commission, NEADS is not informed until two minutes later (see (9:03 a.m.) September 11, 2001). [9/11 Commission, 6/17/2004] According to the Commission, the first “operational evidence” that there is something wrong on Flight 175 is not until 8:47, when its transponder code changes (see 8:46 a.m.-8:47 a.m. September 11, 2001), and it is not until 8:53 that the air traffic controller handling it concludes that Flight 175 may be hijacked (see 8:51 a.m.-8:53 a.m. September 11, 2001). [9/11 Commission, 7/24/2004, pp. 7, 21-22]

Entity Tags: Federal Aviation Administration, North American Aerospace Defense Command, Northeast Air Defense Sector

Timeline Tags: 9/11 Timeline

Category Tags: Key Day of 9/11 Events, All Day of 9/11 Events, Flight UA 175

According to an employee at the FAA’s Boston Center in Nashua, New Hampshire, Flight 11 and Flight 175 nearly crash into each other while heading toward their targets in New York. The unnamed employee says, “The two aircraft got too close to each other down by Stewart” International Airport, which is in New Windsor, NY, about 55 miles north of New York City. Describing the incident, the Nashua Telegraph says that the terrorists “nearly had their plans dashed when the two planes almost collided.” [Associated Press, 9/13/2001; Telegraph (Nashua), 9/13/2001; United Press International, 9/13/2001] It is unclear exactly when this incident occurs, though it is presumably shortly after 8:42, when Flight 175 has its last communication with air traffic control. [9/11 Commission, 7/24/2004, pp. 7]

Timeline Tags: 9/11 Timeline

Category Tags: All Day of 9/11 Events, Flight AA 11, Flight UA 175

The pilot of US Airlines Flight 583 tells an unidentified flight controller, regarding Flight 175, “I just picked up an ELT [emergency locator transmitter] on 121.5. It was brief but it went off.” The controller responds, “O.K. they said it’s confirmed believe it or not as a thing, We’re not sure yet…” One minute later, another pilot says, “We picked up that ELT, too, but it’s very faint.” [New York Times, 10/16/2001] Flight 175 appears to have been the only trigger of any emergency signal on 9/11. It is possible the ELT came from Flight 11 instead.

Timeline Tags: 9/11 Timeline

Category Tags: All Day of 9/11 Events, Flight UA 175

Soldier firing a Stinger missile. [Source: US Army]In New York, the Secret Service has a Stinger missile secretly stored in the World Trade Center, to be used to protect the president if the city were attacked when he visits it. Presumably it keeps this is in WTC Building 7, where its field office is. [Tech TV, 7/23/2002; Weiss, 2003, pp. 379] Stinger missiles provide short-range air defense against low-altitude airborne targets, such as fix-winged aircraft, helicopters, and cruise missiles. They have a range of between one and eight kilometers. [Federation of American Scientists, 8/9/2000; GlobalSecurity (.org), 4/27/2005] Whether the Secret Service makes any attempt at defending New York from the two attacking planes with its Stinger missile is unknown. The agency is also known to have air surveillance capabilities. These include a system called Tigerwall, which provides “early warning of airborne threats” and “a geographic display of aircraft activity” (see (September 2000 and after)). And according to Barbara Riggs, who is in the Secret Service’s Washington, DC headquarters on this day, the agency is “able to receive real time information about other hijacked aircraft,” through “monitoring radar and activating an open line with the FAA.” [US Department of the Navy, 9/2000, pp. 28 ; PCCW Newsletter, 3/2006; Star-Gazette (Elmira), 6/5/2006] These capabilities would presumably be of use if the Secret Service wanted to defend the World Trade Center. Furthermore, according to the British defense publication Jane’s Land-Based Air Defence, “the American president’s residences in Washington and elsewhere are protected by specialist Stinger teams in case of an aerial attack by terrorist organizations.” [Jane's Land-Based Air Defence, 10/13/2000] Knight Ridder has previously reported “several sources” telling it, “Stinger missiles are in the Secret Service’s arsenal.” [Knight Ridder, 9/12/1994] And according to the London Telegraph, the Secret Service is “believed to have a battery of ground-to-air Stinger missiles” ready to defend the White House. [Daily Telegraph, 9/16/2001] Flight 77 reportedly comes within four miles of the White House before turning toward the Pentagon. [ABC News, 10/24/2001; USA Today, 8/13/2002] Whether the Secret Service makes any attempt at defending the place with its Stinger missiles is unknown. However, the Washington Post will later claim it is an “urban legend that Stinger missiles are mounted on the White House roof.” [Washington Post, 4/4/2002]

Entity Tags: Secret Service

Timeline Tags: 9/11 Timeline

Category Tags: All Day of 9/11 Events, Flight AA 11, Flight UA 175, Flight AA 77, World Trade Center

The hole caused by the Flight 11 crash. [Source: Reuters]Flight 11 slams into the WTC North Tower (Building 1). Seismic records pinpoint the crash at 26 seconds after 8:46 a.m. [CNN, 9/12/2001; New York Times, 9/12/2001; North American Aerospace Defense Command, 9/18/2001; USA Today, 12/20/2001; Federal Emergency Management Agency, 5/1/2002, pp. 1-10; USA Today, 8/13/2002; Associated Press, 8/21/2002; Newsday, 9/10/2002; New York Times, 9/11/2002] The NIST report states the crash time to be 8:46:30. [National Institute of Standards and Technology, 9/2005, pp. 19 ] The 9/11 Commission Report states the crash time to be 8:46:40. [9/11 Commission, 7/24/2004, pp. 7] Investigators believe the plane still has about 10,000 gallons of fuel (see 8:57 a.m. September 11, 2001). [New York Times, 9/11/2002] The plane strikes the 93rd through 99th floors in the 110-story building. No one above the crash line survives; approximately 1,360 people die. Below the crash line, approximately 72 die and more than 4,000 survive. Both towers are slightly less than half full at the time of the attack, with between 5,000 to 7,000 people in each tower. This number is lower than expected. Many office workers have not yet shown up to work, and tourists to the observation deck opening at 9:30 A.M. have yet to arrive. [USA Today, 12/20/2001; National Institute of Standards and Technology, 9/2005, pp. 20-22 ] The impact severs some columns on the north side of the North Tower. Each tower is designed as a “tube-in-tube” structure and the steel columns which support its weight are arranged around the perimeter and in the core. The plane, which weighs 283,600 lb and is traveling at an estimated speed of around 430 mph (see October 2002-October 2005), severs 35 of the building’s 236 perimeter columns and damages another two. The damage to the South Tower’s perimeter will be similar (see 9:03 a.m. September 11, 2001). [National Institute of Standards and Technology, 9/2005, pp. 5-9, 20, 22 ] The perimeter columns bear about half of the tower’s weight, so this damage reduces its ability to bear gravity loads by about 7.5 percent. [National Institute of Standards and Technology, 9/2005, pp. 6 ] The actual damage to the 47 core columns is not known, as there are no photographs or videos of it, but there will be much speculation about this after 9/11. It will be suggested that some parts of the aircraft may have damaged the core even after crashing through the exterior wall. According to the National Institute of Standards and Technology (NIST): “Moving at 500 mph, an engine broke any exterior column it hit. If the engine missed the floor slab, the majority of the engine core remained intact and had enough residual momentum to sever a core column upon direct impact.” [National Institute of Standards and Technology, 9/2005, pp. 107 ] According to NIST’s base case computer model, three of the core columns are severed and another ten suffer some damage. [National Institute of Standards & Technology, 9/2005, pp. 189 ] If this is accurate, it means that the impact damage to the core reduces the Tower’s strength by another approximately 7.5 percent, meaning that the building loses about 15 percent of its strength in total. This damage will be cited after 9/11 by NIST and others researchers as an event contributing to the building’s collapse (see October 23, 2002 and October 19, 2004). In addition, some of the fireproofing on the steel columns and trusses may be dislodged. The original fireproofing on the fire floors was mostly Blazeshield DC/F, but some of the fireproofing on the flooring has recently been upgraded to Blazeshield II, which is about 20 percent denser and 20 percent more adhesive. [National Institute of Standards & Technology, 9/2005, pp. xxxvi, 83 ] Photographs and videos of the towers will not show the state of fireproofing inside the buildings, but NIST will estimate the damage to it using a computer model. Its severe case model (see (October 2002-October 2005)) will predict that 43 of the 47 core columns are stripped of their fireproofing on one or more floors and that fireproofing is stripped from trusses covering 60,000 ft2 of floor area, the equivalent of about one and a half floors. NIST will say that the loss of fireproofing is a major cause of the collapse (see April 5, 2005), but only performs 15 tests on fireproofing samples (see October 26, 2005). [National Institute of Standards and Technology, 9/2005, pp. 23 ] According to NIST, more fireproofing is stripped from the South Tower (see 9:03 a.m. September 11, 2001).

Entity Tags: World Trade Center, National Institute of Standards and Technology

Timeline Tags: 9/11 Timeline

Category Tags: All Day of 9/11 Events, Flight AA 11, Flight UA 175, George Bush, WTC Investigation, Key Day of 9/11 Events, World Trade Center

At the time of the attacks on the World Trade Center, two F-16 fighter jets are performing a training mission just eight minutes flying time away from New York, but the pilots are unaware of the crisis taking place. The two jets belong to the 177th Fighter Wing of the New Jersey Air National Guard, which is based at Atlantic City International Airport. [GlobalSecurity (.org), 10/29/2001; Bergen Record, 12/5/2003] F-16s at Atlantic City are involved in scheduled training missions every day, and their first mission is usually between 8:30 a.m. and 9:00 a.m. [Griffin, 2007, pp. 62] The two fighter jets are unarmed and performing practice bombing runs over a section of the Pine Barrens in New Jersey that is designated for military drills. The pilots are unaware of the attacks in New York. They will not be called back to base until shortly after the second WTC tower is hit, and will then have their training munitions replaced with live air-to-air missiles. At the time of the second attack, another two jets from the 177th FW are preparing to take off for routine bombing training, but they too have their mission canceled (see (Shortly After 9:03 a.m.) September 11, 2001). No jets will take off from Atlantic City in response to the attacks until after 9:37, when the Pentagon is hit. [Code One Magazine, 10/2002; Bergen Record, 12/5/2003]
NEADS and FAA Tried Contacting 177th Fighter Wing - Colin Scoggins, the military liaison at the FAA’s Boston Center, is aware that the 177th FW launches F-16s for training flights every morning around this time, and suggested to NORAD’s Northeast Air Defense Sector (NEADS) that it contact Atlantic City to use these jets in response to the hijacked Flight 11. However, when NEADS tried phoning the unit, its call was not answered (see (Between 8:40 a.m. and 8:46 a.m.) September 11, 2001). [Griffin, 2007, pp. 62; Spencer, 2008, pp. 33-34] Apparently around 8:34 a.m., the Boston Center also attempted to contact the Atlantic City unit, but the outcome of that call is unclear (see (8:34 a.m.) September 11, 2001). [9/11 Commission, 7/24/2004, pp. 20]
F-16s Might Have Prevented Attacks on WTC - Author Peter Lance will later point out that, had the two Atlantic City F-16s flying over the Pine Barrens “been notified by the FAA at 8:34… they could have reached the Twin Towers by 8:42 a.m.,” four minutes before Flight 11 hit the North Tower (see 8:46 a.m. September 11, 2001). “Even unarmed, and without a shootdown order, they might have been able to take defensive action to prevent the big 767 from crashing into the tower. In any case, the fighters would certainly have been on patrol and able to interdict UA 175, which didn’t hit the South Tower until 9:03 a.m.” [Lance, 2004, pp. 230-231] Yet despite the crucial role these two fighters could have played, the 9/11 Commission Report will make no mention of them. [9/11 Commission, 7/24/2004] Pointing out the irony of having the two F-16s so near to Manhattan yet with such an unrelated mission, 177th Fighter Wing public affairs officer Lt. Luz Aponte will later remark, “Isn’t that something?” [Bergen Record, 12/5/2003]

Entity Tags: 177th Fighter Wing, Luz Aponte

Timeline Tags: 9/11 Timeline

Category Tags: All Day of 9/11 Events, Flight AA 11, Flight UA 175, Training Exercises

Two F-15 fighter jets are scrambled from Otis Air National Guard Base in Cape Cod, Massachusetts, which is 153 miles from New York City. The fighters are launched in response to the hijacked Flight 11, but this plane is already crashing into the World Trade Center at this time (see 8:46 a.m. September 11, 2001). [Washington Post, 9/15/2001; CNN, 9/17/2001; North American Aerospace Defense Command, 9/18/2001; 9/11 Commission, 6/17/2004]
Delay - The FAA’s Boston Center alerted NORAD’s Northeast Air Defense Sector (NEADS) to the hijacking of Flight 11 and requested that fighter jets be scrambled at just before 8:38 a.m. (see (8:37 a.m.) September 11, 2001), but the mission crew commander at NEADS only instructed the leader of his weapons team to launch the Otis fighters at 8:45 a.m. (see 8:45 a.m. September 11, 2001). [Vanity Fair, 8/1/2006]
Otis Aircraft Head to Runway - As soon as the pilots at Otis Air Base are strapped into their aircraft, the green light directing them to launch goes on. They start their engines and taxi out of the hangar to the nearest runway. One of the pilots, Lt. Col. Timothy Duffy, radios his command post for guidance, asking, “Do you have words?” The response he gets is, “Possible hijack, American Flight 11, 737, flight level 290 [29,000 feet], over JFK [International Airport in New York City].” (This flight information is partly incorrect, since American 11 is a 767, not a 737.) According to the Cape Cod Times, the jets will be up in the air before their radar kicks in. [Cape Cod Times, 8/21/2002; Spencer, 2008, pp. 42] The Otis pilots have already been preparing for the scramble order to come since learning of the hijacking from the FAA’s Cape Cod facility, some time shortly after 8:34 a.m. (see (Shortly After 8:34 a.m.) September 11, 2001). [BBC, 9/1/2002; Spencer, 2008, pp. 27-30] Their jets are reportedly not airborne until seven minutes after being scrambled, at 8:53 a.m. (see 8:53 a.m. September 11, 2001) and there will be conflicting accounts of what their original destination is (see (8:53 a.m.-9:05 a.m.) September 11, 2001). [9/11 Commission, 6/17/2004]

Entity Tags: Timothy Duffy, Otis Air National Guard Base, Daniel Nash

Timeline Tags: 9/11 Timeline

Category Tags: Key Day of 9/11 Events, All Day of 9/11 Events, Flight AA 11, Flight UA 175

Flight 175 stops transmitting its transponder signal. It is currently flying near the New Jersey-Pennsylvania border. [Guardian, 10/17/2001; Newsday, 9/10/2002; 9/11 Commission, 6/17/2004] However, the transponder is turned off for only about 30 seconds, and then comes back on as a signal that is not designated for any plane on this day. Then, within the space of a minute, it is changed to another new code. But New York Center air traffic computers do not correlate either of these new transponder codes with Flight 175. Consequently, according to an early FAA report, “the secondary radar return (transponder) indicating aircraft speed, altitude, and flight information began to coast and was no longer associated with the primary radar return.” Therefore, while controllers are able “to track the intruder easily… they couldn’t identify it.” However, Dave Bottiglia, the New York Center air traffic controller responsible for Flight 175, is currently trying to locate the already-crashed Flight 11, and therefore supposedly does not notice the transponder code changes on Flight 175 until 8:51 a.m. (see 8:51 a.m.-8:53 a.m. September 11, 2001). [Federal Aviation Administration, 9/17/2001 ; Washington Post, 9/17/2001; 9/11 Commission, 8/26/2004, pp. 21 ] According to a “Flight Path Study” by the National Transportation Safety Board, the change of Flight 175’s transponder code is the “first indication of deviation from normal routine.” [National Transportation Safety Board, 2/19/2002 ]

Timeline Tags: 9/11 Timeline

Category Tags: All Day of 9/11 Events, Flight UA 175

Naval Station Norfolk. [Source: US Navy]Rudy Washington, who is one of Rudolph Giuliani’s deputy mayors, sees the smoking North Tower as he is being driven into downtown Manhattan. He immediately calls Admiral Robert Natter, the commander of the US Atlantic Fleet at Norfolk Naval Station, Virginia, the world’s largest naval base. He requests air cover over New York. Norfolk Naval Station is in the region of Naval Air Station Oceana, which has F-14 Tomcats and F/A-18 Hornets. It is also near Langley Air Force Base. Natter says he will need to get in touch with the North American Aerospace Defense Command (NORAD), but will then call back. [Digital Journalist, 10/2001; Global Security (.org), 11/15/2001; CBS News, 4/3/2003; New York Daily News, 5/20/2004] Around this time, Washington also calls Patrick Burns at the base. Burns usually works in New York as the director of fleet support for the Navy, a civilian position that works closely with the mayor’s office and numerous other agencies. He is at Norfolk Naval Station for his two-week Naval Reserve obligation. Washington tells Burns, “I need you here.” No doubt anticipating there will be mass casualties, he adds, “I need that hospital ship.” He is referring to the hospital ship the USNS Comfort. [Associated Press, 9/11/2001; Notre Dame Magazine, 4/2007] However, the Comfort, which is based in Baltimore, will only set off for New York at 3 p.m. the following day, and arrive at Pier 92 in Manhattan late in the evening of September 14. [US Navy, n.d.; Military Sealift Command, 9/18/2001]

Entity Tags: Robert Natter, Rudy Washington, Patrick Burns, North American Aerospace Defense Command, US Department of the Navy

Timeline Tags: 9/11 Timeline

Category Tags: All Day of 9/11 Events, Flight UA 175

Curt Applegate sitting next to his air traffic control terminal. [Source: NBC News]After being focused on Flight 11, Dave Bottiglia, an air traffic controller at the FAA’s New York Center, first notices problems with Flight 175. [MSNBC, 9/11/2002; 9/11 Commission, 7/24/2004, pp. 21] Both Flight 11 and Flight 175 have been in the airspace that Bottiglia is responsible for monitoring (see 8:40 a.m. September 11, 2001 and (8:42 a.m.-8:46 a.m.) September 11, 2001). Bottiglia has just watched Flight 11’s radar blip disappear, which means the plane has dipped below his radar’s coverage area, so is below 2,000 feet. But he does not yet realize it has crashed. He says aloud, “Well, we know he’s not high altitude anymore.” [MSNBC, 9/11/2002; Spencer, 2008, pp. 37] Around this time, Flight 175’s transponder changes twice in the space of a minute (see 8:46 a.m.-8:47 a.m. September 11, 2001).
Conflicting Accounts - According to MSNBC, “within seconds” of losing Flight 11’s blip, “Bottiglia has another unexpected problem.” While looking for Flight 11, he realizes that Flight 175 is also missing, and “instinctively… knows the two [planes] are somehow related.” He asks another controller to take over all of his other planes. [MSNBC, 9/11/2002] But according to the 9/11 Commission’s account, Bottiglia is still trying to locate Flight 11 after it crashes, and so it is not until 8:51 a.m. that he notices the problem with Flight 175 (see 8:51 a.m.-8:53 a.m. September 11, 2001). [9/11 Commission, 8/26/2004, pp. 21 ]
'An Intruder over Allentown' - Around the time Flight 175 changes its transponder code, air traffic controller Curt Applegate, who is sitting at the radar bank next to Bottiglia’s, sees a blip that might be the missing Flight 11. He shouts out: “Look. There’s an intruder over Allentown.” According to the Washington Post, “In air traffic jargon, an ‘intruder’ is a plane with an operating transponder that has entered restricted airspace without permission.” In fact, it is the missing Flight 175. [Washington Post, 9/17/2001; MSNBC, 9/11/2002] However, these accounts make no mention of NORAD being notified about the problems with Flight 175 at this time. But according to a NORAD timeline released shortly after 9/11, NORAD’s Northeast Air Defense Sector (NEADS) was alerted about Flight 175 by the FAA several minutes earlier, at 8:43 a.m. (see 8:43 a.m. September 11, 2001). [North American Aerospace Defense Command, 9/18/2001]

Entity Tags: Dave Bottiglia, Curt Applegate, New York Air Route Traffic Control Center

Timeline Tags: 9/11 Timeline

Category Tags: Key Day of 9/11 Events, All Day of 9/11 Events, Flight AA 11, Flight UA 175

CNN is the first major network to show the footage of the crash site. It breaks into a commercial and anchor Carol Lin says, “This just in. You are looking at… obviously a very disturbing live shot there—that is the World Trade Center, and we have unconfirmed reports this morning that a plane has crashed into one of the towers of the World Trade Center.” CNN then switches to Sean Murtagh, the network’s vice president of finance, who says in a live telephone interview, “I just witnessed a plane that appeared to be cruising at a slightly lower than normal altitude over New York City. And it appears to have crashed into—I don’t know which tower it is—but it hit directly in the middle of one of the World Trade Center towers. It was a jet, maybe a two-engine jet, maybe a 737… a large passenger commercial jet… It was teetering back and forth, wing-tip to wing-tip, and it looks like it has crashed into—probably, twenty stories from the top of the World Trade Center—maybe the eightieth to eighty-fifth floor. There is smoke billowing out of the World Trade Center.” [CNN, 9/11/2001; Bamford, 2004, pp. 16-17] Many reports do not come until a few minutes later. For instance, ABC first breaks into regular programming with the story at 8:52 a.m. [ABC News, 9/14/2002] Incredibly, a NORAD timeline presented to the 9/11 Commission in 2003 claims that CNN doesn’t begin its coverage of the attacks until 8:57. [9/11 Commission, 5/23/2003]

Entity Tags: Carol Lin, Sean Murtagh, World Trade Center, CNN

Timeline Tags: 9/11 Timeline

Category Tags: All Day of 9/11 Events, Flight AA 11, Flight UA 175, World Trade Center

Apparently, managers at United Airlines’ System Operations Control (SOC) center, just outside Chicago, are unaware of any unfolding emergency until they see CNN reporting the burning World Trade Center (see 8:48 a.m. September 11, 2001). “Within minutes,” the air traffic control coordinator at United Airlines’ headquarters, located next to the SOC, calls an official at the FAA’s Herndon Command Center to confirm that the plane that just hit the WTC was not one of United’s aircraft. The FAA official tells him the plane had been a hijacked American Airlines 757. Soon afterwards, the air traffic control coordinator briefs Bill Roy and Mike Barber—the director and the dispatch manager at United’s SOC—on this information from the FAA. Barber then tries notifying United’s top corporate officials about it. However, he is unable to because the airline’s pager system is not working. [Wall Street Journal, 10/15/2001; 9/11 Commission, 8/26/2004, pp. 21-22 ]

Entity Tags: Federal Aviation Administration, Bill Roy, Mike Barber, United Airlines

Timeline Tags: 9/11 Timeline

Category Tags: All Day of 9/11 Events, Flight UA 175

According to a statement by two high-level FAA officials, “Within minutes after the first aircraft hit the World Trade Center, the FAA immediately established several phone bridges [i.e., telephone conference calls] that included FAA field facilities, the FAA command center, FAA headquarters, [Defense Department], the Secret Service, and other government agencies.” The FAA shares “real-time information on the phone bridges about the unfolding events, including information about loss of communication with aircraft, loss of transponder signals, unauthorized changes in course, and other actions being taken by all the flights of interest, including Flight 77. Other parties on the phone bridges in turn shared information about actions they were taken.” The statement says, “The US Air Force liaison to the FAA immediately joined the FAA headquarters phone bridge and established contact with NORAD on a separate line.” [9/11 Commission, 5/23/2003] Another account says the phone bridges are “quickly established” by the Air Traffic Services Cell (ATSC). This is a small office at the FAA’s Herndon Command Center, which is staffed by three military officers at the time of the attacks (see (Before 9:03 a.m.) September 11, 2001). It serves as the center’s liaison with the military. According to Aviation Week and Space Technology, the phone bridges link “key players, such as NORAD’s command center, area defense sectors, key FAA personnel, airline operations, and the NMCC.” [Aviation Week and Space Technology, 6/10/2002; 9/11 Commission, 6/17/2004] According to an FAA transcript of employee conversations on 9/11, one of the phone bridges, between the FAA Command Center, the operations center at FAA headquarters, and air traffic control centers in Boston and New York, begins before Flight 11 hits the World Trade Center at 8:46 (see 8:46 a.m. September 11, 2001). [Federal Aviation Authority, 10/14/2003, pp. 3-10 ] If these accounts are correct, it means someone at NORAD should learn about Flight 77 when it deviates from its course (see (8:54 a.m.) September 11, 2001). However, the 9/11 Commission will later claim that the FAA teleconference is established about 30 minutes later (see (9:20 a.m.) September 11, 2001). The Air Force liaison to the FAA will claim she only joins it after the Pentagon is hit (see (Shortly After 9:37 a.m.) September 11, 2001).

Entity Tags: Secret Service, Federal Aviation Administration, Air Traffic Services Cell, US Department of Defense

Timeline Tags: 9/11 Timeline

Category Tags: Key Day of 9/11 Events, All Day of 9/11 Events, Flight UA 175, Flight AA 77, Flight UA 93

According to a timeline provided to CNN by unnamed but “informed defense officials,” Flight 175 deviates from its assigned flight path at this time. [CNN, 9/17/2001] Other accounts give slightly different times. According to a National Transportation Safety Board report, which is based on various sources of recorded radar, Flight 175 deviates from its assigned altitude at 8:51 a.m., and then begins turning to the southeast at 8:52, climbing during the turn up to 33,500 feet. [National Transportation Safety Board, 2/19/2002 ] The 9/11 Commission Report is unspecific about when it goes off course. It says only that “Minutes later,” after its final 8:42 a.m. communication, “United 175 turned southwest without clearance from air traffic control.” [9/11 Commission, 7/24/2004, pp. 21] New York Center air traffic controller Curt Applegate later says that he follows Flight 175 on the radar screen as it turns to the left and descends. [MSNBC, 9/11/2002]

Timeline Tags: 9/11 Timeline

Category Tags: All Day of 9/11 Events, Flight UA 175

At Boston’s Logan Airport, from which Flight 11 and Flight 175 took off, directors learn that a plane thought to be from there has hit the World Trade Center, and another from there is missing. John Duval, the airport’s deputy director of operations, is at his desk in the executive aviation office, when his son calls and informs him of the first plane hitting the WTC. A duty manager then calls, saying he has been on the phone with the FAA control tower at the airport. The manager tells Duval he has been informed that, as well as the plane that hit the WTC, “Another one is missing,” and, “They think the two planes came from here.” Duval immediately calls Ed Freni, who is Logan’s director of aviation operations. Duval passes on the news of the WTC crash and the other information from his duty manager. The two men arrange to meet in five minutes time at the Massachusetts Port Authority (Massport) aviation office on the 18th floor of the FAA control tower at the airport. [Murphy, 2006, pp. 30-33]

Entity Tags: John Duval, Ed Freni

Timeline Tags: 9/11 Timeline

Category Tags: All Day of 9/11 Events, Flight AA 11, Flight UA 175

The air traffic controller at the FAA’s New York Center who is responsible for monitoring Flight 175 sees the now-hijacked plane on his radar screen making a sharp turn (see (8:50 a.m.) September 11, 2001), and is astonished as it rapidly climbs 3,000 feet. [National Transportation Safety Board, 2/19/2002 ; The Learning Channel, 2005] Around this time, the controller, Dave Bottiglia, first notices that Flight 175’s transponder code has changed (see 8:51 a.m.-8:53 a.m. September 11, 2001). [9/11 Commission, 8/26/2004, pp. 21 ] As he will later recall: “As I’m watching, United 175 makes a hard left-hand turn and starts climbing. Not only did he make a sharp turn, but he also climbed 3,000 feet in a matter of approximately one minute, which is a very fast rate of climb.” Bottiglia will add, “This is something that we have never seen before.” He immediately turns to the manager at the New York Center and says, “I believe I just lost United 175.” [The Learning Channel, 2005] Yet, according to the 9/11 Commission, the center does not alert NORAD’s Northeast Air Defense Sector (NEADS) to Flight 175 until 9:03 a.m. (see (9:03 a.m.) September 11, 2001). [9/11 Commission, 7/24/2004, pp. 23]

Entity Tags: New York Air Route Traffic Control Center, Dave Bottiglia

Timeline Tags: 9/11 Timeline

Category Tags: All Day of 9/11 Events, Flight UA 175

According to the 9/11 Commission, Dave Bottiglia, the air traffic controller handling Flight 175, only notices now that this flight’s transponder signal has changed (see 8:46 a.m.-8:47 a.m. September 11, 2001). Bottiglia asks Flight 175 to return to its proper transponder code. There is no response. Beginning at 8:52 a.m., he makes repeated attempts to contact it, but there is still no response. Bottiglia contacts another controller at 8:53 a.m., and says: “We may have a hijack. We have some problems over here right now.… I can’t get a hold of UAL 175 at all right now and I don’t know where he went to.” [New York Times, 10/16/2001; 9/11 Commission, 6/17/2004; Spencer, 2008, pp. 48] This account apparently conflicts with earlier accounts that claim NORAD’s Northeast Air Defense Sector (NEADS) was notified at 8:43 a.m. that Flight 175 had been hijacked (see 8:43 a.m. September 11, 2001). [North American Aerospace Defense Command, 9/18/2001]

Entity Tags: Dave Bottiglia

Timeline Tags: 9/11 Timeline

Category Tags: Key Day of 9/11 Events, All Day of 9/11 Events, Flight UA 175

Robert Fangman. [Source: Family photo]A flight attendant on Flight 175 calls the United Airlines maintenance office in San Francisco and speaks with Marc Policastro, an employee there. The attendant reports that Flight 175 has been hijacked, both of its pilots have been killed, a flight attendant has been stabbed, and the hijackers are probably flying the plane. The line then goes dead. [Wall Street Journal, 10/15/2001; 9/11 Commission, 7/24/2004, pp. 7-8; 9/11 Commission, 8/26/2004, pp. 21 ] The call, which lasts 75 seconds, is made using an Airfone in row 31 at the back of the plane. Flight crews on United aircraft are able to contact the maintenance office simply by dialing *349 on an Airfone. [9/11 Commission, 8/26/2004, pp. 90-91 ; US District Court for the Eastern District of Virginia, Alexandria Division, 7/31/2006] The identity of the attendant making the call is unclear. According to the Wall Street Journal, the caller is “a female flight attendant.” [Wall Street Journal, 10/15/2001] The 9/11 Commission Report, however, refers to them as “a male flight attendant,” and one of the Commission’s earlier staff statements will specifically name Robert Fangman, who is one of the attendants on Flight 175. [9/11 Commission, 1/27/2004 ; 9/11 Commission, 7/24/2004, pp. 7; 9/11 Commission, 8/26/2004, pp. 18 ] A summary of the phone calls made from the four hijacked planes presented at the 2006 Zacarias Moussaoui trial will refer to the caller simply as a “flight attendant,” with a question mark signifying their name. [US District Court for the Eastern District of Virginia, Alexandria Division, 7/31/2006] After the call ends, Policastro and also another employee at the maintenance office try contacting Flight 175 using ACARS (an e-mail system that enables personnel on the ground to rapidly communicate with those in the cockpit of an aircraft), but they receive no response to these and subsequent attempts at reaching the flight. According to GTE Airfone records, another successful call will be made from Flight 175 to the maintenance office four minutes after this first one (see 8:56 a.m. September 11, 2001). However, other evidence indicates only one call is made. Shortly before 9:00 a.m., a supervisor at the maintenance office will call the United Airlines System Operations Control center, just outside Chicago, and inform a manager there of the reported hijacking of Flight 175 (see Shortly Before 9:00 a.m. September 11, 2001). The supervisor also calls the airline’s security chief. [9/11 Commission, 8/26/2004, pp. 21-22 and 90 ]

Entity Tags: Marc Policastro, Robert Fangman

Timeline Tags: 9/11 Timeline

Category Tags: Key Day of 9/11 Events, All Day of 9/11 Events, Flight UA 175, Alleged Passenger Phone Calls

Mike McCormick. [Source: Associated Press]Mike McCormick, the head of the FAA’s New York Center, sees the coverage of the first World Trade Center attack on CNN. He assumes that Flight 175, which he is tracking on his radar screen, is also headed into the WTC. He will recall: “Probably one of the most difficult moments of my life was the 11 minutes from the point I watched that aircraft, when we first lost communications until the point that aircraft hit the World Trade Center. For those 11 minutes, I knew, we knew, what was going to happen, and that was difficult.” [CNN, 8/12/2002] Yet, according to the 9/11 Commission, the New York Center will not notify NORAD’s Northeast Air Defense Sector (NEADS) about Flight 175 until around the time it crashes, at 9:03 a.m. (see (9:03 a.m.) September 11, 2001). [9/11 Commission, 7/24/2004, pp. 23]

Entity Tags: New York Air Route Traffic Control Center, Mike McCormick

Timeline Tags: 9/11 Timeline

Category Tags: All Day of 9/11 Events, Flight UA 175

Garnet ‘Ace’ Bailey. [Source: Los Angeles Kings]Garnet “Ace” Bailey, a passenger on Flight 175, tries four times to call his wife Katherine, on both her business and home phone lines. According to the 9/11 Commission, his attempts are unsuccessful, and he never gets to speak to her. [9/11 Commission, 8/26/2004, pp. 21 ; ESPN, 9/7/2006] Bailey was assigned a seat in row 6 of the plane but attempts the calls using a phone in row 32. According to a summary of phone calls from the hijacked flights presented at the 2006 Zacarias Moussaoui trial, however, while one of his calls does not connect, the other three do and last for 22 seconds, 25 seconds, and 9 seconds. [US District Court for the Eastern District of Virginia, Alexandria Division, 7/31/2006] Bailey’s wife will later appear to confirm not having received any calls from her husband, recalling that when the plane struck the South Tower at 9:03 a.m., “We had no idea” Garnet was on it, and that “I had no thought he was in harm’s way.” [Press-Telegram (Long Beach, CA), 9/10/2007] Garnet Bailey is a scout for the Los Angeles Kings of the National Hockey League, and played in the NHL himself from 1968 to 1978. [New York Times, 9/13/2001]

Entity Tags: Garnet Bailey

Timeline Tags: 9/11 Timeline

Category Tags: All Day of 9/11 Events, Flight UA 175, Alleged Passenger Phone Calls

Peter Hanson. [Source: Family photo]Businessman Peter Hanson calls his father from Flight 175 and says, “Oh, my God! They just stabbed the airline hostess. I think the airline is being hijacked.” Despite being cut off twice, he manages to report how men armed with knives are stabbing flight attendants, apparently in an attempt to force crewmembers to unlock the doors to the cockpit. He calls again a couple of minutes before the plane crashes. [BBC, 9/13/2001; Daily Telegraph, 9/16/2001; Toronto Sun, 9/16/2001] Hanson’s father immediately calls the local police department and relays what he heard. [San Francisco Chronicle, 7/23/2004]

Entity Tags: Peter Hanson

Timeline Tags: 9/11 Timeline

Category Tags: All Day of 9/11 Events, Flight UA 175, Alleged Passenger Phone Calls

William Wibel, principal of a school inside Otis Air National Guard Base, is inside the Otis base preparing for a meeting when he learns that the WTC has been attacked and his meeting is canceled. He says, “As I drove away, and was listening to the news on the radio, the 102nd was scrambling into duty.” [Cape Cod Times, 9/12/2001] The WTC crash does not break on local news and radio until about 8:52 a.m. Even if he hears CNN’s early reporting starting at 8:48 a.m., it still presumably takes time to learn the meeting is canceled, go back to his car and so forth. NORAD says the fighters took off from Otis at 8:52 a.m.

Entity Tags: North American Aerospace Defense Command, William Wibel

Timeline Tags: 9/11 Timeline

Category Tags: All Day of 9/11 Events, Flight UA 175

The two F-15 fighter jets that took off from Otis Air National Guard Base in Cape Cod head toward the New York area. But accounts will be unclear regarding what speed they fly at as they respond to the hijacking of Flight 11. The two jets were scrambled from Otis at 8:46 (see 8:46 a.m. September 11, 2001), and are airborne by 8:53 (see 8:53 a.m. September 11, 2001). [9/11 Commission, 7/24/2004, pp. 20]
Flying Supersonic - In a number of accounts, it is claimed the fighters fly faster than the speed of sound. [Cape Cod Times, 8/21/2002] Lead pilot Lt. Col. Timothy Duffy will tell the BBC: “I was supersonic.… I don’t know what we could have done to get there any quicker.” [BBC, 9/1/2002] He tells ABC News, “[W]e go supersonic on the way, which is kind of nonstandard for us.” [ABC News, 9/11/2002] According to author Lynn Spencer, “against regulations, [Duffy] takes his plane supersonic, breaking the sound barrier as he passes through 18,000 feet. This is a violation that can get a pilot into a good deal of trouble since the sonic boom tends to break windows in the homes down below.” When the other Otis pilot, Major Daniel Nash, radios and says, “You’re supersonic,” Duffy responds, “Yeah, I know, don’t worry about it.” Then, “Without hesitation, [Nash] follows his lead” and also goes supersonic. [Spencer, 2008, pp. 43]
Flying 'Full Blower' - Duffy will recall, “I was in full blower all the way,” as he flies toward New York. [Aviation Week and Space Technology, 6/3/2002] In another account, he similarly says, “When we took off I left it in full afterburner the whole time.” [Filson, 2003, pp. 57] F-15s can fly at up to 1,875 miles per hour. [Cape Cod Times, 9/12/2001; US Air Force, 3/2008] According to an Otis Air Base spokeswoman, “An F-15 departing from Otis can reach New York City in 10 to 12 minutes.” [Cape Cod Times, 9/16/2001] But, according to the Boston Globe, while “In their prime, the planes can go Mach 2.5 [and] could have been to New York in less than 10 minutes,” Duffy and Nash are “flying F-15 Eagles that were built in 1977.… Because of their age and the three large fuel tanks they were carrying… the planes couldn’t attain that speed, both pilots said.” [Boston Globe, 9/11/2005]
Different Speeds Given - Various speeds will later be given for how fast the Otis jets are traveling. Consistent with Duffy’s claims of flying “supersonic,” ABC News says the two fighters fly “at Mach 1.2, nearly 900 miles per hour.” [ABC News, 9/11/2002] According to the Boston Globe, the fighters are flying at “about Mach 1.4—more than 1,000 miles per hour.” [Boston Globe, 9/11/2005] Major General Larry Arnold, the commanding general of NORAD’s Continental Region, says they fly at “about 1.5 Mach, which is, you know, somewhere—11 or 1,200 miles an hour.” [MSNBC, 9/23/2001; Slate, 1/16/2002] Major General Paul Weaver, the director of the Air National Guard, says the jets fly “like a scalded ape,” but as to their exact speed, he only says they are “topping 500 mph.” [Dallas Morning News, 9/16/2001] And by 9:03 a.m., when the second World Trade Center tower is hit, the Otis fighters are still 71 miles from New York, according to NORAD. [North American Aerospace Defense Command, 9/18/2001] The 9/11 Commission will state that they only arrive over Manhattan at 9:25 a.m. (see 9:25 a.m. September 11, 2001), though accounts of most witnesses on the ground indicate they do not arrive until after 10:00 a.m. (see (9:45 a.m.-10:45 a.m.) September 11, 2001). [9/11 Commission, 7/24/2004, pp. 24] Accounts are contradictory regarding what exact destination the Otis jets are initially heading toward after taking off (see (8:53 a.m.-9:05 a.m.) September 11, 2001).

Entity Tags: Timothy Duffy, Paul Weaver, Larry Arnold, Daniel Nash

Timeline Tags: 9/11 Timeline

Category Tags: Key Day of 9/11 Events, All Day of 9/11 Events, Flight AA 11, Flight UA 175

Adam Arias [Source: US Air Force]Major Don Arias, the public affairs officer for NORAD, has just learned of the first WTC crash from television and a phone call from NEADS (see (8:38 a.m.-8:52 a.m.) September 11, 2001). Alarmed because his younger brother works at the WTC, he calls him immediately. Adam Arias works for an investment company on the 84th floor of the South Tower. According to some accounts, Don Arias tells his brother that the aircraft that crashed into the North Tower was likely a hijacked plane that he has been informed of, and orders him to “Get out of there. Go home.” [Florida State Times, 11/2001; Newhouse News Service, 1/25/2002; Airman, 9/2002] But according to Newsday, Don Arias tells his brother he has heard there is “another hijacked airliner and might be another attack.” [Newsday, 10/30/2001] This would be consistent with an early NORAD timeline, which had the agency receiving notification of the second hijacking at 8:43 a.m. (see 8:43 a.m. September 11, 2001). However, later accounts, including the 9/11 Commission Report, will claim NORAD only hears of it around the time the plane hits the South Tower (see (9:03 a.m.) September 11, 2001). Adam Arias reacts to his brother’s call with urgency, going around the floor exhorting people to leave, and physically throwing one woman out of her office. Several survivors will later credit him with saving their lives. [Newhouse News Service, 1/25/2002; Airman, 9/2002; Filson, 2003, pp. 124] Adam Arias will be killed when the South Tower collapses. [Seattle Post-Intelligencer, 9/9/2003]

Entity Tags: Don Arias

Timeline Tags: 9/11 Timeline

Category Tags: All Day of 9/11 Events, Flight UA 175

After taking off in their F-15s, the two pilots scrambled from Otis Air National Guard Base in response to Flight 11 are not properly informed about the unfolding events. One of these pilots, Lt. Col. Timothy Duffy, later describes, “When you get the scramble order… you are usually not sure what is going on.” However, after they were informed there had been a hijacking (see 8:34 a.m. September 11, 2001), the two “knew it was the real thing,” according to Major Daniel Nash, the other pilot. [Fox News, 9/8/2002] But as they are “headed right down Long Island,” Duffy recalls, “[w]e had no idea what was going on.” [Canadian Broadcasting Corporation, 9/10/2006] When the second World Trade Center tower is hit at 9:03, they are unaware that a second plane has been in trouble, and their request for clarification of their mission from NORAD’s Northeast Air Defense Sector (NEADS) is met with “considerable confusion” (see (9:03 a.m.) September 11, 2001). [Aviation Week and Space Technology, 6/3/2002; Filson, 2003, pp. 60-63] (According to the 9/11 Commission, NEADS itself only receives its first notification about a second possible hijacking at 9:03 (see (9:03 a.m.) September 11, 2001). [9/11 Commission, 8/26/2004, pp. 24 ] ) Furthermore, it is not until after 10:30 a.m. that the two pilots will learn that Washington has also been attacked, when a controller informs them of this in passing, but does not elaborate. [Cape Cod Times, 8/21/2002] Nash will later complain: “Anybody watching CNN that morning had a much better idea of what was going on than we did. We were not told anything.” [Michael Bronner, 2006] Duffy later reflects: “People lose track of how much chaos there was. We were in a situation that was just a mess, you know, and we were trying to get our arms around it a little bit.” [Canadian Broadcasting Corporation, 9/10/2006]

Entity Tags: Daniel Nash, Timothy Duffy

Timeline Tags: 9/11 Timeline

Category Tags: All Day of 9/11 Events, Flight UA 175

Route of the Otis Air National Guard fighters to New York City. [Source: Yvonne Vermillion/ MagicGraphix.com]The two F-15 fighter jets launched from Otis Air National Guard Base in Cape Cod respond to the hijacking of Flight 11, but there will be conflicting accounts regarding their initial destination. The fighters were scrambled at 8:46 (see 8:46 a.m. September 11, 2001), and are airborne by 8:53 (see 8:53 a.m. September 11, 2001). [9/11 Commission, 7/24/2004, pp. 20]
Flying toward New York City - News reports shortly after 9/11 will say that, after taking off, the Otis fighters begin “racing towards New York City.” [CBS News, 9/14/2001; CNN, 9/14/2001; Cape Cod Times, 9/15/2001] Other news reports similarly say they initially head toward New York City. [Washington Post, 9/12/2001; Aviation Week and Space Technology, 6/3/2002; Fox News, 9/8/2002] Major General Larry Arnold, the commanding general of NORAD’s Continental Region, will say the fighters are “coming to New York.” [MSNBC, 9/23/2001; Slate, 1/16/2002] Lt. Col. Timothy Duffy, the lead Otis pilot, tells the BBC, “When we took off we started climbing a 280-heading, basically towards New York City.” [BBC, 9/1/2002] In one account, Duffy recalls that, after launching, he calls for the location of his target and is told, “Your contact’s over Kennedy,” meaning New York’s JFK International Airport. Duffy will add, “[W]e started heading right down to Long Island, basically.” [ABC News, 9/11/2002; Bamford, 2004, pp. 15] In another account, he says that he and the other Otis pilot, Major Daniel Nash, “climbed up, [and] we were supersonic going down to Long Island.” [Filson, 2003, pp. 57]
Without a Target, Heading for Military Airspace - According to some accounts, however, the two Otis fighters do not initially head toward Manhattan. Major James Fox, the leader of the weapons team at NORAD’s Northeast Air Defense Sector (NEADS), will later recall: “We had no idea where [Flight 11] was. We just knew it was over land, so we scrambled [the Otis fighters] towards land.” [Newhouse News Service, 1/25/2002] The 9/11 Commission will conclude that, after taking off, because they are “Lacking a target,” the fighters are “vectored toward military-controlled airspace off the Long Island coast.” [9/11 Commission, 7/24/2004, pp. 20] Colonel Robert Marr, the battle commander at NEADS, says that when the Otis fighters took off, his “intent was to scramble [them] to military airspace while we found out what was going on.” He says that, before 9:03 when the second World Trade Center tower is hit, the fighters are “heading down south toward Whiskey 105 and we don’t really have a mission for them at this point.” Whiskey 105 is military training airspace southeast of Long Island, a few minutes flying time from New York City. [Filson, 2003, pp. 56 and 58-59]
To New York, then Redirected to Military Airspace - Other accounts will say the Otis fighters initially head toward New York City, but are subsequently redirected to the military airspace off Long Island. According to author Lynn Spencer, after taking off, Duffy and Nash fly “supersonic toward New York for approximately 15 minutes.” But just after the second WTC tower is hit, Duffy suggests to the weapons controller at NEADS that the two fighters head to the Whiskey 105 training airspace off Long Island, and that is where they then go. [Spencer, 2008, pp. 83-85] Tape recordings of the NEADS operations floor will reveal that, at 8:45 a.m., Major Kevin Nasypany, the facility’s mission crew commander, gave Major Fox a coordinate north of New York City, and told him to “Head [the Otis jets] in that direction” (see 8:45 a.m. September 11, 2001). Then, at 8:52, he told one of his staff members, “Send ‘em to New York City still” (see 8:53 a.m. September 11, 2001). But, according to Vanity Fair, shortly after the second tower is hit, the NEADS weapons technicians get “pushback” from civilian FAA controllers, who are “afraid of fast-moving fighters colliding with a passenger plane,” so the two fighters are directed to a “holding area” just off the coast, near Long Island (see 9:09 a.m.-9:13 a.m. September 11, 2001). [Vanity Fair, 8/1/2006] Accounts are also unclear regarding what speed the Otis jets fly at after taking off (see (8:53 a.m.-9:05 a.m.) September 11, 2001).

Entity Tags: James Fox, Larry Arnold, Daniel Nash, Robert Marr, Timothy Duffy

Timeline Tags: 9/11 Timeline

Category Tags: Key Day of 9/11 Events, All Day of 9/11 Events, Flight AA 11, Flight UA 175

A typical F-15. [Source: US Air Force]Radar data will show that the two F-15s scrambled from Otis Air National Guard Base in Cape Cod, Massachusetts, are airborne by this time. [Washington Post, 9/15/2001; North American Aerospace Defense Command, 9/18/2001; 9/11 Commission, 7/24/2004, pp. 20] It is now eight minutes since the mission crew commander at NORAD’s Northeast Air Defense Sector (NEADS) ordered that the jets be launched (see 8:45 a.m. September 11, 2001). [Vanity Fair, 8/1/2006] It is 40 minutes since air traffic controllers had their last communication with Flight 11 (see 8:13 a.m. September 11, 2001), and 28 minutes since they became certain that the aircraft was hijacked (see (8:25 a.m.) September 11, 2001). Flight 11 crashed into the World Trade Center seven minutes ago (see 8:46 a.m. September 11, 2001). [9/11 Commission, 7/24/2004, pp. 7, 19 and 459]
Commander Wants Fighters Sent to New York - In Rome, New York, NEADS has just received news of the plane hitting the WTC (see 8:51 a.m. September 11, 2001). Major Kevin Nasypany, the facility’s mission crew commander, is asked what to do with the Otis fighters. He responds: “Send ‘em to New York City still. Continue! Go! This is what I got. Possible news that a 737 just hit the World Trade Center. This is a real-world.… Continue taking the fighters down to the New York City area, JFK [International Airport] area, if you can. Make sure that the FAA clears it—your route all the way through.… Let’s press with this.” [Vanity Fair, 8/1/2006] Yet there will be conflicting reports of the fighters’ destination (see (8:53 a.m.-9:05 a.m.) September 11, 2001), with some accounts saying they are directed toward military-controlled airspace off the Long Island coast. [Filson, 2003, pp. 56-59; 9/11 Commission, 6/17/2004]

Entity Tags: Northeast Air Defense Sector, Robert Marr, Kevin Nasypany, Otis Air National Guard Base

Timeline Tags: 9/11 Timeline

Category Tags: All Day of 9/11 Events, Flight UA 175

Flight 175 almost collides in mid-air with at least two other planes as it descends towards Manhattan. At the FAA’s New York Center, air traffic controller Chris Tucker sees it turn toward the path of Delta Flight 2315, a Boeing 737 heading southwest at 28,000 feet. He tells the Delta pilot: “Traffic 2 o’clock. Ten miles. I think he’s been hijacked. I don’t know his intentions. Take any evasive action necessary.” The Delta plane begins to turn to get out of the way, but Flight 175 turns as well. According to the Washington Post, the two planes’ radar targets actually merge on the radar screen. Controller Dave Bottiglia later says, “It was a terrifying moment just to watch the two airplanes miss by less than, I think it was 200 feet.” Shortly after this near miss, Flight 175 almost collides with US Airways Flight 542, another 737, flying just below and four miles behind Delta 2315. This plane’s onboard collision alert system sounds an alarm as Flight 175 comes closer and closer to it. Its pilot descends, managing to avoid a collision. According to an early FAA report, after this incident, several New York air traffic controllers speculate that the unknown aircraft heading towards New York City—only later confirmed to be Flight 175—is an emergency and is heading for an airport to land. [Federal Aviation Administration, 9/17/2001 ; Washington Post, 9/17/2001; Newsday, 9/10/2002; MSNBC, 9/11/2002; Associated Press, 9/12/2002] Earlier on, Flight 175 nearly collided with Flight 11 (see (Shortly After 8:42 a.m.) September 11, 2001), and minutes later it will narrowly avoid another collision, with Midwest Airlines Flight 7 (see (9:01 a.m.) September 11, 2001).

Entity Tags: Dave Bottiglia, New York Air Route Traffic Control Center, Chris Tucker

Timeline Tags: 9/11 Timeline

Category Tags: All Day of 9/11 Events, Flight UA 175

The head air traffic controller at the FAA’s New York Center notifies a manager at the facility that she believes Flight 175 has been hijacked. The manager tries to notify regional managers about this, but cannot reach them because they are discussing the hijacking of Flight 11 and refuse to be disturbed. However, even though the controller managing Flight 175 said, “we may have a hijack” at 8:53 a.m. (see 8:51 a.m.-8:53 a.m. September 11, 2001), the 9/11 Commission will conclude that NORAD’s Northeast Air Defense Sector (NEADS) is not notified about the aircraft until 9:03 a.m. (see (9:03 a.m.) September 11, 2001). [9/11 Commission, 6/17/2004] The Commission’s account will conflict with previous accounts that state that NEADS was notified of the Flight 175 hijacking at 8:43 a.m. (see 8:43 a.m. September 11, 2001). The head of the New York Center, Mike McCormick, has already decided at 8:52 a.m. that Flight 175 has been hijacked and is on a suicide run to New York City (see (8:52 a.m.) September 11, 2001). [CNN, 8/12/2002]

Entity Tags: New York Air Route Traffic Control Center, Mike McCormick

Timeline Tags: 9/11 Timeline

Category Tags: All Day of 9/11 Events, Flight UA 175

According to GTE Airfone records, an attendant on Flight 175 makes a call to the United Airlines maintenance office in San Francisco at this time, but the employee who would have answered it denies this. The call is supposedly made using an Airfone in row 31 at the back of the plane, and lasts 31 seconds. [9/11 Commission, 8/26/2004, pp. 90-91 ; US District Court for the Eastern District of Virginia, Alexandria Division, 7/31/2006] A Flight 175 attendant, possibly Robert Fangman, called the maintenance office four minutes earlier and spoke with employee Marc Policastro (see 8:52 a.m. September 11, 2001). [9/11 Commission, 1/27/2004 ; 9/11 Commission, 7/24/2004, pp. 7] But Policastro, who would have also answered this second call had it occurred, later recalls only one communication from the flight. United Airlines investigators will conclude that only one call is received. According to Airfone records, a third call from Flight 175 to the maintenance office is attempted a minute later, at 8:57, but this fails to connect. [9/11 Commission, 8/26/2004, pp. 90-91 ; US District Court for the Eastern District of Virginia, Alexandria Division, 7/31/2006]

Entity Tags: Marc Policastro, Robert Fangman

Timeline Tags: 9/11 Timeline

Category Tags: All Day of 9/11 Events, Flight UA 175, Alleged Passenger Phone Calls

Flight 175 an instant before it hits the WTC South Tower. [Source: Associated Press]About a half-dozen air traffic controllers at the FAA’s New York Center in Ronkonkoma, NY, watch Flight 175 on the radar screen in its final minutes, as it approaches Manhattan. [National Transportation Safety Board, 2/19/2002 ; Vanity Fair, 8/1/2006] Flight 175 is marked on the screen with the letter “I” for “intruder.” Initially, those at the center think it might be heading for Newark Airport, maybe for an emergency landing there. But controller Jim Bohleber says, “No, he’s too fast and low, he’ll never make Newark.” [Newsday, 9/10/2002] The controllers start speculating what Flight 175 is aiming for, with one of them guessing the Statue of Liberty. [Vanity Fair, 8/1/2006] They are astonished at the extraordinary rate at which it is descending (see (8:58 a.m.-9:03 a.m.) September 11, 2001). A controller counts down its altitude, “Eight, six, four” thousand feet, and then says, “My god, he’s in the ground in the next step.” But someone else at the center says, “No, that’s the Trade Center right there.” [The Learning Channel, 2005] But, according to the 9/11 Commission, the New York Center does not notify NORAD’s Northeast Air Defense Sector (NEADS) about Flight 175 until 9:03 a.m., the same time as it crashes into the South Tower (see (9:03 a.m.) September 11, 2001). [9/11 Commission, 7/24/2004, pp. 23] Workers at the crisis center at United Airlines’ headquarters outside Chicago, also closely watch Flight 175 head into New York City on radar. [USA Today, 8/13/2002]

Entity Tags: New York Air Route Traffic Control Center, Jim Bohleber

Timeline Tags: 9/11 Timeline

Category Tags: All Day of 9/11 Events, Flight UA 175

Flight 175, now in descent, briefly levels off at 28,500 feet and starts turning northeast. A minute later, it resumes its descent as it heads toward New York City. [National Transportation Safety Board, 2/19/2002 ; 9/11 Commission, 8/26/2004, pp. 22 ]

Timeline Tags: 9/11 Timeline

Category Tags: All Day of 9/11 Events, Flight UA 175

People inside the World Trade Center flee down a stairway. [Source: Shannon Stapleton]By 8:57 a.m., fire department commanders at WTC Tower One advise Port Authority police and building personnel to evacuate Tower Two. According to the 9/11 Commission, the reason for this is not concern of a possible second plane, but because the fire chiefs judge the impact of the plane into the North Tower to have made the entire WTC complex unsafe. However, there is no evidence that this advice is communicated effectively to the building personnel in Tower Two. When an announcement is made to evacuate at 9:02 a.m. (one minute before the building is hit), it does not direct everyone to evacuate, and advises only that everyone may wish to start an orderly evacuation if warranted by conditions on their floor. [9/11 Commission, 5/19/2004; 9/11 Commission, 7/24/2004, pp. 287 and 290]

Entity Tags: World Trade Center

Timeline Tags: 9/11 Timeline

Category Tags: All Day of 9/11 Events, Flight UA 175, World Trade Center

Air traffic controllers at the FAA’s New York Center who are watching Flight 175 on the radar screen (see (8:57 a.m.-9:03 a.m.) September 11, 2001) see the aircraft descending at an astonishing rate of up to 10,000 feet per minute. [The Learning Channel, 2005] From 8:58 a.m., Flight 175 is constantly descending toward New York. [National Transportation Safety Board, 2/19/2002 ] One of the New York Center controllers, Jim Bohleber, is looking at his radar scope and calls out the plane’s rate of descent every 12 seconds, each time the screen updates, saying: “It’s six thousand feet a minute. Now it’s eight. Now ten.” [Newsday, 9/10/2002; Vanity Fair, 8/1/2006] Dave Bottiglia, the controller responsible for monitoring Flight 175, will later comment that 10,000 feet per minute is “absolutely unheard of for a commercial jet. It is unbelievable for the passengers in the back to withstand that type of force as they’re descending. [The hijackers are] actually nosing the airplane down and doing what I would call a ‘power dive.’” [The Learning Channel, 2005] While Flight 175 is in this rapid descent, it heads directly into the paths of several other aircraft, and narrowly avoids a mid-air collision with flight Midex 7 (see (9:01 a.m.) September 11, 2001). [Spencer, 2008, pp. 73-76]

Entity Tags: Dave Bottiglia, Jim Bohleber, New York Air Route Traffic Control Center

Timeline Tags: 9/11 Timeline

Category Tags: All Day of 9/11 Events, Flight UA 175

Brian Sweeney. [Source: Family photo]Brian Sweeney, a passenger on Flight 175, calls his wife, but can only leave a message. “We’ve been hijacked, and it doesn’t look too good.” Then he calls his mother and tells her what is happening onboard. [Hyannis News, 9/13/2001; Washington Post, 9/21/2001] She recalls him saying, “They might come back here. I might have to go. We are going to try to do something about this.” She also recalls him identifying the hijackers as Middle Eastern. Then he tells his mother he loves her and hangs up the phone. The mother turns on the television and soon sees Flight 175 crash into the WTC. The 9/11 Commission later concludes that the Flight 175 passengers planned to storm the cockpit but did not have time before the plane crashed. [New York Daily News, 3/9/2004; CNN, 3/10/2004]

Entity Tags: Brian Sweeney

Timeline Tags: 9/11 Timeline

Category Tags: All Day of 9/11 Events, Flight UA 175, Alleged Passenger Phone Calls

Jim Goodwin. [Source: Chicago Tribune]Rich Miles, the manager at the United Airlines System Operations Control (SOC) center just outside Chicago, receives a call from a supervisor at United’s maintenance office in San Francisco, informing him that Flight 175 has been reported as hijacked. [Wall Street Journal, 10/15/2001; 9/11 Commission, 8/26/2004, pp. 22 ] The maintenance office received a call minutes earlier from a flight attendant on United 175, who said their plane had been hijacked (see 8:52 a.m. September 11, 2001). [9/11 Commission, 7/24/2004, pp. 7-8] When the supervisor tells Miles about this, he initially responds, “No, the information we’re getting is that it was an American 757.” (The FAA has just informed United Airlines that the plane that hit the World Trade Center was a hijacked American Airlines 757 (see (Shortly After 8:48 a.m.) September 11, 2001).) But the supervisor insists, “No, we got a call from a flight attendant on 175.” [Wall Street Journal, 10/15/2001] Miles notifies his boss Bill Roy, the SOC director, about this information. Roy then contacts United’s CEO Jim Goodwin and its chief operating officer Andy Studdert, who are in a meeting at the airline’s headquarters, located next to the SOC. Roy then begins the process of activating the crisis center at the United headquarters, which will take about 30 minutes to complete. [Wall Street Journal, 10/15/2001; 9/11 Commission, 1/27/2004; 9/11 Commission, 8/26/2004, pp. 22 ]

Entity Tags: Andy Studdert, Jim Goodwin, Rich Miles, United Airlines, Bill Roy

Timeline Tags: 9/11 Timeline

Category Tags: All Day of 9/11 Events, Flight UA 175

The FAA’s New York Center informs the air traffic control coordinator at United Airlines’ headquarters, outside Chicago, that Flight 175 is missing from radar. Although Flight 175’s transponder signal changed at around 8:47 (see 8:46 a.m.-8:47 a.m. September 11, 2001), according to the 9/11 Commission the air traffic controller handling the flight only noticed the change at 8:51 (see 8:51 a.m.-8:53 a.m. September 11, 2001). [9/11 Commission, 8/26/2004, pp. 21-22 ]

Entity Tags: United Airlines, New York Air Route Traffic Control Center

Timeline Tags: 9/11 Timeline

Category Tags: All Day of 9/11 Events, Flight UA 175

Flight 175 passenger Peter Hanson calls his parents a second time, and says to his father, “It’s getting bad, Dad—A stewardess was stabbed—They seem to have knives and Mace—They said they have a bomb—It’s getting very bad on the plane—Passengers are throwing up and getting sick—The plane is making jerky movements—I don’t think the pilot is flying the plane—I think we are going down—I think they intend to go to Chicago or someplace and fly into a building—don’t worry, Dad—If it happens, it’ll be very fast—My God, my God.” [San Francisco Chronicle, 7/23/2004]

Entity Tags: Peter Hanson

Timeline Tags: 9/11 Timeline

Category Tags: All Day of 9/11 Events, Flight UA 175, Alleged Passenger Phone Calls

When he arrives at the United Airlines System Operations Control (SOC) center, United’s chief operating officer Andy Studdert has to reassure employees that the unfolding crisis is not a training exercise. [Chicago Tribune, 7/16/2003] Shortly before 9:00 a.m., Studdert had been in a meeting at the United Airlines headquarters, outside Chicago, with United’s CEO Jim Goodwin. His secretary had rushed in and told him about the first plane hitting the World Trade Center. Studdert immediately got up and ran across to the SOC, located next to the headquarters building. [Wall Street Journal, 10/15/2001; 9/11 Commission, 1/27/2004] However, ten days previously, he had surprised the staff there with a crisis-training exercise, where he’d told them a flight over the Pacific had broken radio contact and suffered a potentially disastrous engine failure. For 30 minutes, the staff had believed the story, before he told them the truth. So when he arrives at the SOC at around 9:00 a.m., the Chicago Tribune will report, Studdert senses disbelief among his employees at the real-world crisis. He therefore shouts out to reassure them, “This is not a drill!” According to USA Today, the staff already realizes this. [USA Today, 8/13/2002; Chicago Tribune, 7/16/2003; 9/11 Commission, 1/27/2004]

Entity Tags: United Airlines, Andy Studdert

Timeline Tags: 9/11 Timeline

Category Tags: All Day of 9/11 Events, Flight UA 175, Training Exercises

A public announcement is broadcast inside the WTC Tower Two (the South Tower, which has yet to be hit), saying that the building is secure and people can return to their offices. [New York Times, 9/11/2002] Such announcements continue until a few minutes before the building is hit, and “may [lead] to the deaths of hundreds of people.” No one knows exactly what is said (though many later recall the phrase “the building is secure”), or who gives the authority to say it. [USA Today, 9/2/2002] Additionally, security agents inside the building repeat similar messages to individuals in the tower. For instance, one survivor recounts hearing, “Our building is secure. You can go back to your floor. If you’re a little winded, you can get a drink of water or coffee in the cafeteria.” [New York Times, 9/13/2001] Another survivor recalls an escaping crowd actually running over a man with a bullhorn encouraging them to return to their desks. [Newsday, 9/12/2001] Businessman Steve Miller recalls hearing a voice say over the building’s loudspeaker something similar to: “There’s a fire in Tower One. Tower Two in unaffected. If you want to leave, you can leave. If you want to return to your office, it’s okay.” [Washington Post, 9/16/2001] British visitor Mike Shillaker recalls, “As we got to around floor 50, a message came over the [loudspeaker], telling us that there was an isolated fire in Tower One, and we did not need to evacuate Tower Two. Again, thank god we continued down, others didn’t.” [BBC, 9/1/2002] Despite messages to the contrary, about two-thirds of the tower’s occupants evacuate during the 17 minutes between the attacks. [USA Today, 12/20/2001]

Entity Tags: Steve Miller, Mike Shillaker, World Trade Center

Timeline Tags: 9/11 Timeline

Category Tags: All Day of 9/11 Events, Flight UA 175, World Trade Center

At the United Airlines System Operations Control (SOC) center outside Chicago, flight dispatcher Ed Ballinger learns that Flight 175 is suspected as being hijacked, and then sends text messages to try and make contact with it. [9/11 Commission, 8/26/2004, pp. 23-24 ] The SOC center has just been contacted by the United Airlines maintenance office in San Francisco, about a call it received from an attendant on Flight 175, who had reported that their plane had been hijacked (see Shortly Before 9:00 a.m. September 11, 2001). [Wall Street Journal, 10/15/2001] Subsequently, around 9:01 or 9:02, a dispatch manager at the SOC goes to Ballinger’s desk and informs him of the details of this call. [9/11 Commission, 8/26/2004, pp. 23 ] Ballinger is the flight dispatcher responsible for United’s aircraft flying from the East Coast to the West Coast, which include Flight 175 (and also Flight 93). [Chicago Daily Herald, 4/14/2004] At 9:03, he sends an ACARS message to Flight 175: “How is the ride. Anything dispatch can do for you.” (ACARS is an e-mail system that enables personnel on the ground to rapidly communicate with those in the cockpit of an aircraft.) At the same time, the United Airlines air traffic control coordinator also sends an ACARS message to the flight: “NY approach lookin for ya on [frequency] 127.4.” Just after 9:03, unaware it has now crashed into the World Trade Center, Ballinger and the air traffic control coordinator re-send these ACARS messages to Flight 175. [9/11 Commission, 8/26/2004, pp. 9 and 23-24 ] Twenty minutes later, Ballinger will remain unaware that Flight 175 has crashed and still be trying to contact it by ACARS (see 9:23 a.m. September 11, 2001). [9/11 Commission, 8/26/2004, pp. 26 ] All airlines have a staff of dispatchers like Ballinger who, under FAA rules, are responsible for monitoring aircraft in flight. They follow each flight’s progress, relay safety information, and handle any problems that arise. [Spencer, 2008, pp. 14 and 35] United Airlines dispatchers typically monitor up to two dozen flights at once. [Longman, 2002, pp. 68] Ballinger has 16 transcontinental flights taking off early this morning that he is responsible for. [New York Observer, 6/20/2004]

Entity Tags: Ed Ballinger

Timeline Tags: 9/11 Timeline

Category Tags: All Day of 9/11 Events, Flight UA 175

Colin Scoggins, the military liaison at the FAA’s Boston Center, learns from an FAA teleconference that there is a second hijacked plane over the US. He has previously called the FAA’s New York Center and was told, “We’re working a hijack,” but mistakenly thought the controller was referring to Flight 11 (see (Between 8:40 a.m. and 8:54 a.m.) September 11, 2001). According to author Lynn Spencer, Scoggins now hears on the FAA headquarters’ hijack teleconference of the second hijacked airliner, Flight 175. [Spencer, 2008, pp. 48-49 and 82] Spencer’s account is consistent with a May 2003 statement by the FAA, according to which the FAA established its teleconference “[w]ithin minutes after the first aircraft hit the World Trade Center” (see (8:50 a.m.) September 11, 2001). [9/11 Commission, 5/23/2003] But the 9/11 Commission will claim that the FAA headquarters’ hijacking teleconference is only established at “about 9:20” (see (9:20 a.m.) September 11, 2001). [9/11 Commission, 7/24/2004, pp. 36] According to Spencer, Scoggins assumes that NORAD’s Northeast Air Defense Sector (NEADS) is also on the FAA teleconference and is receiving the same information that he is about the second hijacking. However, the “FAA headquarters’ teleconference is between air traffic control facilities, the [FAA] Command Center, the Defense Department, and several other agencies; NORAD is not looped in.” [Spencer, 2008, pp. 82] Although the FAA will claim that the “Air Force liaison to the FAA immediately joined the FAA headquarters [teleconference] and established contact with NORAD on a separate line,” the Air Force liaison will subsequently claim she only joins the teleconference after 9:37 a.m., when the Pentagon is hit (see (Shortly After 9:37 a.m.) September 11, 2001). [9/11 Commission, 5/23/2003; US Department of Transportation, 8/31/2006 ] Even though Scoggins assumes NEADS is already aware of the information, he will subsequently call it with the news of the second hijacking (see (9:02 a.m.-9:07 a.m.) September 11, 2001). [Spencer, 2008, pp. 82]

Entity Tags: Colin Scoggins, Federal Aviation Administration, Northeast Air Defense Sector

Timeline Tags: 9/11 Timeline

Category Tags: All Day of 9/11 Events, Flight UA 175

Gerald Earwood. [Source: MaryJo Walicki / Milwaukee Journal Sentinel]Just one or two minutes before it crashes into the World Trade Center, Flight 175 narrowly avoids a mid-air collision with another commercial aircraft. [TMJ4, 6/25/2008] Midwest Airlines Flight 7 (Midex 7) is a DC-9 jet bound from Milwaukee to New York’s La Guardia Airport, with about 30 passengers and five crew members on board. [Milwaukee Journal Sentinel, 6/24/2008] Pilot Gerald Earwood and co-pilot Eric Fjelstad have been concerned at the unusually slow radio responses they have been receiving from New York air traffic controllers. [Spencer, 2008, pp. 56-57 and 61-62] As they are approaching La Guardia from the southwest, Earwood is again frustrated as he awaits the controller’s response to his latest transmission. [Milwaukee Journal Sentinel, 6/24/2008]
Instructed to Turn Left - Suddenly, the voice of a panicked controller comes over the radio: “Midex 7, are you with me? Midex 7, Midex 7, are you with me?” Unknown to Earwood, controllers have noticed that Flight 175 is now flying directly at his plane at over 500 miles per hour. Earwood replies, “Midex 7 is with you out of 7 for 4,000,” meaning he has just passed through 7,000 feet in his descent to his assigned altitude of 4,000 feet. The controller orders: “Roger, Midex 7, turn left now! Head two-four-zero degrees now, as quick as you can!” The pilots of Midex 7 begin a standard 30-degrees-of-bank turn. But even though they are doing exactly what they have been ordered to, the controller continues, “Left turn, Midex, left turn!” Several seconds later, the controller restates his order: “Midex 7, tighten it up! Roll left! Now! Now! Now!” Earwood looks out of the window for the plane he is meant to be avoiding, but cannot see anything.
Narrowly Avoids Collision - As Midex 7 is completing its left turn, the controller comes back over the radio even more panicked than before, ordering: ”Roll right, Midex! Roll right as hard as you can! Keep it tight, Midex. Roll hard right! Now! Now!” Midex 7 complies with the instruction, but Earwood is wondering where the plane is that he is trying to avoid. At the FAA’s New York Center, air traffic controllers watch as the radar returns for Flight 175 and Midex 7 get so close that they appear to merge on the screens. Finally, Flight 175 continues its rapid descent toward New York, after having narrowly avoided a collision. [Spencer, 2008, pp. 74-77] Midex 7 returns to its approach to La Guardia Airport, and then Earwood overhears a radio transmission from another pilot, who reports that a second plane has hit the World Trade Center. Earwood will later estimate that Flight 175 crashes into the South Tower 60 to 90 seconds after its near-collision with Midex 7. He sees the fireball coming from the tower, but does not immediately connect it with the aircraft he has just avoided. [Milwaukee Journal Sentinel, 6/24/2008] Minutes earlier, Flight 175 almost collided with at least two other planes as it descended toward Manhattan (see (8:55 a.m.) September 11, 2001), and prior to that it had almost collided with Flight 11 (see (Shortly After 8:42 a.m.) September 11, 2001). [Telegraph (Nashua), 9/13/2001; Washington Post, 9/17/2001] The incident with Midex 7 will not come to light until 2008, when it is described in the book Touching History: The Untold Story of the Drama that Unfolded in the Skies Over America on 9/11, by Lynn Spencer. [TMJ4, 6/25/2008]

Entity Tags: Eric Fjelstad, Gerald Earwood, New York Air Route Traffic Control Center

Timeline Tags: 9/11 Timeline

Category Tags: All Day of 9/11 Events, Flight UA 175

In a conference call, Peter Mulligan, a manager at the FAA’s New York Center, tells the FAA Command Center in Herndon, Virginia: “We have several situations going here. It’s escalating big, big time. We need to get the military involved with us.” [Federal Aviation Authority, 10/14/2003, pp. 15 ] This is apparently a reference to the hijacking of Flight 175. [9/11 Commission, 7/24/2004, pp. 22]
Manager Gives No Details of Aircraft - Mulligan does not initially give any details of the hijacked aircraft, such as its flight number, position, or heading, but soon leaves the phone to inform his military liaison of the hijack (see 9:01 a.m.-9:02 a.m. September 11, 2001). After about one minute, Mulligan comes back on the phone, says that the liaison has been notified, and adds: “We’re involved in something else. We have other aircraft that may have a similar situation going on here.” Again, he provides no detailed information about the second hijacked plane, whose number does not appear to be communicated to the FAA’s Command Center before it crashes. [Federal Aviation Authority, 10/14/2003, pp. 16-18 ]
9/11 Commission Confused - According to the transcript of the 9/11 Commission hearing at which a recording of the teleconference is played, it is the Herndon Command Center that says, “We’re involved with something else, we have other aircraft that may have a similar situation going on here.” [9/11 Commission, 6/17/2004] This version, which indicates the Command Center already knows about the hijacking of Flight 175 when Mulligan passes on the notification, is subsequently picked up by some media. [9/11 Commission, 6/17/2004; American RadioWorks, 9/2/2004; CBC, 9/12/2006] However, this will be altered in the Commission’s final report, which attributes the “We’re involved with something else” statement to Mulligan. [9/11 Commission, 7/24/2004, pp. 22] The transcript of the call on which this section of the report is based indicates that the statement is actually made by Mulligan and that the 9/11 Commission is therefore only correcting an initial error it made at the hearing in its final report. [Federal Aviation Authority, 10/14/2003, pp. 18 ]

Entity Tags: New York Air Route Traffic Control Center, Peter Mulligan, North American Aerospace Defense Command, Federal Aviation Administration

Timeline Tags: 9/11 Timeline

Category Tags: All Day of 9/11 Events, Flight UA 175

The FAA’s New York Center contacts the New York Terminal Radar Approach Control (TRACON) and asks for help in locating Flight 175. Different air traffic controllers scan different altitudes, and TRACON controllers only deal with low-flying planes. These controllers have remained uninformed about the fate of Flight 11 until about now. “We had 90 to 120 seconds; it wasn’t any 18 minutes,” one controller wil later recall, referring to the actual elapsed time between the two crashes. Another controller will say of Flights 11 and 175: “They dove into the airspace. By the time anybody saw anything, it was over.” [New York Times, 9/13/2001; 9/11 Commission, 6/17/2004]

Entity Tags: New York Terminal Radar Approach Control, New York Air Route Traffic Control Center

Timeline Tags: 9/11 Timeline

Category Tags: All Day of 9/11 Events, Flight UA 175

The military liaison at the FAA’s New York Center is reportedly told that Flight 175 has been hijacked. The information is passed on to the liaison by New York Center manager Peter Mulligan. In an apparent reference to the hijacking on a phone bridge with other air traffic control facilities, Mulligan first says the situation is escalating (see (9:01 a.m.) September 11, 2001) and adds, “Just get me somebody who has the authority to get military in the air now.” Mulligan then drops out of the teleconference for a short while, but returns and says: “It’s OK. I’ve got it taken care of over here. I got… my military guy. We got some interceptors in the air.” [Federal Aviation Authority, 10/14/2003, pp. 15-17 ] According to the 9/11 Commission Report, Mulligan says this between 9:01 and 9:02. [9/11 Commission, 7/24/2004, pp. 22] A person at the New York Center then calls NEADS at 9:03 (see (9:03 a.m.) September 11, 2001). Presumably, this is the military liaison Mulligan just informed of the hijacking.

Entity Tags: Peter Mulligan

Category Tags: All Day of 9/11 Events, Flight UA 175

Moments before Flight 175 crashes into the World Trade Center, Colin Scoggins, the military liaison at the FAA’s Boston Center, calls NORAD’s Northeast Air Defense Sector (NEADS) to notify it that there is a second hijacked aircraft over the US. Scoggins learned of the second hijacking on the FAA headquarters’ hijack teleconference (see (Shortly Before 9:02 a.m.) September 11, 2001) and senses that he should call NEADS with this latest information. According to author Lynn Spencer, Scoggins “imagines that he must be one of dozens of FAA facilities flooding [NEADS] with phone calls. What he doesn’t know is that his is in fact the only one giving them information about the flights this morning, other than the coverage on CNN.” [Spencer, 2008, pp. 82] However, the 9/11 Commission will say that NEADS also learns of the second hijacking around this time from the FAA’s New York Center, stating, “The first indication that the NORAD air defenders had of the second hijacked aircraft, United 175, came in a phone call from New York Center to NEADS at 9:03” (see (9:03 a.m.) September 11, 2001). [9/11 Commission, 7/24/2004, pp. 23] Just after Scoggins reports the second hijacking to NEADS, those on the NEADS operations floor see the live television coverage of Flight 175 hitting the South Tower on a screen at the front of the room. [Spencer, 2008, pp. 82] Apparently, Scoggins’s phone call continues for several minutes: According to the 9/11 Commission, “Between 9:04 a.m. and 9:07 a.m., the NEADS identification technicians were on the phone with FAA Boston Center seeking further information on Flight 175 when Boston Center confirmed a second crash at the World Trade Center.” [9/11 Commission, 8/26/2004, pp. 24 ]

Entity Tags: Boston Air Route Traffic Control Center, Colin Scoggins, Northeast Air Defense Sector

Timeline Tags: 9/11 Timeline

Category Tags: All Day of 9/11 Events, Flight UA 175

Flight 175 hits the WTC South Tower. The picture was taken from a traffic helicopter. [Source: WABC 7/ Salient Stills]Flight 175 hits the South Tower of the World Trade Center (Tower Two). Seismic records pinpoint the time at six seconds before 9:03 a.m. (rounded to 9:03 a.m.). [New York Times, 9/12/2001; CNN, 9/12/2001; CNN, 9/17/2001; North American Aerospace Defense Command, 9/18/2001; USA Today, 12/20/2001; Federal Emergency Management Agency, 5/1/2002, pp. 1-10; Associated Press, 8/21/2002; USA Today, 9/2/2002; New York Times, 9/11/2002] According to the NIST report, the crash time is 9:02:59. [National Institute of Standards and Technology, 9/2005, pp. 38 ] According to the 9/11 Commission Report, the crash time is 9:03:11. [9/11 Commission, 7/24/2004, pp. 8] Millions watch the crash live on television. The plane strikes the 77th through 85th floors in the 110-story building. Approximately 100 people are killed or injured in the initial impact; 600 people in the tower eventually die. The death toll is far lower than in the North Tower because about two-thirds of the South Tower’s occupants have evacuated the building in the 17 minutes since the first tower was struck. [USA Today, 12/20/2001; National Institute of Standards and Technology, 9/2005, pp. 5-9, 41 ] The combined death toll from the two towers is estimated at 2,819, not including the hijackers. [Associated Press, 8/21/2002] The impact severs some columns on the south side of the South Tower. Each of the Twin Towers is designed as a “tube-in-tube” structure and the steel columns which support its weight are arranged around the perimeter and in the core. The plane, which is traveling at an estimated speed of around 500 mph (see October 2002-October 2005), severs 33 of the building’s 236 perimeter columns and damages another one. [National Institute of Standards and Technology, 9/2005, pp. 39 ] The perimeter columns bear about half of the tower’s weight, so the damage to them reduces the tower’s ability to bear gravity loads by about 7.1 percent. [National Institute of Standards and Technology, 9/2005, pp. 6 ] The actual damage to the 47 core columns is not known, as there are no photographs or videos of it, but there will be much speculation about this after 9/11. It will be suggested that some parts of the aircraft may be able to damage the core even after crashing through the exterior wall (see 8:46 a.m. September 11, 2001). [National Institute of Standards and Technology, 9/2005, pp. 107 ] According to NIST’s base case model, five of the core columns are severed and another five suffer some damage. [National Institute of Standards & Technology, 9/2005, pp. 235 ] This may reduce the tower’s ability to bear loads by a further approximately 8 percent, meaning that the aircraft impact accounted for a loss of about 15 percent of the building’s strength. This damage will be cited as an event contributing to the building’s collapse after 9/11 (see October 23, 2002 and October 19, 2004). NIST’s base case estimate of damage to the North Tower’s core will be similar, even though the aircraft impact there was dissimilar (see 8:46 a.m. September 11, 2001). Flight 11 hit the North Tower’s core head on, whereas Flight 175 only hits the corner of the South Tower’s core. [National Institute of Standards and Technology, 9/2005, pp. 20-23, 38-41 ] In addition, some of the fireproofing on the steel columns and trusses may be dislodged (see 8:46 a.m. September 11, 2001). [National Institute of Standards & Technology, 9/2005, pp. xxxvi, 83 ] Photographs and videos of the towers will not show the state of fireproofing inside the buildings, but the National Institute of Standards and Technology (NIST) will try to estimate the damage to fireproofing using a series of computer models. Its severe case model (see (October 2002-October 2005)) will predict that 39 of the 47 core columns are stripped of their fireproofing on one or more floors and that fireproofing is stripped from trusses covering 80,000 ft2 of floor area, the equivalent of about two floors. NIST will say that the loss of fireproofing is a major cause of the collapse (see April 5, 2005), but only performs 15 tests on fireproofing samples (see October 26, 2005). [National Institute of Standards and Technology, 9/2005, pp. 41 ] According to NIST, less fireproofing is stripped from the North Tower (see 8:46 a.m. September 11, 2001).

Entity Tags: National Institute of Standards and Technology, World Trade Center

Timeline Tags: 9/11 Timeline

Category Tags: Key Day of 9/11 Events, All Day of 9/11 Events, Flight UA 175, Flight AA 77, Flight UA 93, George Bush, World Trade Center, WTC Investigation

Beginning at 9:03, a number of United Airlines flight dispatchers send text messages to several United aircraft, indicating to the pilots that planes have flown into the World Trade Center. But, according to the 9/11 Commission, “These messages provided no details or warnings.” [9/11 Commission, 8/26/2004, pp. 36 ] It is not until 9:21 that United dispatchers are told to warn their flights to secure cockpit doors (see 9:21 a.m. September 11, 2001). [9/11 Commission, 1/27/2004] The dispatcher responsible for Flight 175 and Flight 93—Ed Ballinger—begins sending warning messages to the flights he is monitoring at 9:19 a.m., informing them that two aircraft have hit the WTC (see 9:19 a.m. September 11, 2001). [9/11 Commission, 8/26/2004, pp. 37 ] Airline dispatchers have an important part to play in managing aircraft in flight. According to commercial pilot and author Lynn Spencer, under FAA rules, dispatchers “take guardianship of each company aircraft in the sky. They are assigned to a certain number of aircraft and know all there is to know about each: who is flying, who is working the cabin, how many pounds of fuel are onboard, the flight plan, the alternate plan, and anything at all relevant to that flight. If there is a glitch in the system, the pilot talks to the dispatcher, and together they formulate a plan of action.” [Spencer, 2008, pp. 35 and 72] United Airlines dispatchers are each responsible for monitoring from ten to 30 flights during a shift, and monitor anything up to two dozen flights at a time. [Longman, 2002, pp. 68]

Entity Tags: United Airlines, Ed Ballinger

Timeline Tags: 9/11 Timeline

Category Tags: All Day of 9/11 Events, Flight UA 175, Flight UA 93

At the FAA’s Command Center in Herndon, Virginia, manager John White learns of the communication apparently made by a hijacker on Flight 11, stating “We have some planes” (see 8:24 a.m. September 11, 2001), and quickly notifies the national operations manager of this. Terry Biggio, the operations manager at the FAA’s Boston Center, is relaying all the information he has about Flight 11 to the Command Center’s teleconference. In the conference room at the Command Center, White is listening in. [Spencer, 2008, pp. 79-80] Because the air traffic controller monitoring Flight 11 had not understood the “We have some planes” hijacker communication, the Boston Center’s quality assurance specialist had been instructed to “pull the tape” of the transmission, listen to it carefully, and then report back. [9/11 Commission, 7/24/2004, pp. 19] Having learned that the specialist has deciphered the transmission, Biggio now relays the details of it over the teleconference. Seconds later, those at the Command Center see Flight 175 crashing into the South Tower of the World Trade live on CNN. White promptly dispatches a manager to pass on the details of the transmission to Ben Sliney, the national operations manager at the Command Center (see 9:06 a.m. and After September 11, 2001). [Spencer, 2008, pp. 79-80] The FAA’s New England regional office also learns of the “We have some planes” communication at this time (see 9:03 a.m. September 11, 2001). [9/11 Commission, 8/26/2004, pp. 23 ]

Entity Tags: Federal Aviation Administration, Ben Sliney, John White, Boston Air Route Traffic Control Center, Terry Biggio

Timeline Tags: 9/11 Timeline

Category Tags: All Day of 9/11 Events, Flight AA 11, Flight UA 175

The 9/11 Commission will later conclude that the FAA’s New York Center tells NORAD’s Northeast Air Defense Sector (NEADS) that Flight 175 has been hijacked at this time. The Commission will refer to this as “the first indication that the NORAD air defenders had of the second hijacked aircraft.” The notification is apparently received from the military liaison at the New York Center (see 9:01 a.m.-9:02 a.m. September 11, 2001). [9/11 Commission, 6/17/2004]
NEADS Technician Announces 'Second Possible Hijack' - Tape recordings of the NEADS operations floor will reveal ID tech Stacia Rountree answering the call from the New York Center, and saying out loud, “They have a second possible hijack!” [Vanity Fair, 8/1/2006] Colonel Robert Marr, the NEADS battle commander, will claim he first learns that an aircraft other than Flight 11 has been hijacked when he sees Flight 175 crash into the World Trade Center on television. [Aviation Week and Space Technology, 6/3/2002] Lieutenant Colonel Dawne Deskins will claim that when she sees Flight 175 hitting the South Tower on television, “we didn’t even know there was a second hijack.” [Filson, 2003, pp. 59]
Conflicting Accounts - However, these accounts contradict NORAD’s claim that it makes shortly after 9/11 that NEADS was first notified about Flight 175 at 8:43 a.m. (see 8:43 a.m. September 11, 2001). [North American Aerospace Defense Command, 9/18/2001] Additionally, as Flight 175 crashes into the WTC, Canadian Captain Mike Jellinek, who is working at NORAD’s Cheyenne Mountain, Colorado operations center, is on the phone with NEADS. He sees the crash live on television and asks NEADS, “Was that the hijacked aircraft you were dealing with?” The reply is yes. (However, it is unclear whether Jellinek is referring to Flight 175 or to the smoke coming from the crash of Flight 11.) [Toronto Star, 12/9/2001] If the 9/11 Commission’s account is correct, several questions remain unanswered. Flight 175 lost radio contact at 8:42 a.m. (see 8:41 a.m.-8:42 a.m. September 11, 2001) and changed transponder signals at 8:47 a.m. (see 8:46 a.m.-8:47 a.m. September 11, 2001); an air traffic controller declared it possibly hijacked sometime between 8:46 a.m. and 8:53 a.m. (see (Shortly After 8:46 a.m.) September 11, 2001); and an air traffic control manager called it hijacked at 8:55 a.m.(see (8:55 a.m.) September 11, 2001). The Commission will not explain why the New York Center waits 10 to 16 minutes before warning NEADS that Flight 175 is possibly hijacked. [9/11 Commission, 6/17/2004]

Entity Tags: Stacia Rountree, Northeast Air Defense Sector, North American Aerospace Defense Command, Robert Marr, Mike Jellinek, New York Air Route Traffic Control Center

Timeline Tags: 9/11 Timeline

Category Tags: All Day of 9/11 Events, Flight UA 175

The minute Flight 175 hits the South Tower, fighter pilot Major Daniel Nash will recall, clear visibility allows him to see smoke pour out of Manhattan, even though NORAD will say he is 71 miles away from there. [Cape Cod Times, 8/21/2002] The other Otis pilot, Lieutenant Colonel Timothy Duffy, recalls, “We’re 60 miles out, and I could see the smoke from the towers.” They call NORAD’s Northeast Air Defense Sector (NEADS) for an update, and, as Duffy will recall: “At that point, they said the second aircraft just hit the World Trade Center. That was news to me. I thought we were still chasing American [Airlines Flight] 11.” [ABC News, 9/14/2002] In another account Duffy will relate: “It was right about then when they said the second aircraft had just hit the World Trade Center, which was quite a shock to both [Nash] and I, because we both thought there was only one aircraft out there. We were probably 70 miles or so out when the second one hit. So, we were just a matter of minutes away.” [BBC, 9/1/2002] He asks NEADS for clarification of their mission, but the request is met with “considerable confusion.” [Aviation Week and Space Technology, 6/3/2002] Bob Varcadipane, a Newark, New Jersey, air traffic controller who sees the Flight 175 crash, will claim: “I remember the two F-15s. They were there moments after the impact. And I was just—said to myself, ‘If only they could have gotten there a couple minutes earlier.’ They just missed it.” [MSNBC, 9/11/2002] However, the 9/11 Commission appears to believe that the pilots never get near New York City at this time. According to the Commission’s account, lacking a clear target, the Otis fighters took off toward military controlled airspace over the ocean, off the coast of Long Island. A map released by the Commission indicates that at 9:03 they are about 100 miles away and heading southwest instead of west to New York City. [9/11 Commission, 6/17/2004] Tape recordings of the NEADS operations floor reveal Major Kevin Nasypany telling Colonel Robert Marr, “Fighters are south of—just south of Long Island.” [Vanity Fair, 8/1/2006] The 9/11 Commission says that, at 9:10 a.m., the FAA’s Boston Center tells the Otis fighters about the second WTC tower being struck. [9/11 Commission, 7/24/2004, pp. 459]

Entity Tags: Bob Varcadipane, Northeast Air Defense Sector, Robert Marr, Timothy Duffy, World Trade Center, Kevin Nasypany, Daniel Nash

Timeline Tags: 9/11 Timeline

Category Tags: All Day of 9/11 Events, Flight AA 11, Flight UA 175

Terry Biggio. [Source: Federal Aviation Administration]Over an FAA teleconference, Terry Biggio, the operations manager at the FAA’s Boston Center, reports to the FAA’s New England regional office the “We have some planes” comment apparently made by a Flight 11 hijacker at 8:24 a.m. (see 8:24 a.m. September 11, 2001). [9/11 Commission, 8/26/2004, pp. 23 ; Spencer, 2008, pp. 79-80] Because the Boston Center controller monitoring Flight 11 had not understood the communication, the center’s quality assurance specialist had been instructed to “pull the tape” of the transmission, listen to it carefully, and then report back. [9/11 Commission, 7/24/2004, pp. 19] Biggio now reports to the New England region representative: “I’m gonna reconfirm with, with downstairs, but the, as far as the tape, Bobby seemed to think the guy said that ‘we have planes.’ Now, I don’t know if it was because it was the accent, or if there’s more than one [hijacked plane], but I’m gonna, I’m gonna reconfirm that for you, and I’ll get back to you real quick. Okay?” Another participant in the teleconference asks, “They have what?” and Biggio clarifies: “Planes, as in plural.… It sounds like, we’re talking to New York, that there’s another one aimed at the World Trade Center.… A second one just hit the Trade Center.” The New England region representative replies: “Okay. Yeah, we gotta get—we gotta alert the military real quick on this.” [9/11 Commission, 6/17/2004; 9/11 Commission, 7/24/2004, pp. 23] A manager at the FAA’s Command Center in Herndon, Virginia, is monitoring the teleconference, and so also learns of the “We have some planes” communication at this time (see 9:03 a.m. September 11, 2001). [Spencer, 2008, pp. 79-80] At 9:05 a.m., Biggio will confirm for the New England region representative—with the Command Center listening in—that a hijacker said, “we have planes” (forgetting the “some”). [9/11 Commission, 6/17/2004; 9/11 Commission, 8/26/2004, pp. 24 ]

Entity Tags: Federal Aviation Administration, Boston Air Route Traffic Control Center, Terry Biggio

Timeline Tags: 9/11 Timeline

Category Tags: All Day of 9/11 Events, Flight AA 11, Flight UA 175

Rick Tepper. [Source: Eileen Blass]Air traffic controllers at Newark International Airport in New Jersey are on the phone with controllers at the FAA’s New York Center and are asked to find Flight 175 from their windows. They see it and watch in horror as it drops the last 5,000 feet and crashes into the World Trade Center. Controller Rick Tepper will recall: “He was in a hard right bank, diving very steeply and very fast. And he—as he was coming up the Hudson River, he—he made another hard left turn and—just heading for downtown Manhattan.… You could see that he was trying to line himself up on the tower. Just before he hit the tower, he almost leveled it out and just—just hit the building.” Newark tower immediately calls the FAA’s Herndon Command Center and says it will not land any more airplanes in Newark, in an effort to keep aircraft away from New York City. This is the first step in shutting down the national airspace system. [MSNBC, 9/11/2002]

Entity Tags: Rick Tepper, Federal Aviation Administration, New York Air Route Traffic Control Center, Newark International Airport

Timeline Tags: 9/11 Timeline

Category Tags: All Day of 9/11 Events, Flight UA 175

A fighter pilot flying from Otis Air Base toward New York City later notes that it wouldn’t have mattered if he caught up with Flight 175, because only President Bush could order a shootdown, and Bush is at a public event at the time. [Cape Cod Times, 8/21/2002] “Only the president has the authority to order a civilian aircraft shot down,” according to a 1999 CNN report. [CNN, 10/26/1999] In fact, by 9/11, Defense Secretary Rumsfeld also has the authority to order a shootdown, but he is not responding to the crisis at this time. [New York Observer, 6/20/2004] Furthermore, NORAD Commander Larry Arnold later states that on 9/11, “I have the authority in case of an emergency to declare a target hostile and shoot it down under an emergency condition.” [Filson, 2003, pp. 75]

Entity Tags: George W. Bush, Donald Rumsfeld

Timeline Tags: 9/11 Timeline

Category Tags: All Day of 9/11 Events, Flight UA 175, Flight AA 11, Donald Rumsfeld

NORAD’s Northeast Air Defense Sector (NEADS) in Rome, NY, has just received a phone call informing it of the hijacking of Flight 175 (see (9:03 a.m.) September 11, 2001), and several personnel have witnessed the plane crashing into the second World Trade Center tower live on CNN. There is considerable confusion on the operations floor over whether the plane seen on TV is the hijacking they have just been informed of. Tape recordings capture NEADS personnel in the background trying to make sense of things: “Is this explosion part of that that we’re lookin’ at now on TV?“… “And there’s a possible second hijack also—a United Airlines“… “Two planes?” Someone comments, “I think this is a damn input, to be honest.” [Vanity Fair, 8/1/2006] Another person replies, “Then this is a damned messed-up input!” [Spencer, 2008, pp. 84] “Input” refers to a simulations input, as part of a training exercise. [Vanity Fair, 8/1/2006] NORAD has the capacity to inject simulated material, including mass attacks, during exercises, “as though it was being sensed for the first time by a radar site.” [US Department of Defense, 1/14/1999] At least one military exercise this morning is reported to include simulated information injected onto radar screens (see (9:00 a.m.) September 11, 2001). [Toronto Star, 12/9/2001] At the current time, despite the earlier crash of Flight 11, NORAD has yet to cancel a major exercise it is in the middle of (see (Shortly After 9:03 a.m.) September 11, 2001). [Filson, 2003, pp. 59]

Entity Tags: Northeast Air Defense Sector

Timeline Tags: 9/11 Timeline

Category Tags: All Day of 9/11 Events, Flight UA 175, Training Exercises

After the second World Trade Center crash at 9:03 a.m., air traffic controllers at the FAA’s New York Center are told by their supervisors to watch for airplanes whose speed indicates that they are jets, but which either are not responding to commands or have disabled their transponders. Controllers in Washington receive a similar briefing, which will help them pick out hijacked planes more quickly. [New York Times, 9/13/2001] Whether controllers at other FAA air traffic control centers receive similar instructions at this time is unclear, but those at its Indianapolis Center, which is handling Flight 77, are apparently not informed by their supervisors of the unfolding crisis. [9/11 Commission, 6/17/2004; Spencer, 2008, pp. 105-107]

Entity Tags: Indianapolis Air Route Traffic Control Center, New York Air Route Traffic Control Center, Washington Air Route Traffic Control Center

Timeline Tags: 9/11 Timeline

Category Tags: All Day of 9/11 Events, Flight UA 175, Flight AA 77

Within minutes of the second World Trade Center tower being hit, United Airlines tells the FAA’s Boston Center that Flight 175 is down. This is according to Colin Scoggins, a civilian manager who is the military liaison at the Boston Center. Scoggins will later recall, “When we phoned United [after the second tower was hit], they confirmed that United 175 was down, and I think they confirmed that within two or three minutes.” [Vanity Fair, 8/1/2006] However, according to the 9/11 Commission, even though by 9:20 United Airlines suspects that the second plane to hit the WTC was Flight 175 (see Between 9:10 a.m. and 9:20 a.m. September 11, 2001), at that time the identity of the crashed aircraft is “still unconfirmed.” It is not until 9:22 that United issues an advisory to its facilities, stating that Flight 175 has been in an accident in New York (see 9:22 a.m. September 11, 2001). [9/11 Commission, 8/26/2004, pp. 26 ]

Entity Tags: Boston Air Route Traffic Control Center, Colin Scoggins, United Airlines

Timeline Tags: 9/11 Timeline

Category Tags: All Day of 9/11 Events, Flight UA 175

President Bush and Sandra Kay Daniels read the goat story while the media watches. [Source: White House/ Eric Draper<]President Bush, having just been told of the second WTC crash, stays in the Booker Elementary School Classroom, and listens as 16 Booker Elementary School second-graders take turns reading “The Pet Goat.” It’s a simple story about a girl’s pet goat. [Agence France-Presse, 9/7/2002; Editor & Publisher, 7/2/2004] They are just about to begin reading when Bush is told of the attack. One account says that the classroom is then silent for about 30 seconds, maybe more. Bush then picks up the book and reads with the children “for eight or nine minutes.” [Tampa Tribune, 9/1/2002] In unison, the children read aloud, “The—Pet—Goat. A—girl—got—a—pet—goat. But—the—goat—did—some—things—that—made—the—girl’s—dad—mad.” And so on. Bush mostly listens, but does ask the children a few questions to encourage them. [Washington Times, 10/7/2002] At one point he says, “Really good readers, whew!… These must be sixth-graders!” [Time, 9/12/2001] In the back of the room, Press Secretary Ari Fleischer catches Bush’s eye and holds up a pad of paper for him to read, with “DON’ T SAY ANYTHING YET” written on it in big block letters. [Washington Times, 10/7/2002] (Note that three articles claim that Bush leaves the classroom at 9:12 a.m.) [New York Times, 9/16/2001; Daily Telegraph, 12/16/2001; Daily Mail, 9/8/2002] However, a videotape of the event lasts for “at least seven additional minutes” and ends before Bush leaves. [Wall Street Journal, 3/22/2004 ] (The timing of this entry is a rough approximation based mostly on the Tampa Tribune estimate. Much of this video footage is shown in Michael Moore’s documentary Fahrenheit 9/11.) [New York Times, 6/18/2004]

Entity Tags: George W. Bush, Ari Fleischer

Timeline Tags: 9/11 Timeline

Category Tags: Key Day of 9/11 Events, All Day of 9/11 Events, Flight UA 175, George Bush

Shortly after he learns a second plane has hit the World Trade Center, United Airlines flight dispatcher Ed Ballinger takes the initiative to begin sending a warning message to the flights he is monitoring, including Flight 93 and Flight 175 (although this aircraft has already crashed). [9/11 Commission, 7/24/2004, pp. 11; 9/11 Commission, 8/26/2004, pp. 26 and 37 ] Ballinger is responsible for monitoring United’s aircraft flying from the East Coast to the West Coast. He has 16 such flights he is in charge of. [Chicago Daily Herald, 4/14/2004] He sends out a text message to his airborne flights: “Beware any cockpit intrusion… Two aircraft in NY hit [World] Trade Center builds.” [9/11 Commission, 7/24/2004, pp. 11; 9/11 Commission, 8/26/2004, pp. 26 ] Although United Airlines has suspected Flight 175 as being hijacked since around 9:00 a.m. (see Shortly Before 9:00 a.m. September 11, 2001), Ballinger is still responsible for multiple flights. (In contrast to United, American Airlines has a policy that flight dispatchers should only manage the hijacked flight, and be relieved of responsibility for their other flights.) [9/11 Commission, 7/24/2004, pp. 455-456] Ballinger’s warning is therefore sent out to his aircraft in groups, and will not be sent to Flight 93 until 9:23 a.m. (see 9:23 a.m.-9:26 a.m. September 11, 2001). Unaware that it was the second plane that hit the WTC, Ballinger will also send the message to Flight 175 (see 9:23 a.m. September 11, 2001). [9/11 Commission, 8/26/2004, pp. 26 and 37 ] Ballinger begins sending out these warnings two minutes before United Airlines instructs its dispatchers to warn their flights to secure their cockpit doors (see 9:21 a.m. September 11, 2001). [9/11 Commission, 1/27/2004; 9/11 Commission, 7/24/2004, pp. 455] According to the 9/11 Commission, his text message represents “the first occasion on 9/11 when either American or United sent out such a warning to their airborne aircraft.” [9/11 Commission, 8/26/2004, pp. 37 ] Ballinger will later recall: “As soon as I had a grasp of what was going on… I sent [the warning] out immediately. It was before [Transportation Secretary Norman] Mineta, and even before the airlines told us to alert the crews.” [Chicago Daily Herald, 4/14/2004]

Entity Tags: Ed Ballinger

Timeline Tags: 9/11 Timeline

Category Tags: All Day of 9/11 Events, Flight UA 175, Flight UA 93

Just before 9:22, United Airlines headquarters, located outside Chicago, begins the “lockout” procedure to restrict access to passenger and crew information about Flight 175. [9/11 Commission, 8/26/2004, pp. 26 ] This procedure is standard for airlines in safety and security incidents. As the 9/11 Commission will later describe, “It acknowledges an emergency on the flight and isolates information so that the case can be managed by top leadership at the airlines in a way that protects information from being altered or released, and also protects the identities of the passengers and crew.” [9/11 Commission, 8/26/2004, pp. 12-13 ] This procedure begins almost 40 minutes after Flight 175 was hijacked (see (Between 8:42 a.m. and 8:46 a.m.) September 11, 2001), and about 35 minutes after the plane’s transponder signal changed (see 8:46 a.m.-8:47 a.m. September 11, 2001). [9/11 Commission, 7/24/2004, pp. 7]

Entity Tags: United Airlines

Timeline Tags: 9/11 Timeline

Category Tags: All Day of 9/11 Events, Flight UA 175

Rich Miles, the manager of United Airlines’ System Operations Control center, located outside Chicago, issues an advisory to all United Airlines facilities, including the flight dispatchers. This advisory, which is issued under the name of UAL Chief Operating Officer Andy Studdert, states that Flight 175 has been involved in an accident in New York City, and that the airline’s crisis center has been activated. [Wall Street Journal, 10/15/2001; 9/11 Commission, 8/26/2004, pp. 26 ] This appears to be United Airlines’ first proper confirmation that Flight 175 has crashed. However, it will not issue a press release confirming the crash until 11:53 a.m. (see 11:53 a.m. September 11, 2001). [United Airlines, 9/11/2001]

Entity Tags: Rich Miles, United Airlines, Andy Studdert

Timeline Tags: 9/11 Timeline

Category Tags: All Day of 9/11 Events, Flight UA 175

Unaware that this aircraft has crashed, United Airlines flight dispatcher Ed Ballinger sends a warning message to Flight 175. The text message reads: “Beware any cockpit intrusion… Two aircraft in NY hit [World] Trade Center builds.” Ballinger began sending this text message to the 16 transcontinental flights he is monitoring at 9:19 a.m. (see 9:19 a.m. September 11, 2001). He is already aware that United Airlines suspects Flight 175 has been hijacked (see (9:01 a.m.-9:04 a.m.) September 11, 2001) and recently learned that a second plane has hit the World Trade Center, but does not yet know this was Flight 175. [9/11 Commission, 8/26/2004, pp. 26 and 37 ] United Airlines did not initially realize the second plane to hit the WTC was one of its own (see Between 9:10 a.m. and 9:20 a.m. September 11, 2001), and it was not until 9:22 that it sent out an advisory to its dispatchers stating that Flight 175 had been involved in “an accident” in New York (see 9:22 a.m. September 11, 2001).

Entity Tags: Ed Ballinger

Timeline Tags: 9/11 Timeline

Category Tags: All Day of 9/11 Events, Flight UA 175

United Airlines finally issues a press release confirming that Flight 175 has crashed, nearly three hours after this aircraft hit the World Trade Center (see 9:03 a.m. September 11, 2001). The release states, “United Airlines has now confirmed that two of its aircraft have crashed.” These include “United Flight 175, a Boeing 767 aircraft, [that] departed from Boston at 7:58 a.m. local time, bound for Los Angeles, with 56 passengers onboard, two pilots and seven flight attendants.” [United Airlines, 9/11/2001] United Airlines previously issued a press release, at 11:17, confirming the crash of Flight 93 (see 11:17 a.m. September 11, 2001), but this had stated that the airline was, at that time, only “deeply concerned” about Flight 175. [United Airlines, 9/11/2001] However, at 9:22, the United Airlines System Operations Control manager had issued an advisory to all the airline’s facilities, stating that Flight 175 had been in an accident in New York (see 9:22 a.m. September 11, 2001). [9/11 Commission, 8/26/2004, pp. 26 ] And Colin Scoggins, the military liaison at the FAA’s Boston Center, will later claim that United confirmed to the center that Flight 175 was down, “within two or three minutes” (see (9:06 a.m.) September 11, 2001). [Vanity Fair, 8/1/2006]

Entity Tags: United Airlines

Timeline Tags: 9/11 Timeline

Category Tags: All Day of 9/11 Events, Flight UA 175