Pentagon Strike Alleged Witness: Tim Timmerman

A

Anders

Guest
In Alleged Pentagon Strike Witnesses Introduction
Laura said:
There are several of these links that bring up errors, they no longer exist on the web. It would be useful if anyone could find them archived somewhere and if a thread has not been created for that witness, to create one in the same style.

Each of these testimonies and witnesses needs to be gone over with a fine-toothed comb. After all, the ONLY thing that keeps the "Flight 77 hit the Pentagon" thing going is the so-called witnesses.
This article is the same as the one for the names "Omar Campo" and "Afework Hagos".

The quote from the following text that appears on WhatReallyHappened is underlined.

http://www.guardian.co.uk/wtccrash/story/0,1300,550486,00.html


Special report: Terrorism in the US

Julian Borger in Washington, Duncan Campbell in Los Angeles, Charlie Porter in New York and Stuart Millar
Wednesday September 12, 2001
The Guardian

American Airlines flight 11 from Boston to Los Angeles had been in the air for a matter of minutes when the terrorists seized control just after 8am and changed course towards New York City. The hijacking heralded the start of a series of appalling attacks which reduced America's two most important cities to war zone-like scenes of carnage and threw the entire nation into a panic-fuelled state of siege. From start to finish, the operation took less than three hours.

Article continues
The first attack came within 45 minutes of flight 11 being seized. At the World Trade Centre in downtown Manhattan, staff were already at their desks and the working day was in full flow. On the densely packed streets of the financial district around the base of the 110-storey twin towers, other New Yorkers were strolling to work in the pristine early autumn sunshine when disaster struck.

The initial reports were patchy and confused, but according to eyewitnesses, what appeared to be a passenger plane had crashed into the north tower. As emergency services rushed to the scene they were joined by dozens of news crews and onlookers who stared in horror at the upper storeys, most of which had been destroyed in impact. The devastation was horrific: vast palls of smoke billowing from twisted window frames and sheets of flame shooting up the side of the building. In desperation, some of those who were trapped began leaping from the windows of the building.

One employee at London firm Garban Intercapital was on the phone to a colleague in the north tower when the first plane hit. The last words he heard were: "Help, we are all dying. Get us out."

Around the world, television images of the north tower, smoke billowing from its upper floors, were being broadcast live. The news anchors were already speculating that terrorists were responsible when the unthinkable happened.

Watched by millions of shocked viewers, a second airliner headed straight for the south tower, dipped its port wing slightly and accelerated into the building somewhere around the 60th storey. The explosion caused by the impact sent a huge, debris-laden fireball cascading down the building on to the streets below.

"The first tower was smoking hard," said Joe Trachtenberg, who was watching from the top of his building. "Then there was another plane, and before we knew, it just kamikaze went straight into the other tower. There was a mass explosion and windows flying. It was horrible."

On the ground, there was chaos. "People were running in all directions jumping over barriers, desperately trying to get away from the area. I guess they were just desperate to escape," said one eyewitness.

There was worse to come. A little before 9.30am, reports emerged that another plane had been hijacked. Within 10 minutes, a medium-sized passenger plane flew in low over Arlington and the Navy Annexe in Washington DC and plunged into the Pentagon's south-west face, throwing up a huge fireball.

Omar Campo, a Salvadorean, was cutting the grass on the other side of the road when the plane flew over his head.

"It was a passenger plane. I think an American Airways plane," Mr Campo said. "I was cutting the grass and it came in screaming over my head. I felt the impact. The whole ground shook and the whole area was full of fire. I could never imagine I would see anything like that here."

Afework Hagos, a computer programmer, was on his way to work but stuck in a traffic jam near the Pentagon when the plane flew over. "There was a huge screaming noise and I got out of the car as the plane came over. Everybody was running away in different directions. It was tilting its wings up and down like it was trying to balance. It hit some lampposts on the way in."

A pilot who saw the impact, Tim Timmerman, said it had been an American Airways 757. "It added power on its way in," he said. "The nose hit, and the wings came forward and it went up in a fireball."

Smoke and flames poured out of a large hole punched into the side of the Pentagon. Emergency crews rushed fire engines to the scene and ambulancemen ran towards the flames holding wooden pallets to carry bodies out. A few of the lightly injured, bleeding and covered in dust, were recovering on the lawn outside, some in civilian clothes, some in uniform. A piece of twisted aircraft fuselage lay nearby. No one knew how many people had been killed, but rescue workers were finding it nearly impossible to get to people trapped inside, beaten back by the flames and falling debris.

In New York, police and fire officials were carrying out the first wave of evacuations when the first of the World Trade Centre towers collapsed. Some eyewitnesses reported hearing another explosion just before the structure crumbled. Police said that it looked almost like a "planned implosion" designed to catch bystanders watching from the street.

As the tower crumbled in on itself, throwing a vast mushroom cloud of choking grey ash, smoke and debris across the densely packed streets of south Manhattan, the air was filled by a terrifying sucking sound akin to the roar of a rocket engine, caused by the sheer volume of air displaced by the collapse.

Screaming

The dust cloud roared through block after block, blanketing the entire area in a thick layer of grey ash and soot, at least three inches thick in some places.

"Everyone was screaming, crying, running, cops, people, firefighters, everyone," said Mike Smith, a fire marshal. "It's like a war zone."

"Windows shattered, people were screaming and diving for cover," one eyewitness said. "People walked around like ghosts, covered in dirt, weeping and wandering dazed."

At 10.15am in Washington, another alert was sounded. "Get them out of here. We've got another threat coming," a policemen yelled, pushing survivors back from the building. Another officer said a report had come in saying another plane was on its way into Washington.

A US air force fighter jet flew around the Pentagon banking steeply, as the air around the defence department began to buzz with military and police helicopters.

Stanley St Clair was stumbling along the road away from the vast building, covered in dust. He had been working on renovations on the first floor of the section which was struck by the plane.

"It shook the whole building and hurt our ears. Papers and furniture and debris just went flying through the hallway and I thought it was a bomb or something. Then someone started shouting get out, get out."

Renovation work on the upper floors had just been completed and they had been handed back to the defence department.

According to Navy Commander Tom O'Loughlin, the third and fourth floors of the outer ring which took the brunt of the impact housed senior navy officers, including vice-admirals. There were also offices used by secretaries of the different armed services and the assistant secretaries. A Pentagon spokeswoman said the defence secretary, Donald Rumsfeld, was unharmed.

A mobile secret service command centre raced west on H Street, with sirens blaring, shortly after 11am as police drew a growing cordon around the White House. Metal gates and yellow tape blocked access to streets and alleys. People scrambled to find working pay phones or reach friends or family on mobile phones.

Just before 10.30am, the north tower of the World Trade Centre collapsed. Authorities had been trying to evacuate the glass-and-steel skyscraper when it came down in a thunderous roar.

At 11.30 in Washington, police cars again screamed up and down the roads around the Pentagon ordering passers-by off the street. One officer said there had been another report of an incoming plane heading down the Potomac river at high speed.

The wide and normally crowded bridges across the Potomac were deserted and the scene resembled a city at war: deserted streets, billowing smoke and warplanes circling above. An elderly man, Tom O'Riordan, standing in the shade of a tree near the Jefferson Memorial, said he had not seen anything like it since Pearl Harbour.

Paul Begala, a Democratic consultant, said he witnessed an explosion near the Pentagon. "It was a huge fireball, a huge, orange fireball," he said in an interview on his mobile phone.

He said another witness told him a helicopter exploded. AP reporter Dave Winslow also saw the crash. He said, "I saw the tail of a large airliner ... It ploughed right into the Pentagon."

General Richard Myers, vice-chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, said that before the crash into the Pentagon, military officials had been notified that another hijacked plane had been heading from the New York area to Washington.

"We heard what sounded like a missile, then we heard a loud boom," said Tom Seibert, 33, a network engineer at the Pentagon. "We were sitting there and watching this thing from New York, and I said, you know, the next best target would be us. And five minutes later, boom."

Within an hour of the New York explosions, the federal government took the additional step of shutting down national landmarks across the country, including the Washington Monument, the Statue of Liberty and the St Louis Gateway Arch, among other locations, according to the National Park Service.

The plane crashed on the helicopter landing pad adjacent to the Pentagon. There were reports of injuries, but no details. The Pentagon building was partially blackened on the outside and at least a portion of the structure had collapsed, witnesses said.

Earlier reports of other explosions in the Washington region, at the State Department and the Capitol, were not accurate, law enforcement officials said.

The crash at the Pentagon, which occurred less than an hour after the New York attacks, triggered immediate security steps in the Washington area, including evacuation of the State Department, the Capitol building and the West Wing of the White House. The nine top leaders of the house and senate were taken into federal protection, according to the US Capitol police. The federal aviation administration shut down airports nationwide.

The federal government closed all of its facilities around Washington at 10.30am and told the region's 340,000 federal employees they could leave.

Dismay

Across the United States, passengers queuing for flights and relatives waiting to meet arriving planes stood in airport lobbies staring at the arrival and departure monitors and listening with a growing sense of bewilderment and dismay to the announcements over the loudspeakers. Every major airport has had its rehearsals for disaster but not since Pearl Harbour had the country experienced such a widespread series of attacks.

Los Angeles International airport, the destination for three of the four hijacked flights, announced a suspension of operations as soon as it became clear what had happened. Worried callers were diverted to the lines of American Airlines and United, which were trying to supply information of who had been on the flights.

The airport itself was closed to the public and its operations suspended with only key staff allowed to remain. California governor Gray Davis made the National Guard available to assist.

Grief counsellors were called in by American Airlines and United to be ready to meet the friends and relatives of those on the flights. Switchboards were jammed as people tried to get information from the airport.

Lieutenant Howard Whitehead of the Los Angeles police said: "We are working with all the other agencies and a total evacuation of the airport has been ordered for precautionary reasons. Right now everything is fluid." Mr Whitehead said that the airport had never previously had to deal with such a serious situation.



Special report
Terrorism in the US

Timeline
12.09.2001: Day of terror

Main articles
12.09.2001: US on war footing as thousands die in hijack jet outrage
12.09.2001: Terrorists 'were at controls' as planes hit targets
12.09.2001: Three hours of terror and chaos that brought a nation to a halt

Witnesses
12.09.2001: World Trade Centre
12.09.2001: Pentagon

Reaction
12.09.2001: Bush: 'The US will hunt down and punish those responsible'
12.09.2001: Palestinian joy - global condemnation
12.09.2001: Blair calls for world fight against terror

Comment and analysis
12.09.2001: Leader: The sum of all our fears
12.09.2001: Martin Woollacott: The best defence is justice
12.09.2001: Ian McEwan: Beyond belief
12.09.2001: Simon Reeve: A new breed of terror
12.09.2001: Giles Foden: Islam and the bombers

Video clips
Terrorism in the US audio and video
© 2001 Reuters / encoding itvmedia.com

Audio
11.09.2001: Blair's reaction

Photo gallery
The story in pictures

Map
Where the attacks occurred

The suspects
12.09.2001: Finger of suspicion pointed at Saudi dissident Osama bin Laden
01.03.1993: Trade Centre bombers mystify authorities

The targets
12.09.2001: Massive force of blasts triggered towers' collapse
11.09.2001: Towers too irresistible for terrorists
11.09.2001: The Pentagon - US military nerve centre
 
Yes, this article was posted under the name "Omar Campo".
 
Sorry for any double-ups. I just followed the missing persons links and were in doubt whether to post it or not. It is also posted under the name of "Afework Hagos". Feel free to delete any unneccessary double-ups.
 
I found this little bit more on what Timmerman said he saw/heard at this link on the web archive http://web.archive.org/web/20020829173808/http://www.dragonslair.pwp.blueyonder.co.uk/77/witnesses.html
Donald "Tim" Timmerman, watched from across Interstate 395:
"I was looking out the window; I live on the 16th floor, overlooking the Pentagon, in a corner apartment, so I have quite a panorama. And being next to National Airport, I hear jets all the time, but this jet engine was way too loud. I looked out to the southwest, and it came right down 395, right over Colombia Pike, and as it went by the Sheraton Hotel, the pilot added power to the engines. I heard it pull up a little bit more, and then I lost it behind a building. And then it came out, and I saw it hit right in front of -- it didn't appear to crash into the building; most of the energy was dissipated in hitting the ground, but I saw the nose break up, I saw the wings fly forward, and then the conflagration engulfed everything in flames. It was horrible.
What can you tell us about the plane itself?
It was a Boeing 757, American Airlines, no question.
You say that it was a Boeing, and you say it was a 757 or 767?
7-5-7.
757, which, of course..
American Airlines.
American Airlines, one of the new generation of jets.
Right. It was so close to me it was like looking out my window and looking at a helicopter. It was just right there. . .
cnn.com TRANSCRIPT
http://commemoratewtc.com/transcripts/tr-13-46.php
It is an interesting link and first it appeared to follow the official story, but then on looking a bit deeper some of the details are so way off the oficial story that it might have been the reason it got scrubbed. It broadens the picture of the alleged witnesses and describes their physical location on that day. The comment above about how most of the energy of the crash was dissipated by it hitting the ground is quite amusing considering the Pentalawn clip. The link at the bottom is no longer available.
 
Timmerman said:
I saw it hit right in front of -- it didn't appear to crash into the building; most of the energy was dissipated in hitting the ground, but I saw the nose break up, I saw the wings fly forward, and then the conflagration engulfed everything in flames. It was horrible.
Right there he has exposed himself as either a liar or compelled for any of a number of reasons to give false testimony. Apparently, he said all this before the evidence that none of it could be true came out...
 
The statements Tim Timmerman in the Guardian are apparently from and interview with CNN.

An elaborate analysis of Tim Timmerman is by Gerard Holmgren: http://atlanta.indymedia.org/usermedia/text/did_flight.txt

Gerard Holmgren said:
A pilot who saw the impact, Tim Timmerman, said it had been an American Airways 757. "'It added power on its way in,' he said. 'The nose hit, and the wings came forward and it went up in a fireball.'" - "Pentagon Eyewitness Accounts
http://www.guardian.co.uk/wtccrash/story/0%2C1300%2C550486%2C00.html
." The Guardian, 12 Sep 2001
This is quoted accurately from the Guardian,but the Guardian quote is lifted from an interview Timmerman did with CNN, in which he stated quite explicitly that the plane did not appear to crash into the Pentagon. Such a selective quote is a misrepresentation of the Timmerman interview. He said that it crashed on a helipad, near the Pentagon, and that he didn't think it hit the building. And if you compare the transcript, with the Guardian quote, you'll see that although the quote is similar in essence, The Guardian actually changed the wording slightly. If quotation marks are to be used then the quote should be repeated verbatim, not tampered with. During this research, I found this to be a common practice.

Here's the full transcript of Timmerman's interview.
CNN Breaking news Sept 11 13.46 said:
We do also have somebody to talk with us who was an eyewitness to the actual crash. He was watch from Arlington, Virginia, which is a suburb. His name is Tim Timmerman. Mr. Timmerman, are you with us right now?
TIM TIMMERMAN, EYEWITNESS: I sure am.
FRANKEN: You are a pilot. Tell us what you saw.
TIMMERMAN: I was looking out the window; I live on the 16th floor, overlooking the Pentagon, in a corner apartment, so I have quite a panorama. And being next to National Airport, I hear jets all the time, but this jet engine was way too loud. I looked out to the southwest, and it came right down 395, right over Colombia Pike, and as is went by the Sheraton Hotel, the pilot added power to the engines. I heard it pull up a little bit more, and then I lost it behind a building. And then it came out, and I saw it hit right in front of -- it didn't appear to crash into the building; most of the energy was dissipated in hitting the ground, but I saw the nose break up, I saw the wings fly forward, and then the conflagration engulfed everything in flames. It was horrible.
FRANKEN: What can you tell us about the plane itself?
TIMMERMAN: It was a Boeing 757, American Airlines, no question.
FRANKEN: You say that it was a Boeing, and you say it was a 757 or 767?
TIMMERMAN: 7-5-7.
FRANKEN: 757, which, of course...
TIMMERMAN: American Airlines.
FRANKEN: American Airlines, one of the new generation of jets.
TIMMERMAN: Right. It was so close to me it was like looking out my window and looking at a helicopter. It was just right there.
FRANKEN: We were told that it was flying so low that it clipped off a couple of light poles as it was coming in.
TIMMERMAN: That might have happened behind the apartments that occluded my view. And when it reappeared, it was right before impact, and like I said, it was right before impact, and I saw the airplane just disintegrate
and blow up into a huge ball of flames.
FRANKEN: So there was a fireball that you saw?
TIMMERMAN: Absolutely. And the building shook, and it was quite a tremendous explosion.
FRANKEN: What did you see after that?
TIMMERMAN: Nothing but the flames. I sat here, and I took a few pictures out of my window, and I noticed the fire trucks and the responses was just wonderful. Fire trucks were there quickly. I saw the area; the building didn't look very damaged initially, but I do see now, looking out my window, there's quite a chunk in it. But I think the blessing here might have been that the airplane hit before it hit the building, it hit the ground, and a lot of energy might have gone that way. That's what it appeared like.
FRANKEN: There is, of course -- we heard some discussion about the fact that it could have been worse had it actually gone a little bit higher and gone into what is the called the ring, the center ring...
(CROSSTALK)
FRANKEN: This is a five-sided building.
TIMMERMAN: As you know, the rings are A, B, C, D, E. It is just across the E ring on the outside, and that's why I felt it didn't look as damaged as it could be. It looked like on the helipad, which is on that side.
FRANKEN: Did you see any people being removed, any injured being removed, that type of thing?
TIMMERMAN: No, sir. I am up about a quarter a mile -- it may be a little bit closer -- and at that point, I saw nothing like that.
FRANKEN: Tim Timmerman, thank you very much -- an eyewitness, Judy, to the crash.
I have some difficulty with the idea that a plane going right past your window at about 400 mph, could be in any way reminiscent of a helicopter, but I'll let that pass, because there are more important issues to explore with this account. If a statement is not truthful, a clue will usually be revealed by inconsistencies in fine details. In this case the fine details relate to placement - where the witness was, the flight path, where he saw it, and where he lost it behind the building, and how he describes his view. And a close analysis of these factors makes this account impossible to believe. You'll need a map of Arlington and the surrounding areas to follow this. If you don't have a hard copy map, I found a number of online maps, which in combination are adequate.
This one
<http://www.realestatemapsmdva.com/virginia/arlington/index.html>
I will refer to as map 1.
<http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-srv/nation/graphics/pentagonmap_091301.htm>
(map 2) and
<http://www.holidayinnwashingtondc.com/downtown.html>
(map 3)
<http://www.kurumi.com/roads/3di/dc.html>
(map 4 ).
http://www.sheratonnationalhotel.com/hotellocation.cfm
(map 5 )
Thorbiorn: I tried to locate the above maps.
Map one is:
arlington.gif

Map two is:
pentagon_map_0913.gif

In map two you notice the "H" The strike on the building was a little below the "H".
The link for map three is dead, instead I suggest the following which is an overview map as Gerard would like it to be. It is from: http://www.virginiadot.org/comtravel/maps-arl-alex.asp which looks like this:
ct-cmaps-arl.jpg

Map four is:
dcdetail.gif

The link for map five is also dead. To make up for this lack I include a map of the location of Sheraton Naitonal hotel in Arlington which has the same orientation as the others. It is from http://www.sheratonnational.com/images/map.gif:
map.gif

A map that may be helpful is the one from: http://www.911-strike.com/quantum-path.htm
ep1shrink.jpg
The Sheraton National Hotel is located to the left more or less where the pink line begins.

Gerard Holmgren said:
Note: These maps do not state their orientation. I have assumed it to be due east- west, from right to left. If it is not, this will create innacuracies in my description of directions. However, this will make no difference to the analysis, because the importance of any direction stated is purely in the context of it's relativity to other directions.

First lets work out where Timmerman's apartment is. Look at map 1 to get a basic overview of the area. Timmerman's apartment is somewhere around the edge of the residential area which borders the south western corner of the yellow area which is the Arlington Cemetary/Pentagon complex. In a moment you'll see how I worked this out. Maps 3 and 4 are also basic overview maps. On map 4, Timmerman is somewhere around the junction of 244 with the circular road around the Arlington cemetary complex. Take a note of where Washington National Airport is, south and slightly east of the Pentagon. Now let's zoom in a bit. Go to map 5 and see where 244 (Columbia Pike) runs behind the southern perimiter of the Navy Annex and then bends to run the eastern perimiter. Note where 244 meets Southgate Rd. Since this map has a scale on it, you can work out that this junction is about 600 yards from the Pentagon west wall if you take a line due east from the junction.

Now refer back to map 1, find this junction by looking for the bend in 244, and this gives you an overview of how much open space there is in the semi circle around the Pentagon. Close to a 1000 yards in general. Go to map 2 which is a closer view of the Pentagon. It doesn't go out to the junction of 244 and Southgate, but it also has a scale which puts the western edge of Washington Boulevarde about 250 yards from the Pentagon. If you go back to map 5, you'll find that the two maps disagree a bit in scale. On map 5, I made this distance about 400 yards. We can't expect pinpoint accuracy with this method, nor do we need it for this exercise. I suspect from what else I've read in the eyewitness reports that the distances on map 5 are a little exaggerated, but the discrepencies will not affect this analysis.If we take the scale of map 2 as being more accurate, the juction of 244 and Southgate is more like 450 yards and the clear circle around the Pentagon about 650- 700 in most areas.

According to other eyewitness reports, the eastern edge of Washington Boulevarde is about 100 yards from the west wall. Timmerman says his apartment is about 1/4 mile from the Pentagon, maybe a little closer.About 400 - 450 yards. That doesn't seem possible from these maps, because it would place him well inside the cemetary.
Looking at maps 1 and 5, it's difficult to place him closer than about 600 yards. We can forgive him an error of judgement and also take into account probable innaccuracy of the maps and the innacuracy of measuring the distance on a computer screen. What it tells us however, is that his apartment must be one of the very closest to the Pentagon. It must be right at the edge of that circle of open ground around the Pentagon, the circle which includes the cemetary. This is supported by this statement.

I was looking out the window; I live on the 16th floor, overlooking the Pentagon, in a corner apartment, so I have quite a panorama.

So regardless of the exact distance that the circle of open ground represents, we know that Timmerman is very close to the edge of it. Now that we've worked out his probable distance from the Pentagon, lets work out his direction. We were given two clues.

And being next to National Airport, I hear jets all the time, but this jet engine was way too loud. I looked out to the southwest, and it came right down 395, right over Colombia Pike, and as is went by the Sheraton
Hotel...

and

It was so close to me it was like looking out my window and looking at a helicopter. It was just right there.

So we know he's close to the airport and close to 395 and close to to Columbia Pike and the Sheraton Hotel. Go back to map 5 to narrow down the possibilities. We saw from map 4 that he can't be too close to the airport, because then he wouldn't have an angle from which it is possible to see the damaged wall. That's the west wall which faces the cemetary. So his most likely location is either hard up against the junction of 395 and Army drive, around Nash or Lynne St, which is still placing him on quite a tight angle of vision to the west wall, or on the other side of 395, close to the junction of 27. He says it went "by" the Sheraton Hotel rather than behind it or over it, suggesting that he's probably to the right of the Sheraton. This is slightly ambiguos however, and doesn't completely rule out the possiblity that he's to the left of it, which would be more consistent with the impression that he has an excellent view of the west wall. If this is the case his only possible location is in an area roughly bounded by 2nd St, Southgate Rd and Washington Boulevarde. This is because McPherson St and Patton Drive
form the boundary of the Arlington Cemetary. We can work that out from
this map.

http://www.arlingtoncemetery.org/interactive_map/interactivemap_big.html

This map is a little confusing at first because it's left to right orientation is not the same as the others. You have to turn the top part of the map (McPherson Drive) to the left to get the orientation to match with map 5.

What's the flight path? To come right up 395 and over Columbia Pike, it must have gone right of the Sheraton and passed over the Navy Annex. (See map5 ) So it either passed right over the top of the Navy Annex and then turned sharply right to fly almost due east towards the helipad, or else it started to veer right as it passed the Sheraton, bringing it over the south-eastern corner of the Annex and from there took a fairly straight line north-east to the helipad. If it took the first of these options, then it flew to the collision point across the southern boundary of the cemetary. If it took the second option, it flew fractionally to the south of the cemetary boundary. Go back to map 1 to get an overview of what it's flying across here. Open country. No residential development.

What did Timmerman see? When he first became aware of the plane he looked back to the south west, down 395 and had a clear enough view of it to identify it as a AA 757 "no question." Obviously he does have quite a panorama, because at this point he is looking back to an area with a substantial amount of high rise development. Even though he is a pilot, and would therefore recognise the plane quicker than most, he would
still need a view of it for at least a few seconds to make such a positive identification. So he saw it for at least 2 seconds, probably longer, before it got to Coumbia Pike. This means he had an unbroken view of it for at least 400 yards as it flew through a heavily built up area. He could still see it as it flew past the Sheraton and over Columbia Pike, which means over the Navy Annex. Then he lost it behind a building until just before impact. What building ? It had just emerged out of the built up area and it's next 400-500 yards of flight is across clear ground. All the maps confirm this. And if you want to see photos of what this stretch of the flight path looks like go to
http://www.arlingtoncemetery.org/images/above_scenes/index.htm
where you'll find a gallery of 55 ariel photos of Arlington cemetary. In photo 31, you can see the Pentagon in the background.This one demonstrates that the clear area extends right to the Pentagon's perimiter. Photos 46, 50 and 51 also provide good perspectives. Photo 55 shows the south-east corner of the cemetary with an unimpeded view across to the Pentagon. According to Timmerman's account, the view in this photo would be almost the exact path of the plane after it flew over Columbia Pike. So there could not have been any building eastwards of the Navy Annex which could have obstructed Timmerman's view across the last 400 -500 yards of the alleged flight path. He only lost it once, and we know could still see it as it was going over the Annex. And we know that he's talking about an apartment block, because in response to the suggestion that it may have knocked over poles on it's way in, he replies "That might have happened behind the apartments that occluded my view. "

What apartments? These poles are at the foot of the westen wall of the Pentagon, a place which we were led to believe that Timmerman could clearly see from his apartment. He doesn't say exactly where he lost it, but it was obviously for a substantial time, 2 seconds at least, otherwise he would not have given it such significance in his description. 2 seconds is about 400 yards of flight. So he lost it for almost the entire flight after Columbia Pike when there was nothing in the area to obstruct his view. This is very difficult to believe, but if it is any way possible, the offending apartments could only have been within the residential area. Since we know that he must be very close to the edge of the residential area, any apartment in front of him which blocked his view would have to be very close to him. In order to have enough elevation to block his view of the flight path and of
the poles at the foot of the Pentagon it would therefore have to be at least about the same hight as Timmerman's apartment - about 15 stories. Any building this tall would have to be 60 - 100 ft wide to have structural integrity.
So Timmerman has a 60 - 100ft wide building very close to him, blocking his view of the west wall of the Pentagon. Not such a panorama afer all. And yet he's told us that he can see the helipad and the damaged section of the wall, which is just to the north of the helipad, and in another part of the interview, gave detailed descriptions of what he could see in that area, in terms of response crews.He's also told us that he can see the Sheraton and an area of Columbia Pike, which we have deduced as being around the Navy Annex area. He didn't lose it behind the Navy Annex, because he saw it fly over that area, and anyway he said that it was a block of apartments which obscured his view.

Is it possible to construct a scenario where Timmerman's line of sight from his apartment allows him to see the Navy Annex, the helipad, and the damaged area of the wall, but almost nothing in between, because of
obstruction from a nearby apartment? Lets run through the possible locations. If he's tucked into the area of Nash and Lynne st, near the Junction of 395 and Army Drive, then if he's looking directly at the helipad, the area where he lost sight of the plane is at about 11 oclock.For a 60 - 100 ft wide building to block 30 degrees of his vision, it would have to be between 35 and 60 yards in front of him. This places his apartment further back from the edge of the residential area.Remember that he said he was 400- 450 yards away, so we already stretching this severely, even without setting him back further into the residential area. Worse still, from this position, he is already at a very tight angle to be able to see much of the western wall, and what little he can see would now be squeezed into a very narrow space along the edge of his sight line. And given that the helipad (which photos show sufferered miraculously little damage) juts out from the wall, he wouldn't be able to see past it to see the damaged section. And yet he gives us a detailed description of the damage. This isn't possible. If we decide to
reduce the width of the obstruction in an attempt to give him more angle past the helipad to see the area where the damage occured, we solve one problem but create another. In response to the suggestion that poles might have been knocked down, he says that may have happened behind the apartments. Since these poles would be situated on about the same line of sight as the damaged area of wall, they have to either both be visible or both obstructed. It does not appear possible to construct any scenario where Timmerman could have seen what he describes from this area. And if we move him to the other side of 395 it gets worse. His angle of vision between the helipad and the Navy Annex becomes even tighter, making it totally impossible to squeeze in an apartment block which could have obstructed the flight path, without also obstructing both the Navy Annex and the collision area. He's almost directly behind the line of the flight path, which means that if he couldn't see the plane in flight, then he also couldn't see the crash site.This problem remains wherever we place him on the west side of 395.

Lets suppose that we somehow solve this problem. We place him east of 395 and somehow manage to sqeeze in an apartment block which allows him to see the the collision area past the helipad, but still blocks out the poles, and allows him to see the Navy Annex but blocks everything inbetween.He would certainly not have anything like a panorama, He would have a clear view of the south wall of the Pentagon, but his view of the west wall, where all the action was, would be on a severe angle, and his view dominated by the apartment block.

And yet, when he describes losing the plane he simply describes it as "behind a building". He doesn't say anything to this effect " behind these apartments right in front of me that block out so much of my view. I have a sharply angled view of the west wall past the edge of them." And he would see very little, if anything of the action afterwards - the fire trucks, the rescue crews. Most, if not all of this would be hidden behind the apartments. So how can he explain this exchange?

FRANKEN: Did you see any people being removed, any injured being removed, that type of thing?
TIMMERMAN: No, sir. I am up about a quarter a mile -- it may be a little bit closer -- and at that point, I saw nothing like that.

He somehow forgot to mention that the reason he couldn't see anything like that was because the area in front of the crash site was hidden by an apartment block? If he couldn't see anything like that happening in the narrow wedge of vision he has along the western wall, he would really have no idea what might have been happening just out from the wall behind the apartments that presumably are still occluding his view.

If power poles that might have been knocked down as it came in were obstructed from his view by apartments, then presumably those apartments were still there after the crash. But referring to the damage he confidently says

"I saw the area; the building didn't look very damaged initially, but I do see now, looking out my window, there's quite a chunk in it."

"It is just across the E ring on the outside, and that's why I felt it didn't look as damaged as it could be. It looked like on the helipad, which is on that side."

Nothing to the effect that his view of the damaged area is so restricted that it's "difficult to tell from this angle."

For the entire interview, Timmerman gives the impression that he has a magnificent view of everything that's happening. If the offending apartment block really is there (permanently), it's impossible to believe that the impression of a clear view was given accidently, just by forgetting to qualify things. Timmerman is a pilot - a person with sharp, quick powers of observation and meticulous attention to detail.

He accurately describes the flight path, distances, the type of aircraft, how it crashed, what he can see of the damage, the response of rescue and fire crews.He describes which freeway the plane flew along and which buildings and landmarks he saw it go over or past, but is curiously vague about which building he lost it behind, when that building must significantly dominate his view. And through the entire interview he somehow forgets to mention what a poor view he has of the western wall, and gives completely the opposite impression.

"I was looking out the window; I live on the 16th floor, overlooking the Pentagon, in a corner apartment, so I have quite a panorama."

"I sat here, and I took a few pictures out of my window, and I noticed the fire trucks and the responses was just wonderful. Fire trucks were there quickly. I saw the area; the building didn't look very damaged initially, but I do see now, looking out my window, there's quite a chunk in it."

"It is just across the E ring on the outside, and that's why I felt it didn't look as damaged as it could be. It looked like on the helipad, which is on that side."


" No, sir. I am up about a quarter a mile -- it may be a little bit closer -- and at that point, I saw nothing like that."

I've never been to Wasington DC. This analysis was deduced from maps. Lets suppose that my unfamiliarity with the area has caused me to miss a detail which could not be deduced from the maps. Even if this has happened, there is still a terrible inconsistency in this account which seems impossible to resolve. Timmerman says that when the plane reappeared, it was right before impact. If it hit the ground 30 yards in front of the wall, and he had 70 yards of flight before that, after it reappeared, that gives him less than 0.4 second to pick it up before the crash and about 0.15 second between the crash and the impact with the wall. His powers of observation would seem extraordinary in this situation, particularly as he could not have known exactly where he should be looking to see it as it re-emerged.

"I saw it hit right in front of -- it didn't appear to crash into the building; most of the energy was dissipated in hitting the ground, but I saw the nose break up, I saw the wings fly forward, and then the conflagration engulfed everything in flames."

And yet, even this near impossible scenario still gives him 100 yards of vision between the Pentagon and the obstructing apartments, probably enough to see the light poles along the eastern edge of Washington Boulevarde. And given the momentum of the plane, as these were broken off, they would have been pushed forward towards the wall. And there is another set of poles closer to the wall, which he could not possibly have had obscured from his view, otherwise he could not have seen the crash. Regarding the poles along the edge of Washington Boulevarde, he is caught between impossibilities. If we shift the obstruction further away, to make it more credible that he could have seen the crash in such meticulous detail, there is no way that these poles can have been obscured. If we shift it closer, his detailed description in such a short time becomes impossible. Of course, he may not have noticed the poles being clipped off in the moment, but it's difficult to believe that he hadn't noticed anything 3 hours later, especially as he was specifically asked about them. And he doesn't say anything to the effect that "All the poles I can see are still standing" He denies any knowledge, strongly implying that all relevant poles are hidden from his view. If they are, then he can't have seen the crash.

This is the statement which seals the fate of this account.

"That may have happened behind the apartments that occluded my view"

Note the use of the past tense. They occluded my view but they don't anymore. The complex ananysis has been done. Now lets look at it very simply and succinctly. From his apartment, Timmerman looks north east, possibly close to due east to the helipad. According to most of the interview, he has a clear view of the west wall. The plane allegedly flew north east or possibly almost due east towards the helipad from an area very close to Timmerman's apartment. So what was in the background of Timmerman's sight as the plane flew from the Navy Annex to the helipad? The west wall of the pentagon of course. Apparently not. A block of apartments which isn't normally there miraculously sprang up and occluded his view, but had disappeared again by the time of the interview.

This account is impossible to believe.

On Sept 12, the Press went into a frenzy with Timmerman's juicy quote about the explosion. But while they were quite happy to use his description of the crash, they brushed aside his modest assessment of the damage, for more exciting descriptions, cleverly juxtaposing these with his quote to make it look like Timmerman had described cataclysmic damage to the building.

For example, the St Petersburg Times on Sept 12. http://www.sptimes.com/News/091201/Worldandnation/Workers_flee_in_panic.shtml

WASHINGTON -- Tim Timmerman was looking out a window of his 16th-floor apartment in Virginia when he saw the plane heading for the Pentagon. "I saw the nose break up. I saw the wings fly forward," Timmerman said. "And then the conflagration just engulfed everything in flames. It was horrible."

The jetliner burst through the Pentagon's stone exterior and exploded, ripping a gaping hole that extended at least 200 feet wide into the squat, five-sided building, authorities said. The plane hit the southwest wall that faces Arlington National Cemetery. Nearby is the building's helicopter landing area.

And also on sept 12 The Rutland Herald http://rutlandherald.nybor.com/News/Story/33484.html
An eyewitness said the plane¡¯s pilot appeared to add power to the engines as it prepared to plow into the west side of the Pentagon at 9:40 a.m. EDT. "I saw the nose break up, I saw the wings fly forward," said Tim Timmerman, who watched the crash from his 16th-floor apartment building in suburban Virginia that overlooks the Pentagon. "And then the conflagration just engulfed everything in flames. It was horrible."

But there is more to this than just the uncritical sensationalising of Timmerman's impossible account. Later in the same article it was reported.

The jetliner burst through the Pentagon¡'s stone exterior and exploded, ripping a gaping hole that extended at least 200 feet wide into the squat, five-sided building, authorities said.

Word for word the same as the St Petersburg Times, complete with the telltale "authorities said" What this tells us, is that in some cases the press was not writing it's own accounts. U.S. authorities were writing the news for them, and the press were printing it verbatim. Were authorities also producing the witnesses?

The same pre-manufactured spin was repeated in combination with the Timmerman quote at Starnet.com http://www.azstarnet.com/attack/3-1.html at the same time as showing a photo of the hole which isn't anywhere near 200 ft wide. Have a look at the photo. If the black van just in front of the hole is 20ft long, then the hole is 50 - 80 ft wide.

It is interesting to note that all three of these reports chose the same Timmerman quote in partnership with what appears to be a pre-set script from authorities. And a similar pairing was also made by the SF Gate on Sept 12 <http://www.sfgate.com/today/0912_chron_main.shtml> although this chose to paraphrase Timmerman, rather quote him directly. Timmerman was only interviewed once and his dramatic description of the crash was quickly co-opted into the official mythology.

Like the Mike Walter report, this demonstrates the absolute importance of being able to interview a witness extensively, before giving too much weight to their account.

See the rest of this article at : http://www.thepowerhour.com/postings-two/eyewitness-accounts-flight77.htm
T: Yesterday I found the same text on an English website, it was taken from a server in Hamilton Canada. Apparently Gerard Holmgren made a series postings analyzing witness accounts. I have found the above text on http://sf.indymedia.org/news/2002/06/131520.php except the last line beginning [the hole is 5--8- ft wide. .... to their account.] The title of the posting is "Did F77 hit the Pentqagon? Eyewitness accounts examined.
by Gerard Holmgren Wednesday June 05, 2002 at 12:41 AM
gerardholmgren@hotmail.com " The powerhour.com might have been the original site, who knows?

Regarding the link with the photos of Arlington Cemetery only a couple of them opened up in the browser.

Thorbiorn
 
The CNN interview with Tim Timmerman is found on: http://transcripts.cnn.com/TRANSCRIPTS/0109/11/bn.32.html

CNN BREAKING NEWS
America Under Attack: Eyewitness Discusses Pentagon Plane Crash
Aired September 11, 2001 - 13:46 ET

THIS IS A RUSH TRANSCRIPT. THIS COPY MAY NOT BE IN ITS FINAL FORM AND MAY BE UPDATED.


THIS IS A RUSH TRANSCRIPT. THIS COPY MAY NOT BE IN ITS FINAL FORM AND MAY BE UPDATED.
JUDY WOODRUFF, CNN CORRESPONDENT: Now to our correspondent at the Pentagon, Bob Franken, who is, I believe, at a safe distance there from what's been going on.

Bob, please bring us up to date.

BOB FRANKEN, CNN CORRESPONDENT: We are on the east side of the Pentagon, as can you see, Judy. And see, over my shoulder, that smoke continues to billow, smoke that is sometimes thick, sometimes a little dissipated. But we're talking about about 4 1/2 hours after a plane -- it's described as probably being a jumbo-jet-sided plane -- crashed into the Pentagon, at about 9:20 this morning.

We now want to show you what it looks like on the west side. This is video that was shot by Vito Magiola (ph), who is an assignment editor and producer for CNN. He was able to get video. You can see that firefighters there are fighting in an area, rings four, five, and six, on the west side of the Pentagon. Vito says that it was an area, in his estimation, that was about 30 yards wide and about 10 yards deep into the building. The firefighting was hampered, he says, because inside the building sprinklers, pipes, and other forms of hydrants were damaged.

There's an estimate that several hundred firefighters and emergency workers at the Pentagon. We're also told, of course, that there has been evacuation efforts throughout the day. We can see those. We do not have an estimate on the number of casualties. I can tell you that, from our vantage point, we have seen a constant parade of casualty units -- military casualty units, civilian ambulances, fire engines, and the like -- going to the Pentagon.

There have been casualties, but as we said, we don't have any sort of estimate about that now.

We do also have somebody to talk with us who was an eyewitness to the actual crash. He was watch from Arlington, Virginia, which is a suburb. His name is Tim Timmerman.

Mr. Timmerman, are you with us right now?

TIM TIMMERMAN, EYEWITNESS: I sure am.

FRANKEN: You are a pilot. Tell us what you saw. TIMMERMAN: I was looking out the window; I live on the 16th floor, overlooking the Pentagon, in a corner apartment, so I have quite a panorama. And being next to National Airport, I hear jets all the time, but this jet engine was way too loud. I looked out to the southwest, and it came right down 395, right over Colombia Pike, and as is went by the Sheraton Hotel, the pilot added power to the engines. I heard it pull up a little bit more, and then I lost it behind a building.

And then it came out, and I saw it hit right in front of -- it didn't appear to crash into the building; most of the energy was dissipated in hitting the ground, but I saw the nose break up, I saw the wings fly forward, and then the conflagration engulfed everything in flames. It was horrible.

FRANKEN: What can you tell us about the plane itself?

TIMMERMAN: It was a Boeing 757, American Airlines, no question.

FRANKEN: You say that it was a Boeing, and you say it was a 757 or 767?

TIMMERMAN: 7-5-7.

FRANKEN: 757, which, of course...

TIMMERMAN: American Airlines.

FRANKEN: American Airlines, one of the new generation of jets.

TIMMERMAN: Right. It was so close to me it was like looking out my window and looking at a helicopter. It was just right there.

FRANKEN: We were told that it was flying so low that it clipped off a couple of light poles as it was coming in.

TIMMERMAN: That might have happened behind the apartments that occluded my view.

And when it reappeared, it was right before impact, and like I said, it was right before impact, and I saw the airplane just disintegrate and blow up into a huge ball of flames.

FRANKEN: So there was a fireball that you saw?

TIMMERMAN: Absolutely. And the building shook, and it was quite a tremendous explosion.

FRANKEN: What did you see after that?

TIMMERMAN: Nothing but the flames. I sat here, and I took a few pictures out of my window, and I noticed the fire trucks and the responses was just wonderful. Fire trucks were there quickly. I saw the area; the building didn't look very damaged initially, but I do see now, looking out my window, there's quite a chunk in it. But I think the blessing here might have been that the airplane hit before it hit the building, it hit the ground, and a lot of energy might have gone that way. That's what it appeared like.

FRANKEN: There is, of course -- we heard some discussion about the fact that it could have been worse had it actually gone a little bit higher and gone into what is the called the ring, the center ring...

(CROSSTALK)

FRANKEN: This is a five-sided building.

TIMMERMAN: As you know, the rings are A, B, C, D, E. It is just across the E ring on the outside, and that's why I felt it didn't look as damaged as it could be. It looked like on the helipad, which is on that side.

FRANKEN: Did you see any people being removed, any injured being removed, that type of thing?

TIMMERMAN: No, sir. I am up about a quarter a mile -- it may be a little bit closer -- and at that point, I saw nothing like that.

FRANKEN: Tim Timmerman, thank you very much -- an eyewitness, Judy, to the crash.

We still have no idea about the number of casualties. We know that there is a gaping hole on the west side of the Pentagon. As you can see, the smoke continues to billow -- Judy.

WOODRUFF: Bob Franken.

To our audience, no surprise. Hospitals in the Washington area are dealing with casualties from the plane crash at the Pentagon. We were told a few hours ago there's a blood shortage in the Washington area, hospitals wanting to people to know if you are in a position to donate blood, it would very much be needed and appreciated.

TO ORDER A VIDEO OF THIS TRANSCRIPT, PLEASE CALL 800-CNN-NEWS OR USE OUR SECURE ONLINE ORDER FORM LOCATED AT www.fdch.com

Thorbiorn
 
This site is with photos and the positions of various features etc and is a helpful addition to Thorbiorns in-depth analysis of what Timmerman could really see. http://perso.wanadoo.fr/jpdesm/pentagon/pages-en/trj-appr.html


The site is by a French engineer and can be useful for our current analysis. Whether we will reach the same conclusion is doubtful as he still holds on to the 757 theory, which is not supported by facts IMO. The home page is found here http://perso.wanadoo.fr/jpdesm/pentagon/english.html

Anders
 
In the thread: "Alleged Pentagon Strike Witnesses Introduction" I have submitted one post which lists the article from the Guardian, as S06NW which is "Source six - News". Below is the whole article reposted with divisions according to which alleged witness appears in the section, although in some places it is most likely the journalists or the source of information is not specified. The quotes that have been used by the What Really Happened have been verified with the original and underlined, so that identification is easier. Some of the witnesses are not witnesses to the actual event, but they do give alleged perspectives to what else was happening on that day in Washington D. C. and Arlington Va.

One reason for taking care to identifying the witnesses, is that I think one will have to look at the whole situation to find traces that can explain what took place. Searching for witnesses who allegedly saw the plane or the object will possibly not prove sufficient to determine with certainty what occured. The 26 witnesses that Michael Rivero lists won't do. This has become more clear as I have read various attempts to integrate all the available information about the Pentagon Strike. What I have come accross is opinions, inclusions, omissions, some analysis, some good, but a very detailed list of the witnesses is missing. And that is very important also. So listing sources, saving the sources before the links become extinct, listing the alleged witnesses that occur in the sources, trying to verifying the personal details of the people who are alleged witnesses may turn out to be a small contribution to the global undertaking to investigate. There are many articles published and here and there some strange small observation is made or commented upon. Each on its own do not say much, but all together they do give a picture. -Thorbiorn

As you will see besides Timmerman there are two other Guardian/S06 witnesses in the WRH presentation; Afework Hagos and Omar Campo. However since Timmerman has spurred more posts and the other two none, I post it in this thread.

S is source, NW is news, W is witness, P is Pentagon/Washington, WRH is what really happened

SO06-NW = The Guardian, weblink: http://www.guardian.co.uk/wtccrash/story/0,1300,550486,00.html
[S06WP00=Journalists at the The Guadian]
[SO06W/P01-WRHW06=Omar Campo]
[SO06W/P02-WRHW13=Afework Hagos]
[SO06W/P03-WRHW24=(Donald) "Tim" Timmerman]
[SO06W/P04=Rescue workers]
[SO06W/P05=Policemen]
[SO06W/P06=Stanley St.Clair]
[SO06W/P07=Navy Commander Tom O'Loughlin]
[SO06W/P08= Pentagon Spokeswoman]
[SO06W/P09=Paul Begala]
[SO06W/P09=One Officer]
[SO06W/P10= Tom O'Riordan]
[SO06W/P11=Paul Begala]
[SO06W/P11HS=Paul Begala/Hearsay]
[SO06W/P12=Dave Winslow]
[SO06W/P13=General Richard Myers]
[SO06W/P1 4=Tom Seibert]
[SO06W/P1 5=Federal Government]
[SO06W/P16=Witnesses]
[SO06W/P17=Law enforcement officials]

[S06WP00=Journalists at the The Guadian]
'Everyone was screaming, crying, running. It's like a war zone'

As millions watched, a second plane hit. Then the Pentagon was struck. The entire US was thrown into a state of siege

Special report: Terrorism in the US

Julian Borger in Washington, Duncan Campbell in Los Angeles, Charlie Porter in New York and Stuart Millar
Wednesday September 12, 2001
The Guardian
[NEW YORK]
American Airlines flight 11 from Boston to Los Angeles had been in the air for a matter of minutes when the terrorists seized control just after 8am and changed course towards New York City. The hijacking heralded the start of a series of appalling attacks which reduced America's two most important cities to war zone-like scenes of carnage and threw the entire nation into a panic-fuelled state of siege. From start to finish, the operation took less than three hours.

The first attack came within 45 minutes of flight 11 being seized. At the World Trade Centre in downtown Manhattan, staff were already at their desks and the working day was in full flow. On the densely packed streets of the financial district around the base of the 110-storey twin towers, other New Yorkers were strolling to work in the pristine early autumn sunshine when disaster struck.

The initial reports were patchy and confused, but according to eyewitnesses, what appeared to be a passenger plane had crashed into the north tower. As emergency services rushed to the scene they were joined by dozens of news crews and onlookers who stared in horror at the upper storeys, most of which had been destroyed in impact. The devastation was horrific: vast palls of smoke billowing from twisted window frames and sheets of flame shooting up the side of the building. In desperation, some of those who were trapped began leaping from the windows of the building.

One employee at London firm Garban Intercapital was on the phone to a colleague in the north tower when the first plane hit. The last words he heard were: "Help, we are all dying. Get us out."

Around the world, television images of the north tower, smoke billowing from its upper floors, were being broadcast live. The news anchors were already speculating that terrorists were responsible when the unthinkable happened.

Watched by millions of shocked viewers, a second airliner headed straight for the south tower, dipped its port wing slightly and accelerated into the building somewhere around the 60th storey. The explosion caused by the impact sent a huge, debris-laden fireball cascading down the building on to the streets below.

"The first tower was smoking hard," said Joe Trachtenberg, who was watching from the top of his building. "Then there was another plane, and before we knew, it just kamikaze went straight into the other tower. There was a mass explosion and windows flying. It was horrible."

On the ground, there was chaos. "People were running in all directions jumping over barriers, desperately trying to get away from the area. I guess they were just desperate to escape," said one eyewitness.
[PENTAGON]
[S06WP00=Journalists at the Guardian]
There was worse to come. A little before 9.30am, reports emerged that another plane had been hijacked. Within 10 minutes, a medium-sized passenger plane flew in low over Arlington and the Navy Annexe in Washington DC and plunged into the Pentagon's south-west face, throwing up a huge fireball.
Fro the two sections a map or photo is useful. The following it from http://www.911-strike.com
flight_path.jpg

The road going from upper left to lower right is 27/Washington Boulevard. Omar Campo was on the "upper side" of the road. The raod that rund into this from the upper middle and makes an eight is 244/Columbia Pike. Asework Hagos was on this and since he is alleged to have had good view of the object his vehicle was most likely facing the incoming object.
[S06W/P01-WRHW06=Omar Campo]
Omar Campo, a Salvadorean, was cutting the grass on the other side of the road when the plane flew over his head.

"It was a passenger plane. I think an American Airways plane," Mr Campo said. "I was cutting the grass and it came in screaming over my head. I felt the impact. The whole ground shook and the whole area was full of fire. I could never imagine I would see anything like that here."
[S06W/P02-WRHW13=Afework Hagos]
Afework Hagos, a computer programmer, was on his way to work but stuck in a traffic jam near the Pentagon when the plane flew over. "There was a huge screaming noise and I got out of the car as the plane came over. Everybody was running away in different directions. It was tilting its wings up and down like it was trying to balance. It hit some lampposts on the way in."
[S06W/P03-WRHW24=(Donald) "Tim" Timmerman]
A pilot who saw the impact, Tim Timmerman, said it had been an American Airways 757. "It added power on its way in," he said. "The nose hit, and the wings came forward and it went up in a fireball."
[S06W/P04=Rescue workers]
Smoke and flames poured out of a large hole punched into the side of the Pentagon. Emergency crews rushed fire engines to the scene and ambulancemen ran towards the flames holding wooden pallets to carry bodies out. A few of the lightly injured, bleeding and covered in dust, were recovering on the lawn outside, some in civilian clothes, some in uniform. A piece of twisted aircraft fuselage lay nearby. No one knew how many people had been killed, but rescue workers were finding it nearly impossible to get to people trapped inside, beaten back by the flames and falling debris.
[NEW YORK]
In New York, police and fire officials were carrying out the first wave of evacuations when the first of the World Trade Centre towers collapsed. Some eyewitnesses reported hearing another explosion just before the structure crumbled. Police said that it looked almost like a "planned implosion" designed to catch bystanders watching from the street.

As the tower crumbled in on itself, throwing a vast mushroom cloud of choking grey ash, smoke and debris across the densely packed streets of south Manhattan, the air was filled by a terrifying sucking sound akin to the roar of a rocket engine, caused by the sheer volume of air displaced by the collapse.

Screaming

The dust cloud roared through block after block, blanketing the entire area in a thick layer of grey ash and soot, at least three inches thick in some places.

"Everyone was screaming, crying, running, cops, people, firefighters, everyone," said Mike Smith, a fire marshal. "It's like a war zone."

"Windows shattered, people were screaming and diving for cover," one eyewitness said. "People walked around like ghosts, covered in dirt, weeping and wandering dazed."
[PENTAGON]
[S06W/P05=Policemen]
At 10.15am in Washington, another alert was sounded. "Get them out of here. We've got another threat coming," a policemen yelled, pushing survivors back from the building. Another officer said a report had come in saying another plane was on its way into Washington.

A US air force fighter jet flew around the Pentagon banking steeply, as the air around the defence department began to buzz with military and police helicopters.
[S06W/P06=Stanley St.Clair]
Stanley St Clair was stumbling along the road away from the vast building, covered in dust. He had been working on renovations on the first floor of the section which was struck by the plane.

"It shook the whole building and hurt our ears. Papers and furniture and debris just went flying through the hallway and I thought it was a bomb or something. Then someone started shouting get out, get out."

Renovation work on the upper floors had just been completed and they had been handed back to the defence department.
[SO06W/P07=Navy Commander Tom O'Loughlin]
According to Navy Commander Tom O'Loughlin, the third and fourth floors of the outer ring which took the brunt of the impact housed senior navy officers, including vice-admirals. There were also offices used by secretaries of the different armed services and the assistant secretaries. [S06W/P08= Pentagon Spokeswoman] A Pentagon spokeswoman said the defence secretary, Donald Rumsfeld, was unharmed.

A mobile secret service command centre raced west on H Street, with sirens blaring, shortly after 11am as police drew a growing cordon around the White House. Metal gates and yellow tape blocked access to streets and alleys. People scrambled to find working pay phones or reach friends or family on mobile phones.
[NEW YORK]
Just before 10.30am, the north tower of the World Trade Centre collapsed. Authorities had been trying to evacuate the glass-and-steel skyscraper when it came down in a thunderous roar.
[PENTAGON]
[SO06W/P09= One Officer]
At 11.30 in Washington, police cars again screamed up and down the roads around the Pentagon ordering passers-by off the street. One officer said there had been another report of an incoming plane heading down the Potomac river at high speed.


The wide and normally crowded bridges across the Potomac were deserted and the scene resembled a city at war: deserted streets, billowing smoke and warplanes circling above. [S06W/P10= Tom O'Riordan] An elderly man, Tom O'Riordan, standing in the shade of a tree near the Jefferson Memorial, said he had not seen anything like it since Pearl Harbour.
[S06W/P11=Paul Begala]
Paul Begala, a Democratic consultant, said he witnessed an explosion near the Pentagon. "It was a huge fireball, a huge, orange fireball," he said in an interview on his mobile phone.
[S06W/P11HS=Paul Begala/Hearsay]
He said another witness told him a helicopter exploded. [S06W/P12=Dave Winslow] AP reporter Dave Winslow also saw the crash. He said, "I saw the tail of a large airliner ... It ploughed right into the Pentagon."
[S06W/P13=General Richard Myers]
General Richard Myers, vice-chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, said that before the crash into the Pentagon, military officials had been notified that another hijacked plane had been heading from the New York area to Washington.
[S06W/P1 4=Tom Seibert]
"We heard what sounded like a missile, then we heard a loud boom," said Tom Seibert, 33, a network engineer at the Pentagon. "We were sitting there and watching this thing from New York, and I said, you know, the next best target would be us. And five minutes later, boom."
[S06W/P1 5=Federal Government]
Within an hour of the New York explosions, the federal government took the additional step of shutting down national landmarks across the country, including the Washington Monument, the Statue of Liberty and the St Louis Gateway Arch, among other locations, according to the National Park Service.
[PENTAGON]
[S06W/P16=Witnesses]
The plane crashed on the helicopter landing pad adjacent to the Pentagon. There were reports of injuries, but no details. The Pentagon building was partially blackened on the outside and at least a portion of the structure had collapsed, witnesses said.
[S06W/P17=Law enforcement officials]
Earlier reports of other explosions in the Washington region, at the State Department and the Capitol, were not accurate, law enforcement officials said.

The crash at the Pentagon, which occurred less than an hour after the New York attacks, triggered immediate security steps in the Washington area, including evacuation of the State Department, the Capitol building and the West Wing of the White House. The nine top leaders of the house and senate were taken into federal protection, according to the US Capitol police. The federal aviation administration shut down airports nationwide.
[S06W/P15=Federal Government]
The federal government closed all of its facilities around Washington at 10.30am and told the region's 340,000 federal employees they could leave.
[US]
Dismay

Across the United States, passengers queuing for flights and relatives waiting to meet arriving planes stood in airport lobbies staring at the arrival and departure monitors and listening with a growing sense of bewilderment and dismay to the announcements over the loudspeakers. Every major airport has had its rehearsals for disaster but not since Pearl Harbour had the country experienced such a widespread series of attacks.

Los Angeles International airport, the destination for three of the four hijacked flights, announced a suspension of operations as soon as it became clear what had happened. Worried callers were diverted to the lines of American Airlines and United, which were trying to supply information of who had been on the flights.

The airport itself was closed to the public and its operations suspended with only key staff allowed to remain. California governor Gray Davis made the National Guard available to assist.

Grief counsellors were called in by American Airlines and United to be ready to meet the friends and relatives of those on the flights. Switchboards were jammed as people tried to get information from the airport.

Lieutenant Howard Whitehead of the Los Angeles police said: "We are working with all the other agencies and a total evacuation of the airport has been ordered for precautionary reasons. Right now everything is fluid." Mr Whitehead said that the airport had never previously had to deal with such a serious situation.
-end of article from The Guardian

Thorbiorn
 
Back
Top Bottom