Posted on 06/09/2004 10:38:46 AM PDT by Ol' Dan Tucker
By JEAN HELLER, Times Staff WriterThe government has long denied that two days after the 9/11 attacks, the three were allowed to fly.
|
| The National Commission on Terrorist Attacks, better known as the 9/11 Commission, sent a list of questions to Tampa International Airport. It appears concerned with the handling of the Tampa flight. |
 |
TAMPA - Two days after the Sept. 11 attacks, with most of the nation's air traffic still grounded, a small jet landed at Tampa International Airport, picked up three young Saudi men and left.
The men, one of them thought to be a member of the Saudi royal family, were accompanied by a former FBI agent and a former Tampa police officer on the flight to Lexington, Ky.
The Saudis then took another flight out of the country. The two ex-officers returned to TIA a few hours later on the same plane.
For nearly three years, White House, aviation and law enforcement officials have insisted the flight never took place and have denied published reports and widespread Internet speculation about its purpose.
But now, at the request of the National Commission on Terrorist Attacks, TIA officials have confirmed that the flight did take place and have supplied details.
The odyssey of the small LearJet 35 is part of a larger controversy over the hasty exodus from the United States in the days immediately after 9/11 of members of the Saudi royal family and relatives of Osama bin Laden.
The terrorism panel, better known as the 9/11 Commission, said in April that it knew of six chartered flights with 142 people aboard, mostly Saudis, that left the United States between Sept. 14 and 24, 2001. But it has said nothing about the Tampa flight.
The commission's general counsel, Daniel Marcus, asked TIA in a letter dated May 25 for any information about "a chartered flight with six people, including a Saudi prince, that flew from Tampa, Florida on or about Sept. 13, 2001." He asked for the information no later than June 8.
TIA officials said they sent their reply on Monday.
The airport used aircraft tracking equipment normally assigned to a noise abatement program to determine the identity of all aircraft entering TIA airspace on Sept. 13, and found four records for the LearJet 35.
The plane first entered the airspace from the south, possibly from the Fort Lauderdale area, sometime after 3 p.m. and landed for the first time at 3:34 p.m. It took off at 4:37 p.m., headed north. It returned to Tampa at 8:23 p.m. and took off again at 8:48 p.m., headed south.
Author Craig Unger, who first disclosed the possibility of a post-9/11 Saudi airlift in his book House of Bush, House of Saud, said in an interview that he believes the jet came to Tampa a second time to drop off two former law enforcement agents from Tampa who accompanied three young Saudis to Lexington for security purposes.
The Saudis asked the Tampa Police Department to escort the flight, but the department handed off the assignment to Dan Grossi, a former member of the force, Unger said. Grossi recruited Manuel Perez, a retired FBI agent, to accompany him. Both described the flight to Unger as somewhat surreal.
"They got the approval somewhere," Perez is quoted as telling Unger. "It must have come from the highest levels of government."
While there is no manifest for those aboard the Lear flight to Kentucky, Unger says the foreign nationals left Lexington for London aboard a Boeing 727. That manifest lists eight Saudis, two Sudan nationals, one Tunisian, one Philippine citizen, one Egyptian and two British subjects.
Of those, three listed residences on Normandy Trace Drive in Tampa, and all of them held Florida drivers' licenses. They are Ahmad Al Hazmi, then 19, Fahad Al Zeid, then 20, and Talal M. Al Mejrad, then 18, all male Saudis.
It is not known which, if any, is a Saudi prince.
Perez, the former FBI agent on the flight, could not be located this week, and Grossi declined to talk about the experience.
"I'm over it," he said in a telephone interview. "The White House, the FAA and the FBI all said the flight didn't happen. Those are three agencies that are way over my head, and that's why I'm done talking about it."
Grossi did say that Unger's account of his participation in the flight is accurate.
The FAA is still not talking about the flights, referring all questions to the FBI, which isn't answering anything, either. Nor is the 9/11 Commission.
Unger's book criticizes the Bush administration for allowing so many Saudis, including the relatives of bin Laden, to leave the country without being questioned thoroughly about the terrorist attacks.
Fifteen of the 19 men who hijacked four airlines on Sept. 11 were Saudi, as is bin Laden.
The 9/11 Commission, which has said the flights out of the United States were handled appropriately by the FBI, appears concerned with the handling of the Tampa flight.
"What information, if any, do you have about the screening by law enforcement personnel - including law enforcement personnel affiliated with the airport facility - of individuals on this flight?" the commission asked TIA.
The TIA Police Department said a check of its records indicated no member of its force screened the Lear's passengers.
Despite evidence that the flight occurred, several new questions have arisen.
Raytheon Aircraft is the only facility at TIA that services general aviation, which includes charter flights. When appropriate, Raytheon collects landing fees from those aircraft for TIA and reports to TIA on the flights.
According to airport records, Raytheon collected landing fees from only two aircraft on Sept. 13, one of them a Lear 35. But according to the record, the registration on the Lear is 505RP, a tail number which, according to the latest federal records, is assigned to a Cessna Citation based in Kalamazoo, Mich., and Oskar Rene Poch.
Poch confirmed Tuesday that he owns a Citation with that tail number and did before the terrorist attacks.
"Somebody must have gotten the registration number wrong in Tampa," he said.
TIA spokeswoman Brenda Geoghagan said it is believed the Lear's Sept. 13 journey began in Fort Lauderdale, possibly at a charter company called Hop-a-Jet Inc. The fact that the four trips in and out of Tampa all carried the flight designation "HPJ32" lends support to that idea.
But an official of Hop-a-Jet who wouldn't identify himself said the company does not own an aircraft with the registration number 505RP. Furthermore, he said, if that tail number is assigned to a Cessna Citation, the company doesn't own any Citations, either.
Most of the aircraft allowed to fly in U.S. airspace on Sept. 13 were empty airliners being ferried from the airports where they made quick landings on Sept. 11. The reopening of the airspace included paid charter flights, but not private, nonrevenue flights.
"Whether such a (LearJet) flight would have been legal hinges on whether somebody paid for it," said FAA spokesman William Shumann. "That's the key."
- Times researcher Kitty Bennett contributed to this report.
I thought Richard Clarke admitted that he authorized the flights?
I beleive the flights to which you refer were the flights that occurred between 9-14 and 9-20.
Very interesting. However, I suspect that these passengers knew nothing of the impending attack, or they would have left the country before it occurred.
The "evidence" in this story hinges on an eyewitness who says the people in the Learjet flew out on a 727, then from there they come up with names? While I think this Learjet flight took place, the chain of evidence is weak, at best, in regards to who was on the plane.
Unverifiable tail numbers? Unverifiable airplane type? Unverifiable passenger manifest? Unlocatable law officer? Sounds to me like this is a hit piece for the 9/11 "Commission" on GWB.
Plus, the author does not even know that Tampa International Airport = TPA, not "TIA"? Come on.
That is my recollection as well.
they flew to Lexington KY to hook up with the Saudi owner of the race horse War Emblem - he knew about 9-11 in advance (Gerald Posner's book), and was later found dead of a "heart attack" at age 43.
He did.....the press didn't think it was worth reporting.
Why would the few flights which were allowed to take place first be denied by government officials?
Why would flights with Saudis on board be the few flights that would be allowed?
"Why would the few flights which were allowed to take place first be denied by government officials?
Why would flights with Saudis on board be the few flights that would be allowed?"
"On 9-11, 9-12 and 9-13, many things didn't get any higher than me," he said. "I decided it in consultation with the FBI."
It appears that Clarke is admitting responsibility for a wider range of dates than just 9-14 thru 9-20.
Actually, Tampa International Airport = TIA
I don't think the author was trying to use the FAA airport abbreviation. (TPA) Instead, I think she was just abbreviating "Tampa International Airport". (TIA)
Excuse my ignorance, perhaps I'm not "getting" something here, but this entire story that's been touted by the extreme left AND right seems like nothing more than a red herring to me.
Let's say it was true, that a group of Saudi citizens were flown out of the country shortly after 9/11. Two possibilities are then the explaination:
1. That our government was somehow involved, either actively or passively, in "covering up" some link between themselves and the terrorists. That is to say, this story of Saudis being whisked away shortly after 9/11 is only the TIP of some kind of global conspiracy that would make even Fox Mulder himself shudder.
OR...
2. The government, more specifically, President Bush realized that these people probably felt uncomfortable in the US after the worst terrorist attack in our nations history. In his desire (perhaps misplaced, but an HONEST desire) to maintain good relations with SA, he allowed the royal family members to leave. The reports of their early departure were denied, simply because his honest desire to maintain good relations with SA WOULD be twisted into some kind of government conspiracy, or pure incompetence on his part, or both, JUST as it is now.
I think the rational conclusion is #2. Kind of disappointing, that he (Bush) wouldn't put enough faith in his supporters to tell the truth about it, but hardly proof of a national conspiracy (or international), which, (and this is an important point to consider):
IF WE REJECT #2, THEN WE CAN ONLY BE LEFT WITH #1!
So, why believe in something so bizzare, so Orwellian, as option #1, if we don't have to? Why worry about something like that, when a perfectly reasonable explaination exists otherwise?
No reason at all, unless one permits conspiracy theories to substitute for facts.
TPA per this http://help.yahoo.com/help/maps/maps-13.html and this:
http://www.airportcitycodes.com/aaa/usstatewisecodes.aspx
TIA - Tirana, Albania - Rinas
http://flyaow.com//airportcode.htm#T
Assuming the only choices are the two you presented.
At this point, I think it's too early to conclude anything because we still don't have all the facts.
Again, I don't think the author was specifically referencing the FAA airport designation of TPA, but rather simply abbreviating Tampa International Airport as TIA.
Maybe some Tampa residents will chime in and provide us with the local terminology for the airport.
TPA is the code for the Tampa International Airport just as MCO is the code for Orlando. However, locals refer to the Tampa International Airport by its abbreviation, TIA.
Thanks for the info.
Disclaimer: Opinions posted on Free Republic are those of the individual posters and do not necessarily represent the opinion of Free Republic or its management. All materials posted herein are protected by copyright law and the exemption for fair use of copyrighted works.