Flight 93 - The Three-Minute Gap: What Happened in the Last 180 Seconds?

AirDisaster.com/Philadelphia Daily News ^ | September 16, 2002 | William Bunch

[prisoner6]

One of them DID state that they asked a nearby pilot if he would mind checking out the scene.

Yes, I remeber that too. The ATC seemed to me to be rather shskey, the story didn't quite make sense to me hten and doens't now.

Weren't ALL non-military aircraft ordered to land ASAP before 93 went in?

prisoner6

[abner]

I agree with the author; the real story will never be told.

ditto.

Can I say that?

[Auntie Mame]

If you are not the author, what does this mean?

I guess this means I'm officially out of the closet LOL!

[Mike Darancette]

We probably will never know the whole story ... but I believe what we do know is enough as regards those passengers who attacked the bastard terrorists on that flight.

I like this story better with the passengers doing a job on the terrorists.

But, then I wouldn't be surprised if another story comes out later about another Hero of 9-11, who did his very distasteful duty.

[piasa]

The order went out for planes to land but that order came late, Flt 93 was already down while other aircraft were still in the air. There were about twelve commercial passenger jets still up at that time- flight 93 was not the 'last plane in the air,' not by a long shot. The priority was on the airliners; small bizjets and civ craft took a while longer to get down - there was even an airliner near Air Force One as it headed out on its last leg to Nebraska.

[kayak]

I'm no pilot and certainly have no technical knowledge on the subject ..... but I would think that the stress of a high-speed dive towards earth, brought about by the passenger heroes struggling with the terrorists and all control of the plane being lost, could cause the plane to begin to come apart before impact.

I would love to hear comments on this subject from those in the know.

[Sonny M]

This whole article is just a nice way of saying the plane was shot down, something dems have been claiming for awhile to try and make Bush and the party look bad and like liars. In some of there propoganda, they claim that the picture of him on the phone in the plane is him ordering the shoot down.

[okie01]

"I'm just the reposter."

Better that than the imposter...

[Timesink]

If you are not the author, what does this mean?

It means the same thing every other post on FR means! Everything between the headline and the first horizontal rule is the text of the copied article. Everything after the horizontal rule is the comments of the reposter.

[Snidely Whiplash]

My stepson just today was telling me the tail section of the plane was found 5 miles from the crash site.

Somehow, I doubt anything that could be defined as a "section" of Flight 93 was found anywhere. There weren't a lot of pieces left that were too big, from what I've read. If you look at photos of the crater, you can see what appear to be imprints made by the engines and tail. That thing hit going full-tilt, nose-down. That might give ye an idea of what we're dealing with. An impact that severe is enough to throw debris a considerable distance.

Another factoid: The "black box" was found 15 feet below the surface of the crater's bottom. That plane hit HARD.

Snidely

[prisoner6]

Thanks for clearing that up for me. I did know 93 wasn't the absolute last plane in the air, but I was under the impression that as far as this area virtually every plane was down.

Thanks again

prisoner6

[nopardons]

Interesting, none-the-less. :-)

[TomB]

I've always wondered why just about every eyewitness to the crash reports that they saw an intact plane hit the ground. I've never heard one person say that they saw the plane break up before hitting or that they saw it trailing smoke, not one.

I live 20 miles from the crash site so I saw the interviews with the eyewitnesses only hours after the crash on the local news coverage, and I've also heard the stories first and second hand, and there was NEVER a mention of anything that would confirm this story.

[the crow]

bump for later

[js1138]

Things fall off airplanes all the time. We hear about only when something lands in someone's yard. Military pilots have already admitted that they thought about ramming the plane, because they were not armed. This is one of those instances where the simplest explanation is probably the best. We don't know exactly how the plane came down, but we know the passengers fought.

[fone]

FYI

[GreyWolf]

* At 10:03, the hijackers — or possibly passengers and crew who were fighting to regain control of the plane — flipped a circuit breaker, or switch, that would cut off power to the cockpit voice recorder. Experts said this would explain why the tape ends abruptly, but they had no idea why the terrorists would do such a thing, especially so far along into their hijacking. And they noted the location of the switch in the cockpit makes it unlikely that it was struck accidentally during a struggle. “That would be a much tougher task than turning off the transponder,” said John Hansman, an aviation professor at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology. “You would have to know exactly which circuit breaker to pull.”

I am not sure this is still the case, but when I worked on DC-9s back in the 70s, the cockpit voice system did not have a breaker. This was intentionally designed this way to prevent crews from shutting off the mike in order to hold private conversations. In order to disable the recorder, power would have to be cut somewhere between the cockpit and the tail section, which is where the recorder is generally mounted for survivability reasons.

I tend to think the lapse is probably due to time sync of the system at pre-flight. I know for a fact that we used to set ours by our watches, although, I would think that in this modern age with GPS and other technology, that process would have been automated. On the other hand, it takes a long time for technology the make its way into design and implementation.

I'll keep my tinfoil hat off on this one for awhile but keep my antennae extended. After all, it doesn't hurt to have heros, and even if the aircraft was brought down by military defence mechnisms, I can't see putting the families through that briefing which would only intensify their grieving process. Better to follow the "Let's Roll" scenerio.

[VOA]

but I would think that the stress of a high-speed dive towards earth, brought about
by the passenger heroes struggling with the terrorists and all control of the plane
being lost, could cause the plane to begin to come apart before impact.

I think a NOVA special about an American Airlines plane (737 or larger) that
was lost during routine flight revealed that after the plane slowly (imperceptibly to the pilots)
rolled over and dived (during a night flight), the wings were lost on the
meteoric dive to earth.

This was in South America.

[Sal]

...a mysterious, low-flying unmarked white jet, military in nature, circled the area at the time of the crash.

Jeff, I know almost nothing about military aircraft, but this description still bothered me. Are there "military in nature" jets painted white and unmarked? I guess I'm wondering what would make it "military in nature" short of having gun mounts or something, and, if it had such things, why would it be white/unmarked. Can you tell me what such vehicles are used for or if they exist? Thanks.

I remember all the stories of "unmarked" black choppers which turned out to be true with black matt markings on a black plane--the uses for which are all too easy to imagine. Outside of Alaska, why white?

[Hatteras]

The "mystery" plane appears to have been just a private jet flown by a hired private pilot. I don't see why this would be a mystery though as this is standard operating procedure to get a pilot in the area to make visual contact and confirm what their radar is telling them. There was also another plane that did a fly-by at the Pentagon that many on the ground mistook as a possible second attacker.

I might also add that this would lead me to believe that there was no missle and the F-16 was further behind than I thought. Why have a private pilot do a fly-by when there was an F-16 in the area?