Norad

[psy kick]

Okay. The first I ever heard of a conspiracy theory on 9-11 was the book by David Icke.
Many things are ridiculous, but one isn't and its bothered me since.
Either Norad was totally incompetant, not being able to get planes up or near their targets two hours after it was known airplanes had been hijacked or it was a conspiracy stand down.
Was norad punished for its incompetance and why wasn't it incompetant before?

[eromitlab]

Check here for answers about NORAD. (http://wtc7lies.googlepages.com/norad%2Cfaa%2Cntsb%2Caircraftcapabilities%2Cpilo)

[PhantomWolf]

Okay. The first I ever heard of a conspiracy theory on 9-11 was the book by David Icke.
Many things are ridiculous, but one isn't and its bothered me since.
Either Norad was totally incompetant, not being able to get planes up or near their targets two hours after it was known airplanes had been hijacked or it was a conspiracy stand down.
Was norad punished for its incompetance and why wasn't it incompetant before?

The first link on the above page is an excellent commentary on NORAD. The basics is that they didn't have 2 hours. NORAD was informed about Flight AA11 around ten mins prior to it crashing, that was the longest warning they had for any of the planes. They were alerted to Flight UA175 at the same time as it crashed. They learned about Flight AA77 just 3 minutes before it crashed, and they didn't find out about Flight UA93 until after it had crashed. There was poor communication between the FAA centers, who knew about the hijackings, and NORAD through the first few hours, there was also very poor comunications between the various FAA Control Centers. For instance, Indianapolis AATC believed that AA77 had crashed when they lost it on both secondary and primary radar and it stopped responding. As such they called in search and rescue. Had they known about the previous incidents from Boston and New York control, they might have considered it differently, and in fact when they did learn about it, they decided they might have a hijack, not a crash, but by then they'd lost the plane completely and couldn't find it. Other situations include that when Boston wanted to talk to New York about AA11, they were told that the coordiators were busy with a hijack. They assumed it was AA11, but in reality is New York was dealing with UA175. Add to that, that the systems at NORAD were designed to deal with planes coming into the US from Overseas, and the FAA Hijacking procedures were designed to deal with hijackers that forced a plane to land, not crash into things, the system as in place was very slow and NORAD only got information because people in the FAA centers short cut the systems and alerted them outside the chain of command. Far from a stand down, NORAD actually performed BETTER than they should have under the system as it was designed in 2001.

[Ivan The Song Boy]

Okay. The first I ever heard of a conspiracy theory on 9-11 was the book by David Icke.
Many things are ridiculous, but one isn't and its bothered me since.
Either Norad was totally incompetant, not being able to get planes up or near their targets two hours after it was known airplanes had been hijacked or it was a conspiracy stand down.
Was norad punished for its incompetance and why wasn't it incompetant before?

If it bothered you so much, why haven't you read all the relevant information that has been available to you for a long time? The positions and times en route of the scrambled jets has been dealt with.. The problems with communication has been gone over as well. We know when they launched, where they flew, and how long they had once in the air to get to targets that they were never asked to intercept. {at least not in time}.


What is your question?

"Why didn't the Air force blow those planes out of the sky 5 minutes after they went off course and turned of their transponders?"

Is this your question? Ask how long it took the Air force to intercept Payne Stewarts' Lear.

Sorry for the edginess. Sorta. Maybe.

Ivan....................

[T.A.M.]

psy kick:

Like almost all 9/11 CT topics, this one has been discussed in GREAT DETAIL here at JREF.

To save time, just go and read this link (it is long, but well detailed, and well worth the read), and if you still have doubts or questions, pose them here after you have read it.

http://forums.randi.org/showthread.php?t=70300

TAM:)

[ULTIMA1]

Was norad punished for its incompetance and why wasn't it incompetant before?


To answer your question, No NORAD was not punished in fact those involved received awards and promotions (for not doing thier job).

[Homeland Insurgency]

Okay. The first I ever heard of a conspiracy theory on 9-11 was the book by David Icke.
Many things are ridiculous, but one isn't and its bothered me since.
Either Norad was totally incompetant, not being able to get planes up or near their targets two hours after it was known airplanes had been hijacked or it was a conspiracy stand down.
Was norad punished for its incompetance and why wasn't it incompetant before?

Sen Mark Dayton calls NORAD liars..

VNQ-HywKG5Q

"We to this day don't know why NORAD told us what they told us, It was just so far from the truth. ... " - Thomas Kean 9/11 Commission

[ULTIMA1]

Sen Mark Dayton calls NORAD liars..


Yes, it seems strange that NORAD would have sent a doctored timeline to the 9/11 commission.

[parky76]

I think all federal employees are liars. especially ones who work for the NSA.

[ULTIMA1]

I think all federal employees are liars. especially ones who work for the NSA.

Reported, rule 12.

[T.A.M.]

psy kick:

If you are legitimately trying to understand the NORAD issue, and not just trolling, then ignore the truther riff raff around here, and go and read the great posts at the link I posted above.

TAM:)

[Ivan The Song Boy]

To answer your question, No NORAD was not punished in fact those involved received awards and promotions (for not doing thier job).

The problem here though is that it's not really a matter of them not doing their job. There is a good argument to made that the job was badly defined. There was certainly a lack of readiness for this event but there was a tremendous amount of confusion regarding who in the FAA was to do the communicating. On the Defense side, some jets ended up in the post launch warning area. There's a lot that went wrong that day, everywhere.

Deciding to shoot down an airliner full of people is not something they consider every day. Sure, there's some "stuff" on paper, but this happened faster than we think when we consider who knew what, and when..

It's not a simple matter at all. I believe this is the most complicated and heart wrenching part of this whole mess. well, other than the loss of life part, which is incredibly sad news and speaks very loudly about what we have not been able to achieve on earth.. Lets hope we can do better.

Ivan..................

[WildCat]

Okay. The first I ever heard of a conspiracy theory on 9-11 was the book by David Icke.
Many things are ridiculous, but one isn't and its bothered me since.
Either Norad was totally incompetant, not being able to get planes up or near their targets two hours after it was known airplanes had been hijacked or it was a conspiracy stand down.
There's one other possibility you haven't mentioned - David Icke is a psychotic liar.

In fact, evidence points to this being the case.

[Pardalis]

Either Norad was totally incompetant, not being able to get planes up or near their targets two hours after it was known airplanes had been hijacked or it was a conspiracy stand down.

You should also read this:

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/False_dichotomy

[dtugg]

Okay. The first I ever heard of a conspiracy theory on 9-11 was the book by David Icke.
Many things are ridiculous, but one isn't and its bothered me since.
Either Norad was totally incompetant, not being able to get planes up or near their targets two hours after it was known airplanes had been hijacked or it was a conspiracy stand down.
Was norad punished for its incompetance and why wasn't it incompetant before?

I think that one of the lizard people ordered NORAD to stand down. You know the world is run by people who are secretly reptilian/human hybrids, right?

[dtugg]

Apparently, psy kick's questions about NORAD were answered by gumboot and others more than two years ago in this thread. (http://forums.randi.org/showthread.php?t=59077&page=2) I can only assume he is just trolling by making this thread.

[Pardalis]

Apparently, psy kick's questions about NORAD were answered by gumboot and others more than two years ago in this thread. (http://forums.randi.org/showthread.php?t=59077&page=2) I can only assume he is just trolling by making this thread.

Or maybe he didn't see that thread at the time and just ran into this NORAD thing only recently.

[T.A.M.]

I love it when totally UNQUALIFIED individuals whine and complain about the INCOMPETENCE of legitimate professionals...********.

TAM

[dtugg]

Or maybe he didn't see that thread at the time and just ran into this NORAD thing only recently.

No, he was posting in that thread.

[Pardalis]

No, he was posting in that thread.

I hear you.

Damn these guys are out of ideas, they're like in a two-year loophole: next thing we'll see is another thread started about "pull it". :rolleyes:

[eromitlab]

Shhh... you're just giving them ideas. In other places I go where troofers run rampant, "Larry said pull" comes up with troubling frequency. I haven't run the numbers, but if it's not their #1 conspiracy talking point it's close to it.

[PhantomWolf]

Sen Mark Dayton calls NORAD liars..

VNQ-HywKG5Q

"We to this day don't know why NORAD told us what they told us, It was just so far from the truth. ... " - Thomas Kean 9/11 Commission

Yes, it seems strange that NORAD would have sent a doctored timeline to the 9/11 commission.

Why would the NORAD bosses lie and doctor the timeline in such a way that the resultant timeline they presented to the 9/11 Commission, and was shown to be wrong by the 9/11 Commission resulting in the DoJ being brought in to investigate and determine the real timeline, actually protrayed them in a WORSE light and made them look MORE incompetent than the REAL timeline would have?

If the 9/11 Commission was supposed to be a whitewash, why didn't they simply accept NORAD's first timeline? Why did they instigate a new investigation into what happened at NORAD and get a new and properly constructed Timeline using the phone records and NORAD tapes?

[PhantomWolf]

Actually this thread really show how rediculous and ignorant about 9/11 most of the CTs are. The timeline which NORAD presented to the 9/11 Commission, and was sudsequently proven wrong, and which two CTs have basically called a lie here, actually would be FAR BETTER for the 9/11 "Truth" Movement than the subsequent one worked out from the Tapes. NORADs inital timeline was so focused on the four planes and tried to fit all the things that happened into a four plane context that they said they knew about Flight AA77 far eariler then they actually did. They said that the fighter which were really launched to intercept the Ghost AA11 were launched to intercept AA77. They also claimed to have known about UA93 eariler, and had several other incidences eariler than really happened. The initial timeline should have been a CTs dream as it would have shown that NORAD did act incomptently and was way too slow, but instead they throw away all this juicy CT evidence to try and claim that NORAD lied to the Commission by making themselves look so shockingly bad.

[dtugg]

Actually this thread really show how rediculous and ignorant about 9/11 most of the CTs are. The timeline which NORAD presented to the 9/11 Commission, and was sudsequently proven wrong, and which two CTs have basically called a lie here, actually would be FAR BETTER for the 9/11 "Truth" Movement than the subsequent one worked out from the Tapes. NORADs inital timeline was so focused on the four planes and tried to fit all the things that happened into a four plane context that they said they knew about Flight AA77 far eariler then they actually did. They said that the fighter which were really launched to intercept the Ghost AA11 were launched to intercept AA77. They also claimed to have known about UA93 eariler, and had several other incidences eariler than really happened. The initial timeline should have been a CTs dream as it would have shown that NORAD did act incomptently and was way too slow, but instead they throw away all this juicy CT evidence to try and claim that NORAD lied to the Commission by making themselves look so shockingly bad.

I didn't actually know this. That is great. Thanks for explaining.

[Homeland Insurgency]

Why would the NORAD bosses lie and doctor the timeline in such a way that the resultant timeline they presented to the 9/11 Commission, and was shown to be wrong by the 9/11 Commission resulting in the DoJ being brought in to investigate and determine the real timeline, actually protrayed them in a WORSE light and made them look MORE incompetent than the REAL timeline would have?

If the 9/11 Commission was supposed to be a whitewash, why didn't they simply accept NORAD's first timeline? Why did they instigate a new investigation into what happened at NORAD and get a new and properly constructed Timeline using the phone records and NORAD tapes?

Where did I say they accepted it? Why did they have to go to the DOJ in the first place? NORAD LIED. The 9/11 commission had no power.

Why don't you tell me who was held accountable and how for giving a false time line? Who was held accountable for being incompetent?

[gumboot]

Where did I say they accepted it? Why did they have to go to the DOJ in the first place? NORAD LIED. The 9/11 commission had no power.

Why don't you tell me who was held accountable and how for giving a false time line? Who was held accountable for being incompetent?


The inquiry into the FAA and USAF accounts of 9/11 determined that officials did not knowingly give false information.

[psy kick]

First, I am not trolling. I will check out that link. It had been awhile since I read this board and was looking for an explanation. I know not to believe Icke's 'ideas', but that one had seemed like a legitimate wonder to me.

[PhantomWolf]

Where did I say they accepted it? Why did they have to go to the DOJ in the first place? NORAD LIED. The 9/11 commission had no power.

I never claimed that you claimed they accepted it, I wanted to know why they didn't accept it if as you claim they were a white wash and and had no power?

Why don't you tell me who was held accountable and how for giving a false time line? Who was held accountable for being incompetent?

Why should anyone have been held accountable when it was discovered that the reason the timeline was out was because they used erronous information rather then checking the best source? Why should they have been held accountable for it when the timeline they gave was a WORSE account of NORADs capability than the real story. You seem to be claiming that the heads of NORAD should have been punished for saying they really screwed up badly when the truth was they didn't.

[ULTIMA1]

I love it when totally UNQUALIFIED individuals whine and complain about the INCOMPETENCE of legitimate professionals...********.

TAM

If NORAD was the legitimate professionals you say how do you account for the fact that they let 4 planes go unintercpeted on 9/11?

Either they were incompetent that day or they were told to stand down.

[parky76]

can't the answer be somewhat in the middle? whats with the polar thinking?

i say, our national defenses were confused, screwed up, got bad info, and then tried to hide their mistakes from the 9-11 Commission.

what, if anything, should anyone at NORAD or NEADS be charged with? obstruction of justice.

[ULTIMA1]

i say, our national defenses were confused, screwed up, got bad info, and then tried to hide their mistakes from the 9-11 Commission.

But NORAD is very professional agency. They do lots or wargames and exercises to train for things like this.

[dtugg]

But NORAD is very professional agency. They do lots or wargames and exercises to train for things like this.

What wargames and exercises did they have to train for the possibility of domestic airliners being hijacked and used as guided missiles? Please educate me.

[DGM]

But NORAD is very professional agency. They do lots or wargames and exercises to train for things like this.
No they don't. What would they base the games on. Nothing even remotely similar had ever happened prior to 9/11. Why do you feel the need to pull all of your arguments out of your back side?

[T.A.M.]

If I recall, there may have been one wargame scenario, or Emergency Response Scenario, that involved a plane as a missile...I am not sure.

Even if there was, it would help minimally when confronted with FOUR HIJACKED AIRLINERS SIMULTANEOUSLY, used as missiles within 1 hour of each other.

And by the way, as someone who has run a mock disaster, preparation helps, but it is far from a vaccine against such an attack.

TAM:)

[ULTIMA1]

What wargames and exercises did they have to train for the possibility of domestic airliners being hijacked and used as guided missiles? Please educate me.

They respond to aircraft off course or hijacked all the time. How fun and easy to post the facts.

http://911research.wtc7.net/planes/analysis/norad/
It is standard operating procedure (SOP) to scramble jet fighters whenever a jetliner goes off course or radio contact with it is lost. Between September 2000 and June 2001, interceptors were scrambled 67 times. 1 In the year 2000 jets were scrambled 129 times.

[DGM]

They respond to aircraft off course or hijacked all the time. How fun and easy to post the facts.

http://911research.wtc7.net/planes/analysis/norad/
It is standard operating procedure (SOP) to scramble jet fighters whenever a jetliner goes off course or radio contact with it is lost. Between September 2000 and June 2001, interceptors were scrambled 67 times. 1 In the year 2000 jets were scrambled 129 times.
Can you tell us where these intercepts were made, for what reason and how long they took? Ignoring these FACTS helps "truthers" justify their argument. How about it ALTIMA?

ETA If you wouldn't mind. How many of these were commercial aircraft?

[T.A.M.]

jets were scrambled on 911.

What is the point. I see nowhere there, where it says these ìnterceptors`actually intercepted anything.

Scrambled does not mean instantly in the air.
Scrambled does not mean intercepted.

You have provided no details on these scramblings, as to how many resulted in intercepts, and how long it took from the scramble to the intercept, and how far away from the target were the jets at the time of scrambling...etc...

pure junk n garbage

TAM:)

[dtugg]

They respond to aircraft off course or hijacked all the time. How fun and easy to post the facts.

http://911research.wtc7.net/planes/analysis/norad/
It is standard operating procedure (SOP) to scramble jet fighters whenever a jetliner goes off course or radio contact with it is lost. Between September 2000 and June 2001, interceptors were scrambled 67 times. 1 In the year 2000 jets were scrambled 129 times.

First of all don't cite some 9/11 conspiracy website, I don't care what the say.

Second of all, the only time a domestic airliner was intercepted over the United States in ten years before 9/11 was Payne Stewarts plane in 1999 and it took them longer than they had for any of the 9/11 flights. And the transponder was still on. All the intercepts you are talking about are planes coming into the United States from oversees.

Third, 9/11 was the only case of a hijacking in the US in a long time.

You fail.

[T.A.M.]

87 minutes for Paynes plane, IIRC. Early in the woo, truthers use to quote some number about 22-27 minutes, but were failing to realize that when you account for the change in time zones, the actual time for intercept was in the 80-90 minute range.

TAM:)

[ULTIMA1]

First of all don't cite some 9/11 conspiracy website, I don't care what the say.

Just becasue you do not agree with what it states does not make it a conspiracy site.

Second of all, the only time a domestic airliner was intercepted over the United States in ten years before 9/11 was Payne Stewarts plane in 1999 and it took them longer than they had for any of the 9/11 flights. l.

87 minutes for Paynes plane, IIRC. Early in the woo, truthers use to quote some number about 22-27 minutes, but were failing to realize that when you account for the change in time zones, the actual time for intercept was in the 80-90 minute range.

TAM:)


So fun and easy to prove you wrong with facts.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/1999_South_Dakota_Learjet_crash
a U.S. Air Force F-16 test pilot from the 40th Flight Test Squadron at Eglin Air Force Base, Florida, who happened to be in the air nearby, was directed by controllers to intercept N47BA.

[dtugg]

So fun and easy to prove you wrong with facts.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/1999_South_Dakota_Learjet_crash
a U.S. Air Force F-16 test pilot from the 40th Flight Test Squadron at Eglin Air Force Base, Florida, who happened to be in the air nearby, was directed by controllers to intercept N47BA.


:dl: :dl: :dl: :dl: :dl:


That is exactly the same plane that I was talking about. Did you even read the article?

[psy kick]

I think, what it comes down to is, we were defenseless against an attack and norad was not doing its job. No conspiracy, but we were open to attack by anyone without much of a competant defense and may be in the future.

[dtugg]

I think, what it comes down to is, we were defenseless against an attack and norad was not doing its job. No conspiracy, but we were open to attack by anyone without much of a competant defense and may be in the future.

The problem is that NORAD wasn't really tasked with protecting against the type of threat that happened on 9/11. It's not their fault, it's just the way it was. Nothing like that is going to happen again, mainly because there is no way that terrorists are going to manage to hijack planes after 9/11.

[DGM]

I think, what it comes down to is, we were defenseless against an attack and norad was not doing its job. No conspiracy, but we were open to attack by anyone without much of a competant defense and may be in the future.
NORAD was set-up to defend against threats from OUTSIDE the country. So what did they do wrong?

[~enigma~]

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/1999_South_Dakota_Learjet_crash
a U.S. Air Force F-16 test pilot from the 40th Flight Test Squadron at Eglin Air Force Base, Florida, who happened to be in the air nearby, was directed by controllers to intercept N47BA.
What did TAM get wrong? 1327 Zulu to 1454 Zulu is not the common truther claim of 21 minutes.

[ULTIMA1]

[QUOTE=dtugg;4238282That is exactly the same plane that I was talking about. Did you even read the article?[/QUOTE]

Then why did you lie about how long it took a plane that was close by to intercept?

[dtugg]

Then why did you lie about how long it took a plane that was close by to intercept?

I didn't. From last contact to intercept was longer than they had for any flights on 9/11. Did you actually read the article?

[ULTIMA1]

NORAD was set-up to defend against threats from OUTSIDE the country. So what did they do wrong?

NORAD's job is to defend the US agains all threats not just OUTSIDE the country.

So fun and easy to prove you wrong with facts.

http://www.norad.mil/about/index.html
Aerospace control includes ensuring air sovereignty and air defense of the airspace of Canada and the United States.

[Sparky]

NORAD's job is to defend the US agains all threats not just OUTSIDE the country.

So fun and easy to prove you wrong with facts.

http://www.norad.mil/about/index.html
Aerospace control includes ensuring air sovereignty and air defense of the airspace of Canada and the United States.

It is now. How about then?

[ULTIMA1]

I didn't. From last contact to intercept was longer than they had for any flights on 9/11.

I have read all the articles and it did not take over an hour for the F-16 (that was close by) to intercept his plane.

[ULTIMA1]

It is now. How about then?

Are you for real,, Can you read?

It has always been NORADs job to defend US airspace.

[DGM]

NORAD's job is to defend the US agains all threats not just OUTSIDE the country.

So fun and easy to prove you wrong with facts.http://www.norad.mil/about/index.html
Aerospace control includes ensuring air sovereignty and air defense of the airspace of Canada and the United States.
So when will you start? My 10 year old has better reading comprehension then you do.

[dtugg]

I have read all the articles and it did not take over an hour for the F-16 (that was close by) to intercept his plane.

If you read the article, you would know that it took 87 minutes from last contact to intercept. Stop embarrassing yourself.

[Jonnyclueless]

These arguments are like stepping into a time machine. It's as if CTers are stuck in 2003 and didn't get any updates.

[PhantomWolf]

If NORAD was the legitimate professionals you say how do you account for the fact that they let 4 planes go unintercpeted on 9/11?

Either they were incompetent that day or they were told to stand down.

Once you get back from suspension (again) please feel feel to explain exactly how NORAD should have been able to intercept these planes given that the most notice they had for any of them was 10 minutes, and that was with AA11. Feel free to explain how they could have intercepted flight UA175 when they were only informed of its hijacking by NYATC at the same time as it was crashing. Free free to explain how they could have intercepted UA93 when they weren't alerted to its hijacking until AFTER it had crashed. Feel feel to explain how they should have intercepted AA77 when they were only informed three minutes before it crashed that it was hijacked and never informed of its location. Really, please feel free to explain all of this, even though I know you won't.

[Homeland Insurgency]

Once you get back from suspension (again) please feel feel to explain exactly how NORAD should have been able to intercept these planes given that the most notice they had for any of them was 10 minutes, and that was with AA11. Feel free to explain how they could have intercepted flight UA175 when they were only informed of its hijacking by NYATC at the same time as it was crashing. Free free to explain how they could have intercepted UA93 when they weren't alerted to its hijacking until AFTER it had crashed. Feel feel to explain how they should have intercepted AA77 when they were only informed three minutes before it crashed that it was hijacked and never informed of its location. Really, please feel free to explain all of this, even though I know you won't.

So NORAD is in the clear because of all the rampant incompetence on 9/11?

Perfect.

[WildCat]

So NORAD is in the clear because of all the rampant incompetence on 9/11?

Perfect.
So you don't believe there was a "stand down" order?

[notheist]

I doubt if any truthers know how many planes are flying around the US at a given time. I doubt the know who is controlling where those planes go, what course, altitude. Who would know when one of them goes off course and why. I doubt any truthers know about the different types of radar tracking.

I trutherville it happens like in the movies. If a plane goes off course red lights flash, NORAD know instantaneously, jets are scrambled. The pilots can find the errant aircraft with super duper "see all" radar.

Well children... In the real world it's not like that. Before 9/11 the few NORAD stations we had were looking of threats from outside, things like drug smuggling planes. The FAA was doing the job of tracking the 4000 of so aircraft over various zones in the US. If an aircraft goes off course it's the FAA ATC who has to decide if it's a mechanical problem, miscommunication from another ATC. If it is a hijacking then the ATC calls NORAD, and NORAD has the task of finding a plane in a sea of other aircraft that may or may not the a hijacking. In hindsight a simple job. 20/20

[PhantomWolf]

So NORAD is in the clear because of all the rampant incompetence on 9/11?

Perfect.

No, there was no "rampant incompetence". NORAD is in the clear because the systems they were working under were never designed to confront a 9/11 senario, and so failed.

Before 9/11 it was believed that hijackers would demand a plane land and then deal, none had ever crashed the plane they had into a building. That was the way the FAA regulations were set up and had been set up for decades. In a hijack situation NORAD has zero authority. The only way they can get involved is through a request by the FAA. That request is then required to have approval by the SoD before they even launch, and if they do launch they are only to locate and tail the plane, the law expressly forbids the use of any ANG or AF craft to be used as a weapons platform against a hijacked aircraft. Only the PotUS can over rule that. Under these systerms the FAA still hadn't offically requested help from NORAD even after 10:10am when the PotUS gave the order to shoot down any plane that was considered a threat.

That meant that NORAD's information and requests for asistance came from people short cutting their chain of command and getting in touch with NORAD directly, mostly the guy who posts here under the name CheapShot but also his counterpart in New York. The reason that they thought of getting directly in touch with NORAD was that Boston and New York often deal with NORAD and they knew people there to contact. Indianapolis doesn't deal with NORAD and so never contacted them, even after realising that Flight AA77 may not have crashed.

NORAD and several of the Air Traffic Control Centers basically threw away the rule book and did it their own way after doing their part and realising the rule book wasn't going to work, that they had to move faster. The first jets in the air were launched without authority on the premise that "They could get permission afterwards." This was not "rampant incompetence" but a lot of folks working hard in a situation they had never faced, using systems never designed to do what they were trying to do. Instead of poking the borax at them and accusing them of things that simply aren't true, how about you do some real research, find out the truth of the matter and start to recognise that the guys in the FAA Control Centers and in NORAD where among the major heroes of 9/11 and that under the circumstances and with the cards they were handed they did an amazing job.

[PhantomWolf]

I have read all the articles and it did not take over an hour for the F-16 (that was close by) to intercept his plane.

I have $5,000 that says it took over an hour from the loss of contact until the first F-16 intercepted Stewart's Plane, care to match that?

[T.A.M.]

These arguments are like stepping into a time machine. It's as if CTers are stuck in 2003 and didn't get any updates.

lol...dead on.

TAM:)

[PhantomWolf]

lol...dead on.

TAM:)

Well one of the problems is that CT sites are never updated, so when they go looking for information from those sites the information truely is from 2003 and never had any updates. The same is true in all CTs. Alius has a page claiming that the "photo" of Shepard's golf shot from his book (which is a constructed images rather then a real one) would have had to have been taken by Stuart Roosa by it can't have been because Roosa is in the image. They were told over 3 years ago when they put it up that a) Roosa was the CMP and LMP, the astronaut that landed with Shepard, was Dr Edgar Mitchell, and that b) the photo was a construct by the book's publishers and not an offical NASA image, but the claim is still on their site.

[T.A.M.]

yes, and to make it even worse, the internet seems to be collect, and keep all of these things, like a gigantic horder/packrat.

TAM:)

[PhantomWolf]

yes, and to make it even worse, the internet seems to be collect, and keep all of these things, like a gigantic horder/packrat.

TAM:)

Quite true. People put up sites on free hosts and then never touch them again so they just sit there forever.

[T.A.M.]

Here is a good visual description (but a bit blurry) of the internet:

http://www.craphound.com/images/katamarie3.jpg

TAM:)

[gumboot]

I'll be happy to clarify some issue with anyone who still has questions about the performance of the Air Defense System on September 11.

Please phrase your response as numbered straight-forward questions, so I can give you direct straight-forward answers. Be precise with you questions, and if necessary ask multiple questions. You are welcome to respond with additional questions once I have answered the initial ones.

At the first sign that you are failing to register what I am telling you (for example reframing previously-answered questions in a new way, or basing new questions on facts I have demonstrated false in previous answers) I will cease with educating you on this matter as you will have shown you have no interest in truth, and only in "stirring the pot".

The ball is in your court.

(Questions are open to anyone).

[PhantomWolf]

I have one, but screw the numbering etc.

Have you bothered to make up a timeline including all the stuff you have done like when the phone calls telling NORAD came in, when the phone calls from the planes came in, when NORAD did stuff, and when the Airlines told the FAA their planes had crashed. I think it'd be pretty handy. I was going to look through a heap of your threads to see if I could pull it all out, but figured I ask first.

[psy kick]

gumboot, I will attempt to.
It was known a plane was off course and not responding (and planes can be tracked even with a transponder off) at what time?
Planes hit the towers, and a third was flying toward capitol hill.
When was norad first alerted and when did they get a plane up?
Thanks.
How long between first known plane off course and liftoff?

[PhantomWolf]

gumboot, I will attempt to.
It was known a plane was off course and not responding (and planes can be tracked even with a transponder off) at what time?
Planes hit the towers, and a third was flying toward capitol hill.
When was norad first alerted and when did they get a plane up?
Thanks.
How long between first known plane off course and liftoff?

Try checking out this thread (http://forums.randi.org/showthread.php?t=61752) (which ironically almost answer my question too. :))

[psy kick]

It doesn't answer mine (not in a good way!) Planes can be tracked without their transponders.

[Jonnyclueless]

Have you tried tracking a blip in a see of 5000 blips? I wouldn't pretend it's easy until you actually try it. Another big assumption being made here is that as soon as NORAD is alerted of the first hijacking, the automatically know about all the other planes as well. When they first learned about flight 11 (which was 10 minutes before impact) they didn't know about flight 93. So you can't start the clock on flight 93 at the first notification of flight 11 being hijacked, etc.

[PhantomWolf]

It doesn't answer mine (not in a good way!) Planes can be tracked without their transponders.

To a point.

Flight AA11 was lost on Secondary Radar at 0813 but was tracked on Primary Radar by Boston until it dropped below their Radar level and into the clutter of NYC. Boston informs NORAD at 0837. They had issues trying to match the blip on their screens to the blip on NORADs meaning NORAD never determined where AA11 was but they launch fighters anyway at 0854, AA11 hits WTC seconds later.

Flight UA175 never turned off its Transponder, it merely switched the band. It was tracked by NY Control on Secondary Radar until impact. NY didn't inform NORAD until 0903, at the same time as it crashed.

Flight AA77 turned off its Transponder in an area where the Primary Radar had a black spot. These occur all over the US for various reasons due to the way the system is stitched together. This meant that when the ATC went from secondary to primary there was no blip and initially they assumed it had crashed (Gumboot: a question here. In your Timeline you have that this occured a 0854 and that at 0856 they realised it was a hijack and alerted the FAA. Could you recheck this, I thought they took longer than two minutes to discover this error.) By the time they checked for a hijack, they coildn't locate the blip along its last flightpath, the plane had turned around. Using tapes stored by the radar system the FAA has been able to recreate the entire path of 77. Indianapolis doesn't inform NORAD, but they learn of it via a phone conversation at 0934.

I think that Flight UA93 was tracked on Secondary Radar until it crashed, but I may be wrong on that one. Initially the ATC didn't know which plane was hijacked mistaking the transmissions for Delta 1998. Ceveland didn't tell NORAD, but Boston heard that 1998 was a hijack which they reported to NORAD. NORAD wouldn't know about 93 until 1007, 4 minutes after 93 crashed.

[funk de fino]

It doesn't answer mine (not in a good way!) Planes can be tracked without their transponders.

The transponder identifies that plane with the radar track on screen. If the transponder is switched off then the track becomes one of many on a screen. If someone is watching that track when the transponder is switched off then they can continue to look at that track and follow it. If they are not watching that track when the transponder is switched off and then someone tells them to go look at their screen and find that aircraft again it is literally like looking for a needle in a haystack.

[psy kick]

I'm in Cleveland, and i think it was mistakenly announced on our news that one of the planes had landed in Cleveland and then went on again. Obviously not, but there was a lot of confusion that day.
Another, unrelated to Norad qestion:
Why did the president keep flying around instead of addressing the troubled citizens?

[funk de fino]

I'm in Cleveland, and i think it was mistakenly announced on our news that one of the planes had landed in Cleveland and then went on again. Obviously not, but there was a lot of confusion that day.
Another, unrelated to Norad qestion:
Why did the president keep flying around instead of addressing the troubled citizens?

He was told to. That is the point of Airforce One.

[PhantomWolf]

I'm in Cleveland, and i think it was mistakenly announced on our news that one of the planes had landed in Cleveland and then went on again. Obviously not, but there was a lot of confusion that day.

It was confussion based on two other planes. One was Delta 1989 (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Delta_Air_Lines_Flight_1989) and the other was a NASA plane that was unable to leave because of the take off ban, so returned to a hanger for the passangers to disembark.

Another, unrelated to Norad qestion:
Why did the president keep flying around instead of addressing the troubled citizens?

It was the safest place for him to be.

[JoeyDonuts]

I'm in Cleveland, and i think it was mistakenly announced on our news that one of the planes had landed in Cleveland and then went on again. Obviously not, but there was a lot of confusion that day.
Another, unrelated to Norad qestion:
Why did the president keep flying around instead of addressing the troubled citizens?

When an attack of that magnitude occurs, the president's location becomes out of his hands. He is subject to continuity of goverment contingency plans that will take him the place where he is safest. In many instances, the absolute safest place is onboard AF1 with its advanced C2, countermeasures, and obviously its fighter escort.

If the capitol building had been struck, there would be no way to guarantee his safety if one of the planes had hit it. He would have been most likely underground in the comms facilities, and there MAY have been a Stinger missile detail on the roof - but a Stinger is NOT going to take down a low-flying airliner on a collision course. It'd be about as effective as trying to shoot it down with a shotgun even if they got lucky and fragged an engine or two.

Nope, moving POTUS to AF1 was the correct tactical call in that situation. Now as to why he did not address the nation whilst in flight, anything you or I would have to say on the matter is absolute speculation - we weren't there.

[psy kick]

And why he wasn't taken to the air immediately instead of waiting a long time after knowing of the attack in a school where he was known to be.?

[PhantomWolf]

And why he wasn't taken to the air immediately instead of waiting a long time after knowing of the attack in a school where he was known to be.?

Again, not his choice.

When the President is going somewhere the route to and from the location has to be approved, but only at the time of his travel. You can't just yank him out from where he was to a different location without making sure that the route and the new location are both secure. On 9/11 the school was a secure location and until they knew that both the Airport and the route to the Airport was secure and safe to use the USSS wasn't moving him.

[JoeyDonuts]

On 9/11 the school was a secure location and until they knew that both the Airport and the route to the Airport was secure and safe to use the USSS wasn't moving him.

Exactly. With the lack of tactical intelligence of exactly what the heck was going on at the time, there was an awful lot of audibles being called on the ground by the USSS. They didn't know whether or not an attempted assassination of POTUS was a part of the attack or not (and his appearance at the school WAS known) - and they were not going to move him one inch unless their transit defenses were in place. I would bet my whole paycheck on this - the convoy that initially took the president to the airport was probably the most heavily armed and escorted presidential convoy ever to move him from one place to another inside the US.

Pres. Bush conceivably COULD have countermanded the standing orders and moved immediately but he's known to defer to his advisors and in this case a hasty exit would have done more to create a panic. Plus you have to ask yourself this - what would having POTUS onboard AF1 and airborne have done to expedite air defenses from NORAD? He can't make them correlate tracks or scramble aircraft any faster than they did. Most likely a shootdown order would have to have come from him or a very ballsy subordinate at the Pentagon...but given that we know when the planes went down and when NORAD/NEADS were informed of them, POTUS and his embarked staff could not have made the situation go any smoother. In all likelihood, they would have only succeeded in complicating what had already become a giant soup sandwich.

[A W Smith]

It doesn't answer mine (not in a good way!) Planes can be tracked without their transponders.

here is a loose analogy
you have a room full of thousands of mosquito's, you can see all of them, identify the female.

[Ivan The Song Boy]

If NORAD was the legitimate professionals you say how do you account for the fact that they let 4 planes go unintercpeted on 9/11?

Either they were incompetent that day or they were told to stand down.

This is a ridicules simplification, of course. It is not at all hard to account for.. You have 4 aircraft that suddenly become primary targets on Radar {They turned OFF the transponder}. They are not even squawking VFR {1200 on a transponder}, they are now in a sea of other aircraft, giving no altitude information. This is a problem en route for ATC. Who knows how many aircraft they had to assign new headings, just because they either could not find the "new" primary targets, or they could see them but did not know their altitude.{ I believe both of these things were true, on and off} These people were very very busy making sure there were no collisions.. That's just a small part of this. Those who think that Radar still works without a transponder are only sort of right, depending on where you are in the country and what else is in the air, and how far from a sweep you are. Targets can and DO come and go. It is NOT a forgone conclusion that one can simply count on painting an object and getting a return. In fact, I believe that at least one of these aircraft were "in and out". The problems faced by ATC on this day were really huge. You underestimate this, of course, because YOU KNOW NOTHING!

Just when do you think it's time for the FAA to call NORAD on the phone and say, "Hey, um,, we have a plane here with no transponder on at all, could you blow him all to hell when you get a minute?". Who's supposed to call? After NORAD get's it, where does it go then? What do you tell the officers in the cockpits of these fighters when they go? How does one FIND a target from a fighter jet when there are 4000 aircraft over the country and all you know is that you are being vectored toward a piece of metal? Do you have the RIGHT piece of metal?

How do you suppose this all goes down?

The fact is, you don't know the first thing about any of this.. You don't. You are just making things up and pretending that NORAD should have "Magically known" there was something wrong. Who ever is feeding you this crap is a moron. This was NOT AT ALL what you think it was. The fact that they actually ended up having ten minutes {way less in some cases} is amazing. Under the circumstances, ATC did a great job under the rules they had.. {you think your complaint is with NORAD, but it is not.}

Have you read the accounts from ATC and the members of the military who made and received these calls? Are you calling them all a bunch of liars? Would you like to walk right UP TO THEM and claim all this? Or are you just a 9 year old who ended up with the keys to moms' computer?

The mind spins and spins.. Ouch...

[psy kick]

How important it is to get both sides. From people who know what they're talking about. It makes sense now.
Do conspiracy fans want this stuff to be true?
(thank you guys)

[ElMondoHummus]

Now as to why he did not address the nation whilst in flight, anything you or I would have to say on the matter is absolute speculation - we weren't there.

Actually, this was obliquely addressed on the recent History Channel special on Air Force 1: They simply didn't have the video capacity at the time (of course, that begs the question of why no radio message, but that's starting to drift from the point here). The camera crew was shown the in-flight teleconferencing system that AF1 has, and the airplane staff made it a point to say that the need for it became apparent after 9/11, so that's why it was installed.

[ElMondoHummus]

All right, before anyone else comes up with any questions here, I recommend that those who haven't studied things yet refer to these basic primers on the days events:


Gumboot's NORAD 9/11 Response timeline (http://forums.randi.org/showpost.php?p=1845150&postcount=1).
Gumboot's NORAD Response background (http://forums.randi.org/showthread.php?t=70300).
Gravy's NORAD page (http://wtc7lies.googlepages.com/norad,faa,ntsb,aircraftcapabilities,pilo).
Vanity Fair's "NORAD Tapes" article (http://www.vanityfair.com/politics/features/2006/08/norad200608).
I hate to sound like a teacher giving an assignment, but to call the information in those sources mandatory knowledge is to understate the case. People need to know the gist, if not all the details, of the information laid out in those sources. At minimum, if you're discussing response times, the Timeline link is absolutely necessary.

[PhantomWolf]

How important it is to get both sides. From people who know what they're talking about. It makes sense now.

Funnily enough when you ask experts and people that have studied the issue you quickly find that most CTs are neither experts, or have done little more than read CT sites with the same ignorant and incorrect claims. I'm constantly amazed about how wrong CTs constantly are. It's almost like they go out of their way to get things wrong because otherwise they'd get something right just by fluke. I have had a challenge open in this board for nearly a year now wanting just 1 fact (other then the date) that is proven and that the majority of the Truth Movement agree on. I still haven't gotten an answer. To me that is pretty telling.

Do conspiracy fans want this stuff to be true?
(thank you guys)

Not that I really want to answer for them, but it seems that yes they do.

[T.A.M.]

Do conspiracy fans want this stuff to be true?
(thank you guys)

This is a question that we debate here from time to time. I think most here would agree that to an extent they do. Many of the CTers that follow 9/11 truth, have a hatred for "Big Brother" a hatred for "authority". This contempt, this hatred, is fueled by Alex Jones and others. Why do you think, now that the Bush Admin is on the way out, AJ and others are now fabricating a story about how Obama is all part of the big vast conspiracy?

If the stuff is lies, then their world falls apart.

TAM:)

[JoeyDonuts]

Do conspiracy fans want this stuff to be true?


Of course. Ignorance of facts is the Ace of Spades sitting at the very bottom of their upside-down house of cards. Truthers for the most part can't even agree on a theory of what happened, all they agree on is that the government LIES about everything.

It is good that you are questioning some things in the Official Theory that you don't understand. It's even better that you seem to be able to recognize facts when they are presented to you. :D

[gumboot]

I have one, but screw the numbering etc.

Have you bothered to make up a timeline including all the stuff you have done like when the phone calls telling NORAD came in, when the phone calls from the planes came in, when NORAD did stuff, and when the Airlines told the FAA their planes had crashed. I think it'd be pretty handy. I was going to look through a heap of your threads to see if I could pull it all out, but figured I ask first.



My new Air War document has a more detailed timeline with all of that, however I've discovered some mistakes in the "official" documentation by listening to the NORAD recordings, so I'm transcribing all of them before completing my timeline. It's rather tedious work and something I haven't felt like doing lately, so it will take a while...

[JoeyDonuts]

My new Air War document has a more detailed timeline with all of that, however I've discovered some mistakes in the "official" documentation by listening to the NORAD recordings, so I'm transcribing all of them before completing my timeline. It's rather tedious work and something I haven't felt like doing lately, so it will take a while...

Please. Take your time. We're not going anywhere, and by the time you get done with it there may only be 2 or 3 truthers left to call you a government disinformation agent.

[gumboot]

gumboot, I will attempt to.
It was known a plane was off course and not responding (and planes can be tracked even with a transponder off) at what time?

Hi, first you need to specify "known by who?". The system is not one cohesive entity, nor a single hive mind, but numerous separate components, and each component had to be told. Here's some relevant times for each of the four flights:

American Airlines Flight 11
0814 - AA11 fails to respond to communication from Boston ARTCC
0825 - Boston ARTCC suspects AA11 has been hijacked.
0828 - Boston ARTCC notifies the FAA National Command Centre (ATCSCC) that AA11 is a suspected hijacking.
0832 - The ATCSCC notifies FAA Headquarters that AA11 is a suspected hijacking.
0834 - Boston ARTCC breach protocol and ask Cape Cod TRACON to contact Otis ANGB and request a fighter scramble.
0834 - Otis ANGB receive a call from Cape Cod TRACON about the hijacking and decide to prepare for Battle Stations while more information is gathered.
0837 - Boston ARTCC breach protocol and contact NEADS (NORAD) and request a fighter scramble.
0837 - Otis ANGB contact NEADS to report the hijacking and NEADS tells them they are working on the issue.
0838 - NEADS orders Otis fighters to "Battle Stations" (pilots in aircraft, ready to scramble)
0841 - Otis fighters achieve "Battle Stations"
0842 - (approx) AA11 drops below radar coverage
0844 - NEADS decide to scramble Otis fighters to AA11's last known position and to start tracking all unknown radar returns
0846 - Scramble order issued for Otis fighters - PANTA 4-5 and PANTA 4-6
0846 - AA11 impacts WTC1
0851 - NEADS learns an unknown aircraft has hit the WTC
0852 - PANTA airborne
0853 - PANTA are directed to a holding point off Lower Manhattan Bay, about 20nmi from the WTC

United Airlines Flight 175
0841 - Earliest potential time for hijacking
0846 - Latest potential time for hijacking
0846 - Transponder code changes twice in short time (ATC handling the flight is at the time focused on AA11 and does not notice)
0850 - NY ARTCC notices UA175s transponder code and asks them to recycle it
0852 - UA175 turns for NYC, NY ARTCC attempt to contact flight
0855 - NY ARTCC manager learns that UA175 is a suspected hijacking
0901 - NY ARTCC notifies the ATCSCC that UA175 is a suspected hijacking
0903 - UA175 impacts WTC2
0903 - NY ARTCC notifies NEADS that UA175 has been hijacked
0905 - NY ARTCC declares ATC Zero - closing their airspace to all air traffic

American Airlines Flight 77
0851 - Hijacking commences
0854 - AA77 deviates slightly from flightpath
0856 - Transponder turned off - because aircraft is in an area covered by a "beacon only" radar site, when the controller turns on primary radar coverage they cannot locate the flight, and assume it has crashed
0856 - Indianapolis ARTCC tries to contact AA77
0908 - Indianapolis ARTCC notifies the National Search and Rescue coordination center at Langley AFB that they believe AA77 has crashed.
0920 - Indianapolis ARTCC learns of the hijackings on the east coast and reassesses AA77.
0921 - Both Indianapolis ARTCC and the ATCSCC suspect AA77 has been hijacked.
0921 - Dulles TRACON and Washington ARTCC are instructed to look for unknown radar contacts.
0925 - The ATCSCC notifies FAA HQ that AA77 is "missing".
0925 - The ATCSCC orders a nationwide ground stop.
0932 - Dulles TRACON locate an unknown primary return travelling at high speed over Washington DC
0934 - Washington ARTCC mention to NEADS that AA77 is reported "missing"
0936 - Boston ARTCC notify NEADS that Dulles TRACON have an unknown contact over the White House
0936 - NEADS declare AFIO (priority declaration for Active Air Defense Missions) and direct two fighters from Langley AFB (who were on their way to Baltimore) to fly direct to the White House
0937 - AA77 impacts the Pentagon

United Airlines Flight 93
0928 - Aircraft is hijacked
0932 - Cleveland ARTCC notifies the ATCSCC that UA93 is a hijack with a bomb onboard
0934 - The ATCSCC notifies FAA HQ that UA93 is hijacked
0936 - Cleveland ARTCC asks the ATCSCC if military aircraft have been requested for UA93 - the ATCSCC tells them that decision has to be made by HQ
0940 - Boston ARTCC report to NEADS that Delta Flight 1989 has a bomb onboard

0941 - The ATCSCC notifies HQ that UA93 is eastbound and descending
0942 - The ATCSCC declares ATC Zero nationwide, closing US airspace for the first time in history
0946 - The ATCSCC notifies FAA HQ that UA93 is 29 minutes from Washington DC
0949 - The ATCSCC urges HQ to make a decision about fighters
0953 - HQ tell the ATCSCC they are discussing a fighter scramble
0954 - Selfridge AFB offers to NEADS to keep unarmed fighters in the air to intercept DA1989
0957 - Passengers on UA93 begin an attempt to seize control of the aircraft
1003 - UA93 crashes into a field near Shanksville, PA
1007 - Cleveland ARTCC notifies NEADS that UA93 is a hijack with a bomb onboard
1010 - US Military ordered to DEFCON THREE
1013 - The ATCSCC notifies FAA HQ that UA93 has crashed
1015 - Washington ARTCC notifies NEADS that UA93 has crashed


Planes hit the towers, and a third was flying toward capitol hill.

You appear to be referring to AA77. As you can see in my brief timeline above, no one knew AA77 was heading for Washington DC.


When was norad first alerted and when did they get a plane up?

PANTA flight, two F-15Cs from Otis ANGB, were scrambled at 0846 and were airborne at 0952.

QUIT flight, two F-16s from Langley AFB (with a third unarmed F-16 in tow) were scrambled at 0924 and were airborne at 0930.


How long between first known plane off course and liftoff?

If you're referring to AA11...

Between when ATC knew AA11 was off course and when PANTA were airborne - 27 minutes.

Between when NORAD knew about the hijacking and when PANTA were airborne - 15 minutes.

[gumboot]

(Gumboot: a question here. In your Timeline you have that this occured a 0854 and that at 0856 they realised it was a hijack and alerted the FAA. Could you recheck this, I thought they took longer than two minutes to discover this error.)

Yeah that old timeline is wrong. Indianapolis ARTCC learned about the east coast hijackings at about 0920 and by 0921 they and the ATCSCC were in agreement that AA77 had probably been hijacked.


I think that Flight UA93 was tracked on Secondary Radar until it crashed, but I may be wrong on that one.

UA93's transponder was turned off at 0941.

[gumboot]

I'm in Cleveland, and i think it was mistakenly announced on our news that one of the planes had landed in Cleveland and then went on again.

That was Delta 1989 which was a suspected hijacking because it had the same flight profile as the other flights and was in the same airspace as UA93 when the "bomb on board" transmission was received (contrary to popular belief, ATC controllers can't tell what aircraft a radio transmission is coming from).


Another, unrelated to Norad qestion:
Why did the president keep flying around instead of addressing the troubled citizens?

That question is off-topic. Start another thread if you want to discuss the President.

[Ivan The Song Boy]

Gumboot,

Thanks for doing this work.. It's very good of you.. Really.

Ivan..................

[gumboot]

There seems to be a bit of confusion about radar so I thought I'd just clear a few things up for everyone.

Firstly, when it comes to radar, there are two discreet systems in play here - the FAA system and the NORAD system. Each is independent, and due to the age of NORAD's system, it was impossible to data-share between systems, so any information that the FAA had, had to be given to NORAD manually - that means talking on the phone.

FAA System
The FAA system has both Primary and Secondary radar coverage over the entire USA. Normally primary coverage is turned off and ATC exclusively uses Secondary radar, however individual controllers can activate primary coverage for their sector pretty easily. They can also easily adjust filters that remove unwanted radar returns like ground clutter.

In addition, the FAA shares information between centres with a system called TSD - Traffic Situational Display. This is a read-out of all of the current aircraft in the air, and is accessed by all control centres. The Command Centres exclusively used TSD for their work. This system is not a reflection of the actual radar situation, but is a display of pre-scheduled flight paths for commercial flights. When ATC alter a flight path they can manually update the TSD. In addition the TSD can be monitored by the USSS. NORAD do not have access to the TSD.

NORAD System
NORAD receive radar feeds from the FAA, specifically from ARSR-4 radar sites positioned around the perimeter of the USA. They cannot see into the interior of the country. NORAD radar cannot be adjusted easily by controllers - technicians at the 84th RADES must make any changes to radar data feeds. By default radar data is amplified to maximise the amount of information on the screens. This is done to detect enemy infiltrators, but has the negative side effect of also increasing the amount of "noise" or ground clutter (unwanted radar returns). This isn't normally a problem for NORAD because ground clutter is minimal over the ocean which is where an enemy aircraft would be coming from.

Now, the implications of all of this are numerous, as relates to 9/11.

Firstly, ATC could easily continue to track an aircraft if the transponder was switched off by simply flicking over to primary radar coverage and continuing to follow the track, "painting" it with a manual identifier. This would only work if the controller handling the flight at the time noticed, otherwise it would be impossible to locate the specific flight.

However NORAD were not handling flights, so would not have noticed the moment of deactivation, and thus had to first find the flight, in amongst the numerous other primary returns and ground clutter. By the time NORAD knew about AA11 it was already descending rapidly and getting lost in the ground clutter of the eastern seaboard. They located the flight briefly then lost it again.

Secondly, ATCs updated flights with manual inputs into the TSD which further confused issues because other ATC centres ended up monitoring the TSD for progress - this is why UA93 was reported closing on Washington DC long after it had crashed, and this is why Boston ARTCC reported AA11 still airborne well after it had crashed (the "phantom" AA11).

[PhantomWolf]

Nice work Gumboot, I think the reason I couldn't locate info on the 93 transponder turn off was because it was so late after the hijack. Can't wait for the Timeline to be complete, but guess I'll have too. ;)

[Cheap Shot]

It doesn't answer mine (not in a good way!) Planes can be tracked without their transponders.

The FAA and the military share some radar sites, the FAA can track the primary return, that is the RAW return of the aircraft skin and it displays on the FAA radar and miltiary radar. At high altitude FAA controllers do not have the promary selected. They have to turn it on. Takes a second to do this. Even the though the return is RAW it is still digitized. The NEADS Northeast Air Defense Sector from Rome, NY was the facility Boston Center and New York Center were in contact with. They operate under NORAD. The FAA deosn't like ground clutter so they use a system which used to be called MTI that reduces ground clutter. The military does the oppiste, they crank that ground clutter up so they can see anything coming from the coast from over water. Not to much ground clutter over the Atlantic. When advised to look in the vicinty of Albany NY, they were overwhelmed with ground clutter. They couldn't see the target, the FAA could. Simple as that. THe problem has been addressed and though some issues may remain unsolved this issue shouldn't happen again.

[psy kick]

It is good that you are questioning some things in the Official Theory that you don't understand. It's even better that you seem to be able to recognize facts when they are presented to you. :DDavid Icke almost had me convinced. See, I hadn't known about radar or transponders but thought maybe Icke did.
Heck, when I first read Krassner's The Parts Left Out of the Kennedy Story, I believed it!

[JoeyDonuts]

David Icke wouldn't know a radar or transponder if a giant reptilian beat him upside the head with one.

[Ivan The Song Boy]

Gumboot,

Thanks again for this fine overview of both the time line and the potential Radar coverage..

Yes, I had read a number of times about the ground clutter problem for NORAD. It occurs to me now, that a secondary target on the FAA side going dark could make it either easier to track or harder, depending upon the gear. If a jet goes from their current squawk code to VFR {1200} they are still secondary, but if they go dark all together the ATC'er has to either literally move to a different screen or in some cases, they can switch the scoop in front of them to primary? I'll go look. If they had a good idea about heading air speed and geography before the jets went dark and can switch to primary fast enough and un-clutter it fast enough, it seems they could track it pretty well. I mean, how many primary targets will there be? Some for sure on a beautiful September morning but NONE at that air speed.

So, my earlier comment about having to find these jets in a "sea of jets" is probably wrong.. The problem is different than that.

I will go read more about the data blocks on the secondary radar, what the difference between A-C-S and so on transponders are, and what they shoot back to ATC in the way of data after interrogation. Pretty interesting stuff. I'm aware of the Traffic Situational Display system too, but need to know more about this.. This certainly ads to the confusion on that day.. Man, did those folks have their hands full or what? As if their gig isn't stressful enough.

Ivan.......................

[Humanzee]

Thanks Gumboot. That was a good read. And thanks Psi for revising what you think when presented with new compelling evidence. You may or may not be a truther but thats something they don't often do.

[PhantomWolf]

David Icke almost had me convinced. See, I hadn't known about radar or transponders but thought maybe Icke did.
Heck, when I first read Krassner's The Parts Left Out of the Kennedy Story, I believed it!

Dude, most kooks think David Icke is a Kook!

[PhantomWolf]

I mean, how many primary targets will there be? Some for sure on a beautiful September morning but NONE at that air speed.

So, my earlier comment about having to find these jets in a "sea of jets" is probably wrong.. The problem is different than that.

This will give you an idea (http://www.nasa.gov/vision/earth/improvingflight/FACETSOY.html)

[gumboot]

Yes, I had read a number of times about the ground clutter problem for NORAD. It occurs to me now, that a secondary target on the FAA side going dark could make it either easier to track or harder, depending upon the gear.

One thing worth contemplating is that the FAA planned to deactivate all primary surveillance radars in the late 1990s and run on secondary only. They only (reluctantly) stalled after some very loud protests from the military, and in the months before 9/11 they were again moving ahead with shutting down the primary radar network.

The implications of this, for 9/11, are pretty profound - without primary coverage no one would have had the faintest idea what was going on until the entire attack was over.



If a jet goes from their current squawk code to VFR {1200} they are still secondary, but if they go dark all together the ATC'er has to either literally move to a different screen or in some cases, they can switch the scoop in front of them to primary?

The scopes actually simultaneously display primary and secondary, however the Radar Data Processor filters out primary-only returns on a normal basis, only displaying primary returns that are "bonded" to a secondary return. They can easily "turn on" full primary coverage (really it's more a case of turning off the filter) with the flick of a switch or turn of a knob or whatever, so it literally takes only a moment, and they can pick up the aircraft because it will be on the screen exactly where it just left.


So, my earlier comment about having to find these jets in a "sea of jets" is probably wrong.. The problem is different than that.

Yeah this was a misconception from the media. It wasn't the FAA that had to find the aircraft in a "sea of jets", it was more NORAD that had to find the aircraft in a "sea of jets and ground clutter".

[JoeyDonuts]

I mean, how many primary targets will there be? Some for sure on a beautiful September morning but NONE at that air speed.

Gumboot, you've probably been through the FDR data more in-depth than any of us. Did they maintain a cruising speed prior to going terminal? I would think that they would want to maximize the amount of fuel in the tanks when they hit, and opening up to 500kts at low altitude the entire way would probably chew up some gas.

If they did maintain normal cruising speed, ATC personnel would have had a Sisyphean task to try to pick out those particular flights using only radar returns without XPNDR information.

[psy kick]

Dude, most kooks think David Icke is a Kook!Lady, not dude. :)

[PhantomWolf]

Lady, not dude. :)

My mistake, I was going by your Avatar :) Icke is still a kook though. The guy thinks the world is run by shape shifting space reptilian aliens! I swear the guy watched V to many times while stoned and thought it was a documentary.

[psy kick]

I remember V. Its interesting how his mind works though.
Thank you guys for making sense.

[gumboot]

Gumboot, you've probably been through the FDR data more in-depth than any of us. Did they maintain a cruising speed prior to going terminal? I would think that they would want to maximize the amount of fuel in the tanks when they hit, and opening up to 500kts at low altitude the entire way would probably chew up some gas.

If they did maintain normal cruising speed, ATC personnel would have had a Sisyphean task to try to pick out those particular flights using only radar returns without XPNDR information.


The flights generally sat around 300-350KT.

Just to reiterate; UA175's transponder was never turned off.
ATC had no problem tracking UA93 or AA11 (until they flew below radar coverage)
AA77 was the only flight that tracking proved a problem for, and that was because it was hijacked in a secondary-only area.

[JoeyDonuts]

The flights generally sat around 300-350KT.

Just to reiterate; UA175's transponder was never turned off.
ATC had no problem tracking UA93 or AA11 (until they flew below radar coverage)
AA77 was the only flight that tracking proved a problem for, and that was because it was hijacked in a secondary-only area.

Duly noted, and many thanks.

[Ivan The Song Boy]

Indeed. Good info here.. It seems that the only other primary targets would be small aircraft who had not requested what is called "flight Following".. ATC will help you along and hand you off as needed even if you have no flight plan, but you have to ask, and officially, if they're to busy, they can deny. {you almost always get it if you want it}.. There are also speed restrictions of 250 kts under 10,000 feet MSL so it seems any target at 350 kts would be easy to spot, and there would not be many, if any at those speeds. Most small aircraft are in the 90-to- 180 kts speed range, even most twins. Anyone in the 300 kt speed range would have certainly filed an IFR flight plan and been assigned a transponder code on the ground. This would narrow it down pretty quick, I would think.

Ivan...............

[PhantomWolf]

They weren't below 10,000 feet until they were into the ground clutter though, and as noted above, the FAA knew where 3 of them were throughout their entire flight so they didn't have to pick them out. Also planes on Pimary radar don't have Alttiudes attached, that is a function of the Secondary Radar, which they lost in 2 cases. NORAD of course had none of that information to start with, they just had 1-2000 dots moving on the screen, plus additional ground clutter.

[JoeyDonuts]

They weren't below 10,000 feet until they were into the ground clutter though, and as noted above, the FAA knew where 3 of them were throughout their entire flight so they didn't have to pick them out. Also planes on Pimary radar don't have Alttiudes attached, that is a function of the Secondary Radar, which they lost in 2 cases. NORAD of course had none of that information to start with, they just had 1-2000 dots moving on the screen, plus additional ground clutter.

I'm a little ignorant of the type of radar we're talking about here...from what you described it sounds like Primary radar is 2D, secondary is 3D. That about right?

[PhantomWolf]

Primary Radar is the pure radar return from the skin of the aircraft. Secondary Radar is the return from the system interrogating the aircraft transponder and thus getting things like the exact location, flight information, heading, and altitude which are then tagged onto the primary radar.

[JoeyDonuts]

Primary Radar is the pure radar return from the skin of the aircraft. Secondary Radar is the return from the system interrogating the aircraft transponder and thus getting things like the exact location, flight information, heading, and altitude which are then tagged onto the primary radar.

I get that the secondary should be able to give you altitude via Mode C of the transponder...what I would call IFF. I understand the interrogation giving you flight number and all sorts of other stuff...

I guess what I didn't know was if their actual RADAR system which is ARTS if im not mistaken, can give you altitude...apparently it only gives you azimuth and range. Never mind.

[PhantomWolf]

Here we go...

http://forums.randi.org/imagehosting/155794934e3a05e016.jpg

Cheap Shot might be able to tell us if this is accurate to their system, but what the image depicts is a basic ATC Radar Screen. The returns you see with the data attached are from Transponders. That is Secondary Radar. Primary would just be a bunch of blips. You can see the Altitude shown in the Transponder data.

[JoeyDonuts]

Here we go...

Cheap Shot might be able to tell us if this is accurate to their system, but what the image depicts is a basic ATC Radar Screen. The returns you see with the data attached are from Transponders. That is Secondary Radar. Primary would just be a bunch of blips. You can see the Altitude shown in the Transponder data.

This is actually very similar in principle to the display used onboard Navy ships for track sharing/correlation. We could also interrogate transponders, which was a godsend for finding out whether or not an air contact was "one of ours." We didn't have to depend on Mode C for altitude data, though. Most of the fleet air search radars, like the SPY-1D and SPS-48, are 3D. Range, Bearing, Altitude.

Wow, just seing that picture brought back memories of staring for hours on end at a screen drinking coffee by the gallon... :D

[PhantomWolf]

This is actually very similar in principle to the display used onboard Navy ships for track sharing/correlation. We could also interrogate transponders, which was a godsend for finding out whether or not an air contact was "one of ours." We didn't have to depend on Mode C for altitude data, though. Most of the fleet air search radars, like the SPY-1D and SPS-48, are 3D. Range, Bearing, Altitude.

Wow, just seing that picture brought back memories of staring for hours on end at a screen drinking coffee by the gallon... :D

Ahhh. From what I understand from Cheap Shot the initial reason they contacted NEADS was to try and gain altitude informtion so they knew who to clear out of the way of AA11.

[JoeyDonuts]

Ahhh. From what I understand from Cheap Shot the initial reason they contacted NEADS was to try and gain altitude informtion so they knew who to clear out of the way of AA11.

Interesting, but I could have sworn I've seen somewhere that the RADAR system that feeds NEADS/NORAD is pointed outward, not inward...

Does NEADS have a way of correlating altitude information to civilian ATC tracks who are not getting secondary (interrogation) return? :confused:

[gumboot]

ARSR-1E, ARSR-2 and ARSR-3 radars do not have height finding capability. (These are long range primary surveillance radars utilised by the FAA).

The ARSR-4 has height-finding capability, and is used at JSS (Joint Surveillance System) sites around the perimeter of the USA. These are fed to FAA facilities, and then to NORAD facilities. However while the FAA cannot utilise their height-finding capability, NORAD can.

The initial calls from Boston ARTCC to NEADS were an attempt to get NEADS to use their ARSR-4 feeds to establish AA11's altitude.

All of the radars have a 360 degree coverage area, with a range of about 200nmi (at 60,000ft), so NORAD could see inland about 200nmi and out to see about 200nmi. However, the system was configured for maximum detection over water, thus was amplified. This increased ground clutter on the inland portion of the radar coverage, rendering it impossible to detect a primary contact. The "outward looking radar" is a simplified way of explaining the situation to a layman.

Due to the obsolete nature of NORAD's equipment on 9/11, it was impossible for the NORAD and FAA radar/computer systems to share data. I believe a thorough upgrade of NORAD's systems was implemented after 9/11 and digital linking between NORAD and FAA is strongly establish, however the specific details of this are no doubt classified. I do know from several articles that now when an aircraft on the FAA system goes NORDO it is automatically tagged on the NORAD system.

[PhantomWolf]

Interesting, but I could have sworn I've seen somewhere that the RADAR system that feeds NEADS/NORAD is pointed outward, not inward...

Does NEADS have a way of correlating altitude information to civilian ATC tracks who are not getting secondary (interrogation) return? :confused:

The do, but they use the FAA sites base about the coastal areas which means they cover areas inland along the East and West Coasts, they just usually ignore it and concentrate on the Ocean areas.

T be honest I have no idea if they can determine Altitude or not. Probably not. This was likely the reason to suggest and sent up planes to intercept, so they'd have the information on where the plane was. I'm sure Cheap Shot could fill in the blanks a lot better here.

[Ivan The Song Boy]

They weren't below 10,000 feet until they were into the ground clutter though, and as noted above, the FAA knew where 3 of them were throughout their entire flight so they didn't have to pick them out. Also planes on Pimary radar don't have Alttiudes attached, that is a function of the Secondary Radar, which they lost in 2 cases. NORAD of course had none of that information to start with, they just had 1-2000 dots moving on the screen, plus additional ground clutter.

Indeed. Understood. I was just pointing out that it would be easy to eliminate many other aircraft that were primary only, because they would all be slow, and low compared to the Criminal aircraft. In other words, as primary targets go, it seems that a fast jet would stick out among them, even though we would not know its altitude.

Ivan......................

[Cheap Shot]

The do, but they use the FAA sites base about the coastal areas which means they cover areas inland along the East and West Coasts, they just usually ignore it and concentrate on the Ocean areas.

T be honest I have no idea if they can determine Altitude or not. Probably not. This was likely the reason to suggest and sent up planes to intercept, so they'd have the information on where the plane was. I'm sure Cheap Shot could fill in the blanks a lot better here.

Finding the altitude using the ARSR-4 is nothing more than traingulation. The FAA never felt they had a need for that part of the system. It passes through our buildings but we don't do anything with that data. The military does use the height finding portion. We actually could have brought the info up on a PC which I found out later. But we were originally trying to find out the altitude of AAL11. The system isn't that accurate but it could give you an altitude within 3,000 ft below or above the target. But they could never see the target so we never got the info we were looking for. UAL175 switched its transponder to a different code, so it was still being tracked. And as said before AAL77 was in a secondary area only. Switching to Primary on the FAA display shows up as a digitized plus + symbol. If it is very small it will show up as a dot. You can track the plus + symbol and when it is being tracked susch as ALL11 the plus + symbol tirns into an X.

NEADS used the radar inside the US as well not always over the ocean, when they provide service as an MRU military radar unit. They provide GCI service to fighter aircraft operating in MOAs and ATCAAs.

[JoeyDonuts]

I'm genuinely curious here, CheapShot. I'm mostly familiar with the triangulation of surface tracks from passive receivers, and sometimes correlating with surface search radar.

How does one triangulate altitude from a radar that only gives you azimuth and range? I apologize if I've missed something here, I'm a tad out of my element. :o

EDIT: Actually...disregard. I think I did, in fact miss something.

[PhantomWolf]

Indeed. Understood. I was just pointing out that it would be easy to eliminate many other aircraft that were primary only, because they would all be slow, and low compared to the Criminal aircraft. In other words, as primary targets go, it seems that a fast jet would stick out among them, even though we would not know its altitude.

Ivan......................

None of the jets were travelling at speeds greater than any other aircraft at altitude. The speed factor came in once they dropped in altitude to head at their targets, but previous to that they were all under Autopilot control. The Hijackers seem to have merely changed the destination and allowed the planes to do most of the flying, taking over to hit the targets once they had them in sight. Even so their speeds at impact weren't excessive for planes at cruise altitude, just for planes at low altitude.

[gumboot]

FAA Radars

ARSR-1E
The Air Route Surveillance Radar Model 1E (ARSR-1E) is based on a 1970s vintage radar that has been updated through Service Life Extension Program (SLEP). It is a long-range radar system with a maximum detection range of 200 nautical miles (nmi). The ARSR-1E is a surveillance system used to detect azimuth and slant range of en route aircraft operating between terminal areas. It also provides weather intensity data. ARSR-1 and ARSR-1D are similar configurations to the ARSR-1E. The ARSR-1E is interface to a collocated Common Digitizer Model 1/2 (CD-1/CD-2) or other digital processor which provides digitized output.
The ARSR-1E is integrated with a collocated ATCBI-6 or Mode S beacon to provide correlated target output data. Twenty-two ARSR-1E systems are collocated with ATCBI-6 and three are collocated with Mode S systems.
These are legacy FAA and DOD systems that are now owned by DOD. The FAA will participate in maintenance and staffing. These systems are likely to be replaced by DOD if decommissioned.

ARSR-2
The Air Route Surveillance Radar Model 2 (ARSR-2) is based on a 1970s vintage radar that has been updated through Service Life Extension Program (SLEP). It is a long-range radar system with a maximum detection range of 200 nautical miles (nmi). The ARSR-2 is a surveillance system used to detect azimuth and slant range of en route aircraft operating between terminal areas. It also provides weather intensity data. The ARSR-2 is interface to a collocated Common Digitizer Model 1/2 (CD-1/2) or other digital processor which provides digitized output.
The ARSR-2 is integrated with a collocated ATCBI-6 and Mode S beacon to provide correlated target output data. Eighteen ARSR-2 radars provide service to the NAS. These systems are owned by DOD with maintenance support from the FAA. The ARSR-2 service will be sustained until 2025.

ARSR-3
The Air Route Surveillance Radar Model 3 (ARSR-3) is a 1980s radar that provides primary long-range surveillance data, including slant range and azimuth data. It processes the returns which includes demodulation, analog-to-digital conversion, moving target indicator (MTI) function processing, sensitivity time control (STC), range and azimuth gating (RAG), and digital target extraction - all of which are performed digitally (with the exception of the front-end RF demodulation and analog-to-digital conversion). In addition, the ARSR-3 has a weather channel with associated processing to provide three-level weather intensity contour information in digital format.
Twelve ARSR-3 systems are integrated with a collocated ATCBI-6 or ATCBI-5 beacon system to provide correlated target output data. Primary radar service in the affected coverage areas will be sustained until 2027 by DOD unless a decision is made to replace them with new surveillance systems. The FAA will provide maintenance support.

ARSR-4
The Air Route Surveillance Radar Model 4 (ARSR-4) is a three-dimensional, long-range, rotating phased array, primary surveillance radar with integrated height finder capability. It is part of the Joint Surveillance System (JSS) that is used in conjunction with ARSR-1, ARSR-2 and ARSR-3, to provide coverage as part of the National Airspace System (NAS) and nationwide air defense surveillance network. The ARSR-4 performs the functions as other ARSR radars for the FAA. ARSR-4 also satisfies DOD specific requirements for providing height data on surveillance targets. The ARSR-4 outputs weather intensity contour data formatted in up to six levels of intensity.
The ARSR-4 is integrated with a collocated Air Traffic Control Beacon Interrogator Model 5 (ATCBI-5) or ATCBI-6 beacon systems to provide correlated target output data. ARSR-4 is not currently collocated with Mode Select (Mode S) systems.
Forty-one (41) ARSR-4 systems provide service to the NAS. Two additional systems are owned by DOD and do not interface to the NAS. One support system is installed at the FAA Logictics Center. ARSR-4 systems are funded by DOD and FAA with providing FAA maintenance support. Plans are to sustain the ARSR-4 up to 2025 unless a decision is made to procure replacement systems through DOD earlier.

Taken from the FAA's NAS Architecture 6

[JoeyDonuts]

ARSR-4
The Air Route Surveillance Radar Model 4 (ARSR-4) is a three-dimensional, long-range, rotating phased array, primary surveillance radar with integrated height finder capability.
<snip>
The ARSR-4 performs the functions as other ARSR radars for the FAA. ARSR-4also satisfies DOD specific requirements for providing height data on surveillance targets.

That's what I was looking for.

I think I can finally wrap my brain around it now. Thanks, kiwi.

[Cheap Shot]

For Joey Doughnuts, What Gumboot said.

For Gumboot any data on the FAA ATRCRBS do they show it as part of thier future plans, this is what the FAA wanted to go to prior to 9-11 no primary radar, beacon only. We have a site up in Skowhegan, ME.

[gumboot]

For Joey Doughnuts, What Gumboot said.

For Gumboot any data on the FAA ATRCRBS do they show it as part of thier future plans, this is what the FAA wanted to go to prior to 9-11 no primary radar, beacon only. We have a site up in Skowhegan, ME.



I think the plan post 9/11 is that DOD will maintain all primary radars and procure replacements as necessary.