Author: Oredigger 61

9-11: The Otis Scramble; a puzzling event, explained

(Author’s note.  I will add relevant audio clips after I obtain all the files)

Introduction

The public domain explanation for the Otis scramble is simple and straightforward: the Northeast Air Defense Sector (NEADS) learned of a hijack in Boston airspace and launched alert fighters, which flew, direct and supersonic, to defend New York City.  None of that conformed to the reality I saw when I first ran the 84th RADES radar files and saw not a direct flight, but a path resembling a pretzel.

We asked General Craig McKinley, General Larry Arnold, and Colonel William Scott to clarify that for us at the May 23, 2003, air defense hearing.  They did not, and possibly could not because they had never sorted it out.  One example of their inability: Colonel Scott blurred the path of the Otis fighters, blaming to Commission Staff in a later interview the inadequacies of PowerPoint.

So how did the Otis scramble actually proceed?  There is not and will not be a complete primary source historical record for the specific guidance and direction given by NEADS to the Otis fighters.  In a previous article, I established that the audio channels at NEADS for the Otis flight military controllers were not recorded the morning of 9-11. However, one of the controller voices, most likely the WD/T, was recorded at FAA’s Boston Center (ZBW), Cape Sector, during the time the fighters were vectored to Whiskey 105.

Even with limited primary source information for the NEADS controllers, we have enough other primary source information–NEADS tapes, FAA air traffic control tapes, radar–to explain what happened. We cannot, however, explain why the Otis fighters ended up over New York City.

Useful Commission Work Papers

I created screen print slide sets for planes of interest–the hijacked planes, fighters, and observers, such as Gofer 06 and the Falcon Jet vectored to the Shanksville site.  The set for the Otis fighters can be found at this link.

Another useful source is a compilation of the air traffic control contacts with the Panta flight.  (Panta 45 and 46 Scramble Timeline)  The flight was controlled by CAPE TRACON until Boston Center (ZBW), Cape Sector (18RA) gained radar contact at 8:55.  Thereafter, FAA contact was continuous as the flight was passed from Cape Sector to ZBW, Hampton Sector (31R) at 9:01, and then to New York Center (ZNY), Kennedy Sector at 9:17.  Ultimately, Panta 46 was handed off to Kennedy Approach (N90) at 10:10.

A third document, a chronological compilation of condensed audio transcripts, is a useful guide to conversations recorded at NEADS.

A fourth helpful document is a draft “Otis Story Board.”  This was a work paper created to provide a list of potentially useful audio clips for an oral monograph.  (Team 8 wrote the monograph, but it was not published because we ran out of time.  The draft should be available in the Commission’s electronic files, once they are released.)

There are multiple other useful work files, but the four listed are sufficient for the task at hand.  We begin with the scramble order.

The Scramble

NEADS obtained operational information, a set of coordinates, at 8:40, the notification time from FAA as entered in the MCC/T log, the official log book of the day.  The Otis fighters were placed on battle stations soon after 8:41, the scramble order-heading 290, flight level 290—-was issued at 8:46; and the air defense fighters, Panta 45 and 46, were airborne shortly after 8:52.  It was a rapid response, but NEADS did not have a target.

Joe Cooper at ZBW told Major Dawn Deskins at NEADS that “it’s just a primary, we lost mode so you’d have to get up and we would have to vector you.”  Deskins responded, “Okay you’d want to control intercept because…,” and Cooper broke in and concluded, “We’d have to until you pick up on primary.”

This exchange just before 8:40 established that FAA would always control the fighters, which they did.  Lynn Spencer’s narrative to the contrary, AFIO (Authority For Intercept Operations) was never declared for the Otis fighters.  Nor, according to the 84th RADES radar files, did they ever squawk AFIO, “quad sevens,” 7777.

Fighter speed, a useful source

A short digression at this point is in order.  A press release, “Air Force Says 911 Interceptors Flew Slow,” was released on November 17, 2003.  The argument was based on the NORAD timeline of events on 9/11, which stipulated that a rate of progression of .9 Mach could be used for fighter speed.  The NORAD staff wrote two point papers in response, one written by an officer in NJ33 (an operations office) and the other by Cheri Gott.  The two papers, combined, provide explicit information on how fast the Otis and Langley fighters flew, and why.  They also provide additional insight as to why fighters at Andrews AFB were not considered as a reaction force.

Now back to the Otis scramble.

NEADS did not find the primary target but did establish a “Z” point at 8:44 based on the coordinates provided by ZBW.  At that time AA 11 was well south of the “Z” point, rapidly approaching its own target.  Even though a fixed point was established, contemporary records reveal that NEADS altered its own plan to vector the fighters to that point, as we shall see.

Standard scramble procedures

As was the case with the Langley fighters later, Panta 45 and 46 launched to the east (runway 5) and proceeded toward Cape Cod before turning back at 8:54 at an altitude of 10,000 feet.  It was standing operating procedure that air defense fighters would take off easterly and fly runway heading to a certain altitude or distance.  Those standard tactics, techniques, and procedures allowed for routinized transition to FAA control and safety in the air.

Here is a Google Earth image of Otis AFB, Dec 2001.  Note that the alert area was at the southwestern end of Runway 5, with a dedicated short taxi strip.  The same configuration applied at Langley except that the alert area was on the north side.

At both facilities the fighters had the ability to start takeoff from the taxi strip.  Also, at both facilities, the pilots had the ability to “back taxi” the runway and take off westerly: this was an available procedure, but one that was rarely used.

In sum, the Otis fighters were quickly airborne and ready to fly somewhere, but the scramble order did not provide two necessary elements of information, a distance to fly and a target to find.  NEADS had an option of vectoring the air defense fighters to a military training area, Whiskey 105, and that’s exactly what happened.

Whiskey 105 and Giantkiller

Whiskey 105 (W105) is one of many offshore military training areas; its westernmost extension is southeast of New York City.  Aircraft operating in any such area come under the control of Giantkiller (Fleet Area Control and Surveillance Facility, Virginia Capes, Oceania Naval Air Station, Virginia Beach, VA), a Navy-operated facility and one recipient of the scramble order.

Giantkiller played a brief role in the control and vectoring of both the Otis fighters and the Langley fighters.  However, the only time we hear the voices of Giantkiller is when they appear on either FAA tapes or NEADS tapes.

Giantkiller long-standing policy was to recycle its tapes, and that is what they did post 9/11.  No one in the Giantkiller chain-of-command gave them instructions to alter the policy and retain the 9/11 tapes.  No one at Giantkiller had the presence of mind to realize that their tapes might be a valuable primary source of information concerning events of the day.

Getting to Whiskey 105

Whiskey 105 was activated by Giantkiller after the Otis fighters launched and before they turned back to the west.  Shortly before 8:50 that fact was reported to ZBW Cape Sector.  Minutes earlier, the NEADS Mission Crew Commander (MCC) Major Nasypany, summarized the situation for Colonel Robert Marr in the Battle Cab.  “I have scrambled Otis, and already, as per your direction, we’re sending them in that general direction, we’re sending them right to that Z point, and then we can maneuver them, um, as deemed uh right.”

By 8:51, however, NEADS knew that a plane had hit the World Trade Center.  Still, just before the fighters turned the MCC said, “send them to New York City, still considered a go.”  He then changed his mind.

“Okay, continue taking the fighters down to the New York City area, JFK area, best that we can, make sure the FAA clears your route all the way…just press with it.”  And then, “until it’s confirmed it’s gonna be a lot easier to get them down to this area [Whiskey 105].”  “…if he didn’t crash into the world trade center [he] is 20 miles south of JFK, so I want you to take them down into this area, hold as needed.”

The FAA transcript for Boston ARTCC Cape Sector, Sector 18, Radar position, is definitive on what happened.  The transcript shows that FAA, NEADS, Giantkiller, and Panta 45 worked together to vector the fighters, first on a heading of 260 vice the scramble heading of 290, and then a direct heading of 250 to Whiskey 105.

At 8:54, HUNTRESS called Cape Sector and asked to change the Panta heading: “the heading that we gave him …is a bad heading now, actually he’s now south of JFK.”  Panta 45 checked in with Cape Sector at 8:55 and was given a new heading of 260, based on Cape Sector’s conversation with HUNTRESS.

NEADS had concluded that holding the fighters south of JFK in W105 was the best course of action.  At 8:59, according to the 84th RADES radar files, the Panta flight veered slightly south and headed directly for W105.  At 9:01, Panta 45 told Cape Sector he was “proceeding our present heading of two five zero for about a hundred miles and HUNTRESS wants us to hold just south of Long Island.”

At 9:01, Panta 45 checked in with ZBW Hampton Center and reported he was looking to hold in the corner, the west end of W105.  Hampton asked him for his destination.  Panta 45 did not know.  At 9:05, Hampton informed, probably, Giantkiller that “Panta is going to hold in W105, left to right turns at 290.”

Panta awareness

The primary sources of the day are clear that the Panta flight knew about both impacts at the World Trade Center.  First, on check-in with ZBW Cape Sector at 8:56, Panta 45 was told about the crash into World Trade Center One.

Second, at 9:08, ZBW Hampton Sector told Panta 45 about the second impact.  A minute later Panta 45 told Hampton Sector he needed to move to a holding pattern over New York City, and immediately modified that request to be a CAP over New York City, if available.  Panta was instructed to navigate for the Kennedy VOR.

The Panta pilots were angry, and that anger comes clearly across in the one cockpit voice recorder (CVR) tape that is part of the Commission’s records.

The primary sources of the day include the CVR from one of the two Panta fighters and both of their HUD (Heads Up Display).  Those tapes are in the Commission master files and have not been released by NARA.

None of the three is accurately time-stamped.  Further, the HUD tapes require a knowledgeable person to explain what is displayed.  The Air Force provided such support to the Commission Staff.

Getting out of Whiskey 105

The first left turn back east in the holding pattern began about 9:09.  The MCC’s voice is actively heard on the NEADS tapes talking to both the Senior Director (Major Fox) and to the Battle Cab and Colonel Marr.  To Fox he directed at 9:08 that “we need to talk to FAA…let’s get them over Manhattan, at least we have some kind of play.”  And at 9:09 he directed a scramble at Langley, modified by Colonel Marr to be battle stations, only.

NEADS did not know how many planes were missing out of Boston, and the MCC believed he needed to get the fighters over Manhattan.  Yet no specific orders were apparently given.  At 9:10, he told probably Fox that he did not like the fighters there, W105, and he wanted them closer in.  “I want them south of JFK.”

South of JFK and over Manhattan are two different things.  At 9:11, on the guard [emergency] channel, NEADS broadcast “Panta 45 remain current position until FAA requests assistance.”  Two minutes later the Panta flight did not make the second left turn to continue the holding pattern, but broke formation and made a sharp right U-turn and headed directly for New York City, arriving over Manhattan at 9:25.

We have no primary source information that informs us as to why the Panta flight abandoned the holding pattern.  There is no amplifying information for the odd, one-time use of the guard channel to communicate with the Panta flight.

What we do know is that the MCC was not immediately aware that the fighters were on their way to New York City.  At 9:17, four minutes after the Panta flight abandoned the holding pattern, the MCC told Colin Scoggins at Boston Center that, “I’ve got fighters in Whiskey 105 rignt now, and I’ve got a tanker there as well, I’ve got other aircraft on alert at Langley as well.”  “I’ve got trackers [looking] over JFK…just looking for anything suspicious.”

Moreover, at 9:22, after learning of the rebirth of AA 11 as a threat to Washington, the MCC wanted to “take the fighters from Otis and chase this guy down if I can’t find him.”  By then, the Panta flight was over Long Island quickly approaching New York City.

Panta flight under FAA control

As of 9:09, Panta 45 had approval from Boston Hampton Sector  to move to a holding pattern over New York City and was told to navigate to the Kennedy VOR.  That was the time that the Panta flight entered the holding pattern in W105.  The problem was that they were actually in Giantkiller-controlled air space and Hampton Sector had no control authority over New York City airspace.

Giantkiller asked for the Panta frequency shortly after 9:11, as the Panta flight was transiting west to east in its airspace.  Concurrently, Panta 45 told Hampton Sector that he was talking to HUNTRESS.

HUNTRESS is NEADS, and it is that conversation that we do not have because console 19, the console for the Weapons Director and the Weapons Director/Technician for the Panta flight, was not recorded.

Time for a short summary

Let’s step back a moment and assess what we have.  We have Panta 45 with FAA (ZBW Hampton Sector) approval to move to a holding pattern over New York City.  That approval was modified to be a controller direction to navigate to the Kennedy VOR.

We have the Panta pilots angry and, from their view, headed in the direction from which they came, not the direction of the visible evidence of the attack.  We know that they knew about both crashes into the World Trade Center.

We have the MCC under the assumption that the fighters are at his tactical direction in Whiskey 105, and we have NEADS broadcasting on guard for the Panta flight not to go to New York City without FAA approval.  They knew that FAA’s New York Center had issued an order for no more planes to enter its airspace.

So, what happened?

Absent the audio files from the NEADS controllers, we do not know what actions they took, and when.  What we do know is that at 9:14, the MCC told Colonel Marr that “we got [a tanker, MAINE 85] going to W105 right now, we also have the fighters holding there, we’re trying to move them down south of JFK, okay, we got some bad poop from FAA.”

The “bad poop” reference is possibly a reference to the original coordinates that established the “Z” point.  As the MCC was briefing Colonel Marr, the Panta flight was no longer holding in W105 and was not just navigating to the Kennedy VOR; it was headed directly for New York City.

Back to FAA control

Given what the ZBW Hampton Sector controller observed on radar, the Panta flight headed directly for New York City, he did what he was required to do: he made a “point out” to the gaining Sector, ZNY’s Kennedy Sector.  Shortly before 9:15, he pointed out the flight, “East of Kennedy 40 miles.”  Kennedy Sector acknowledged that he had radar contact, a necessary step before transfer of control can take place.

However, Hampton Sector maintained control for nearly two minutes and told the Panta flight to maintain Flight Level 240, the altitude of the holding pattern in W105.  The handoff to ZNY Kennedy Sector came at 9:17, the same time that the NEADS MCC was telling Colin Scoggins that the flight was holding in W105.

Kennedy Sector assumed responsibility for the flight and worked with adjacent sectors and New York TRACON to establish the parameters of a combat air patrol, which the Panta flight entered at 9:25, flight level 180.  Thereafter, both Panta 45 and 46 worked under Sector, NEADS, and TRACON control to check out potential targets of interest.

My Assessment

I have puzzled over the Otis scramble for the past five years and have reached this conclusion.  Retrospectively, it made tactical sense for the Panta flight to remain in W105.  The situation was fluid, they had no target, and tanker support was arriving. There was no compelling tactical imperative to send them to a combat air patrol (CAP) over New York City.

It is understandable that the Panta flight, and perhaps their controllers, felt compelled to establish a presence over New York City.  But to what end?

NEADS had no target for them.  Further, that cut NEADS’ available assets in half, and the other half, at Langley, was still on the ground, but had gotten the scramble order at 9:24.

From 9:25, the time the Panta flight began its CAP, and 9:37, the time NEADS declared AFIO for the Quit flight, NEADS had no available air defense-capable fighters immediately ready to combat the threat to the nation’s capital.

By this time the 9:21 report of a still airborne AA 11 represented a threat from the North.  A few minutes later NEADS learned that AA 77 was missing; and soon identified the track as B-32, a fast-moving unknown threatening the capital.

So, did the Panta flight proceed with FAA approval?  The answer is yes, except that the approval was granted by Boston Center, not New York Center.  Did the Otis pilots proceed with NEADS approval?  We do not know.


9-11: The NEADS audio files; important information for Historians

Background

I have written about the Northeast Air Defense Sector (NEADS) audio files in two previous articles.  First, I explained  the Alderson transcripts.  Second, I addressed an issue–a non-issue really–raised about the Commission’s ability to obtain the NEADS files.  Both of those articles should be read before continuing with this article.

My purpose in this third article is to provide additional insight and guidance especially for future historians.  Modern day researchers and writers will benefit, but the intent is to facilitate work in the broad reach of history.  We start with the NEADS partial transcript.

The NEADS partial transcript

The NEADS partial transcript was the first secondary source document the Commission Staff obtained to provide insight into the activities at NEADS on 9-11.  Its direct and necessary complement is the first primary source information received, the radar files of the 84th Radar Evaluation Squadron (RADES).

Multiple copies of the partial transcript were archived as workpapers by the Commission Staff, each annotated or cut and pasted in some fashion.  I archived at least two copies.

The most useful, partially color-coded as to speaking voice, is available at this link.  Retrospectively, I believe this is the copy I took with me on the first NEADS visit, based on the annotations.

A second, earlier copy is at this link.  In that copy I specifically annotated an important point about the NEADS partial transcript; it is partial for a reason.

According to the transcript: “MEMO FOR RECORD: 21 SEP 01.  Due to an equipment malfunction, the rest of the information recorded on DRM 2, DAT 2 was lost.  The incident tape was in the data recorder for playback purposes by SSgt James D. Tollack, 305 OSS [Operations Support Squadron], McGuire AFB, who was performing the transcription, when the computer equipment failure occurred.”

SSgt Tollack was the one person designated to transcribe the NEADS audio files in the immediate aftermath of 9-11.  He did his work at the NEADS Sector Operations Center.

The Sector Operations Center (SOCC)

NEADS had two main facilities, the Headquarters and the SOCC.  The two were located on Rome Air Force Base but physically separated by a distance of several hundred yards.  Typically, the Command and primary staff were at the Headquarters, but on 9-11 Colonel Marr and key staff were in the Battle Cab at the SOCC; there was an exercise scheduled.

My SOCC work files are available to researchers and historians.

The Tollack Saga

SSgt Tollack was the only person who listened, iteratively, to the NEADS tapes prior to the Commission Staff’s first visit in late fall, 2003. A copy of notes taken during our interview document the basic story.  Tollack said that, according to Jeremy Powell, NEADS personnel did listen to the tapes prior to Tollack’s arrival.

Tollack stated he arrived at NEADS on Sep 20, 2001; (added Jul 14, 2001) his travel voucher is for the period Sep 20 – Oct 4.  If so, his work did not inform the effort of General Arnold working with Jeff Griffith at FAA to establish an agreed upon timeline, the preparation of either agency for a White House meeting, or the release of the NORAD timeline on September 18, 2001.

A copy of Tollack’s travel orders is in the Commission’s paper files; that document will establish his time on station. (para deleted Jul 14, 2001)

Tollack worked long hours to accomplish the work that led to the NEADS partial transcript.  He did not type the transcript, but did type his notes which he gaive to two secretaries dedicated to him; they created the transcript.

Because of the equipment malfunction, Colonel Marr stopped Tollack’s work on DRM 2.  According to Marr during his inbrief for our first visit, he sequestered all the NEADS tapes to preserve them.  There was no attempt to further listen to or use the tapes between the time Tollack ceased work and the time the Commission requested the tapes and transcripts.

During our interview with Tollack I asked him about “Freedom files–should not have 20 min error.”  I will return to the Freedom Files subject later.  Tollack said there was no error in the NEADS audio files and he was, in fact, the person who discovered the 25 second error in the NEADS radar files, later documented by NTSB.

Getting the audio files

Despite Commission formal requests for a copy of the tapes and a transcript, NEADS was unable to deliver in time for our first visit the last week in October, 2003.  I arranged with our POC to obtain a copy of the tapes on site; there would be no transcript.

As agreed, NEADS provided, piecemeal, digitized copies of their tapes as Commission Staff was conducting interviews.  We worked with a copy of the partial transcript and the audio files and attempted to walk interviewees through the events of the morning of 9-11.  It quickly became apparent that the transcript was insufficient for the task at hand.  Our Team Leader, John Farmer, consulted with Colonel Marr and informed him that we were terminating the visit prior to the final interview with him.

The direct result of our termination of the visit was the issuance of a subpoena to DoD.  The audio files were delivered under a schedule provided by the Under Secretary of Defense in a November 6, 2003, memo.  There were no transcripts and Commission Staff contracted that effort, as I discussed in the Alderson article.

There was still a problem with the missing channels from DRM2.  The manufacturer, Dictaphone, took control of the tapes and was able to recover “most of the tracks,” as the Under Secretary reported in a November 25, 2003, memo.  Working with our DoD point-of-contact we were able to obtain digitized files from Dictaphone for all of the recorded channels from all three digital recording machines at NEADS.

The “Freedom Files”

The Dictaphone-provided files are the “Freedom Files,” alluded to in my question to Tollack about timing errors.  For a reason never determined, Dictaphone’s recovery process introduced a 20-minute error across the board for all NEADS audio files provided as a result of the manufacturer’s recovery process.  That error has no analytical impact except that it must be accounted for and analysts, researchers, and historians need to remember which set of files is at hand as they work.

Two sets of NEADS audio files

There are two sets of NEADS audio files in the Commission master files; the NEADS-provided set as documented in the DoD memo of November 6, 2003, and the Dictaphone-provided Freedom Files set as mentioned in the DoD memo of November 25, 2003.  Each set is useful in its own way.

The Freedom Files set has more channels, but none of the additional channels contains audio files that change anything, analytically.  The essential NEADS story is contained in the NEADS-provided files, the NEADS partial transcript, and the Alderson transcripts.

The NEADS audio files. These files are accurately time-stamped.  Researchers, however, need to make sure they line up clock time and tape time as they work with the files.  The files have the advantage of containing all the dead space, and some of the channels are just that, dead space.

It is not analytically useful to listen to the tapes using a basic media player.  A program such as Adobe Audition provides an easy way of identifying dead space, locating potential recordings of background conversations, and reducing noise and clicks.

I strongly recommend the NEADS audio files for researchers and historians, especially those examining the NEADS audio files for the first time.  Those files are in the public domain.

The Freedom Files. These files are not yet in the public domain.  They have the unique advantage of being conversation only; all dead space is eliminated.  Each conversation segment is time-annotated from the basic NEADS time clock, but does have a 20-minute offset.

Some of the conversation segments approach 30 minutes in length.  These are the information-dense segments from the MCC, ID, SD, and WD areas where conversation was near continuous.

The Freedom Files are extremely useful for researchers and historians who are familiar with the NEADS floor conversations and are looking for specific conversation segments.  Toward the end of our work I tended to use the Freedom Files almost exclusively, for example.

Two Channels not recorded

Nowhere in either set of primary source audio files from NEADS do we hear the voices of the controllers–the Weapons Director and Weapons Director/Technician–for the Otis fighters.  There is no primary source information that tells us how and why the Otis fighters established a combat air patrol over New York City, despite Lynn Spencer’s narrative in Touching History.

But that is a story for another article.  For our purpose in this article it is sufficient to identify the two channels that were not recorded.

According to my SOCC work charts, one console, ODC 19 was not recorded.  ODC 19 was the position for the Otis controllers.  The two channels missing are channels 15 and 16, DRM 2, according to the matrix on the second page of my archived work files.  That second page is a summation page and is more accurate than any following chart.

We asked Dictaphone for a determination as to why the two channels were not recorded.  Dictaphone could not make a forensic determination because the SOCC equipment suite had changed too much since 9-11.  It was, however, their judgment that the two channels were, for whatever the technical reason, not recorded on 9-11.

I agree with that assessment.  Anyone who has listened to the NEADS tapes knows that there is a cacophony of sound, especially at critical times.  It was that feature that caused Alderson to conclude that it was easier to try and follow individual voices.

That cacophony was caused, in part, because individual channels recorded side by side on the master tape bled over to each other during the process of copying individual channels to digital form.  For example, the voices of the Langley controllers are heard on multiple channels.  On the contrary, the voices of the Otis controllers are never heard, there was no bleed over because there was nothing to bleed.

What’s next?

This concludes our discussion of the NEADS files, a necessary step before the Otis scramble can be discussed, given that the military controllers for that scramble were not recorded.

I will refer back to this article when we begin our discussion of the Otis story.

9/11: AA 77; Flight Data Recorder, a definitive analysis

This short article serves to document the work of Warren Stutt.  Warren has taken it upon himself to parse the data from the AA 77 flight data record down to its most elemental level.  His work is definitive and significantly extends the work of the Commission on this issue.

For those interested in definitive, supportable research on the technical details of the flight of AA 77 this is your best source.

9-11: AA 77; detailed work on the radar coverage issue

There is a dedicated group of individuals who are working diligently and thoroughly to document technical information pertaining to the flight of AA 77.  Their work builds on the work of the Commission and extends that work in depth and detail. One such individual is Tom Lusch whose interest is the radar coverage issue.  Here is a portion of his vitae.

Tom Lusch is a Certified Professional Controller with over 28 years of experience in the enroute, terminal, and tower options of the Federal Aviation Administration’s air traffic control system.  In 1992, a paper he authored, “Real Targets – Unreal Displays: The inadvertent suppression of critical radar data” was republished in the Journal of Air Traffic Control (link) His treatise focused on the low-altitude environment.
 
As demonstrated with the vanishing of AA 77 from the screens at Indianapolis Center, the processing of multiple radar data remained a challenge for the FAA.  On his web site he counters the contention that  there was “…poor primary coverage where American 77 was flying.” (link).  His thesis is that the problem was radar data processing not radar coverage.
 

9-11: Chaos and Ghosts; little understood at the time, poorly understood even today

Author’s Note

This article is a work in progress; consider it version 1.0.  I am publishing it now because its content may inform the work of writers, historians, and other researchers.  To that end I am breaking with my usual practice and am allowing comments.

Background

When UA 175 flew into the World Trade Center south tower at 9:03 a.m, on September 11, 2001, is was generally understood that the nation was under attack.  What is little understood today is the time it took the national level to get itself organized and how poorly it gained situational awareness, even after the fact.

In the aftermath, participants at all levels were unable to accurately explain what happened; not to the Commission, not to the public, and not to themselves.  The net result was a garbled official story that took the 9-11 Commission Staff an extended period of time to sort out and accurately report.

Historians, researchers and writers are independently unable to accurately assess events for two primary reasons.  First, no one has access to the totality of information made available to the 9-11 Commission and to the Congressional Joint Inquiry before it.  Second, many writers and bloggers base their theses on participant recall or other anecdotal information, exactly the wrong place to start.  Such information is only useful when validated and verified by primary and secondary source information.

Introduction

My purpose is to provide a framework for researchers, one based almost exclusively on primary sources, the voices of the day as taped at multiple Federal Aviation Agency (FAA) sites and at the Northeast Air Defense Sector (NEADS).  I will use the language of Chaos Theory to graphically depict the attack, the situational awareness of the attack as it occurred, and the very limited amount of time that FAA and NEADS had to do anything.

This portrayal should help knowledgeable and interested people understand why mid-level action officers such as Terry Van Steenburgen at FAA and Nelson Garabito of the Secret Service were unable to explain during interview what the threat actually was to the nation’s capital and to Air Force One.  They were the among the first action officers to deal with the potential threat as the President made plans to return to the nation’s capital

It will help explain why senior FAA and NORAD officers were unable to establish an agreed upon position as to what happened; why persons who testified before the Commission, such as Jane Garvey, Norman Mineta, and Generals McKinley and Arnold, were unable to accurately inform the Commission as to what happened; and why the Air National Guard, twice, tried to glamorize and glorify a battle it did not fight.

No one in government could adequately inform the Commission, the Congressional Joint Inquiry that preceded it, or the people of the nation and the world as to what happened because they did not know; their staffs did not figure out the attack and the response to the attack.  That is most evident in the garbled testimony of, first, Jane Garvey, and then Norman Mineta to the Commission.

I will use the lens of Chaos Theory to explain things.  My earlier articles on the relevance of Chaos Theory to the events of 9-11 explain why I have taken this theoretical approach.  As I said, my understanding comes almost exclusively from listening, multiple times, to primary sources, the voices of the day, as recorded at FAA air traffic control facilities and at NEADS.

We begin with a description of the attack.

The Attack

Previously, I published two articles on the attack. One described the attack as a battle in a larger war on terror.  The other drew upon the “testimony” of Khalid Sheik Mohammed at the Moussaoui trial to provide a different perspective.  In this article I will focus on the language of Chaos Theory, specifically the term bifurcation, to describe the attack.

Simply put, bifurcation means to divide into two parts.  In Chaos Theory cascading periodic bifurcation leads to chaos and complex mathematical constructs are called for.  That is well beyond the scope of this article.  My intention here is to use Chaos Theory as a metaphor and to borrow its language to describe the bifurcations of the attack and, more important, the bifurcating situational unawareness of what was actually happening. The chart at this link depicts the attack as we now know it.

The Attack Retrospectively

In military terms the attack was straight forward, a two-pronged attack, each prong two-pronged.  However, none of that sophistication was known prior to and during the attack.  In its initial stages the attack was treated as a linear event, the hijacking of a single aircraft.

FAA’s Boston Center (ZBW) followed existing linear processes to manage the event, with one exception.  ZBW short-circuited the hijack notification process and contacted NEADS directly.  That was the only request for assistance made to NORAD/NEADS that morning.

Beginning shortly after 8:40 the northern prong bifurcated when UA 173 was hijacked and the main attack, itself, bifurcated a few minutes later when AA 77 was hijacked.  That double bifurcation was not recognized or understood at any level within FAA or the government.

The FAA’s New York Center (ZNY) and Indianapolis Center (ZID), separately and unknowingly, one to the other, picked up the emerging diversity of the attack, but there was no correlation of disparate events.  Specifically, the hub of FAA air traffic control management, the Air Traffic Control System Command Center (Herndon Center) did not have the situational awareness to correlate events, primarily because they did not know what ZID knew, that AA 77 was lost off radar.

At 9:03, when UA 175 flew into the World Trade Center South Tower, the nation knew it was under attack; confirmed within FAA when ZBW reported the results of the AA 11 tape review–we have some planes.

The attack was unfolding, the battle commanders, Ben Sliney at Herndon Center and Colonel Bob Marr at NEADS, were not talking to each other, and the national level had not yet organized to be of any help.  Sliney and Marr, separately, were on their own.

The attack plan, UA 93 considered

I and others have wondered what the circumstances would have been had UA 93 not been delayed in takeoff

Retrospectively, had UA 93 taken off with the same delay time as the other three hijacked aircraft, then the introduction of chaos into the system would have been a compound double bifurcation.  The main attack and both prongs would have bifurcated before UA 175 impacted.

That means that one additional FAA air traffic control center, Cleveland (ZOB), would also have had essential information.  We do not know and will likely never know if the nation would have responded more effectively to the southern prong of the attack had UA 93 been hijacked according to plan.

Given what the primary source information tells us, my assessment is that a more effective response would have only been possible had Sliney and Marr been talking to each other and that they were sharing  accurate information before 9:09.

9:09 EDT, 1309 Zulu, an opportunity missed

At 9:09 the Joint Surveillance System (JSS) radars supporting NEADS reacquired AA 77.  The chart at the following link depicts that time in comparision to the awareness FAA and NEADS had of the four hijacked aircraft.

Awareness of the attack

At the same time NEADS radars reacquired AA 77 the NEADS Mission Crew Commander asked that the Langley fighters be scrambled.  He knew nothing about AA 77 or the fact that it could have been tracked.  Colonel Marr opted to place the Langley fighters on battle stations only.  Concurrently ZID escalated the information that AA 77 was lost off radar and presumed down to its higher administrative headquarters, Great Lakes Region (AGL).  The flow of information stopped there and Herndon Center was not informed by either ZID or AGL.

It is clear from the NEADS surveillance technicans’ audio tapes, and their ability to establish a track on AA 77 just before it flew into the Pentagon, that NEADS would have been able to establish a track on AA 77 within a few minutes after 9:09 had they been cued.  Moreover, they would also have been able to establish a track on UA 93 after it was hijacked and before it dropped off the JSS radars in the area of Pittsburgh.

The dotted line terminating the extended track of UA 93 at 10:28 depicts the time that UA 93 was, notionally, visible on TSD, Traffic Situation Display.  I mention it here because that is the “plane” to which Norman Mineta refers in his statements and testimony.  We will continue that discussion later.

Situational awareness,  bifurcation after bifurcation

The chart at this link depicts what was understood in real time by those trying to grapple with a chaotic situation.  It was chaotic and that chaos can be clearly depicted using a bifurcation chart.  Here it is the information about the attack that is bifurcating.

Chaotic Situational Awareness

The paths shown in red are what actually happened concerning each of the four hijacked aircraft.  Every other bifurcation was either an artifact in the air traffic control system or a misread of the actual situation by someone at some level.

The artifacts are the notional paths of all four aircraft in the traffic situation display system.  AA 11 and UA 175 original flight plans were unchanged.  The AA 77 flight plan was changed by ZID but only to assist controllers to the west, not the east.  The UA 93 flight plan was changed by Cleveland Center with a new destination of DCA, Washington Reagan National.  AA 11A was a new plane entered into the system to enable air traffic controllers to follow the actual path of AA 11.

AA 77

The most problematic hijacked plane was AA 77.  It was presumed lost and down; American Airlines thought it might be one of the two aircraft that hit the World Trade Center.  No one knew its whereabouts until it became the fast moving threat to the nation’s capital from the West.

There is no evidence in primary source information that anyone at any level of government or in the airline industry knew about the threat of AA 77 until a few minutes after 9:30 when the alarm was sounded by Dulles TRACON.

The reporting that it was lost and down apparently became conflated with the report that AA 11 was still airborne and approaching the capital from the North.  That false report did alert both FAA and NEADS and resulted in the launch of the Langley fighters.

Two planes threaten the capital

Near concurrent reports that the Pentagon was hit and that a plane was moving toward and then away from the White House became two separate entities.  There is no equating of the two incidents at either FAA Headquarters or Herndon Center, according to the tapes from Herndon.  The report of the plane threatening the White House became a threat separate from the plane that hit the Pentagon.

The second threat was the track of UA 93 observable notionally in the traffic display system as it proceeded to “land” at DCA.  When Cleveland Center entered the new flight plan for UA 93 the icon for that plane jumped, literally, on TSD to a location in the general vicinity of Camp David.  When I observed that jump while watching a replay of the TSD tape at Herndon Center my immediate assessment was that the jump was the most likely source for the false information that UA 93 had crashed near Camp David.  I know of no verification of that assessment.

National Level awareness

No one on any staff at any level sorted out the situational awareness on the morning of 9-11 to support the later statements and testimony of Administrator Garvey, Secretary Mineta, or Generals McKinley, Arnold and Eberhart.  Testimony by all senior officials was inaccurate and garbled.

Timelines developed by NORAD and FAA were never in agreement and were individually flawed. Further, military officials conflated information about D 1989 with UA 93 because D 1989 was the only plane on which NEADS/NORAD established a track that morning.

The Air National Guard twice perpetuated its misunderstanding.  First, they commissioned Leslie Filson to publish Air War Over America. Second, they misinformed Lynn Spencer in her earnest effort to tell the story in the skies that morning in her book Touching History.

My Assessment

The attack was well planned and well executed, the northern prong more so than the southern prong. After several years of synthesis of both primary and other source information I’m reasonably convinced that we know why the northern prong proceeded as it did.

The Attack against New York

Why did Atta choose Portland and Logan?  Elsewhere in my writings I have described the choice of Portland as simply a “plan B.”  Atta intended to succeed at some level with just himself and one accomplice.  Hence their entry into the National Airspace System at a remote location.

The choice of Logan was logical for at least two reasons.  First, it cancelled out the delay factor that morning, which could not be predicted at any airport.  By choosing Logan, Atta had some degree of confidence that whatever the delay for the planes hijacked by Atta and Al Shehhi the delay would be on the same order of magnitude.

Second, Al Shehhi as a passenger on a United airplane had a reasonable opportunity to hear transmissions on frequency from AA 11 by listening to cabin channel 9.  Given the restricted airways out of Logan westbound, it was likely that both planes would be on the same frequency during their time in Boston Center’s airspace.  Both planes were on the same frequency when Atta transmitted over the air.  The pilot of UA 175 reported that fact to New York Center (ZNY) air traffic control shortly after the hand off from ZBW to ZNY.

We will likely never know to what degree Atta and Al Shehhi planned what happened, but they had the acumen, the training, and the time to calculate their plan in detail.  Nowhere is that more evident than in the fact that Al Shehhi changed the transponder code on UA 175 just as soon as AA 11 flew into the World Trade Center north tower.

The Attack against Washington

The southern attack was poorly conceived in contrast to the attack against New York City.  The choice of two different departure airports meant the attackers could not negate the delay factor.  Further, there was no chance that the two planes would ever be on the same frequency.

What we can surmise, given the scheduled times and the boarding times, is that the southern attack was intended to lag the northern attack and that it would begin in  the same time frame that the northern attack was finished.  Given that UA 93 had departed 30 minutes earlier then UA 93 would have lagged AA 77 by roughly 20 minutes.  UA 175 lagged AA 11 by 17 minutes.

Terrorism as Theater

Brian Jenkins has long held the position that “terrorism is theater.”  Nowhere is that more evident than in the attack on the morning of 9-11.  Atta set the scene for Act I; he captured a world-wide audience as Al Shehhi closed the Act.

That same act was supposed to repeat itself in Washington.  Hanjour set the scene for Act II; he captured the same world-wide audience, but Jarrah failed to close.  The passengers aboard UA 93 had figured things out and they closed the Act prematurely.

Norman Mineta

The convergence of evidence is clear that Mineta misspoke when he testified to a time of “9:20.”

First, it is simply not possible to do everything Mineta said he did after 9:03 and be in the PEOC by 9:20 in action and receiving information.  Moreover, there was no information to receive.  The FAA’s primary net was not activated until 9:20, the first national level conference to be so activated.  No operational information was ever passed on that net.

Clarke’s SVTS conference was activated at 9:25 and did not become operational until 9:40.  The NMCC began its Significant Event Conference at about the same time as SVTS was activated; the Conference was terminated and an Air Threat Conference was convened about the time the Pentagon was struck.

Second, Mineta arrived at the White House as it was being evacuated.  CNN raw footage and BBC footage supporting “Clear The Skies” is conclusive that the evacuation did not begin until after the Pentagon was struck.

Third, Mineta still had to pass through the gates and checkpoints and then proceed all the way across the White House and then down to the PEOC.

The 9-11 Commission Staff concluded that Mineta and the Vice President were not together in the PEOC until after 10:00.  The plane they dealt with was the by then notional UA 93 as it completed the flight plan entered by Cleveland Center and “landed” at Reagan National at 10:28.

My Assessment

The simplest explanation may be the best.  Norman Mineta internalized what he saw and heard to rationalize a story that made sense at the time to himself and his staff.

The UA 93 story was straightforward, other than the conflation with D 1989, as shown in the bifurcation chart.  So, that was a given to those working the timeline issue; it was known down.  Therefore, it must have been AA77 that was the problematic threat.  That notion persisted and manifested specifically as NORAD prepared for the May 23, 2003 first air defense hearing.

So how did 10:20 the actual time at issue for Mineta become 9:20?  There are three plausible explanations, based on my own experience in two major operations centers dealing with the problem of accurately establishing event times.

First, he glanced at a clock for Central Daylight Time and internalized that time.  Second, his staff later confused the difference between Eastern Daylight Time and GMT, five hours vice four.  Third, his staff confused the time of interest for UA 93 to be Central Daylight Time, the time zone for Cleveland Center.

Only Norman Mineta can clear this up.

9-11: UA 93; headed for Washington National

The purpose of this brief article, published under the UA 93 category, is to document primary source information concerning the new flight plan for UA 93 with destination Washington National.

The audio file was recorded at Position 14C, Herndon Center, on a tape with the title: 5 DCC 1933 Ops Phone 5140, Position 14C 1315-1415 UTC.  That position received a call at 10:04:25 after UA 93 was down asking if the Command Center had the “strip” on UA 93.  The unidentified caller reported a call from New York Center that the plane departed Newark and was “inbound to Washington National.”

That call confirms that the new flight plan and destination for UA 93, as entered in the system by Cleveland Center, was available in the Traffic Display System.

The conversation can be heard on this clip. 100425 UA 93 Headed to Washington National

9-11: FAA Tactical Net; a window into the FBI SIOC

Introduction

The purpose of this article is to document primary source information concerning the Federal Aviation Agency’s (FAA) Tactical Net.  The source is Herndon Center tape 5DCC 1923 Ops Phone 5128, Position 28 13-15-1415 UTC.  Thanks to the inclination of air traffic specialists at Herndon Center to leave lines open we have a window into FAA Headquarters and, by extension, a brief window into the Federal Bureau of Investigation’s (FBI) Strategic Information and Operations Center (SIOC).

The Commission Staff interview with Mike Weikert established who was sitting where in the FAA’s Washington Operations Center (WOC).  Pete Falcone was running the Tactical Net, his recorder was Chuck Gaffey.  Mike Weikert was running the Primary Net, his assistant was Tom Taffe.  A sketch of the WOC positions is  in notes from the Weikert interview.

According to Weikert there was “little traffic on his net.”  According to Major Chambers at the National Military Command Center nothing was passed on the Primary Net.  From notes I took, “virtually nothing being said–dead air space–dropped at some point.”

When I interviewed Taffe he could identify everyone who was on the dais at the front of the WOC, his line of sight was through the operations position for the Primary Net.  He could not identify who was operating the Primary Net.  According to a memo I prepared, “he could not recall who manned the primary net and was reluctant to place Mike Weikert at that position.”

At some point, the Primary Net was for all intents and purposes merged with the Tactical Net, “dropped at some point” in Chambers words.  On the tape for position 28 we hear one potential Primary Net participant, the FBI’s Jeff Bauer at the SIOC come up on the Tactical Net.  My assessment is that he did that because the net he should have been on, the Primary Net, was not available.  The Primary Net was activated at 9:20; Bauer called at 9:21 and was directed to the Tactical Net as we shall hear.

We begin by identifying position 28 as an open line to the Tactical Net.

Tactical net identified

There was confusion within FAA as to which net was which.  At 9:18 Marcus Arroyo, Eastern Region manager called Pete Falcone and asked which net he was on.  That conversation can be heard here.  091800 FAA Tactical Net That was two minutes before the Primary Net was activated, an indication that the Primary Net was redundant.

FBI calls seeking information

Immediately after the Primary Net was activated Jeff Bauer called to establish contact with FAA.  That request can be heard here. 092100 Bauer SIOC announced. Seconds later he is announced as joining the Tactical Net.  That continuation can be heard here. 092116 Jeff Bauer joined tactical net.

Bauer leaves the line open

Bauer did not hang up on the Tactical Net.  For the next nearly eight minutes background conversations at the SIOC are heard.  It is clear from those conversations that the FBI had no new information and was in the process of getting itself organized at the SIOC.  For example,  the date of the last World Trade Center attack was discussed.  At one point Bauer is heard explaining that he is on the FAA’s “Ops” net.  That statement can be heard hear.  092315 FBI on FAA Ops Net

FAA realizes there is an open mike

The window into the FBI SIOC continued for over five more minutes before someone, probably Pete Falcone, realized he had an open mike on his net.  That realization can be heard here. 092850 Open Mike on Tac Net

Situation

The time of the open window into the FBI SIOC was just under 8 minutes, from 9:21 to nearly 9:29.  That covers the time that the national level was getting itself organized.  The FAA’s Primary Net was activated at 9:20.  The White House Secure Video Teleconference, chaird by Richard Clarke, was activated at 9:25 and becaome operational at 9:40.  The NMCC was in the process of convening a Significant Events Conference which was terminated in favor of an Air Threat Conference.  Not one of the three entities, four included the FBI, knew that a fast moving unknown, AA 77, was approaching from the West.

In his testimony to the Commission, Norman Mineta cited a time of 9:20 that he was operational in the President’s Emergency Operations Center (PEOC).  Logs of the day, as reported by the Commission in its report, place both Mineta and the Vice President in the PEOC after 10:00.

Mineta was simply wrong in his recall and researchers and writers who argue from a position of accepting Mineta’s testimony have placed themselves in an untenable position.  There is no primary or secondary information that supports Mineta’s testimony.  Indeed, the convergence of evidence is conclusive that Mineta misspoke and information he claimed pertained to AA 77, in fact, pertained to UA 93.

93, Go pass that

There is one brief background conversation just before 10:15 at Operations Position 28 which suggests that erroneous information concerning UA 93 was being passed along from the FAA’s Washington Operations Center (WOC).

The background voice said, “OK, number one is 93, it’s 20 minutes outside of DC, go pass that.”  That brief transmission can be heard here. 101430 UA 93 20 minutes out.

Despite the known status of UA 93, someone at the WOC decided to pass along erroneous information, information that could only have come from a Traffic Situation Display which depicted the new flight plan for UA 93 as entered by Cleveland Center.  According to landing records at Reagan National, UA 93 “landed” at 10:28.

The Battle of 9-11, Redux

The attack began at 5:45 when Mohammed Atta entered the National Airspace System at Portland, Maine.  The counterattack began when Boston Center declared a hijack at 8:25.  The air defense response began when NEADS was notified at 8:40, according to the MCC/T log.  The FAA Tactical Net was activated at 8:50.  At 9:03 the nation knew it was under attack.

As we have learned in this article it took the national level an additional 15-45 minutes to get itself organized.  No one at any level had the situational awareness to accurately inform the National Command Authority which as of at least 10:15 was being misinformed.

To be continued….

9-11: UA 93; airphone call, not a cellphone call

This short article provides an example of how the terms “airphone” and “cellphone” became conflated and confused right from the first reports of use.  The pertinent conversation was recorded at Operations Position 28, Herndon Center, a few minutes after 10:00.

Great Lakes Region security notified the FAA Tactical Net of a report from the Oak Brook, Illinois, police that they had received a 911 airphone call from a passenger aboard UA 93 reporting three hijackers with knives and making bomb threats.

Concurrently, in the background another individual passed the information to someone else and substituted the word “cellphone” for “airphone.”  That conflation occurred as the report was received by the Tactical Net.

The audio of those conversations can be heard here.  100310 Airphone Call UA 93

A report that the White House, Treasury and State are being evacuated can be heard in the background at the beginning of the audio clip.  The time was 10:03, so that was a delayed report.  BBC video footage from “Clear The Skies” established that the White House evacuation began sometime after the Pentagon was struck, but  before 10:00.

9-11: Chaos Theory; 9:33 to 9:37, a most confused time

Introduction

In an earlier article I stated that at one point Herndon Center became upset with the misinformation being passed on the FAA Tactical Net and broke into a conversation to set the record straight.  This article covers a nearly four minute conversation between FAA Headquarters and FBI Boston which conflated and confused information about AA 11, UA 175 and AA 77.

That conversation took place between 9:33 and 9:37.  At the same time, Dulles TRACON was alerting the air traffic control system and, by extension, the Secret Service that a primary-only target was bearing down on the nation’s capital. That report reached FAA HQ during this conversation on the Tactical Net, as you will hear.

Nothing in all of the primary source information available better portrays the confusion of the morning and the lack of situational awareness within FAA as a whole.

FBI Boston asks for an update

Both FBI Boston and the FBI’s SIOC (Strategic Information and Operations Center) were on the FAA’s Tactical Net at various times after it was activated at 8:50.  The FBI should have been on the Primary Net, but there is no evidence that net passed operational information after it was activated at 9:20.

The first portion of the FBI/FAA conversation can be heard in the following audio clip, the first of three.  (The complete conversation was too large to upload as a continuous file) 093300 FAA to FBI Boston, confused report

FAA HQ believed that the two planes that struck the World Trade Center were AA 11 and AA 77.  They also understood inaccurately that UA 175 was not involved and had dropped off radar.

FBI attempts to clarify

FBI Boston asked for a recapitulation to make sure it understood what FAA HQ was saying.  That conversation can be heard here. 093400 FBI recap

FBI Boston pursued the issue concerning UA 175.

Herdon Center had heard enough

Ricky Bell at the Herndon Center had been listening to all the misinformation.  His frustration is clearly evident as he broke into the conversation proudly announcing that the intruding voice was from the “Air Traffic System Command Center, Herndon, Virginia.”  Only because Bell decided earlier that morning to leave his line open do we have this window into the real-time information available to FAA HQ.

That segment of the conversation via the Tactical Net can be heard in this audio. 093500 Herndon Center had heard enough

FAA HQ attributed the information that UA 175 had dropped off radar over Indiana to FAA’s Eastern Region.  I have consistently held the position that the FAA’s Regions, administrative headquarters, did little to help Ben Sliney and Herndon Center fight the battle of 9-11.  There is no better example–in chaos terms–of disruptive feedback into the air traffic control system.

Supervisor provides accurate information, Eastern Region (AEA) reports fast moving “VFR”

Bell then stepped aside, and a supervisor provided a concise and accurate accounting of the four hijacked aircraft, to include UA 93.  As he concluded, Eastern Region broke back into the Tactical Net to report a fast moving VFR approaching the White House.  The time was 9:36:30, according to the tapes of Operations Positions 28, phone line 5128, and Operations Position 35, phone line 5135, Herndon Center.

Those conversations can be heard on this audio clip.  093600 Herndon clarifies and Eastern Region informs Tac Net about fast moving VFR

Eastern Region concluded by stating that the information came from air traffic control.  That was not, in context, a ringing endorsement by Eastern Region.  Nevertheless, they did report the information.  That is the first time FAA Headquarters was informed of the immediate threat to the nation’s capital.

Concurrently, the Administrator, Jane Garvey was on her way to Clarke’s SVTS conference.  FAA records show that she was present at 9:40.  Clarke’s account has Garvey reporting that AA 11 and UA 175 were “the two aircraft that went in,” accurate information.  His account mentions no other aircraft.  Clarke’s account also has Norman Mineta as missing.  “At first, FAA could not find him.”

To be continued

In a separate article I will address the impact of the report of a fast-moving aircraft approaching from the West as it played out in real time on the Tactical Net.  That article will put the information recalled during interview by Terry Van Steenburgen, FAA, and Nelson Garabito, Secret Service in perspective.

Chaos Theory: 9-11; Delta 1989, flap of a butterfly’s wings

Introuction

No one could have predicted that a plane never under duress could be a center piece in the unfolding events of 9-11. Yet it was and its story became conflated and confused as the government, in particular NORAD and FAA, failed to sort out the events of the day in the aftermath.  It was a significant flap of a butterfly’s wings that morning.

In this article we will tell the Delta 1989 story using the best primary source, the actual voices of the people involved.  The clarity of my emerging understanding of the story comes about for two reasons.  First, I now use the lens of chaos theory to revisit, study and better understand the events of that morning.  Second, I now have the luxury of time to parse the audio files of the day in detail and with an overarching theory in place.

Background

I have touched on Delta 1989 in other articles.  The radar files show that the paths of UA 93 and D 1989 were such that controllers had to move Delta 1989 out of the way, to cause it to “meander.”  We know that NORAD, Colonel Marr and General Arnold in particular, recall watching UA 93 “meander.”  We also know that Delta 1989 was the only plane for which NEADS established a track, B-89, and forwarded that track to NORAD.  Delta 1989 was the only “hijacked” plane that NORAD would report about in the National Military Command Center’s (NMCC) Air Threat Conference.  Delta 1989 took on a life of its own far beyond its mere position as simply one other aircraft aloft.

So, how did all that happen?  Here is that story, and we began with a discussion of how chaos built that morning as the nation grappled with unfolding events it did not anticipate, under estimated as they occurred, and, in both real time and the final analysis, did not understand.

Chaos, from Boston to Herndon

Events became chaotic for Boston Center (ZBW) the moment a strange voice was heard on frequency by the controller responsible of AA 11.  Boston’s reaction was straight forward, they declared a hijack at 8:25, notified Herndon Center at 8:27, contacted Otis TRACON at 8:34 and NEADS at 8:38.  They thought they had things under control and the situation transferred to New York Center (ZNY).

The transfered situation was not immediately chaotic; it was a matter of finding AA 11 spatially, they had it on radar, and projecting a potential destination.  All that changed at 8:46 when AA 11 slammed into the World Trade Center north tower and the attack bifurcated.  The transponder code for UA 175 changed and changed again as it morphed into a transponding intruder and, UA 175, itself, became a plane of interest.

Watchers around the world saw UA 175 knife into the second World Trade Center tower.  What no one knew was that the original attack, itself, had bifurcated,  AA 77 went missing and was presumed down.  That was chaotic for Indianapolis Center, but not for Herndon Center.  The lost report went to FAA’s Great Lake Center and to the DoD’s Rescue Coordination Center, and no further.

In the immediate aftermath of the two-pronged attack on New York Center, Herndon Center and the air traffic control centers did what they could to control chaos; they established bounds, ground stops at key locations.

However, while this was happening ZBW had been assessing the situation.  Ever proactive–hijack notification to the military, cockpit notification to planes under its purview–ZBW concluded that there was a developing pattern and it reported its assessment to Herndon Center.

Delta 1989 becomes a plane of interest

ZBW concluded that the pattern was that transcontinental flights to Los Angeles from Boston were being hijacked.  There wee three planes that fit that model–AA 11, UA 175, and Delta 1989.  They reported that observation to both New England Region, its higher administrative headquarters, and to Herndon Center, tis higher operational headquarters.

That initiative took hold before anything was known about AA 77 outside of Indianapolis Center and Great Lakes Region.  It is the most likely source of concern by the air traffic control system that there might be a third plane.  That “third plane” was not AA 77, it was not UA 93, it was Delta 1989.