Conspiracy Theory

bonkey

Yes, yes...we're all sick of rehashing the 9.11 events, and the inevitable conspiracy theories which cropped up left, right and centre.

However, a m8 of mine just sent me this link, and I must say, it poses some interesting questions. It basically asserts (in an interesting format) that the plane which hit the Pentagon didnt exist. Better put - the damage to the Pentagon is not consistent with a plane-crash.

I must go and do some lookup, because I'm guessing someone has already debunked this theory, and I'm interested in seeing how.

Anyway - if you're not fed up to death of the whole thing by now, it may pass a few minutes of your day. Check it out here

jc

p.s. Before we have the ra-ra flag-wavign pro-US faction jumping up n down on me again, please read the above carefully, and notice that I am stating how skeptical I am of the article.

I dont need follow-up posts telling me that I'm just looking for an excuse to go US-bashing, cause god knows I can come up with plenty of more useful ones than this if I want to. I'm looking for discussion on the point which the web page makes.

jc

Gargoyle

Bonkey, the link didn't work for me.

bonkey

Sorry Gargoyle - fixed now.

Biffa Bacon

Intriguing! I think part of the explanation may be that the plane didn't actually hit head on but instead crashed short of the Pentagon, which may explain why the damage was less than might have been expected. And weren't there plenty of eye-witnesses also?

scipio_major

Nope couldn't find any Boeing. The hitting side on theory doesn't stand up because in that case would't there be even more weckage of a plane about?

If we suppose for a moment that it was a truck bomb why in the world would the Pentagon (the organisation not the building) cover that up?

Finally I remember hearing the reports that there had been car-bombs in Washington.

fade to Credits
Scipio_major

bonkey

The only problems I have are :

1) Where did the debris from the wings go. 757-200 wings are mostly hollow (as opposed to 300 wings which have far more internal support) and would not cause damage to a reinforced building but would essentially break up into tiny pieces, which should have been spread over a large area.

2) Despite the high speed of impact, I would have thought there would have been a significant amount of "blowback" fuel escaping out the way the plane came in....which should have caught fire and thus caused extensive damage to the lawn.

Had the plane crashed and skidded/bounced into the building, then the lawn damage would be even more extensive, as would the wing-debris. If it crashed almost directly into the base of the building, then most force would be directed inwards and downwards, causing base-level structural damage, which would be consistent with the damage seen, and also with the relatively low height of the collapsed rubble. This appears more consistent, but still leaves the 2 questions I have above.

That said, I still believe that the plane did hit the Pentagon, and that what the site is showing is carefully selected pictures which highlight the author's arguments.

Quickly tracking some lhits from google on this reveals that this site appears to be set up by some guys who have essentially written a conspiracy theory book oin the subject.....further grounds to completely dismiss it

jc

bonkey

Originally posted by scipio_major
If we suppose for a moment that it was a truck bomb why in the world would the Pentagon (the organisation not the building) cover that up?

Finally I remember hearing the reports that there had been car-bombs in Washington.

In the case of your first question, I think the argument is that the plane was somehow forced over water and splashed, and that there was a truck-bomb as originally reported. The combining of the two stories excused the US from admitting to splashing a plane. In hindsight, they wouldnt have received much (if any) flak for such an action, but having made the statement, they could hardly reverse their position.

The car-bombs were mis-reported. They were actually sonic booms of fighters scrambling to provide air-cover. Normally restricted to subsonic over land, the pilots were permitted to "drop the hammer" in the emergency, and the resulting sonic-booms were mis-reported because of their relative rarity (people didnt know what they were, and so assumed small explosions).

jc

Hobbes

yea apprantly they flew by a mall scaring the hell out of a lot of people.

How do they know that's the way the plane came in at, if it came in at an angle almost face down it could make that much of a mess.

btw the pentagon is designed to withstand damage.

bonkey

Originally posted by Hobbes
btw the pentagon is designed to withstand damage.

Not really, other than its "spread" design. The Pentagon is more designed for redundancy - virtually impossible to take out in one move (barring ballistic missiles).

IN recent years, the US decided that they should "harden" the Pentagon to make it effectively bomb-proof and more fire-resistant. To date, only one of its 5 sides had been completed. Fortuinately - thats what the plane hit!

jc

adnans

what about the eyewitness reports from hundreds of people around the pentagon who reported seeing a plane heading towards the building? or the phone calls from the people aboard the plane? if there was never a plane hitting the pentagon, what happened to the real plane and the very real people on board? conspiracy theories tend to leave out importnant details like that.

apart from that, it's one of the slickest conspiracy theories i've seen to date, one worth writing a book about

adnans

shotamoose

I don't believe there were any phone calls reported from people on THAT plane. There were some reported from the plane that crashed in pittsburgh and from at least one of those that crashed into the WTC.

IN recent years, the US decided that they should "harden" the Pentagon to make it effectively bomb-proof and more fire-resistant. To date, only one of its 5 sides had been completed. Fortuinately - thats what the plane hit!

Doesn't that mean that a plane crashing into that side would make less of an impact than we might expect?

shotamoose

having looked at a couple of news stories from the day, what was reported was that a plane crashed into or near the Pentagon at 9:30, followed around forty minutes later by the collapse of the section of the building shown in the photos. I would have thought this delayed reaction would rule out a direct hit, but then the birds-eye view photos on that page don't show much of a nearbye impact site either. It's a weird one.

news story from the day here

Biffa Bacon

Check this out:
Photos of plane hitting Pentagon
Although I can't make out the plane in the first photo...

bonkey

Yeah - I was vastly amused to see on CNN las tnight that the Pentagon had just released these pictures.

They release pics just as a conspiracy theory webby is getting effectively /.ed saying that there was no plane.

Coincidence? I think not. I am amused that they dont own up and say straight out "in response to those conspiracy theorists....." like NASA did with the recent resurgence of the moon-landing conspiracy theorists.

As for the location of the plane in the first pic....look at the "pillar" at the left of the pic (looks like a support for a crash barrier). Look behind it. You can see a shape in the first pic which is not there in later pics. Zoom in some, and you can make out that it is the plane.

Also, the 5th pic shows where all the bits went - many of the larger pieces were "catapulted" over the first ring of the building...presumably to land on rooftop or inbetween the rings.

Yes, yes, yes. Crap quality, and sooooo easy to fake pics like that, but hey - look at the angle the plane came in at. The guy practically landed the thing and brought it screaming in at ground-level. He was a damn good pilot....pity he was such an ar5e to boot.

jc

jc

seamus

Originally posted by bonkey
The guy practically landed the thing and brought it screaming in at ground-level. He was a damn good pilot....pity he was such an ar5e to boot.

Yeah, did you ever try get really close to the ground in a flight sim? Damn hard. Now try it in a real plane. Difficulty x 100. Not sure about the wing damage thing. If you look at their superimposing of the plane on the pic, the damage done is wider than the plane, showing that maybe the plane angled slightly just before impact. Some wing would be destroyed on hitting lawn (some of the lawn was damaged right beside the impact point) and the rest would cause that wider damage that we see. Solved?

bonkey

Well, like I said at the start....it was an interesting theory of which I was highly skeptical.

The release of pics from the Pentagon, despite them being low res and all that, does seem to clear up most of the questions. The rest is obviously just a case of assumptions of what would probably happen not matching the facts of what does happen

Case closed for me

jc

Hobbes

Originally posted by Biffa Bacon
Check this out:
Photos of plane hitting Pentagon
Although I can't make out the plane in the first photo...

Here's one that doesn't require Flash.

http://news.bbc.co.uk/hi/english/world/americas/newsid_1861000/1861977.stm

Call me a tin-foil hat wearing freak but I still can't see the plane and the date and time is completly wrong.

PiE

Yea, why is the date and time wrong in those pics? Was any reason given?

chernobyl

I think there is no conspiracy.
The plane hit the ground first and not the pentagon and disintegrated, if it had been a direct hit then it would have destroyed more.

cournioni

Interesting... I dunno what to say either way but I believe that there is some covering up being done on this subject. You can never really tell.