Mineta testimonty

[Panoply_Prefect]

Bear with me here, I know most of you think this is beating a very old and moldy horse, but humour me. Im trying an angle on the Mineta testimony regarding AA77 and Im looking for the flightpath for AA77 at the moment Mineta said he heard the convo between Cheney and an aide, until it actually hit the Pentagon.

In short:

Mineta sait the convo occured beteen 9.25-9.26. AA77 struck the Pentagon 12 minutes later at 9.38.

If the plane flew at cruising-speed, which I gather is 950km/h and the range was 50 miles, this gives:

50 miles is 80.40 km. The plane flew (950/60) 15,83 km/minute which gives (80,4/15,83) about 5 minutes to fly 50 miles.

If so, the plane took around 12 minutes to fly a distance that should have taken it about 5 minutes.

Now, my request: Im wondering if the flightpath of AA77 was so documented (by FDR data for instance), that you could document the last 12 minutes of the plane's flight with some accuracy? More specifically I'm looking for speed measures and flight path (perhaps there is some illustration using those fancy Googly Earth maps people like to do nowadays?).

I know there are more to the Mineta testimony that doesn't add up, but Im trying to focus on this specific angle.

Cheers,
S

 

[gumboot]

Mineta said that this conversation lasted two minutes (the various distance reports) as you described, 9.25 - 9.26. (It could have been one minutes, but as you will see, that would be even more ridiculous...)

During this conversation the aircraft allegedly went from 50 miles out to 10 miles out. That's 40 miles in 2 minutes, or 20 miles per minute - 1200 MPH or 1,931 Km/h, or if you prefer, Mach 1.5.

Following this conversation, the airliner must have covered the remaining 10 miles in 12 minutes, averaging 0.83 Miles per minute, or 50 MPH.

I am not aware of any airborne object - be it a machine or an animal, that is capable of maintaining flight at both 50 MPH and 1200 MPH in the earth's atmosphere.

This is, of course, best case scenario. Worst case scenario, if we allow 1 minute for the initial conversation and apply the information we have from NORAD and the FAA regarding the position at which AA77 was identified on radar, the physics only becomes more impossible.

The bottom line is Mineta's testimony of events is physically impossible and should not be taken at face value. The universal laws of physics say it cannot have occured as he claims it occured.

-Gumboot

 

[Liszt]

That´s a pretty good explaination.

But why on earth did Mineta say this? Can´t he be done for giving a false statement? What were his motives? All very odd.

 

[gumboot]

That´s a pretty good explaination.

But why on earth did Mineta say this? Can´t he be done for giving a false statement? What were his motives? All very odd.

Mineta makes it very clear in his statements that he is speculating on what he was seeing, and making inferences. He wasn't brought to the commission to discuss the day's events - he was brought there to discuss security (particularly in airlines) pre 9/11.

He brushes over the event initially, and clearly tells the commission to talk to people more directly involved for details of the day's events.

For whatever reason the commissioners decided to obsess over this one conversation, which is the only reason it plays an important part in his testimony. Rather than ask him questions about the thing THEY SUMMONED HIM TO TALK ABOUT they asked repeated questions about a frankly irrelevant topic that Mineta himself claimed he had little knowledge of.

Expecting someone to know precisely what time a specific conversation occured in the midst of a traumatic event 2 years ago is ridiculous. Expecting a very old man to remember is absurdity.

-Gumboot

 

[Liszt]

This is his quote, from wikipedia

"There was a young man who had come in and said to the vice president, 'The plane is 50 miles out. The plane is 30 miles out.' And when it got down to, 'The plane is 10 miles out,' the young man also said to the vice president, 'Do the orders still stand?' And the vice president turned and whipped his neck around and said, 'Of course the orders still stand. Have you heard anything to the contrary?' Well, at the time I didn't know what all that meant. And--"

That´s all wiki has on the subject.


That´s also a pretty solid thing to say - it should be taken at face value. Who is the "young man"? I´m not surprised the commissioners obsessed over this.

Mineta got the Presidential Medal of Freedom in 2006.

 

[Panoply_Prefect]

Mineta said that this conversation lasted two minutes (the various distance reports) as you described, 9.25 - 9.26. (It could have been one minutes, but as you will see, that would be even more ridiculous...)

During this conversation the aircraft allegedly went from 50 miles out to 10 miles out. That's 40 miles in 2 minutes, or 20 miles per minute - 1200 MPH or 1,931 Km/h, or if you prefer, Mach 1.5.

Following this conversation, the airliner must have covered the remaining 10 miles in 12 minutes, averaging 0.83 Miles per minute, or 50 MPH.

I am not aware of any airborne object - be it a machine or an animal, that is capable of maintaining flight at both 50 MPH and 1200 MPH in the earth's atmosphere.

This is, of course, best case scenario. Worst case scenario, if we allow 1 minute for the initial conversation and apply the information we have from NORAD and the FAA regarding the position at which AA77 was identified on radar, the physics only becomes more impossible.

The bottom line is Mineta's testimony of events is physically impossible and should not be taken at face value. The universal laws of physics say it cannot have occured as he claims it occured.

-Gumboot

Tnx m8, I actually didn't think of this implication, which furthers my argument that if Minetas timeline and flight designation is correct, that plane did some weird and somewhat amazing flying...

But why on earth did Mineta say this? Can´t he be done for giving a false statement? What were his motives? All very odd.

I believe Mineta was very clear that he wasn't sure about the specifics. As I understand it his testimony regarding the events is decently accurate, but his timeline and interpretation isn't.

Still, to further my argument I would like to see if I can make a timeline of the, umm, inflight of AA77 towards the Pentagon. Having a clear map with the flightpath would make it beyond interpretation that it wasn't AA77 Cheney and the aid were talking about.

Help me out here!

/S

 

[gumboot]

This is his quote, from wikipedia

"There was a young man who had come in and said to the vice president, 'The plane is 50 miles out. The plane is 30 miles out.' And when it got down to, 'The plane is 10 miles out,' the young man also said to the vice president, 'Do the orders still stand?' And the vice president turned and whipped his neck around and said, 'Of course the orders still stand. Have you heard anything to the contrary?' Well, at the time I didn't know what all that meant. And--"

That´s all wiki has on the subject.


That´s also a pretty solid thing to say - it should be taken at face value. Who is the "young man"? I´m not surprised the commissioners obsessed over this.

Mineta got the Presidential Medal of Freedom in 2006.

Instead of taking a single quote out of context from Wikipedia, why don't you go and read his entire testimony?

Here's a few things you left out of his testimony:

First this, in his opening words:

There are many events that occurred on September 11th that I do not have personal knowledge of, though I have learned about them in subsequent investigations and reports. I know this commission will be speaking to the same agencies and individuals that provided me with that information, so I will let the Commission collect that information from those primary sources.

And how is this specific conversation actually raised? By Mineta? No.

MR. HAMILTON: We thank you for that. I wanted to focus just a moment on the Presidential Emergency Operating Center. You were there for a good part of the day. I think you were there with the vice president. And when you had that order given, I think it was by the president, that authorized the shooting down of commercial aircraft that were suspected to be controlled by terrorists, were you there when that order was given?

MR. MINETA: No, I was not. I was made aware of it during the time that the airplane coming into the Pentagon. There was a young man who had come in and said to the vice president, "The plane is 50 miles out. The plane is 30 miles out." And when it got down to, "The plane is 10 miles out," the young man also said to the vice president, "Do the orders still stand?" And the vice president turned and whipped his neck around and said, "Of course the orders still stand. Have you heard anything to the contrary?" Well, at the time I didn't know what all that meant. And --

MR. HAMILTON: The flight you're referring to is the --

MR. MINETA: The flight that came into the Pentagon.

MR. HAMILTON: The Pentagon, yeah.

MR. MINETA: And so I was not aware that that discussion had already taken place. But in listening to the conversation between the young man and the vice president, then at the time I didn't really recognize the significance of that.

And then later I heard of the fact that the airplanes had been scrambled from Langley to come up to DC, but those planes were still about 10 minutes away. And so then, at the time we heard about the airplane that went into Pennsylvania, then I thought, "Oh, my God, did we shoot it down?" And then we had to, with the vice president, go through the Pentagon to check that out.

MR. HAMILTON: Let me see if I understand. The plane that was headed toward the Pentagon and was some miles away, there was an order to shoot that plane down.

MR. MINETA: Well, I don't know that specifically, but I do know that the airplanes were scrambled from Langley or from Norfolk, the Norfolk area. But I did not know about the orders specifically other than listening to that other conversation.

MR. HAMILTON: But there very clearly was an order to shoot commercial aircraft down.

MR. MINETA: Subsequently I found that out.

MR. HAMILTON: With respect to Flight 93, what type of information were you and the vice president receiving about that flight?

MR. MINETA: The only information we had at that point was when it crashed.

MR. HAMILTON: I see. You didn't know beforehand about that airplane.

MR. MINETA: I did not.

-Gumboot

 

[Liszt]

I don´t really know much about 911, sorry, I usually trust wiki to get things in context.

Thanks for this info Gumboot

 

[Panoply_Prefect]

Did Mineta really claim that conversation, with the countdown, took 2 minutes, or did he say it started about that time?

Am I right to assume that the turn AA77 prior to impact was made about 0934 to 0937?

I did this calculation based on the NTSB flight path study. Please help me check it, I suck at math:

Last turn prior to impact 0934-0937 (3 mins)

At 0934 AA77 was 3,5 miles out of Pentagon (according to NTSB flight path study)

The autopilot was disconnected at 09.29. As I understand it that gives that the plane was maintaining cruise speed until that time. Is this correct?

So, the speed after 0929?

At 0929 the NTSB has AA77 35 miles out. At 0934 NTSB has it at 3,5 miles out of Pentagon, begining its turn. (34-29) 5 minutes to go (35-3,5) 31,5 miles, gives an average speed of (31.5/5) 6.3 miles per minute or (6,3*60) 378 mph

So working with Minetas timeline as origin (0926, 50 miles out) that gives:

0926-0929 Autopilot on, thus cruise speed at 567 mph
0929-0934 Autopilot off, average speed 378 mph
0938 Hit the Pentagon

Doing the math again (NTSB figures in bold):


0926-0929 (567/60*3 mins) 28,3 miles (50-28,3) 21,7 miles out of Pentagon (35)
0929-0934 (378/60*5 mins) 31,5 miles (21,7-31,5) - 9,8 miles past Pentagon (3,5)

Did I get everything right? (I feel like Im back at school...)

/S

 

[Gravy]

This is his quote, from wikipedia

"There was a young man who had come in and said to the vice president, 'The plane is 50 miles out. The plane is 30 miles out.' And when it got down to, 'The plane is 10 miles out,' the young man also said to the vice president, 'Do the orders still stand?' And the vice president turned and whipped his neck around and said, 'Of course the orders still stand. Have you heard anything to the contrary?' Well, at the time I didn't know what all that meant. And--"

Quite similar to what this man heard while doing triage outside the Pentagon, long after flight 77 hit:

So they said a second plane is coming. You’re looking above your head, you can’t see nothing. Then somebody on the radio said, “Oh, my god, it’s ten minutes out,” or “It’s ten miles out.” “It’s five minutes out.” “It’s five miles out.” So, we were thinking, ‘oh, God, we’ve got to get these people out of here.’ – Technical Sergeant Vernon Jones, USAF

http://history.amedd.army.mil/memoirs/soldiers/responding.pdf

There were several similar warnings that morning.

 

[Panoply_Prefect]

Anyone know of a link to the full NTSB animation? (The one Pilotsftruh like to show clips of) I'd like to see what speed it gives at 0926-0929.

(And no, I wont buy the Pandoras Black box DVD just to get it)

EDIT: Never mind. I'll make a separate thread instead.

Cheers,
/S