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The Flight That Fought Back

1134 Views 13 Replies 7 Participants Last post by  country85
Did anyone see this docu-drama on Discovery Channel last night? (9/11/05). It was about the 9/11 plane that crashed in a field in PA because the passengers attempted to regain control of the plane. It was pieced together from, among other things, testimony of people who had cell phone conversations with the passengers.

One of the interresting things was the attack was initiated by the sudden stabbing of one of the passengers and then the announcement that they were taking over the plane.
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Missed that unfortunately but - being not too many miles away from Shanksville where plane went down, have read up quite a bit over time.

It would seem that a sufficiently determined set of folks could subdue attackers, however well armed they are - the question possibly being could they do it quick enough.

Still many questions exist but the assemblage of testimony has made the picture seem much clearer than it was.
There were a lot of interviews with...

...family members and others who had cell phone conversations with the passengers as this was happening. One that I found particularly interresting was a woman, who talked as if her husband was the big leader of the rebellion. She said that when he told her that they were going to try to regain control of the plane, she told him to stay out of it and not get involved. :chairshot

Oh, by the way, one would get the impression that Todd Beamer's only contribution to the whole effort was to say "Let's Roll!". But he was in contact with a telephone operator or someone like that. Everyone else seems to have been in contact with a family member, every one of whom talked as if it was their relative who was the leader.

Also, from the cockpit voice recorder, we find out just how ignorant the terrorists were. After the passengers had gotten past the guy outside the cockpit door and were at work trying to break it down, the leader of the terrorists told them to hold the fire axe up in front of the peep hole so they would see it and be afraid, not realizing that it would not appear very threatening when viewed from the other side. (as if anyone was looking through the peep hole while they were trying to break down the door, anyway). From the recording, they determined that the passengers did get into the cockpit.
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While I respect the actions of those on Flight 93, I don't think we'll ever know enough to have a clear picture of what happened. Certainly not enough to put together a TV script.

"The Flight That Fought Back" is merely someboy's idea of what MIGHT have happened, and I think filming it had more to do with making money than anything else.

I didn't watch it.
I saw it. I was enthralled. There certainly is enough concrete info available to extrapolate a tv script and this was a BEAUT! I'm going to buy the DVD and show it to all my students. Know why? Three reasons:
#1 This shows the true FACE OF OUR ENEMY in very non PC terms. But so factual that it is unassailable by the lefties.
#2 It must be totally obvious to anybody that had the flight crew been ARMED and alert, the casualties might have numbered just 19: The number of hijackers.
#3 It shows the virtue of being a sheepdog even in the face of death. Our country was composed of mostly such people in our formative years, however whining PC and liberalism has eroded the American spirit to the point of well....sheepishness.
One thing in the movie that is known to be factual is that a few minutes after the transmission was made to all aircraft to be aware that a takeover attempt was possible, and about 2 minutes before they believe the actual takeover began, the pilot (or perhaps co-pilot) requested a clarification. Seems like condition white mentality and indicates to me that even if they had been armed, it might not have helped.

As far as writer's "filling in the blanks" from their own imagination, I get the impression that that would be limited to creating dialog from statements family members made. For example, someone's wife might say that her husband said that the terrorists took over the plane. The writer then turns that into the character of the husband saying, "Some terrorists just took over the plane". This didn't seem to be done in the standard docudrama style of telling a story with a plot and a love interest and all of the "based on a true story" nonsense. They presented a piece of information, such as the use of the food cart as a battering ram and then showing the passengers pushing a food card town the aisle.

The only way I can visualize inaccuracy is if the writers made up things that were claimed by the narrator as known facts or the recollection of the ear-witnesses.
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The surprise for me was the fact that there was a Federal LEO on board who was not armed. Can you imagine how he must have kicked himself for "traveling light?"

From my perspective, these "9/11" programs every year serve to re-open the wound. I hope they keep it up, every year, because as unpleasant as it is, we must not forget.

SSKC
Don't they have to...

...notify the pilot and get his OK to carry the gun on board? If so, perhaps he figured it wasn't worth the hastle.

Also, the standard "wisdom" which even the terrorists talked about (they were talking to the passengers on the plane's intercom but had somehow also transmitted it on the radio) was that they would land the plane, issue some demands and no one would get hurt. So the highjacking was well under way before anyone knew it was a suicide mission. So, even if he carried a knife as a backup/SHTF weapon, he might have decided to sit tight and go with the standard wisdom of the time.

But I imagine he was kicking himself.
Standard security briefing with regard to hijackings given to travelling servicemembers pre-9/11 was to hide your military ID and sit tight.

Standard briefing now is to grab the nearest blunt object and fight like Hell; even if they have knives, or guns or bombs. It's better to make them blow up the plane than let them ram it into something.
SSKC said:
The surprise for me was the fact that there was a Federal LEO on board who was not armed.
It doesn't surprise me. When I was involved with those folks a lot of them were of the mind that they wore their "piece" 8-12 hours a day. SInce they weren't forced to travel armed, if they weren't traveling for work the gun stayed home. Besides, that way they could kick back and have a drink on the plane. :smile:
tanksoldier said:
Standard security briefing with regard to hijackings given to travelling servicemembers pre-9/11 was to hide your military ID and sit tight.
In the late 70's and early 80's they even suggested that we get a "regular" passport to travel on since the official red one that the government issued us made us stand out as military.
rstickle said:
It doesn't surprise me. When I was involved with those folks a lot of them were of the mind that they wore their "piece" 8-12 hours a day. SInce they weren't forced to travel armed, if they weren't traveling for work the gun stayed home. Besides, that way they could kick back and have a drink on the plane. :smile:
I should clarify. I'm not surprised that he wasn't carrying, I just never heard/read that there were any LEO's on any of the flights. I agree also that he wouldn't have gotten involved right away, but once they found out that it was a suicide scenario, a gun might have come in handy. It wouldn't have solved all their problems, but it might have helped.

SSKC
SSKC said:
I should clarify. I'm not surprised that he wasn't carrying, I just never heard/read that there were any LEO's on any of the flights. I agree also that he wouldn't have gotten involved right away, but once they found out that it was a suicide scenario, a gun might have come in handy. It wouldn't have solved all their problems, but it might have helped.

SSKC
What I'm saying is that if he wasn't traveling for work he probably didn't have a gun with him on the plane. I do know that some agencies do require their people to be armed, but not all.
I do not think this could happen again. Prior to 911 the belief was that if you cooperate with hijackers your odds of living though it are greater. But know I believe if anyone attempted to take over a they would be overwhelmed by the passangers.
As I Jewish bothers say "Never Again"
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