Bush , who was in Florida at the time of the attacks and had spent the day being shuttled around the country because of security concerns, returned to the White House. These acts shatter steel, but they cannot dent the steel of American resolve. In a reference to the eventual U. Within two months, U.
Osama bin Laden, the mastermind behind the September 11th attacks, remained at large until May 2, , when he was finally tracked down and killed by U. In June , then-President Barack Obama announced the beginning of large-scale troop withdrawals from Afghanistan; it took until August for all U.
It was signed into law by President George W. Bush on November 25, Today, the Department of Homeland Security is a cabinet responsible for preventing terror attacks, border security, immigrations and customs and disaster relief and prevention.
Mohammed led propaganda operations for al Qaeda from In August , a U. On the first day of trading after the attacks, the market fell 7. The heaviest losses were in finance and air transportation, which accounted for 60 percent of lost jobs. Thousands of first responders and people working and living in lower Manhattan near Ground Zero were exposed to toxic fumes and particles emanating from the towers as they burned and fell.
The Victim Compensation Fund was set to stop accepting claims in December The first memorials to September 11 came in the immediate wake of the attacks, with candlelight vigils and flower tributes at U. For the first anniversary of the attacks in New York City in , two bright columns of light were shot up into the sky from where the Twin Towers once stood.
On clear nights, the beams are visible from over 60 miles away. It consists of two reflecting pools with waterfalls rushing down where the Twin Towers once rose into the sky. The names of all 2, victims are engraved on the bronze panels surrounding the pools, arranged by where individuals were on the day of the attacks, so coworkers and people on the same flight are memorialized together.
New York Magazine. September 11th Terror Attacks Fast Facts. But if you see something that doesn't look right, click here to contact us! Subscribe for fascinating stories connecting the past to the present. On September 11, —a clear, sunny, late summer day—al Qaeda terrorists aboard three hijacked passenger planes carried out coordinated suicide attacks against the World Trade Center in New York City and the Pentagon in Washington, D.
The September 11 attacks struck the nation on a clear, late summer morning on the East Coast. One hijacked plane crashed in a field outside Shanksville, Pennsylvania. Their travel patterns and information from family members suggest that the four may have been in contact with each other as early as the fall of All five in this group had begun university studies. Omari had graduated with honors from high school, had attained a degree from the Imam Muhammad Ibn Saud Islamic University, was married, and had a daughter.
Suqami came from Riyadh. Moqed hailed from a small town called Annakhil, west of Medina. Suqami had very little education, and Moqed had dropped out of university. Neither Suqami nor Moqed appears to have had ties to the other, or to any of the other operatives, before getting involved with extremists, probably by Salem's family recalled him as a quarrelsome teenager.
His brother Nawaf probably recommended him for recruitment into al Qaeda. Binalshibh argues that al Qaeda wanted to send a message to the government of Saudi Arabia about its relationship with the United States.
Several other al Qaeda figures, however, have stated that ethnicity generally was not a factor in the selection of operatives unless it was important for security or operational reasons. He says that so many were Saudi because Saudis comprised the largest portion of the pool of recruits in the al Qaeda training camps. KSM estimates that in any given camp, 70 percent of the mujahideen were Saudi, 20 percent were Yemeni, and 10 percent were from elsewhere. Their families often did not consider these young men religious zealots.
Some were perceived as devout, others as lacking in faith. For instance, although Ahmed al Ghamdi, Hamza al Ghamdi, and Saeed al Ghamdi attended prayer services regularly and Omari often served as an imam at his mosque in Saudi Arabia, Suqami and Salem al Hazmi appeared unconcerned with religion and, contrary to Islamic law, were known to drink alcohol.
Al Qaeda recruiters, certain clerics, and-in a few cases-family members probably all played a role in spotting potential candidates. Several of the muscle hijackers seem to have been recruited through contacts at local universities and mosques. Omari, for example, is believed to have been a student of a radical Saudi cleric named Sulayman al Alwan. His mosque, which is located in al Qassim Province, is known among more moderate clerics as a "terrorist factory.
Saeed al Ghamdi and Mohand al Shehri also spent time in al Qassim, both breaking with their families. According to his father, Mohand al Shehri's frequent visits to this area resulted in his failing exams at his university in Riyadh. Saeed al Ghamdi transferred to a university in al Qassim, but he soon stopped talking to his family and dropped out of school without informing them.
According to relatives, some recruits began to make arrangements for extended absences. Others exhibited marked changes in behavior before disappearing. Salem al Hazmi's father recounted that Salem- who had had problems with alcohol and petty theft-stopped drinking and started attending mosque regularly three months before he disappeared.
None had mentioned going to Afghanistan. These statements might be true or cover stories. The four recruits from the al Ghamdi tribe, for example, all told their families that they were going to Chechnya. Only two-Ahmed al Ghamdi and Saeed al Ghamdi-had documentation suggesting travel to a Russian republic. In , Ibn al Khattab-the primary commander of Arab nationals in Chechnya-reportedly had started turning away most foreign mujahideen because of their inexperience and inability to adjust to the local conditions.
According to him, a number of Saudi mujahideen who tried to go to Chechnya in to fight the Russians were stopped at the Turkish-Georgian border. Upon arriving in Turkey, they received phone calls at guesthouses in places such as Istanbul and Ankara, informing them that the route to Chechnya via Georgia had been closed. These Saudis then decided to travel to Afghanistan, where they could train and wait to make another attempt to enter Chechnya during the summer of While training at al Qaeda camps, a dozen of them heard Bin Ladin's speeches, volunteered to become suicide operatives, and eventually were selected as muscle hijackers for the planes operation.
Khallad says he met a number of them at the Kandahar airport, where they were helping to provide extra security. He encouraged Bin Ladin to use them. Khallad claims to have been closest with Saeed al Ghamdi, whom he convinced to become a martyr and whom he asked to recruit a friend, Ahmed al Ghamdi, to the same cause. Upon arriving in Afghanistan, a recruit would fill out an application with standard questions, such as, What brought you to Afghanistan?
How did you travel here? How did you hear about us? What attracted you to the cause? What is your educational background? Where have you worked before? Applications were valuable for determining the potential of new arrivals, for filtering out potential spies from among them, and for identifying recruits with special skills.
For instance, as pointed out earlier, Hani Hanjour noted his pilot training. Prospective operatives also were asked whether they were prepared to serve as suicide operatives; those who answered in the affirmative were interviewed by senior al Qaeda lieutenant Muhammad Atef. Khallad agrees, and claims that this criterion had preeminence in selecting the planes operation participants. The second most important criterion was demonstrable patience, Khallad says, because the planning for such attacks could take years.
But KSM asserts that young mujahideen with clean records were chosen to avoid raising alerts during travel. This included training in firearms, heavy weapons, explosives, and topography. Recruits learned discipline and military life. They were subjected to artificial stresses to measure their psychological fitness and commitment to jihad.
At least seven of the Saudi muscle hijackers took this basic training regime at the al Faruq camp near Kandahar. This particular camp appears to have been the preferred location for vetting and training the potential muscle hijackers because of its proximity to Bin Ladin and senior al Qaeda leadership. Two others-Suqami and Moqed-trained at Khaldan, another large basic training facility located near Kabul, where Mihdhar had trained in the mids. According to KSM, Bin Ladin would travel to the camps to deliver lectures and meet the trainees personally.
If Bin Ladin believed a trainee held promise for a special operation, that trainee would be invited to the al Qaeda leader's compound at Tarnak Farms for further meetings. Bin Ladin, assisted by Atef, personally chose all the future muscle hijackers for the planes operation, primarily between the summer of and April Upon choosing a trainee, Bin Ladin would ask him to swear loyalty for a suicide operation.
After the selection and oath-swearing, the operative would be sent to KSM for training and the filming of a martyrdom video, a function KSM supervised as head of al Qaeda's media committee. At this early stage, the operatives were not told details about the operation. The majority of the Saudi muscle hijackers obtained U.
This was to avoid raising suspicion about previous travel to countries where al Qaeda operated. Fourteen of the 19 hijackers, including nine Saudi muscle hijackers, obtained new passports. Some of these passports were then likely doctored by the al Qaeda passport division in Kandahar, which would add or erase entry and exit stamps to create "false trails" in the passports.
These candidate hijackers either backed out, had trouble obtaining needed travel documents, or were removed from the operation by the al Qaeda leadership. Khallad believes KSM wanted between four and six operatives per plane. KSM states that al Qaeda had originally planned to use 25 or 26 hijackers but ended up with only the The training reportedly was conducted at the al Matar complex by Abu Turab al Jordani, one of only a handful of al Qaeda operatives who, according to KSM, was aware of the full details of the planned planes operation.
Abu Turab taught the operatives how to conduct hijackings, disarm air marshals, and handle explosives. He also trained them in bodybuilding and provided them with a few basic English words and phrases. The recruits learned to focus on storming the cockpit at the earliest opportunity when the doors first opened, and to worry about seizing control over the rest of the plane later.
The operatives were taught about other kinds of attack as well, such as truck bombing, so that they would not be able to disclose the exact nature of their operation if they were caught. According to KSM, the muscle did not learn the full details-including the plan to hijack planes and fly them into buildings-before reaching the United States.
The safehouse was run by al Qaeda operative Abd al Rahim Ghulum Rabbani, also known as Abu Rahmah, a close associate of KSM who assisted him for three years by finding apartments and lending logistical support to operatives KSM would send.
According to an al Qaeda facilitator, operatives were brought to the safe-house by a trusted Pakistani al Qaeda courier named Abdullah Sindhi, who also worked for KSM. The future hijackers usually arrived in groups of two or three, staying at the safe house for as long as two weeks. The facilitator has identified each operative whom he assisted at KSM's direction in the spring of Ali apparently assisted nine future hijackers between April and June as they came through Dubai.
He helped them with plane tickets, traveler's checks, and hotel reservations; he also taught them about everyday aspects of life in the West, such as purchasing clothes and ordering food. Dubai, a modern city with easy access to a major airport, travel agencies, hotels, and Western commercial establishments, was an ideal transit point. Hawsawi would consult with Atta about the hijackers' travel schedules to the United States and later check with Atta to confirm that each had arrived.
Hawsawi told the muscle hijackers that they would be met by Atta at the airport. Hawsawi also facilitated some of the operation's financing. Those arriving in Florida were assisted by Atta and Shehhi, while Hazmi and Han-jour took care of the rest.
By the end of June, 14 of the 15 muscle hijackers had crossed the Atlantic. Moreover, substantial deposits into operatives' U. All of the hijackers opened accounts in their own name, and used passports and other identification documents that appeared valid on their face.
Contrary to numerous published reports, there is no evidence the hijackers ever used false Social Security numbers to open any bank accounts. While the hijackers were not experts on the use of the U. As mentioned earlier, he had abandoned Hazmi in San Diego in June and returned to his family in Yemen. Mihdhar reportedly stayed in Yemen for about a month before Khallad persuaded him to return to Afghanistan.
Mihdhar complained about life in the United States. In June , Mihdhar returned once more to Mecca to stay with his cousin for another month. Mihdhar said that Bin Ladin was planning five attacks on the United States.
Before leaving, Mihdhar asked his cousin to watch over his home and family because of a job he had to do. Kennedy International Airport in New York. He then joined the group of hijackers in Paterson, reuniting with Nawaf al Hazmi after more than a year. With two months remaining, all 19 hijackers were in the United States and ready to take the final steps toward carrying out the attacks.
Al Qaeda members received advice and training from Hezbollah. Intelligence indicates the persistence of contacts between Iranian security officials and senior al Qaeda figures after Bin Ladin's return to Afghanistan. Khallad has said that Iran made a concerted effort to strengthen relations with al Qaeda after the October attack on the USS Cole , but was rebuffed because Bin Ladin did not want to alienate his supporters in Saudi Arabia. Khallad and other detainees have described the willingness of Iranian officials to facilitate the travel of al Qaeda members through Iran, on their way to and from Afghanistan.
For example, Iranian border inspectors would be told not to place telltale stamps in the passports of these travelers. Such arrangements were particularly beneficial to Saudi members of al Qaeda. But we now have evidence suggesting that 8 to 10 of the 14 Saudi "muscle" operatives traveled into or out of Iran between October and February He also planned to assist individuals in Saudi Arabia in traveling to Iran during November.
A top Hezbollah commander and Saudi Hezbollah contacts were involved. In November, Ahmed al Ghamdi apparently flew to Beirut, traveling-perhaps by coincidence-on the same flight as a senior Hezbollah operative. An associate of a senior Hezbollah operative was on the same flight that took the future hijackers to Iran. Hezbollah officials in Beirut and Iran were expecting the arrival of a group during the same time period.
The travel of this group was important enough to merit the attention of senior figures in Hezbollah. In February , Khalid al Mihdhar may have taken a flight from Syria to Iran, and then traveled further within Iran to a point near the Afghan border.
They deny any other reason for the hijackers' travel to Iran. They also deny any relationship between the hijackers and Hezbollah. There also is circumstantial evidence that senior Hezbollah operatives were closely tracking the travel of some of these future muscle hijackers into Iran in November However, we cannot rule out the possibility of a remarkable coincidence-that is, that Hezbollah was actually focusing on some other group of individuals traveling from Saudi Arabia during this same time frame, rather than the future hijackers.
At the time of their travel through Iran, the al Qaeda operatives themselves were probably not aware of the specific details of their future operation. Some opened bank accounts, acquired mailboxes, and rented cars. Several also joined local gyms, presumably to stay fit for the operation. Upon first arriving, most stayed in hotels and motels; but by mid-June, they settled in shared apartments relatively close to one another and Atta.
The two were turned away by Bahamian officials on arrival, however, because they lacked visas; they returned to Florida that same day. They likely took this trip to renew Suqami's immigration status, as Suqami's legal stay in the United States ended May He flew to San Francisco the next day, where he stayed one night before returning via Las Vegas.
While this travel may have been a casing flight-Shehri traveled in first class on the same type of aircraft he would help hijack on September 11 a Boeing and the trip included a layover in Las Vegas-Shehri was neither a pilot nor a plot leader, as were the other hijackers who took surveillance flights. Each traveled in first class, on United Airlines.
For the east-west transcontinental leg, each operative flew on the same type of aircraft he would pilot on September 11 Atta and Shehhi, a Boeing ; Jarrah, a Boeing Jarrah and Hanjour also received additional training and practice flights in the early summer. A few days before departing on his cross-country test flight, Jarrah flew from Fort Lauderdale to Philadelphia, where he trained at Hortman Aviation and asked to fly the Hudson Corridor, a low-altitude "hallway" along the Hudson River that passes New York landmarks like the World Trade Center.
Heavy traffic in the area can make the corridor a dangerous route for an inexperienced pilot. Because Hortman deemed Jarrah unfit to fly solo, he could fly this route only with an instructor. Hanjour flew the Hudson Corridor, but his instructor declined a second request because of what he considered Hanjour's poor piloting skills. In one such instance on July 20, Hanjour-likely accompanied by Hazmi-rented a plane from Caldwell and took a practice flight from Fairfield to Gaithersburg, Maryland, a route that would have allowed them to fly near Washington, D.
Other evidence suggests that Hanjour may even have returned to Arizona for flight simulator training earlier in June. Both were likely too busy organizing the newly arrived muscle hijackers and taking their cross-country surveillance flights. Atta, moreover, needed to coordinate with his second-in-command, Nawaf al Hazmi. Analysis of late April communications associated with KSM indicates that they had wanted to get together in April but could not coordinate the meeting.
After he returned to New Jersey, Hazmi's behavior began to closely parallel that of the other hijackers. He and Hanjour, for instance, soon established new bank accounts, acquired a mailbox, rented cars, and started visiting a gym.
So did the four other hijackers who evidently were staying with them in New Jersey. Several also obtained new photo identification, first in New Jersey and then at the Virginia Department of Motor Vehicles, where Hazmi and Hanjour had obtained such documents months earlier, likely with help from their Jordanian friend, Rababah.
Returning from his initial cross-country surveillance flight, Atta flew into New York. Rather than return immediately to Florida, he checked into a New Jersey hotel.
He picked up tickets to travel to Spain at a travel agency in Paterson on July 4 before departing for Fort Lauderdale. Now that the muscle hijackers had arrived, he was ready to meet with Ramzi Binalshibh for the last time.
During the Berlin meeting, the two had agreed to meet later in the year in Kuala Lumpur to discuss the operation in person again. According to Binalshibh, Bin Ladin said he preferred the White House over the Capitol, asking Binalshibh to confirm that Atta understood this preference. Binalshibh says Bin Ladin had given the same message to Waleed al Shehri for conveyance to Atta earlier that spring. Binalshibh also received permission to meet Atta in Malaysia.
KSM told him to ask Atta to select a date for the attacks. Binalshibh was to return to Germany and then inform KSM of the date. Binalshibh then left for Kuala Lumpur. Atta could not travel because he was too busy helping the new arrivals settle in the United States.
After remaining in Malaysia for approximately three weeks, Binalshibh went to Bangkok for a few days before returning to Germany. He and Atta agreed to meet later at a location to be determined. He says he preferred Berlin, but that he and Atta knew too many people in Germany and feared being spotted together. Unable to buy a ticket to Madrid at the height of the tourist season, Binalshibh booked a seat on a flight to Reus, near Barcelona, the next day.
Atta was already en route to Madrid, so Binalshibh phoned Shehhi in the United States to inform him of the change in itinerary. He spent the night in a hotel and made three calls from his room, most likely to coordinate with Binalshibh. The next day, Atta rented a car and drove to Reus to pick up Binalshibh; the two then drove to the nearby town of Cambrils.
Hotel records show Atta renting rooms in the same area until July 19, when he returned his rental car in Madrid and flew back to Fort Lauderdale. On July 16, Binalshibh returned to Hamburg, using a ticket Atta had purchased for him earlier that day. According to Binalshibh, they did not meet with anyone else while in Spain.
Bin Ladin, Binalshibh conveyed, was worried about having so many operatives in the United States. Atta replied that he could not yet provide a date because he was too busy organizing the arriving hijackers and still needed to coordinate the timing of the flights so that the crashes would occur simultaneously. Atta said he required about five to six weeks before he could provide an attack date. Binalshibh advised Atta that Bin Ladin had directed that the other operatives not be informed of the date until the last minute.
Atta was to provide Binalshibh with advance notice of at least a week or two so that Binalshibh could travel to Afghanistan and report the date personally to Bin Ladin. Atta said he thought this target too difficult, but had tasked Hazmi and Hanjour to evaluate its feasibility and was awaiting their answer. Atta said that those two operatives had rented small aircraft and flown reconnaissance flights near the Pentagon. If any pilot could not reach his intended target, he was to crash the plane.
If Atta could not strike the World Trade Center, he planned to crash his aircraft directly into the streets of New York. Atta told Binalshibh that each pilot had volunteered for his assigned target, and that the assignments were subject to change.
They thought a nuclear target would be difficult because the airspace around it was restricted, making reconnaissance flights impossible and increasing the likelihood that any plane would be shot down before impact. Moreover, unlike the approved targets, this alternative had not been discussed with senior al Qaeda leaders and therefore did not have the requisite blessing.
Nor would a nuclear facility have particular symbolic value. Atta said he, Shehhi, and Jarrah had encountered no problems carrying box cutters on cross-country surveillance flights. The best time to storm the cockpit would be about minutes after takeoff, when the cockpit doors typically were opened for the first time. Atta did not believe they would need any other weapons. He had no firm contingency plan in case the cockpit door was locked. While he mentioned general ideas such as using a hostage or claiming to have a bomb, he was confident the cockpit doors would be opened and did not consider breaking them down a viable idea.
Atta told Binalshibh he wanted to select planes departing on long flights because they would be full of fuel, and that he wanted to hijack Boeing aircraft because he believed them easier to fly than Airbus aircraft, which he understood had an autopilot feature that did not allow them to be crashed into the ground.
They would be divided into teams according to their English-speaking ability. That way they could assist each other before the operation and each team would be able to command the passengers in English. According to Binalshibh, Atta complained that some of the hijackers wanted to contact their families to say goodbye, something he had forbidden.
This realization led to a vote and a collective decision to fight back. In just over 30 minutes, this diverse group of people on Flight 93 developed a plan and put it into action.
The cockpit voice recorder reader discretion advised captured the sounds of their struggle: shouts, screams, calls to action, and sounds of breaking glassware. To stop the uprising, the terrorist piloting the aircraft began to roll it to the left and right, and pitch the nose up and down.
In its final moments, the plane turned upside down as it passed over rural Western Pennsylvania. The terrorists remained in control of the plane and chose to crash it rather than risk the passengers and crew regaining control of the aircraft. Upon impact, the 7, gallons of jet fuel on board the aircraft exploded, creating a ball of fire that rose higher than the trees.
On September 11, , D. Berkebile captured smoke in the sky from his property The flight data recorder that was recovered from the crash site revealed that the terrorists had reprogrammed the aircraft's autopilot system for a new destination - Washington, D. Recovered evidence and responses to interrogations revealed that the terrorists' intended target was most likely the United States Capitol Building, where the nation's legislators were in session.
Flight 93 crashed only 20 minutes flying-time from Washington, D. Because of the quick and determined actions of the passengers and crew, Flight 93 was the only one of the four hijacked aircraft that failed to reach the terrorists' intended target that day.
The passengers and crew showed unity, courage, and defiance in the face of adversity. Sponsored by the Friends of Flight 93 National Memorial. Box Shanksville , PA
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