ok gumby try this....sounds about right

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Septemb...rrorist_Attack

The attacks started with the hijacking of four commercial airliners. With jet fuel capacities of nearly 24,000 U.S. gallons (91,000 liters),[3] each aircraft became a flying incendiary bomb. American Airlines Flight 11 crashed into the north side of the north tower of the World Trade Center (WTC) at 8:46:40 a.m. local time (12:46:40 UTC). At 9:03:11 a.m. local time (13:03:11 UTC), United Airlines Flight 175 crashed into the south tower, an event covered live by television broadcasters that had their cameras trained on the North Tower. American Airlines Flight 77 crashed into the Pentagon at 9:37:46 a.m. local time (13:37:46 UTC). The fourth hijacked plane, United Airlines Flight 93, crashed in a field in southwest Pennsylvania, at 10:03:11 a.m. local time (14:03:11 UTC), with parts and debris found up to eight miles away. The crash in Pennsylvania is believed to have resulted from the hijackers either deliberately crashing the aircraft or losing control of it as they fought with the passengers. No one survived in any of the hijacked aircraft.[4]

The fatalities were in the thousands: 265 on the four planes; 2,595, including 343 New York City firefighters, 23 NYPD police officers, and 37 Port Authority police officers, in the towers and on the ground; and 125 civilians and military personnel at the Pentagon. At least 2,986 people were killed in total. In addition to the 110-floor Twin Towers of the World Trade Center itself, five other buildings at the WTC site, including WTC building 7, and four subway stations were destroyed or badly damaged. In total, on Manhattan Island, 25 buildings were damaged. Communications equipment such as broadcast radio, television and two-way radio antenna towers were damaged beyond repair. In Arlington County, a portion of the Pentagon was severely damaged by fire and one section of the building collapsed.[5]


The Pentagon was severely damaged during the attack, and 125 lives were lost.Some passengers and crew members were able to make phone calls from the doomed flights. They reported that multiple hijackers were aboard each plane. A total of 19 were later identified by the FBI, four on United 93 and five each on the other three flights.

For a short period, the precise identity of the 19 hijackers was uncertain. For example, the BBC reported 14 days after the attack that 4 of the 19 were alive based upon the initial identification supplied by the FBI.[6]

The hijackers reportedly took control of the aircraft by using box-cutter knives to kill flight attendants and at least one pilot or passenger. The 9/11 Commission could only establish that two of the hijackers had recently purchased Leatherman multi-function hand tools,[7] but some form of noxious chemical spray, such as tear gas or pepper spray, was reported to have been used on American 11 and United 175 to keep passengers out of the first-class cabin. Bomb threats were made on three of the aircraft, but not on American 77.

In the fourth airplane, black box recordings reportedly revealed that crew and passengers attempted to seize control of the plane from the hijackers, who then rocked the plane in a failed attempt to subdue the passengers. According to 9-1-1 tapes, one of the passengers, Todd Beamer, had asked for the operator to pray with him before the passengers attempted to retake the aircraft. After praying, he simply said, "Let's roll." (The 9/11 Commission stated that Beamer actually said "Roll it," most likely referring to a drinks cart being used as a battering ram.) The term "Let's roll" would later become the war cry for those fighting Al Qaeda in Afghanistan. Soon afterward, the aircraft crashed into a field near Shanksville in Stonycreek Township, Somerset County, Pennsylvania, at 10:03:11 a.m. local time (14:03:11 UTC). There is a dispute about the exact timing of the crash, founded on the seismic evidence which indicates that the impact occurred at 10:06 a.m..[8] The 9/11 Panel reports that captured al-Qaeda mastermind Khalid Shaikh Mohammed said that Flight 93's target was the U.S. Capitol, which was given the code name, "The Faculty of Law."

See also: Communication during the September 11, 2001 attacks
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Fatalities
Number of fatalities World Trade Center Towers 2,595
Flight 11 92
Flight 175 65
Pentagon Building 125
Flight 77 64
Shanksville Flight 93 45
Total 2,986
At the World Trade Center, faced with a desperate situation of smoke and burning heat from the jet fuel, an estimated 200 people jumped to their deaths from the burning towers (as depicted in the photograph The Falling Man), landing on the streets and rooftops of adjacent buildings hundreds of feet below (a reaction to the attacks similar to the effects of the Triangle Shirtwaist Factory fire). In addition, some of the occupants of each tower above its point of impact made their way upward toward the roof in hope of helicopter rescue. No rescue plan existed for such an eventuality. By some accounts, fleeing occupants instead encountered locked access doors upon reaching the roof. In any case, thick smoke prevented rescue helicopters from landing.

As many as 1,366 people were trapped at and above the floors of impact in the North Tower (1 WTC). None of them survived. As many as 600 people were trapped at and above the floors of impact in the South Tower (2 WTC). Only about 18 managed to escape in time from above the impact zone and out of the South Tower before it collapsed.

As the suburbs around New York City learned of the destruction so close to home, many schools closed for the day, evacuated, or were locked down. Other school districts shielded students from watching television because many of their parents held jobs in the World Trade Center towers. In New Jersey and Connecticut, private schools were evacuated. Scarsdale, New York schools closed for the day. In Greenwich, Connecticut, about 15 miles north of the city, hundreds of students had direct ties to victims of the attacks. Greenwich, Connecticut, and New Canaan, Connecticut, two of the wealthiest towns in the world, had more residents killed than any other town in the New York metro area.

According to Associated Press, the city identified over 1,600 bodies but was unable to identify the rest of the bodies (about 1,100 people). They report that the city has "about 10,000 unidentified bone and tissue fragments that cannot be matched to the list of the dead."[9]

See also: Survivors of the September 11, 2001 attacks
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Other planned attacks
Allegedly 27 members of al-Qaeda attempted to enter the United States to take part in the September 11 attacks. In the end, only 19 allegedly participated. Other would-be hijackers are often referred to as the 20th hijacker.

Ramzi Binalshibh allegedly meant to take part in the attacks, but he was repeatedly denied a visa for entry into the U.S. Mohamed al-Kahtani, a Saudi Arabian citizen, may also have been planning to join the hijackers but U.S. Immigration authorities at Orlando International Airport refused his entry into the U.S. in August, 2001. He was later captured in Afghanistan and imprisoned at the U.S. military prison known as Camp X-Ray at Guantanamo Bay, Cuba. Zacarias Moussaoui was reportedly considered as a replacement for Ziad Jarrah, who at one point threatened to withdraw from the scheme because of tensions amongst the plotters. Plans to include Moussaoui were allegedly never completed because the al-Qaeda hierarchy allegedly had doubts about his reliability. In April 2005, Moussaoui pled guilty to conspiring to hijack planes, and to involvement with al-Qaeda, but he denies foreknowledge of the 9-11 attacks. His plea makes him eligible for the death penalty. At his sentencing trial, FBI agent Greg Jones testified that prior to the attacks, he urged his supervisor, Michael Maltbie, "to prevent Zacarias Moussaoui from flying a plane into the World Trade Center." Maltbie had refused to act on 70 requests from another agent, Harry Samit, to obtain a warrant to search Moussaoui's computer.[2]


Buildings surrounding the World Trade Center were heavily damaged by the debris and massive force of the falling twin towers.Other al-Qaeda members who allegedly may have attempted, but were unable, to take part in the attacks include Saeed al-Ghamdi (not to be confused with the successful hijacker of the same name), Mushabib al-Hamlan, Zakariyah Essabar, Ali Abdul Aziz Ali, and Tawfiq bin Attash. According to the 9/11 Commission Report, Khalid Sheikh Mohammed, the attack's mastermind, wanted to remove at least one memberâ??Khalid al-Mihdharâ??from the operation, but he was overruled by Osama bin Laden.

According to Mohammed Afroze, a planned simultaneous attack in London on the Palace of Westminster and Tower Bridge was aborted at the last minute when the would-be hijackers, waiting to board the planes they were to hijack, saw the damage in the U.S., panicked, and fled.

Zacarias Moussaoui, at his sentencing hearing in March 2006, claimed that, upon the personal directive of Osama bin Laden, he and Richard Reid were due to hijack a fifth plane and fly it into the White House.[3] His own defence lawyers dismissed this as fantasy on the part of Moussaoui, saying that he was not an operative in Al Qaeda, but only a "hanger-on."[4] In February of 2006, President Bush revealed that an Al Qaeda plan to crash a plane into Library Tower in Los Angeles, also on the same day, had been foiled.[5] Similar attacks may also have been planned in New Delhi, Melbourne, and Montreal.

The U.S. government also initially claimed that the White House and Air Force One were also targeted, although the source and nature of these threats was not disclosed (BBC News, September 12, 2001, http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/world/americas/1537534.stm).

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Responsibility and motives
[edit]
Responsibility
Main article: Responsibility for the September 11, 2001 attacks

The World Trade Center on fire. The plume of smoke escaping the towers would, upon the towers' ultimate collapse, go on to cover the entire lower portion of Manhattan as well as large sections of Brooklyn.The United States government determined (in part based on classified information) that al-Qaeda and Osama bin Laden bear responsibility for the attacks. Bin Laden initially denied, but later admitted involvement in the incidents. He had earlier declared a holy war against the United States and this is seen as a motive for the 9/11 attacks.

On September 16, 2001, Osama bin Laden denied any involvement with the attacks by reading a statement which was broadcast by Qatar's Al Jazeera satellite channel: "I stress that I have not carried out this act, which appears to have been carried out by individuals with their own motivation."[10] This denial was broadcast on U.S. news networks and worldwide. This was in stark contrast to an earlier Fatwa, signed by bin Laden and others, calling for the killing of American civilians in 1998.[11]

In November, 2001, U.S. forces recovered a videotape from a destroyed house in Jalalabad, Afghanistan, in which a man who apparently is Osama bin Laden is talking to Khaled al-Harbi. In the tape, bin Laden admits to planning the attacks.[12] The tape was broadcast on various news networks in December, 2001.

Shortly before the U.S. presidential election in 2004 in a taped statement, bin Laden publicly acknowledged al-Qaeda's involvement in the attacks on the U.S, and admitted his direct link to the attacks. He said that the attacks were carried out because, "we are a free people who do not accept injustice, and we want to regain the freedom of our nation."

The National Commission on Terrorist Attacks upon the United States was formed by the United States government and was commonly called the 9-11 Commission. It released its report on July 22, 2004, concluding that the attacks were conceived and implemented by members of al-Qaeda.[13] The Commission stated that, "9/11 plotters eventually spent somewhere between $400,000 and $500,000 to plan and conduct their attack," but that the specific origin of the funds used to execute the attacks remained unknown. To date, only peripheral figures have been tried or convicted in connection with the attacks.

[edit]
Motive
According to official U.S. government sources, the September 11th attacks were consistent with the mission statement of al-Qaeda. The group's involvement in the bombing of American embassies in Kenya and Tanzania is widely suspected, and al-Qaeda had declared responsibility for the 2000 USS Cole bombing in Yemen.

The motivation for this campaign was set out in a 1998 fatwa issued by Osama bin Laden, Ayman al-Zawahiri, Abu-Yasir Rifa'i Ahmad Taha, Shaykh Mir Hamzah, and Fazlur Rahman (Amir of the Jihad Movement in Bangladesh, Fazlur Rahman).[14] The fatwa lists three "crimes and sins committed by the Americans":

U.S. support of Israel.
U.S. occupation of the Arabian Peninsula.
U.S. aggression against the Iraqi people.
The fatwa states that the United States:

Plunders the resources of the Arabian Peninsula.
Dictates policy to the rulers of those countries.
Supports abusive regimes and monarchies in the Middle East, thereby oppressing their people.
Has military bases and installations upon the Arabian Peninsula, which violates the Muslim holy land, in order to threaten neighboring Muslim countries.
Intends thereby to create disunion between Muslim states, thus weakening them as a political force.
Supports Israel, and wishes to divert international attention from (and tacitly maintain) the occupation of Palestine.
The Gulf War and the ensuing sanctions against and bombing of Iraq by the United States, were cited, in 1998, as further proof of these allegations. To the discrete disapproval of moderate Muslims, the fatwa uses Islamic texts to exhort violent action against American military and citizenry until the alleged grievances are reversed: stating "ulema have throughout Islamic history unanimously agreed that the jihad is an individual duty if the enemy destroys the Muslim countries."


Aerial photo taken April 27, 2004 of the area of the crash of United Airlines Flight 93 in Shanksville, PA (USGS)Statements of al-Qaeda recorded after 9/11 add weight to the U.S account of who was responsible for the attacks. In a 2004 video, apparently acknowledging responsibility for the attacks, bin Laden stated that he was motivated by the 1982 Lebanon War, which he held the U.S. partially responsible for. In the video, bin Laden also claims that he wants to, "restore freedom to our nation," to, "punish the aggressor in kind," and to inflict economic damage on America. He declared that a continuing objective of his holy war was to, "[bleed] America to the point of bankruptcy."[15] Bin Laden said, "We swore that America wouldn't live in security until we live it truly in Palestine. This showed the reality of America, which puts Israel's interest above its own people's interest. America won't get out of this crisis until it gets out of the Arabian Peninsula, and until it stops its support of Israel."

The 9/11 Commission Report determined that the animosity towards the United States felt by Khalid Shaikh Mohammed, the so-called, "principal architect" of the 9/11 attacks, stemmed "not from his experiences there as a student, but rather from his violent disagreement with U.S. foreign policy favoring Israel." The same motivation has been imputed to the two pilots who flew into the WTC: Mohamed Atta was described by one Ralph Bodensteinâ??who traveled, worked and talked with himâ??as "most imbued actually about... U.S. protection of these Israeli politics in the region." Marwan al-Shehhi is said to have explained his humorless demeanor with the words: "How can you laugh when people are dying in Palestine?"

By contrast, the Bush administration says that Al-Qaeda was motivated by hatred of the freedom and democracy exemplified by the United States, and independent analysts say that one major Al-Qaeda motive is to encourage Islamic solidarity focused on a common enemy, and thus in the long term help pave the way for an Islamic world order