Reply #16: Answer to your questions

[John Doe II]

Paul, you wrote:
The article postulates a U-turn and you continue to suggest one had to have happened in order for there to be debris over Indian Lake.

I like to repeat once again:
This article presents all witnesses for a plane from northwest and all the witnesses for a plane over Indian Lake. All witnesses that could be located have been presented here (save Lee Purbaugh but from his description it is not possible to figure out where the plane came from he saw crashing).
There is no interpretation or even speculation
and no, Paul, this article does neither favour a U-turn nor the presence of two planes (either two commercial planes or one commercial and one white jet).
In fact it is the very structure and the very idea of this article to present all theoretically possible scenarios (of course including a U-turn and the presence of a second plane) and to point out the contradictions that do arise.
You won’t find a single sentence that states what really happened. Not a single one.

Therefore saying “But the suggestion that this could imply two planes is so at odds with all the facts brought up that it leaves me speechless. (post 10)” isn’t correct.


Witnesses from the east:

Let’s have a look again at the witnesses from the east.
You write:

“None that I see quoted give any timings or any directions.”


The Timing
Here all the people clearly indicate to have witnessed the plane just before the crash:


Jim Stop of Somerset was fishing at the Indian Lake marina, about three miles from the crash site, when he looked up and saw the plane overhead.
“I heard the engine whine and scream,” Stop said.
He then heard an explosion and saw a fireball.”
http://www.pittsburghlive.com/x/search/s_12942.html

All of a sudden the lights flickered and we joked that maybe they were coming for us. Then we heard engines screaming close overhead. The building shook. We ran out, heard the explosion and saw a fireball mushroom,” said Fleegle, pointing to a clearing on a ridge at the far end of the lake.
http://www.pittsburghlive.com/x/search/s_12967.html
(Newsday, 9/14/01)

Jim Brant, owner of Indian Lake Marina, said he rushed outside Tuesday morning when he heard the roar of jet engines overhead, then saw a fireball rise into the air.
(AP, 9/13/01 c)

Residents of nearby Indian Lake reported seeing debris falling from the jetliner as it overflew the area shortly before crashing.
http://www.pittsburghlive.com/x/search/s_12969.html


The direction

Concerning the direction of the plane that was witnessed over Indian Lake.

You write:
“Yet the essay concludes: "Several people witnessed a plane coming in from the east just before the crash happened." Why east??? Show me one of these witnesses who claims it came from the east. It could have been coming or going to any direction, from their descriptions” (post 10)

The possibility that the plane that was seen over Indian Lake was coming from the west and is going east is ALSO dealt with in the article. So even if for us it is clear that the witnessed plane came in from the east the other possibility is not excluded.

Imagining the witnessed plane flies east when it was witnessed.
The plane was witnessed before the crash (as seen above) and flies AWAY and not towards the crash site. Therefore logically this plane can’t have been the one the people witnessed crashing.
I had present this argument already and you answered:
I have no idea what you're talking about - you're putting ideas into his head.

But logically the plane can only fly towards the crash site while overflying Indian Lake (this would be it came in from the east as assumed in the articles conclusion) or it flies away from the crash site in that case it can’t have crashed and here comes the only conclusion: as there is no doubt a crash happened it must have been a second plane that crashed.
To say that clearly I don’t favour the idea that there was a second plane but it is logically necessary if you propose the possibility that the plane that was witnessed at Indian Lake flew away from the crash site.


Position of the witnessed plane

You write:
Furthermore, eyewitnesses often get things wrong. Certainly some of the eyewitnesses here had misimpressions, were misquoted, and so forth, yet their accounts are being treated as gospel. It could have seemed like it was overhead when it was two miles away, and so on. If I were sitting on a boat in a lake in some rural location and saw a jet plane flying low and pass by just two miles away, I would probably say something to the effect that it practically flew right over me. A controversy is being made here where there is none.

I don’t think witness accounts are treated like gospels but I think it’s simply a question of objectivity not to censure witnesses but to present them all. And in fact the witnesses at Indian Lake are very coherent in their description. Without a single exception all of them state that the plane was overhead . There is not a single witnesses east of the crash site that witnessed the plane coming in from northwest and then crashing west of Indian Lake.


Residents of nearby Indian Lake reported seeing debris falling from the jetliner as it overflew the area shortly before crashing.
http://www.pittsburghlive.com/x/search/s_12969.html

Meanwhile, investigators also are combing a second crime scene in nearby Indian Lake, where residents reported hearing the doomed jetliner flying over at a low altitude before ‘falling apart on their homes.’
‘People were calling in and reporting pieces of plane falling,’ a state trooper said.
(Pittsburgh Tribune Review, 9/13/01)

Jim Stop of Somerset was fishing at the Indian Lake marina, about three miles from the crash site, when he looked up and saw the plane overhead.
“I heard the engine whine and scream,” Stop said.
He then heard an explosion and saw a fireball.”
http://www.pittsburghlive.com/x/search/s_12942.html

Jim Stop reported he had seen the hijacked Boeing 757 fly over him as he was fishing. He said he could see parts falling from the plane.
(Pittsburgh Tribune, 9/13/01)

All of a sudden the lights flickered and we joked that maybe they were coming for us. Then we heard engines screaming close overhead. The building shook. We ran out, heard the explosion and saw a fireball mushroom,” said Fleegle, pointing to a clearing on a ridge at the far end of the lake.
http://www.pittsburghlive.com/x/search/s_12967.html
(Newsday, 9/14/01)

Jim Brant, owner of Indian Lake Marina, said he rushed outside Tuesday morning when he heard the roar of jet engines overhead , then saw a fireball rise into the air.
(AP, 9/13/01 c)


So, I don’t know how you can conclude:
A controversy is being made here where there is none.


The raining debris

You write:
The New Baltimore debris is entirely paper debris and the timing of that is very vague. Point to me one witness who definitively states the debris reached New Baltimore within an hour of the crash. I don't see any. Plus, if the plane was raining debris over Indian Lake, it would have had less of a distance to travel to reach New Baltimore (about five miles instead of eight - I don't know where you get 17 miles).

(First of all the 17 miles simply come from adding the way from the crash site to New Baltimore and back.)
Unfortunately we do only have one witness account from New Baltimore but it is quite precise in its description:

The village of New Baltimore is a dozen or more miles by automobile but eight as the wind blows, which it was doing a year ago. Melanie Hankinson was at the church next to her home, transfixed before a television that showed the World Trade Center ablaze, when the man who sprays her lawn stopped by to tell her he was finding odd things in the weeds.
"He said there was a loud bang and smoke and then these papers started blowing through your yard," she said.
http://www.post-gazette.com/columnists/20020911roddy091...

I think it’s rather safe to assume that « then » doesn’t mean around 50 minutes later.
The quote continuous:

"I said, 'Oh.' Then I went back to the TV." Then the parish priest, the Rev. Allen Zeth, told her an airplane had crashed in Shanksville.
For the next few hours, Hankinson gathered charred pages of in-flight magazines, papers from a pilot's manual -- she remembers a map showing the Guadalajara, Mexico, airport -- and copies of stock portfolio monthly earnings reports.
"And there was some black webbing -- a lot of people found that," she said. The webbing, flexible where it hadn't burned, crisp where it had, was from insulation lining the belly of the jetliner.
http://www.post-gazette.com/columnists/20020911roddy091...

The fact that Ms Hankinson learnt from the television of the crash in Shanksville AFTER she was told about the debris found in her garden proves as well that the wind can’t have blown it from the crash site. The news of UA 93 crashing certainly was shown before 10:50 on the television.


The altitude of the plane before the crash

You write:
By some accounts, the plane was at about 2000 feet altitude just before it crashed. (post 10)

This isn’t correct. In Boswell (8 miles) Rodney Peterson and Brandon Leventry see the plane still at 2000 feet. But afterwards the plane flies extremely low BEFORE vanishing behind the treeline (the only exception is Linda Shepley, 4 miles away, estimating 2,500 feet).
Terry Butler (4 miles) 500 feet.
Rob Kimmel (4 miles) 100 or 200 feet
Eric Peterson (two miles) 300 feet.
Nevin Lambert (less than half mile) was afraid because “It looked like it was coming right to my house” (Minneapolis Star Tribune, 9/11/04) implying that the plane was very low.
And Lee Purbaugh being only 300 yards away from the crash site sees the plane at an altitude of 40 or 50 feet.
(Pittsburgh Post Gazette, 9/12/01 b; Independent, 8/13/02)
Jere Longman: Among the Heroes)
http://www.mirror.co.uk/news/allnews/page.cfm?objectid=12192317&method=full&siteid=50143
http://www.post-gazette.com/headlines/20010912somerscenenat4p3.asp
For more info on the alitudes:
“…and kiss the official UA 93 theory good-bye!”

Therefore (exception of course Linda Shepley) wee see a slow and constant descent of the plane. The fact that the plane crosses the treeline at an altitude of 100 to 300 feet (and certainly not 2000 feet) is in fact the reason why I expressed doubts that the plane coming from northwest could have caused the crater. This is mentioned in the article but not as an evidence.
For more info: “Part II: …and kiss the official UA 93 theory good-bye!”


The treeline

You wrote:
Everyone of course is entitled to their opinion, but frankly, personally I'm surprised that people I respect here such as yourself and John Doe would formulate or seriously contemplate a second plane hypothesis when a single plane can easily explain all the eyewitness accounts. And by failing to mention the two eyewitnesses who claim to have seen the plane make a sharp right turn, the authors cherrypicked only the evidence that was to their liking. That is very disappointing.

I’m sorry, Paul, but this is a very serious accusation. Maybe the worst one can make for a 911 researcher.


You also wrote:
Where is the treeline? I don't know - who does? Could the northwest witnesses have seen the plane turn BEFORE the treeline? Yes. In fact, that's what at least two of them saw.

This is true. The treeline the witnesses are talking about is between Lambertville Road and the crash site. Therefore if the witnesses being northwest of the crash site saw the sharp right turn BEFORE the treeline then it logically follows that the bizarre turn changes absolutely nothing that the witnessed plane crashed within seconds after disappearing behind the treeline that is flying southeast. Therefore this plane in no way can account for the witnesses and the debris on Indian Lake.
Therefore the sharp right turn changes nothing.
Therefore it’s not a kind of cherrypicking but the assumption that the localisation of the witnesses are decisive.


The right hand turn
One of the witnesses says the plane was flying east-southeast. That's what I would think, too, which is different than your postulated line. Then the plane makes a sharp right turn, which certainly can be done the time period involved. Flight 77 made a complete 360 in the same or lesser amount of time. That would have put the plane briefly over Indian Lake. As Jim Sharp notes, it was raining debris as it flew over. Thus the solid debris in that area.

Here you present the same idea of the sharp right turn as happening over Indian Lake. Just not to have no misunderstanding: Just point out to me please which one of the flight path shown below you have in mind!









(The turning point would be exactly over Indian Lake Marina. Or would you more think of turning in the north of Indian Lake? In case I completely misunderstood you I’m sorry and propose that you simply load the first image of the article on your computer draw your wanted line and put it on the net with the help of http://www.imageshack.ws/ Thanks a lot)


I’m sorry. I really hate to argue with you, Paul. You surely do know how much I appreciate your work. But your posts imply some quite heavy accusations about the credibility of my research and I think it’s normal that I don’t let this stand like this and defend myself and the article. And in any case the discussion can only help to find something we certainly both want to find: The truth.