Posted on 12/13/2004 7:37:47 AM PST by B4Ranch
American Free Press/Greg Szymanski | December 13 2004
A 9-11 rescue worker recently came forward to say he was told by FBI agents to “keep my mouth shut” about one of the “black boxes” a fellow firefighter helped locate at ground zero, contradicting the official story that none of the flight and cockpit data recorders were ever recovered in the wreckage of the World Trade Center (WTC) towers.
Honorary firefighter Mike Bellone claims he was approached by unknown bureau agents a short time after he and his partner, Nicholas DeMasi, a retired New York firefighter, found three of the four “black boxes” among the WTC rubble before January 2002.
The pair first claimed in an August 2003 book entitled Behind the Scene: Ground Zero to have found the data recorders.
DeMasi said the “black boxes” were found while he traversed “ground zero” in his all-terrain vehicle (ATV) with three federal agents.
FBI and New York fire officials have denied ever finding the voice and data recorders.
Now Bellone claims agents were adamant about keeping the discovery a secret.
“They confronted me and told me to not to say anything,” recalled Bellone, referring to one of three reddish-orange boxes with two white stripes he saw in the back of DeMasi’s ATV. “I said, ‘Give me a good reason.’ When they couldn’t, I told them I wouldn’t shut up about it.
“Why should I? I have nothing to hide and nothing to gain. It’s the truth, and Nick and I are sticking to our story as we always have.”
Bellone said he and DeMasi were not the only 9-11 rescue workers to see the “black boxes.” He said there were several other witnesses and said he knows they have been silenced by federal agents.
“I know two or three others saw what went down, but they are not talking,” said Bellone. “They got to those guys after they talked to me. The only reason I can figure they are trying to hide the truth is that the government knows it screwed up, and the recorders would prove it.”
Asked to give names of the other witnesses, he said he wouldn’t break a fellow worker’s confidence by revealing his identity.
“I can tell you this, though, it was all very strange. I worked on the spaceship Columbia cleanup, and you know when something important is found and when something is not,” he said.
The day the “black boxes” were secretly carted away, agents acted like “something big was going down,” he added.
Bellone said he never learned the FBI agents’ names as this type of personal contact and information wasn’t exchanged between the civilian workers and government officials working side-by-side at ground zero.
“They had on their FBI jackets, but I’m sure I could pick them out of a lineup or recognize their pictures,” said Bellone.
The pair’s bombshell accusations blow a big hole in the official story as well as the findings in the recent 9-11 commission report.”
In Chapter 1, footnote 76, there is the sole but definitive reference to the airline “black boxes”: “The CVR’s and the FDR’s [voice and flight data recorders] from American 11 and United 175 were not found.”
Asked if DeMasi and Bellone were questioned or subpoenaed, commission spokesman Al Felzenberg said: “I can’t tell you now if he was one of the 1,200 people we interviewed or if the book was one of the countless ones we researched. We explored every lead, but I will try to find out if we talked with him and get back to you.”
Bellone said commission members never contacted him or DeMasi and never asked the two to appear before the group even though the book was published well before the hearings commenced.
“I have been contacted by only one newspaper reporter, from The Philadelphia Daily News,” said Bellone, referring to an October 2004 story by reporter William Bunch, who recapped DeMasi’s statements as well as the usual official denials.
Those close to the 9-11 investigation said the recovery of the “black boxes” is important because they may hold vital clues about what really happened on the morning of Sept. 11, 2001.
The cockpit voice recorder uses a pair of microphones to capture all cockpit sounds for the last 30 minutes of a doomed flight. The flight data recorder is also significant since it records altitude, heading and airspeed.
Both recorders are designed to withstand enormous impact and heat. National Transportation Safety Board (NTSB) officials said they should have withstood the conditions at the WTC.
And finding the boxes after a crash seems to be standard procedure, according to the NTSB.
“It’s extremely rare that we don’t get the recorders back,’ said NTSB spokesman Ted Lopatkiewicz. “I can’t remember another case which we did not recover the recorders.”
Bellone is retired and was made an honorary New York fireman for his efforts after 9-11. DeMasi has recently retired from Engine Co. 261, nicknamed the “Flaming Skulls.”
93 is a different story, I think. It went straight down into the ground, didn't it. That could have resulted in the black box becoming little tiny piece of metal.
I have no idea what happened. It just seems odd that a couple of FF's, now they are retired, start to talk.
Those planes almost certainly deviated from their prescribed flight plans
The planes deviated from flight paths because the pilots were killed. The hijackers turned off the tracking transponder systems and reset the autopilots to the WTC destination. Their deviations were not noticed, but the lack of transponder signals were noticed. No one knew where the planes were for a while. I am certain some ATF alarms were raised while people wondered what was happening. There were also calls from cell phones and in flight phones. People knew but the usual hijacking up to this time resulted in a plane being flown to Cuba.
The black boxes were destroyed in the collapse of the buildings with the resultant pressure and grinding of tons and tons of concrete. Use your head, things were ground to smytherines in that environment. Remember the silly story of the tourist who supposedly "road" the collapsing building down and survived? What will you believe? What makes sense? BTW the tourist was a hoax too.
It is identifiable as an object rather than a piece of trashed rubble. It is not destroyed, but clearly still in one piece. It is something a person would pick up and say, hmm, what could this be?
I'm pretty sure those screens were not from the floors impacted by the planes. I had a friend that worked on 103, they found his body about 1 month later. I also had 3 other friends that worked on that floor, as far as I know no remains have been identified for two of them, and the third I think it was about a year before some piece was identified.
While you worked in the pit I'm sure some amazing things were found, but there must have been logical reasons for their survival such as positioning before the collapse or protection from a void combined with no fire or water damage damage.
No wonder he's 'honorary' - obviously Bellone's a charm!
I wannna go huntin' with this guy!
If the objective of this theory is to demonstrate a cover up, it would seem that the recovery of flt 93's flight recorder and the release of it's information would put a kink in the theory.
it has always been incredibly fishy that these boxes weren't found. They're made to survive and virtually always do.
The same can be said about skyscrapers, but this was an exceptionally destructive situation.
I knew two people who disappeared in that building. Not a single cell that used to make up their body has ever been identified. They were vaporized. That doesn't happen very often either.
Maybe he's also an honorary bloodhound!
No, they're not labeled "black box". And besides, they are optical orange.
Yours is the most logical comment on the thread. Thank you.
"...unknown bureau agents..."
It's seems there's a lot of that lately. What are these people? The secret police? I thought we were rid of them when Hitler was defeated. I want to see a business card from these guys. I want to see not only their office address but their home address and their social security number. They work for me and I'm going to insist on accountability. Then, if one says something that is in violation of his oath to protect the Constitution, he can be deported as fraudulently naturalized.
I would imagine the agents were wearing coveralls just like everyone else. Probably even had FBI written on the left front and in big lettering across the back. I am confident that the NYPD did check them for badges and ID cards.
Once they put on the coveralls, I doubt that they felt any more identification was necessary.
Which is not unusual in this day and time where revisionism runs rampant and regularly occurs in our society.
In other words if you don't like this account wait awhile and another debunking will appear with the "real scoop" and then another, and another and so on and on!
I could swear the boxes were found.
I remember the victims' families heard the cockpit tapes. Where else would the tapes have come from - if not the "Black Box" (which by the way - are Orange).
Sounds like Bravo Sierra to me.
It didn't have to Melt. It simply had to bend.
"My wife is an audiologist and uses ASL everyday. I only know a couple of signs, and that is one of my most used.
"
It's one of my favorites, too.
************
I recall that as well. Some of the families chose not to listen, the rest heard the tapes in private.
My Bad...
Black box wasn't found....
Check old news stories for more information.
Which is where I find this...
Apparently, the Book Deal is True...
http://www.summeroftruth.org/groundzero.html
Kinda like what spews from politicians mouths, huh?
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