Posted on 07/15/2004 6:19:30 AM PDT by Rutles4Ever
A WWS Exclusive Article
Note from the Editors: You are about to read an account of what happened during a domestic flight that one of our writers, Annie Jacobsen, took from Detroit to Los Angeles. The WWS Editorial Team debated long and hard about how to handle this information and ultimately we decided it was something that should be shared. What does it have to do with finances? Nothing, and everything. Here is Annie's story.
On June 29, 2004, at 12:28 p.m., I flew on Northwest Airlines flight #327 from Detroit to Los Angeles with my husband and our young son. Also on our flight were 14 Middle Eastern men between the ages of approximately 20 and 50 years old. What I experienced during that flight has caused me to question whether the United States of America can realistically uphold the civil liberties of every individual, even non-citizens, and protect its citizens from terrorist threats.
On that Tuesday, our journey began uneventfully. Starting out that morning in Providence, Rhode Island, we went through security screening, flew to Detroit, and passed the time waiting for our connecting flight to Los Angeles by shopping at the airport stores and eating lunch at an airport diner. With no second security check required in Detroit we headed to our gate and waited for the pre-boarding announcement. Standing near us, also waiting to pre-board, was a group of six Middle Eastern men. They were carrying blue passports with Arabic writing. Two men wore tracksuits with Arabic writing across the back. Two carried musical instrument cases – thin, flat, 18" long. One wore a yellow T-shirt and held a McDonald's bag. And the sixth man had a bad leg -- he wore an orthopedic shoe and limped. When the pre-boarding announcement was made, we handed our tickets to the Northwest Airlines agent, and walked down the jetway with the group of men directly behind us.
My four-year-old son was determined to wheel his carry-on bag himself, so I turned to the men behind me and said, "You go ahead, this could be awhile." "No, you go ahead," one of the men replied. He smiled pleasantly and extended his arm for me to pass. He was young, maybe late 20's and had a goatee. I thanked him and we boarded the plan.
Once on the plane, we took our seats in coach (seats 17A, 17B and 17C). The man with the yellow shirt and the McDonald's bag sat across the aisle from us (in seat 17E). The pleasant man with the goatee sat a few rows back and across the aisle from us (in seat 21E). The rest of the men were seated throughout the plane, and several made their way to the back.
(Excerpt) Read more at womenswallstreet.com ...
Is she saying what their reasons are?
I flew on Gulf Air some years ago. Fact: as soon as that seatbelt light goes off every arab man on the plane makes a mad dash for the lavatory--to load up on the free after shave. It was a non-stop exercise.
What's the WWW story?
Consewrvative radio station KVI 570 in Seattle is interviewing Annie Jacobsen right now... 4:00 PM tonight PDT.
BTTT Stream 570KVI.com NOW. John Carlson interviewing this woman. (4:00PM Pacific time)
please post what you hear, especially any new information.
Hmm, ok.
Nothing new, I am going back to Hugh Hewitt, even if he is flogging his book I prefer him to Carlson.
Although she did say that air marshals only deploy when there is an incident.Maybe that should change.
NBC News to do the story on Monday. The news on this is spreading like wildfire.
KVI's John Carlson said he didn't say it on the air, but he knows she is a liberal democrat. Hopefully she now see's that we really are at war.
KVI is now talking to a airline pilot who called in who is giving his insight.
Pilot on KVI says: He talked to the woman and believes her story. Thinks it's very odd that 6 of them were were aloud to pre-board when only one had a bad leg, and those 6 were all sitting in coach.
Also mentioned: Detroit has a large Muslim population and is near the Canadian border. He and other pilots are frustrated that all of them are searched, to the point of even taking off their shoesm yet some high risk lokking passengers are alloud to board with a minimal search.
I agree, but the idea that we cannot profile is absurd!
Why didn't the Air-Marshals intervene, made the guys sit down? Another question is how is it that more than one air marshal was on this flight to begin with? Are we sure this is a true story?
If they were innocent, why do such a thing? Some sick joke or something...by the way, love your screenname.
Don't dig deeper, because perhaps the agents have a snitch in with this terror cell, and they knew that no bombing was going to take place. Perhaps they are trying to catch the bigger guys, and not these foot soldiers.
KVI re-running the interview at 5:15 PDT
PC may be the death of all of us before this is over.
This why we must kill as many of the Islamokazis in Afghanistan, Iraq, and coming up Iran and Syria. If they die there, they can't harm us here.
Caller thinks her story is balony. His reason: on a 757 how many people can you really see from your seat? She seemed to know every detail that was going on from nose to tail, how many was standing hear and there.
Your thoughts?
Mine: If she was making it up, there were 200 or so people on the plane who could call her on it. A writer making up a story to make a name for herself won't have a job very long. And what about the flight attendents? Was them passing notes also made up?
..asking anyone else on board that day to respond...to verify/validate this story!
"Is it possible that this was a test by our authorities to test the reaction of the flight crew and passengers to a possible terrorist situation?"
I've been thinking about the overt nature of their acts and I'm wondering now if that wasn't just to probe responses. What if all these 'test runs' that people have been noticing are designed to plant the idea in everyone's mind that we have to keep our eyes on the ME people who carry instrument cases and keep going to the bathroom, etc? Then, when they're ready for the real attack, they send two groups onto a plane: ME guys to act up in order to draw the marshalls and passengers attention, and a second group of non-ME guys (or gals) to do whatever it is they plan to do. While half the plane is wrestling down the ME guys, the others could set off the bomb or do whatever.
The other possibility is that all this has been meant to draw security resources to air travel when their actual target is something else.
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