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My best recollection has me seeing the video of a flare or rocket off on the horizon ending in flames in the sky. Then there was wreckage falling. Is this what you remember? I usual watch late news so I would have been up at the time. I also remember going to bed thinking and knowing that this was a terrorist act based on the video and not an accident or mechanical malfunction. I called my father-in-law the next morning and he saw the same thing and felt the same way.

One has to consider what happened to TWA 800 and then the Airbus that went down right after 9-11 when the tail came off and then consider the activity since studying IR missile countermeasures for commercial aircraft commissioned by the government and just reported by a think tank that it would be too expensive and not sufficient. The question is, why would the government be concerned if no such shoot-down ever happened?

I think the A-320 or 318 was shot down and the missile went for the hot APU exhaust signature at the tail cone thereby blowing off the vertical fin and causing the crash. On the B747 the APU exhaust is on the wing root or near the center fuel tank. The APU exhaust is an important feature because military spec'd IR seekers are tuned for a wavelength that is more visible at higher temperatures like those found on low bypass turbofans and APUs. The high bypass engines of commercial engines are much cooler than the seeker is looking for. The seekers can be tuned to "see" the cooler parts though but they will be overall less effective because of contrast issues.