Forensics don't lie. The forensics of the airplane showed
*no explosive material of the type associated with any known warhead, and certainly not on any "Stinger" type missile.
*This was explained away in "First Strike" as the (what I will call) "attack" missile didn't explode---it "passed through." This would be more unusual than electric static charge, more about which I will comment in a moment.
*Since Saunders had no explosive residue, he then focused on the infamous "red residue" that he claimed could be evidence of a "pass through" missile---i.e., one that didn't explode but simply passed through the airplane. Problem: this also would not cause the explosion. Saunders then hypothesized that such a missile wasn't the "attack" missile, but now changed his story to claim it was an off-course drone from a Navy exercise being chased by an "attack" missile. Ok, so now we have TWO missiles, neither of which showed up on ANY radar screen anywhere.
I have yet to find any military person who thinks a Stinger, given the range, altitude, and distance, could have reached TWA 800. It was at the very, very extreme end of a Stinger IF . . . IF . . . the shooter was perfectly situated underneath TWA 800. But then see problem #1: no explosive residue.
The so-called red residue of a pass through missile was explained by other chemical reactions, and for such a pass through missile to have been the culprit, it would have left massive, other consistent signatures everywhere---in hull entry, throughout every piece of recovered (compromised) material. No such evidence was ever found.
No radar has ever detected missile evidence; the Navy staunchly denied ever conducting tests, and no Navy person has ever once broken with that denial.
As to the static electricity, this was reproduced on the show "Mythbusters" a few years ago. They achieved a fuel tank explosion under similar (not exact) conditions that to them was stunning in the violence of the explosion. It literally blew their test article apart.
The Mythbusters did nothing to reduce the oxygen content of the atmosphere around their test subject to mirror the oxygen content in the center fuel tank of TWA800 at 12,000'-14,000'. Since they didn't do this their "test" was meaningless....
Rubbish.
There are multiple unidentifieds on the radar images.
That is if you believe the government line.
Ok, you are presuming that the wiring is on the inside of the tank. The pilots I spoke with said no. The wiring is on the outside of the tank.
What caused the tank to explode? I have seen pictures of the tank, and it is bowed from the outside in. Why is that? I am no expert, but it seems to me that if the tank exploded it would bow outwards. True?
No explosive residue? Perhaps.
But propellant residue might well be another story.
I understand the point, and I know a shoulder fired manpad didn’t have the slant range to take down TWA800 unless it was perfectly in flight path, yet if there was a genuine fuel tank error with a shorted pump, why weren’t all 747’s GROUNDED to repair the prblem ??