Why Congress Must Reopen the TWA 800 Investigation

The American Thinker ^ | 7-7-14 | Jack Cashill

[Lower Deck]

The story as I understand it is that the missile test involved an advanced missile that was designed to track down its target using the target aircraft's radio transmissions, not its heat signature. This would explain why it's actually necessary to test the effectiveness of the weapon close to a major metropolitan area where there is a lot of background "radio noise" that would have to be overcome in order for the weapon to work effectively.

Such a missile would be worthless, being easily defeated by merely turning off your radio. And even if one existed it would be far easier, far safer, and far more secure from a secrecy standpoint to simulate radio traffic on a military range. Easily done electronically.

[G Larry]

What do you call mistakenly flying live nukes to Barksdale?

[diogenes ghost]

ATCS is Air Traffic Control Specialist. I was one of dem for 35 years, 13 in Chicago ARTCC.

I did not stipulate the exact conditions for TWA800, which you tried to do, but failed.

I was the last controller to work Happy31, a KC-135 which blew up over Wonder Lake, IL in '82. Loose VHF connector caused .......wait for it......a FUEL TANK EXPLOSION, raining 27 bodies over the countryside.

Disinfo attempt? Tell it to the families of those 27 servicemen, butthead.

[Neidermeyer]

I didn’t read the article fully ... I don’t need to ... we have approximately 30,000 commercial aircraft ,, all burn kerosene .. a rather stable fuel ... and I believe fuel pumps are generally external to the tanks for ease of maintenance.

We also have over 300,000,000 automobiles in this country ... over 98% burn gasoline , and almost every one built in the last 25 years has a fuel pump inside the fuel tank and at some point the electric pump connections , typically simple spade connections , are exposed to fuel vapor and not liquid fuel... I have never heard of or seen reported a fuel tank explosion from a car ,, and in a car it is much more likely to have a minimal amount of fuel heat soak off of hot pavement (the fuel tank bottom being less than a foot from the asphalt) ... which was a takeaway from the investigation into TWA800...

[Neidermeyer]

I think Bush simply chose to look the other way and accept the Clinton administration finding
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Bush had the truth ,,, and simply decided not to tar and feather Clinton.

[Neidermeyer]

If you’re a terrorist looking to down a flight then why are you using a missile to begin with? What if you miss? In the pre-911 days it would have been easier to smuggle a bomb on board in the luggage that could have been set to take the plane down at any time. And your chances of success are much higher than shooting off a missile.
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Luggage ? yeah sure why not ... but being that air cargo was not screened before 09/11/2001 and was not screened for years afterwards why not simply bring a truckload of bombs to the air cargo office and mail them to a dozen different destinations? you could down a dozen aircraft with simple altimeter triggers for pennies.

[garryowenartillery]

Jeez... Deja Vu thread,

Calling Mike Rivero and _Jim.

[brothers4thID]

Not this again...

[Smokin' Joe]

IIRC, the FBI took over the crash investigation from the NTSB. That alone was highly irregular. It is enough to make one think someone wanted control of the information at higher levels.

Ordinarily, the NTSB would do their thing, and the Feebies would be brought in to consult if there appeared to be a criminal origin of the problem. If there was no criminal (or terrorist) act, the Feebies wouldn't have a hand in it--it'd be one for the engineers to sort out.

[Smokin' Joe]

What do you call mistakenly flying live nukes to Barksdale?

A message.

There are a few levels of security those nukes would have to pass before ever getting loaded out.

[G Larry]

I was a nuke weapons specialist in the early 70’s.

I don’t need any instruction on how its supposed to be.

My point is that security went to hell when they dissolved SAC in ‘92.

[Smokin' Joe]

All the guys I knew at Minot were very serious when it came down to nukes, and I'll let my point stand for those who aren't as in the know as you are.

If you ever see them moving weapons out to the silos, you'd see that, too.

Nobody wants to be the one who let one fall into the wrong hands.

The bottom line, though (for the tourists' benefit) is that it takes more than just lax security (at a few levels) to even get the weapon on the apron, much less send it out of town--and this was more than one weapon.

[G Larry]

Partial List:
Command Authority
Base Commander
MOSR-Schedule Statused daily and far in advance
Base Safety
Base Security
Wing Commander
Munitions Control
...and that’s just for the weapons.
The Aircraft manifesting is an entire new layer!

[Smokin' Joe]

Seems like just a bit too much slop to be ‘sloppy’. My guess is that they orders came down, the ‘discovery’ was planned to make a point, and everything happened just like it was supposed to.

[G Larry]

I don’t see the point of moving weapons and then pretending it shouldn’t have happened.

If you’re trying to send a message, why not issue a direct order for the move?

What was going on at the time that we’d have wanted to send a message?

[Smokin' Joe]

Iraq

[G Larry]

IF you’re trying to send a message, why not issue a direct order for the move?

[Smokin' Joe]

Issue a direct order, and that becomes something that would not be well received by the world (prepositioning nukes to attack another country).

Having them show up at the jumping off point for the Middle East during developing hostilities is a not-so-subtle reminder that they can be delivered any time, without an issuing an overt threat that becomes a political hot potato.