Open Letter to NTSB - re: Flight 587 Debris Field in Jamaica Bay and Other Debris on Land

USRead; emails ^ | 12/5/02 | Victor Trombettas

[Beach_Babe]

From: victor@usread.com [mailto:victor@usread.com]
Sent: Thursday, December 05, 2002 4:33 PM
To: Ted Lopatkiewicz
Subject: Open Letter in Re Jamaica Bay Pictures & Other Debris

To Whom It May Concern At The NTSB:

U.S.Read and The Wave are requesting the following from the NTSB related to the debris field in Jamaica Bay, and debris found on land a distance from the crash site:

1. Make available all photographs and video NTSB may possess taken in Jamaica Bay on November 12th, 2001

2. The Public Information Division (DCPI) at the NYPD, has stated to U.S.Read that they will not release any photographs or videotape taken by the NYPD unless the NTSB explicitly gives the "o.k." to do so. Therefore, U.S.Read and The Wave request that the NTSB contact DCPI at the NYPD and grant that authorization. Phone number for Lieutenant Burke at DCPI will be provided below. NTSB should specifically request that pictures taken by any NYPD units, including but not limited to:

(a) The Crime Scene Unit (CSU) in Jamaica, NY
(b) The Harbor Unit at Floyd Bennett Field
(c) The 100th Precinct

... should be released to U.S.Read and The Wave.

The CSU has informed U.S.Read that such pictures are considered "crime scene evidence" and "are never released except under order by a Judge". U.S.Read informed CSU that the NTSB announced at the Flight 587 Hearings that criminal activity has been ruled out, but CSU needs to hear this from the NTSB. CSU's phone number will also be provided below.

3. NTSB has in their possession several pictures taken by Witness # 321 of debris in the Bay that he and his friends recovered and then turned over to either an NYPD or Coast Guard vessel. This witness' boat was just east of the flight path along with witnesses # 18 and #122. U.S.Read and The Wave request the release of all the pictures surrendered to you by Witness # 321.

4. Several, if not dozens, of pieces of debris from flight 587 landed up to 3/4 statute mile away from the crash site, on land. Aside from the engines and tail section, the NTSB has provided no pictures in the Structures reports of that debris. Your Structures Report mentions the "left wingtip" at 116th Street but there was no specific mention or pictures of the following, for example:

(a) two "panels" found on the roof of the Rockaway Sunset Diner at 116th Street and Beach Channel Drive. These pieces were at least 8 square feet each.

(b) Witness # 292 describes a 4 foot by 4 foot section picked up at 116th street

(c) the left winglet at 125th street and Cronston Ave.

(d) what appeared to be a crew member's or flight attendant's seat belt near the winglet at 125th street. I have the names of the two residents who picked it up and surrendered it to the authorities. The seat belt was slightly sooted and left some residue on their hands.

U.S.Read requests the release of pictures (with descriptions) of all debris recovered away from the crash site and that the NTSB produce a map of this debris field. Seasoned Air Crash Investigators are surprised to learn that such a map does not exist.

5. On July 10th, 2002, a Rockaway resident submitted to an NYPD detective charred pages from a book (in English text) entitled "Manual of Islamic Behavior", that were said to have been recovered at the crash site. The FBI recovered other pages from this book on the day of the crash. The resident who surrendered the pages from this book to the NYPD did so with the understanding that a copy would be made and returned to this resident. This was not done. The NYPD forwarded these pages to FBI Special Agent (name withheld) in Queens, NY. The NYPD stated to U.S.Read that this is "an ongoing criminal investigation". U.S.Read sees yet another instance where the NTSB should update the NYPD (and perhaps the FBI) that this is an ongoing "accident" investigation. This might encourage the FBI to release the pages from the book back to the resident, or, if the FBI has connected these pages to a specific passenger on board 587, then perhaps the Family Affairs Office at the NTSB should ensure that the family of the passenger will be given this and any other personal effects the FBI may be withholding. Either way, there seems to be no legal basis (since there is no criminal investigation) for the FBI to continue holding this debris that either belongs to the resident who found it or to the family of the passenger.

The requests for Jamaica Bay pictures have been initiated due to corroborated eyewitness statements in the NTSB's Flight 587 docket, and in followup interviews with those witnesses by U.S.Read, that:

(a) luggage and escape chute(s) were seen falling out of the sky along with flight 587 and ...

(b) luggage and possibly one escape chute/raft were seen floating in Jamaica Bay immediately after the crash.

NTSB's current position, as you informed U.S.Read, is that no such debris fell into the Bay, or away from the main crash site.

Contacts:
1. DCPI @ NYPD - 646-610-xxxx, ext 8792
2. Crime Scene Unit - 718-558-xxxx and xxxx

Thank you

Victor Trombettas
victor@usread.com
U.S.Read / The Wave

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From: Lopatkiewicz Ted
Date: Fri, 6 Dec 2002 09:40:24 –0500
To: "'victor@usread.com'" victor@usread.com
Cc: FOIA foia@ntsb.gov
Subject: RE: Open Letter in Re Jamaica Bay Pictures & Other Debris

We have no wish or intention to interject ourselves into the document release procedures of other agencies.

As to the records in our possession, I am forwarding your request to our Freedom of Information Office, which is the proper entity to handle these matters.

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From: Lopatkiewicz Ted lopatt@ntsb.gov
Date: Fri, 6 Dec 2002 09:42:43 –0500
To: "'victor@usread.com'" victor@usread.com
Subject: RE: Open Letter in Re Jamaica Bay Pictures & Other Debris

Also, Victor, don't put words in our mouth. We said we had no information that such items as you asked about were recovered from the bay.

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From: victor@usread.com [mailto:victor@usread.com]
Sent: Friday, December 06, 2002 10:46 AM
To: Lopatkiewicz Ted
Subject: Re: Open Letter in Re Jamaica Bay Pictures & Other Debris

Please don't change your wording and then accuse me of doing that.

I didn't ask if you had information. I asked simply if such debris was recovered. And your one word response was "negative". Now ... if you wish to clarify your statement, that's fine.

But saying you "have no information" is not accurate because you *did* have that information ... provided to you by witnesses the week of the crash. The real questions here of course are ... what happened to this debris? Did it all sink? Was it recovered by NYPD or Coast Guard and ... somehow ... the NTSB never got wind of it?

…and if this debris was there, how did it get there? What events on board 587 precipitated such a catastrophic and sudden fuselage breakup?

I spoke with Witness 117 last night, Ed, and spoke to his co-worker Andre--they were looking east from their truck at Floyd Bennett Field and saw a large square sized object, that looked to them like a luggage container, fall from 587 (from an area behind the wings in the belly of the craft) around the same time the tail blew off. They were both adamant this was not the tail or tail debris. This large object did not flutter down like the tail debris. It just fell straight down quickly into the Bay quite a distance from the seawall.

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Subj: Re: Open Letter in Re Jamaica Bay Pictures & Other Debris
Date: 12/6/02 10:51:58 AM Eastern Standard Time
From: victor@usread.com
To: lopatt@ntsb.gov

thank you

I will forward your reply to the NYPD and inform them that the decision is theirs to make and the NTSB has no objection to their release of 587-related documents.

Victor

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From: Lopatkiewicz Ted lopatt@ntsb.gov
Date: Fri, 6 Dec 2002 10:55:49 –0500
To: "'victor@usread.com'" victor@usread.com
Subject: RE: Open Letter in Re Jamaica Bay Pictures & Other Debris

What I'm saying is that us saying it wasn't recovered is not the same as saying it didn't fall into the bay. Right?

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Subj: Re: Open Letter in Re Jamaica Bay Pictures & Other Debris
Date: 12/6/02 11:36:33 AM Eastern Standard Time
From: victor@usread.com
To: lopatt@ntsb.gov

Oh please Ted

I didn't know we would have to dissect our words like this. But I have to remember, you work in D.C. The Word Dissection Capital.

Let's dissect: I said on Dec 4th : "While I have your attention ... was any of the following debris in the Bay?

a. Luggage or packages or any personal effects including papers and books.
b. any section of the fuselage
c. escape slide/raft"

OK? I said: "in the Bay".

You said "negative". You said two days ago what today you claim you didn't say.

Actually Ted, the real issue here is not this play on words. If I had lost a loved one on 587, I'd want to know that every stone was turned over, that the Bay was thoroughly and completely scanned ... every piece of crap pulled up from the Bay around the flight path of 587. I know for a fact the NYPD Harbor Unit didn't do this. I informed you of this several months ago. The NYPD was willing to go back out and re-scan the Bay. Instead, the door was slammed shut. Therefore, officially, no one did a complete scan of the Bay. At least not that the Public knows of.

Just now ... I got off the phone with witness #321, a Supervisor with the Dept of Sanitation in NYC who was in a boat in Jamaica Bay only a mile or so east of 587. He saw a parachute-like (undeployed) object descend from 587. Mind you ... most people have never seen an evacuation chute as in the attached (I'm only speculating that's what he saw, in some degree of deployment ... but let's assume for a moment). He said to me it was long and white .. he said it looked like a condom. A condom ... now how does a witness mistake pieces of the rudder, tail, engine, left wingtip, for a long white parachute or condom unless he's tripping on some really bad drugs? He's not the only witness to describe parachute or chute or raft-type objects or luggage falling from the sky and then floating in the Bay.

The FBI also received this information from some witnesses and didn't write it up.

Does even the remotest possibility that this was indeed debris from the interior of 587 in any way change the nature of this investigation. That's what inquiring minds want to know.

Victor

[eno_]

This AB was not FBW.

This is significant in two ways: a) What you cited as possible problems don't apply; b) FBW would have been more resilient to a bomb on board.

[eno_]

LEARTIST signed up 2002-12-06.

New shill, old discredited theory.

[copycat]

Your analysis starts late in the game, and ignores the eyewitness testimony of scores of Americans who witnessed FIRE or SMOKE before the tail separated.

Jet "exploded into pieces"
Feds Downplay Flt. 587 Explosion Reports

Breakup of Airliner is captured on security film.
Flight 587 Video Shows "Puff of Smoke" in Sky
FBI Sitting on Flt. 587 Videotape

Accident Theories Falling Like Dominoes (a collection of trial balloons)
Air Turbulence May Be Factor in Jetline Crash, Officials Say
Sabotage Explains Fight 587 Crash, Expert Says

JetBlue Pilot Saw American Airlines Crash
Flt. 587 Eyewitnesses insist Expolsion Came Before Tail Broke Off
Flight 587 probe focusing on what made tail fall off

Flight 587 Witnesses Blast Feds
Flight 587:Video May Hold the Key

[copycat]

Flt. 587 Eyewitnesses Insist Explosion Came Before Tail Broke Off

Two eyewitness to the Nov. 12 crash of American Airlines Flight 587 said over the weekend that investigators for the National Transportation Safety Board are wrong to focus on potential structural defects as the cause of the disaster - insisting instead that the plane's tail came off over New York's Jamaica Bay only after it exploded in a fireball.

"It was after the explosion," eyewitness Tom Lynch, a retired firefighter, told the New York Post. "I'm telling you, the tail was there until the second explosion."

"No tail fell off, not before the explosion. I swear to that," Lynch told the paper's Steve Dunleavy.

The eyewitness said there was absolutely no doubt about what he saw.

"I had my head up taking in that beautiful, clear day and was staring straight at the plane. It made a bank turn and suddenly there was an explosion, orange and black, on the right-hand side of the fuselage. It was a small explosion, about half the size of a car."

He continued:

"The plane kept on going straight for about two or three seconds as if nothing had happened, then ‘vwoof' - the second, big explosion on the right wing, orange and black. It was only then that the plane fell apart. It was after the explosion and I'm telling you, the tail was there until the second explosion."

Lynch, who lives near the Belle Harbor, N.Y. crash site, said he knew thirteen others who also saw the explosion and/or fire.




The next step in this dance is for you to discredit your fellow Americans who witnessed these two EXPLOSIONS.

[eno_]

LEARTIST shows up brand new to flog another dead theory, agreeing somewhat with Narby. I think Narby has an "invisible friend."

[Joan912]

Can someone please tell me how yet another airline disaster/terrorist-related coverup can possibly help our nation in any way? Is the NTSB trying to give the impression that air travel is safe or are other government agencies pretending that there is no real Islamic threat in this country? Is this all about funding? Accountability? Political correctness? I am confused.

[Burn24]

It's about money. I have no doubt 587 was sabotage, but, coming so soon after 9/11, it would have caused a stock market crash. The pity of it is the families of all these people never got help.

[eno_]

It goes along with Tom Ridge's attempt to claim the anthrax was not "weaponized" and the even earlier claims that the first anthrax victim "drank water from a stream while hunting" and somehow came down with inhalation anthrax.

Why the impulse to cover up? There could be many reasons: CLinton not having the balls to do anything. Fear of collapsing the airlines (that's water under the bridge now). A strange dance where we use the fact AQ does not "take credit" to try to reduce the effect of terrorism attacks. Bureaucratic ass covering to cover up security failures. "Multiculturalist" PC. Take your pick.

I happen to think it is stupid. We are on the brink of war in which we could take millions of civilian casualties in a bioweapons attack. We could go nuclear. We could face missiles with nukes from North Korea. The people need to know how serious the situation is.

[Beach_Babe]

Many believe that the crash of Flight 587 was linked to terrorism and that government officials are deceiving the public about the investigation. Skeptics denounce any accusations of terrorism by saying that it is not in the government’s best interest to lie to the American public about airline safety or what happened in the case of Flight 587. I beg to differ.

It would be in the government’s best interest to lie to us because of the fact that they just bailed out the airline industry to the tune of more than a billion dollars. If that doesn’t illustrate the enormous significance of the airline industry on the economy, I don’t know what does.

Also, we were in the midst of the biggest holiday traveling season of the year. We were also in a recession. We needed methods of jump starting the economy, and the government was in no position to throw any more money around with a shrinking surplus. Simply put, the government wanted people to travel by air and they were doing everything to assure the public that the airports and airlines are safe. If the eyewitness reports were true, it would make all the sense in the world why the government is not telling us the truth about Flight 587.

Telling the truth would lead to further destruction of the airline industry. Everyone would find alternate methods of travel, just to avoid getting on a plane.

Telling the truth would mean mass hysteria and widespread panic about continued attacks against us.

Telling the truth would mar our "success" in the war on terrorism because the downing of Flight 587 would undoubtedly prove that we are still vulnerable on any given day. I think you get the point.

While the NTSB’s explanation(s) for the crash seem valid, the claims made by the eyewitnesses cannot, and should not, be dismissed. They are far too credible. Furthermore, what would these guys have to gain by lying to the FBI or NTSB?

It is so ironic that many of the eyewitnesses are former representatives of the NYPD and the FDNY, the agencies that are supposed to be the epitome of truth and honor. Sadly, they now find themselves in the position of having to defend their claims and their honor.

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[wtc911]

Why I don't agree with you that the tail "just fell off"

For a solid week before this incident The Feds were telling us all to watch for "something big". Well something big happened and within 12 hours the Feds were calling it an accident.

Numerous sober minded witnesses told local news teams (I am local to that area and may have seen coverage that you did not) that they heard an explosion, looked up and saw flames before the plane crashed. These people were on the spot eyewitnesses, many of whom were NYPD and FDNY current or retired personnel, not the sort to mis-report.

If the tail just fell off why were the hundreds of other craft in the airbus fleet immediately grounded? UPS uses these craft in the hundreds.

Bottom line, I'm not buying it.

[timestax]

Why I don't agree with you that the tail "just fell off" For a solid week before this incident The Feds were telling us all to watch for "something big". Well something big happened and within 12 hours the Feds were calling it an accident. Numerous sober minded witnesses told local news teams (I am local to that area and may have seen coverage that you did not) that they heard an explosion, looked up and saw flames before the plane crashed. These people were on the spot eyewitnesses, many of whom were NYPD and FDNY current or retired personnel, not the sort to mis-report. If the tail just fell off why were the hundreds of other craft in the airbus fleet immediately grounded? UPS uses these craft in the hundreds. Bottom line, I'm not buying it. 35 posted on 01/14/2003 1:47 PM PST by wtc911 [ Post Reply

DITTO...couldn't have said it any better!!

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