Why didn't they shoot down the planes when they went off course?

I was wondering that as well. The Pentagon is surrounded with ground-to-air missiles, right?

BTW, does anyone know the requirements to give blood? How long do we have to have been back from foreign countries, etc?

 

too small to stop a jet-liner. They can blow out an engine, but the momentum of the plane would carry it onward.

 

Huh?

You just can't shoot down a commercial aircraft. No one knew the planes had been hijacked. What if they had lost their engines? Would you shoot them down? No.

The controllers probably did attempt to contact the planes when they went off course. They were probably concerned. They probably did alert officials. We don't know.

The controllers probably assumed the planes were headed for the NYC area airports.

 

I think you are dealing with both response issues and safety issues. If you assume it takes at least 10 minutes or so to determine there really is a problem, another 5 or 6 to deploy the aircraft, another 7 or 8 minutes to engage, you still have to decide how you are supposed to engage a passenger plane, where it might land and what if you miss!

I think it is safe to say that this simply was not a scenario anyone imagined.

 

A plane flies off course and you're asking for it to be shot down?! Before today, did you think in your wildest dreams that a plane would be aimed at the World Trade Center buildings? If a plane were hijacked, do you just automatically shoot it down? Of course not.... you let it land wherever its captors intend to take it, then attempt to negotiate or board the plane.

There was nothing anyone could do about this.

 

Only about two miles away from the Reagan International Airport. All planes are normally forced over the River, but when your in this type of situation who knows what to do. Airport could have been part of the problem somehow, but you'd like to think the Pentagon would have been prepared for something like this.

All that being said, remember the crash landing at the whitehouse. Anything is possible when people are involved. Humans make human decisions.

 

The first couple of planes is understandable, but there should've been (or I hope there will be in the future) some fighter jet presence to minimize the effects.

The second one should not have made its target.

Although, if you think about it, even if they knew the first couple (in different locations) were hijacked, the first reaction is not to shoot them down. We expect there to be demands and for the hijackers to land somewhere, be it in this country or somewhere else. That's what has happened in the past.

There needs to be a new contingency plan to protect people from situations like this from happening again.

 

Some rumors around that the plane that crashed in Pennsylvania was indeed shot down.

It does make sense...why would they crash it there, in a remote location?? Or maybe the pilot was able to struggle with the hijacker?

Old School

 

Dr of Dunk: one of the pilots managed to punch the "hijak" button, right?

Besides, those crashes were apart by like half an hour. Shouldn't the latter two have been stopped?

 

Who cares how it happened! it happened. now its pay back time! i hope we bring the nukes out for this one, this is can not go unpunished. Bush just said he was going to hunt down and punish who ever was responsible for this. okay maybe nukes might be overkill, but an all out assault on bin laden(sp?) wouldn't be.

 

Actually I think that the first 2 were 18 minutes apart (someone correct me please). Picture it :

First plane hits.
It probably takes 5 minutes before anyone even realizes what in God's name has just happened. The focus is on rescue efforts. Also, I don't know if anyone pressed a "hijack button" on the first plane. They may have.
You're asking someone to intercept another plane within about 10 minutes. It would probably take 5-10 minutes just to get people in to an interceptor plane.
Fine, you have the interceptor targeting the 2nd plane. By the time the interceptor reaches the 2nd plane, guess what? You're over freakin' NYC... do you fire at that point? Do they even know this plane is hijacked?

You guys are acting as if they had 1-2 hours to respond.

By the time anyone realizes what is wrong, it's too late.

 

I think it was more along the lines of 10-12 minutes on the first two planes at the WTC.

The point is that the planes went off course and (presumably) refused radio contact. That is suspicious. From now on I guess it is likely that those planes will be shot down. And probably should. Great news for Amtrak.

This is a new era. It is a shame that such a predicted tragedy of these proportions had to occur to accelerate our readiness and preparedness and resolve.

 

The Dr. is dead on. 18 minutes was all they had between the two. And I don't think anybody realized exactly what happened with the first plane at the time.

And - somebody correct me on this - was the second plane closer from it's point of takeoff, or did they both originate from the same general area?

 

Both planes were from Logan in Boston.

The airport was cited last year for having some of the laxest security in the nation. They didn't take it seirously - publicly denied the report in fact.