Hanjour piloted the plane. FBI investigators have officially concluded that 11 of the 19 terrorists who hijacked the aircraft on 11 September did not know they were on a suicide mission, Whitehall . The Mossad killed him. [38] These beliefs were even stronger during Operation Infinite Reach, which he believed that Monica Lewinsky was a Jewish agent influencing Bill Clinton against aiding Palestine, which would later play a key role in creating the Hamburg Cell. By the time it took off, Mohammed Atta was just four minutes away from hitting the North Tower of the World Trade Center. Something is not right. - United Airlines Flight 175 (traveling from Boston to Los Angeles) strikes the South Tower of the World Trade Center . [59][60], From July 13 to 16, Atta stayed at the Hotel Sant Jordi in Tarragona. His mother, Bouthayna Mohamed Mustapha Sheraqi, came from a wealthy farming and trading family and was also educated. The incident joins the short but tantalizing list of near-miss encounters involving Mr. Atta. . Shave excess hair from the body and wear cologne. The leader of the nineteen was Mohamed Atta, and they were divided into four groups, one for each plane, each with a pilot who served as group leader: Atta, Marwan al-Shehhi, Ziad Samir Jarrah . When they later returned to Huffman, Mr. Pursell said, they were reprimanded. Tuohey was the ticket agent at the Portland International Jetport who handed two of the terrorists - Mohamed Atta and Abdulaziz al-Omari - their boarding passes for an early morning flight to . Turning toward New York. Mohamed Atta accepted and was in Germany two weeks later, in July. Al-Omari chose 8G and al-Suqami chose 10B in Business Class. [34] His friends in Germany described him as an intelligent man in whom religious convictions and political motives held equal sway. Waleed purchased his ticket online with his debit card. He said he wanted to visit the World Trade Center and asked Bryant about the security there. Jarrah had arrived in the United States on June 27, 2000, after his flight landed at Newark, New Jersey, and Jarrah had decided to go with Shehhi and Atta to search for different flight schools in the US. refused to comment on whether any official investigation had ever been started against the two men, citing the criminal investigation into the hijackings. "Nothing they said or did raised any suspicions at all," he told the commission's investigators. Days later, Shehhi, Jarrah and Atta ended up in Venice, Florida. On August 26, Saudi brothers Waleed and Wail al-Shehri also purchased tickets for the same flight. Almost all of these points discuss spiritual preparation, such as prayer and citing religious scripture. He rented a Chevrolet Malibu from an Alamo Rent A Car agency. [83][84][85], Atta and al-Omari arrived early the next morning, at 5:40a.m., at the Portland International Jetport, where they left their rental car in the parking lot and boarded at 6:00a.m. Colgan Air (US Airways Express) BE-1900C flight to Logan International Airport in Boston. Evidently, he tried to deliver a message instructing the passengers and crew to stay put over the cabin's PA system, but pressed the wrong switch and thereby tipped off ATC that the flight had been hijacked. "[113] In turn, political scientist Robert Pape has claimed that Atta was motivated by his commitment to the political cause, that he was psychologically normal, and that he was "not readily characterized as depressed, not unable to enjoy life, not detached from friends and society. [88] At 6:45a.m., while at the Boston airport, Atta took a call from Flight 175 hijacker Marwan al-Shehhi. Apr. Atta took control of the plane and crashed it into the North Tower of the World Trade Center at 8:46a.m.[6] The crash led to the collapse of the skyscraper and the deaths of more than 1,600 people. According to the interrogations of KSM and Ramzi Bin al-Shibh (his interlocutor in Germany), Mohammed Atta was worried about the communications, Atta's real concern being that Jarrah might be unable to break away from his wife, that it would just be too painful in the end for him to follow through with his suicide flight. Mr. Kraus said Mr. Atta and Mr. Shehhi told him they had not been aware that they needed to radio the tower for instructions. On the morning of 9/11, Atta and Al-Omari drove to Portland International Jetport and boarded a 6 a.m. commuter flight to Boston's Logan International Airport. Skies, Plot Leader Met bin Laden", "Video of 9/11 ringleader Mohammed Atta posted by British news site", "FBI Informant Says Agents Missed Chance to Stop 9/11 Ringleader Mohammed Atta", "Flight Path Study American Airlines Flight 11", "Personal Stories Who Were They? The couple explained at dinner that they ran an exchange program and invited Atta to continue his studies in Germany; they also offered him room and board at their home in the city. Atta was seated in business class, in seat 8D. He was let go from the firm in 1997, however, because its business had declined and "his draughtsmanship was not needed" after it bought a CAD system. [40] Before this trip he grew out a beard, with a view to show himself as a devout Muslim and to make a political gesture thereby. Some say it was the makeup of Jarrah's team, that he had only three instead of four muscle men (because the 20th hijacker and his fourth was denied entry into the U.S.). The hijackers in the September 11 attacks were 19 men affiliated with the militant Islamist group al-Qaeda.They hailed from four countries; 15 of them were citizens of Saudi Arabia, two were from the United Arab Emirates, one was from Egypt, and one from Lebanon.To carry out the attacks, the hijackers were organized into four teams, each led by a pilot-trained hijacker who would commandeer the . You may have heard about recently. In the Czech Republic, some intelligence officials say the source of the purported meeting was an Arab informant who approached the Czech intelligence service with his sighting of Atta only after Atta's photograph had appeared in newspapers all over the world. Instead, he went to Central Office & Travel in Pompano Beach to purchase a ticket for a flight to Newark, leaving on the evening of August 7 and schedule to return in the evening on August 9. [38] Even before bin al-Shibh had arrived, Atta, Shehhi, and Jarrah were sent to the House of Ghamdi near bin Laden's home in Kandahar, where he was waiting to meet them. Bin al-Shibh was worried that Jarrah might even abandon the plan. He had vacationed often as a child (and would continue to take vacations with his wife while he was in the United States) and was the best English speaker and student of the four. They were on a suicide flight. A spokesman for the F.A.A. Just stay quiet and you will be OK. We are returning to the airport." Mohamed Atta Flight Record. During that period, his roommates grew annoyed with him. On Sept. 12, 2001, investigators combed over the field near Shanksville, Pa., where United Flight 93 crashed a day earlier. Months later both he and Jarrah enrolled at flying schools in America. Here's some background information about the 19 hijackers of September 11, 2001.. Timeline September 11, 2001 - Nineteen men hijack four commercial airlines loaded with fuel for cross country . Other hijackers traveled to Las Vegas at different times in the summer of 2001. The Mohamed Atta Files. The two had arrived in the United States from Saudi Arabia in April 2001 and joined Atta's team. By the time it took off, Mohammed Atta was just four minutes away from hitting the North Tower of the World Trade Center. [1][2][3][4][5] Having just turned 33 at the time of the attacks, he was the oldest of the 19 hijackers who took part in the mission. His father, who kept the family ever insulated, forbade young Atta to fraternize with the other children in their neighborhood. The 9/11 Commission obtained details about the meeting, based on interrogations of bin al-Shibh in the weeks after his arrest in September 2002. He was the hijacker-pilot of American Airlines Flight 11 which he crashed into the North Tower of the World Trade Center as part of the coordinated attacks. The second chapter showed Atta and Ziad Jarrah reading their wills together ten days later on January 18. Atta had lived in Germany for approximately five years and also had a "strong record as a student". On Oct. 6, 2021, a new episode of the "Your Mom's House" podcast was released . If you try to make any moves, you'll endanger yourself and the airplane.". He criticized how the newfangled skyscrapers and other modernizing projects were disrupting the fabric of communities by blocking common streets and altering the skyline. [108], Atta's father, Mohamed el-Amir Awad el-Sayed Atta, a retired lawyer in Egypt, vehemently rejected allegations his son was involved in the September 11 attacks, and instead accused the Mossad and the United States government of having a hand in framing his son. [31][32] Further, after the Egyptian government had imprisoned droves of political activists, he knew better than to trust it not to target him too, with his social and political beliefs being such as they were. In the summer of 2001, Mohamed Atta, the operational leader of the 9/11 conspiracy, drove another conspirator, Ziah Jarrah, to Miami's main airport so that Mr. Jarrah could fly to Germany to visit . The men who would become the pilots of the four hijacked planes began working on the plot in 1999, traveled to the US in 2000, and enrolled in flight training schools. LA Times Archives, Tracking the Flights Hijacked on 9/11, Last edited on 21 February 2023, at 21:12, [mmmd elmi wd essj.jed t], Ronald Reagan Washington National Airport, Computer Assisted Passenger Prescreening System, "On Path to the U.S. . Records on Atta's cellphone indicated that he phoned the Moroccan embassy in Washington on January 2, just before Shehhi flew to the country. On American Airlines Flight 11, Atta joined four other hijackers. Mohamed Atta had varied his name on documents, also using "Mehan Atta", "Mohammad El Amir", "Muhammad Atta", "Mohamed El Sayed", "Mohamed Elsayed", "Muhammad al-Amir", "Awag Al Sayyid Atta", and "Awad Al Sayad". After consulting with the other hijacker pilots about the flights they also booked on September 11, three days later Atta again visited aa.com and retrieved his reservations and paid for his flight for himself and A. al-Omari (one of his muscle men) using his VISA card. Miami International is controlled, that is, the tower controls the movement of all airplanes on the airfield. In June 2000, Atta, Ziad Jarrah and Marwan al-Shehhi arrived in the United States to learn how to pilot planes, obtaining instrument ratings in November. Atta phoned his graduate advisor, Machule, and mentioned family problems at home, saying, "Please understand, I don't want to talk about this. TERRORIST: Mohammed Atta's mum claims her son is still alive and in Guantanamo Bay . Twenty-three minutes later, Atta flew that plane into the North Tower of the World Trade Center. Atta returned to Hamburg in February 2000, and began inquiring about flight training in the United States. Atta, who piloted the first plane into the world trade center, flew to Las Vegas on June 28, rented a car, then spent . Atta's bags were later recovered in Logan International Airport, and they contained airline uniforms, flight manuals, and other items. The date for the planes operation is set. He . They inquired about multi-engine planes and told the instructor that "they wanted to move quickly, because they had a job waiting in their country upon completion of their training in the U.S." In mid-October, Atta and Shehhi returned to Huffman Aviation to continue training. Many al-Qaeda members lived in this apartment at various times, including hijacker Marwan al-Shehhi, Zakariya Essabar, and others. 2) Make sure you know all aspects of the plan well, and expect the . [19] In 1992, his father had overheard a German couple who were visiting Egypt's capital. They may have helped arrange and host the meeting in Tarragona. Dale Kraus, then the general manager at Huffman, recalled a telephone call that came within minutes of the incident in Miami from an irritated official in the flight tower. [43], On April 11, 1996, Atta signed his last will and testament at the mosque, officially declaring his Muslim beliefs and giving 18 instructions regarding his burial. [42] He made acquaintances at al-Quds; some of whom visited him on occasion at Centrumshaus. Mr. Kraus noted that the two men had been trained on smaller, ''uncontrolled'' airports that operate without flight towers. Another theory is that the 9/11 ringleader was concerned about a last-minute weather glitch or traffic jam in Boston. [25] The invitation had been for a three-day visit, but Atta ended up staying several weeks that August, only to visit Aleppo yet again that December. [51] They met three or four times a week to discuss their anti-American feelings and to plot possible attacks. Newsweek is reconstructing the road to 9/11 as it was constructed 20 years ago, day by day. Ringleader Mohammed Atta and at least four of the other 19 hijackers made six visits to Las Vegas between late May and mid-August of 2001. At 8:25 . [11] Atta was the only son; he had two older sisters who are both well-educated and successful in their careers one as a medical doctor and the other as a professor. [96] Mahmoud Atta, a naturalized U.S. citizen, was subsequently deported from Venezuela to the United States, extradited to Israel, tried and sentenced to life in prison. Beginning in May 2001, Atta assisted with the arrival of the muscle hijackers, and in July he traveled to Spain to meet with bin al-Shibh to finalize the plot. Just stay quiet, and you'll be okay. "[1][95], In the aftermath of the September 11, 2001 attacks, the names of the hijackers were released. But Atta's night before 9-11 which he spent in Portland, Main -- is a mystery that has puzzled terrorism experts for five years. They continued to inquire about flight schools and personally visited some, including Airman Flight School in Norman, Oklahoma, which they visited on July 3, 2000. He lived in Hamburg in the 1990's and is now believed to have trained at an Al-Qaida camp in Afghanistan in 1999. ''They said I'd hear back from them, which I never did.''. We are going back to the airport. identifies as one of the 19 hijackers, taxied a small private plane toward a runway when, unexpectedly, it stalled. The timing of the incident also apparently came near the end of the time Mr. Atta and Mr. Shehhi spent in Venice and the start of the months they spent in South Florida before the attacks. He believed that the drab and impersonal apartment blocks, built in the 60s and 70s, ruined the beauty of old neighborhoods and robbed their people of privacy and dignity. Air traffic controller Danielle O'Brien was at the Dulles Tower outside Washington, D.C., that morning. According to The Sunday Times, "American and German investigators have struggled to find evidence of Atta's whereabouts in January 2000 after he disappeared from Hamburg. In April, he was ticketed in South Florida for driving without a license. Atta did not take the return flight. The academic team inquired into the effects of redevelopment in the Islamic Cairo, the old quarter, which the government undertook to remodel for tourism. Jan 28, 2004 at 3:00 am. ", "Staff Report "We Have Some Planes": The Four Flights a Chronology", National Commission on Terrorist Attacks Upon the United States, "The Aviation Security System and the 9/11 Attacks Staff Statement No. [8][29] Among other odd jobs to supplement his income, Atta sometimes worked at a cleaning company and sometimes bought and sold cars. the suspected ringleader of the Sept. 11 hijackings and the pilot of the first plane to crash into the World Trade Center, was a homosexual. His travel to Pakistan and Afghanistan were also signs of radicalization, both of which were masked in the passports he used to enter the United States. Atta and Jarrah appear in high spirits, laughing and smiling in front of the camera. But with more than 200,000 warrants pending on minor offenses in Broward County, he was never picked up. He stayed there until 1998. "I suspect they were casing a fallback position to launch from if, for weather or security, they couldn't get out of Boston, Drumhiller said. "There's a real question there because he took a tremendous risk in going to Portland the night before and then having to catch a commuter flight to Boston, said Roger Cressey, who was director of transnational threats for President Bush's National Security Council. Atta stayed in Cairo awhile with his family after Hauth and Bodenstein flew back to Germany. The Egyptian Mohamed Atta arrived at the Florenc bus terminal in Prague, from Germany, on June 2, 2000. Mohamed Atta", "In Egypt, some see war on terror as a war on Islam", "Interview with Professor Dittmar Machule", "Four Corners Ralph Bodenstein interview", "Will Gives a Window into Suspect's Mind", "Germans Lay Out Early Qaeda Ties to 9/11 Hijackers", "Video showing Atta, bin Laden is unearthed", "Zacarias Moussauoi v. the United States (trial testimony)", "Transcript of Johnelle Bryant Interview", "Hijacker tried to get U.S. loan to buy plane", "Algerian accused in Britain of training hijackers", "Atta recibi en Tarragona joyas para que los miembros del 'comando' del 11-S se hiciesen pasar por ricos saudes", "War Without Borders The Madrid Bombing", "Search for Sept. 11 Suspect Focuses on a Visit to Spain", "Sept. 11 hijacker raised suspicions at border", Document links al Qaeda paymaster, 9/11 plotter, "NewsMine.org hijackers traced to huffman aviation.txt", "While America Slept: The True Story of 9/11", "A Mundane Itinerary on the Eve of Terror", "9/11 mystery: What was Atta doing on 9/10? By early 1993, Atta had moved into university housing with two roommates, in Centrumshaus. The incident, which occurred on a busy travel day at the country's ninth-busiest passenger airport, is especially notable because of how close it brought the two men to official scrutiny. They learned of a massive terrorist attack underway, concluding that they had to take action to down the plane: it was not being hijacked to land and for demands to be made. Mohamed Mohamed el-Amir Awad el-Sayed Atta (/t/ AT-ah; Arabic: [mmmd elmi wd essj.jed t]; September 1, 1968 September 11, 2001) was an Egyptian hijacker and the ringleader of the September 11 attacks in 2001 in which four United States airliners were commandeered with the intention of destroying specific civilian, military, and governmental targets. The night before, Atta went to Portland, Maine, a trip that has mystified terrorism experts for five years. Statements entered at . That month, Atta and Shehhi stayed in hotels and rented rooms in New York City on a short-term basis. They were all well-educated, had experience of living in western society, along with some English skills, and would be able to obtain visas. [8] He then worked for several months at the Urban Development Center in Cairo, where he joined various building projects and dispatched diverse architectural tasks. Atta flew to Spain on January 4, 2001, to coordinate with bin al-Shibh and returned to the United States on January 10. Some, like the 9/11 plot's ringleader, Mohamed Atta, flew in from Florida, checking into the King's Inn Motel in Wayne for a few days and then leaving and then returning days later. One of them came on Dec. 26 at Miami International Airport. [8] In his will, written in 1996, Atta gives his name as "Mohamed the son of Mohamed Elamir awad Elsayed". [9] He was known as Abd al-Rahman al-Misri by al-Qaeda. Undated photos of suspected hijackers of United Airlines flight #93 that crashed in rural Pennsylvania, released by the FBI September 27, 2001 in Washington, DC. Investigators believe the call was to confirm the attacks were ready to begin. On November 29, 1999, Mohamed Atta boarded Turkish Airlines Flight TK1662 from Hamburg to Istanbul, where he changed to flight TK1056 to Karachi, Pakistan. The hour-long tape places him in Afghanistan at a decisive moment in the development of the conspiracy when he was given operational command. Phillpott said that Shaffer was "relying on my recollection 100 percent," and the Defense Department Inspector General's report indicated that Philpott "may have exaggerated knowing Atta's identity because he supported using Able Danger's techniques to fight terrorism. A voice believed to be that of al Qaeda hijack leader Mohamed Atta urged passengers to . Although estimates range from 18 It's Easy to Get Knives and Razors Onto a Plane, the Hijackers Found, The FBI's Radical Fundamentalist Unit Ignored This Radical Fundamentalist. Atta and Amal appeared to be attracted to each other, but Atta soon decided that "she had a quite different orientation and that the emancipation of the young lady did not fit." Financial records and bank video show Atta and Al-Omari made two ATM withdrawals in Portland, and the men were reportedly spotted at an area Wal-Mart, as well as in the parking lot of a Pizza Hut restaurant. Had his conversations been monitored, the NSA would have heard the conversations of a husband and wife, talking about day-to-day life, in the German language, probably raising no suspicions. My name is Mohamed Atta. At 2:12 p.m. on August 25, Mohammed Atta logged into his . In Hamburg, Atta became involved with the al-Quds Mosque, where he met Marwan al-Shehhi, Ramzi bin al-Shibh, and Ziad Jarrah, together forming the Hamburg cell. There, Mr. Atta and Marwan al-Shehhi, another man the F.B.I. He is now with God. ET (approx.) According to Bryant, Atta wanted to finance the purchase of a crop-duster. [73] The absence of other hotel stays, signed receipts or credit card stubs has led investigators to believe that the men may have met in a safe house provided by other al-Qaeda operatives in Spain. The hijacked airliner came down . The luggage included a copy of Atta's will, written in Arabic, as well as a list of instructions, called "The Last Night". '', See the article in its original context from. Initially, Mohamed Atta's identity was confused with that of a native Jordanian, Mahmoud Mahmoud Atta, who bombed an Israeli bus in the West Bank in 1986, killing one and severely injuring three. He left Prague the next day, flying on Czech Airlines to Newark, New Jersey, U.S. For Mohamed Atta, the meticulous and intensely disciplined figure who is believed to have helped organize the Sept. 11 attacks, mistakes did happen, or at least nearly did.