Hijackers in the September 11 attacks

The Hijackings

American Airlines flight 11 is crashed into the north side of the northern tower of the World Trade Center at 8:48 AM EDT (some accounts say 8:45 AM EDT and 8:46 AM EDT). A member of the flight crew pressed a switch that permitted air traffic controllers to overhear at 8:28 AM EDT: "Don't do anything foolish. You are not going to get hurt. We have more planes. We have other planes."

A passenger on United Airlines flight 175, Peter Hanson, called his father from the plane reporting that hijackers were stabbing flight attendants in order to force the crew to open the cockpit doors. At 9:03 AM EDT, the plane is crashed into the south side of the southern tower of the World Trade Center.

On American Airlines flight 77, Barbara K. Olson called her husband, Solicitor General Theodore Olson at the Justice Department at 9:25 from the plane to tell him about the hijacking and to report that the passengers and pilots were held in the back of the plane. It is crashed into the western side of the Pentagon at 9:43 AM EDT, starting a violent fire.

On United Airlines flight 93, a passenger reached officials on his cell phone from the plane's rest room, repeatedly claiming that the plane was hijacked and that the call was not a hoax. Passengers speaking on cell phones had learned about the World Trade Center crashes and were planning on resisting the hijackers. One passenger told his wife that one person had already been stabbed to death by the hijackers. There is speculation that the passenger's resistance led to the plane crashing before it reached its intended target. At 10:10 AM EDT (other accounts say 10:03 AM EDT), the plane crashed southeast of Pittsburgh in Somerset county, Pennsylvania.

The Hijackers

There were 19 hijackers in all; five on three of the flights, four on one.

Many of the terrorist hijackers appeared to be traveling with false passports, assuming the identities of other people. Saudis Saeed Alghamdi, Abdulaziz Alomari, and Waleed M. Alshehri, whose photographs have appeared on CNN and other media outlets, have spoken to Saudi newspapers since the attack.

Their profiles do not seem to match that of past suicide terrorists (young, poor, uneducated and indoctrinated): many were in their late twenties and thirties, most with college educations, and had lived for prolonged periods of time in western countries.

Note that there has been a great variation in the spelling of the names of the alleged hijackers in differing accounts of the attacks- one good example being the Alshehri brothers from Flight 11. This is because there is no one correct way of translating from Arabic script to English letters.

It is interesting to note that in a Gallup survey of 10,000 inhabitants of sample Islamic countries only 18% believed that the Arabs were responsible.

The suspected hijackers aboard American Airlines flight 11 used the names

• Waleed Alshehri
• Wail M. Alshehri
• Mohammad Atta
• Abdulaziz Alomari
• Satam Al Suqami

Mohammad Atta is believed to be the pilot of Flight 11.

Aboard United Airlines flight 175 the suspected hijackers used the names

• Marwan Alshehhi
• Fayez Banihammad
• Mohald Alshehri
• Hamza Al Ghamdi
• Ahmed Al Ghamdi

Marwan Alshehhi is believed to be the pilot of Flight 175.

Those believed to be the hijackers aboard American Airlines flight 77 used the names

• Khalid al-Mihdhar
• Majed Moqued
• Nawaf al-Hazmi
• Salem Al Hazmi
• Hani Hanjour

Hani Hanjour is believed to be the pilot of Flight 77.

The suspected hijackers aboard United Airlines flight 93 used the names

• Ahmed Al Haznawi
• Ahmed Alnami
• Ziad Jarrah
• Saeed Alghamdi

Ziad Jarrah is believed to be the pilot of Flight 93.

September 11, 2001 Terrorist Attack - Full Timeline
In Memoriam - Casualties - Missing Persons - Survivors - Personal experiences
Give Blood - Donations - Assistance - Closings and Cancellations - Memorials and Services
US Governmental Response - Responsibility - Hijackers - World political effects - World economic effects

See also: World Trade Center -- Pentagon -- New York City -- Washington, D.C. -- AA Flight 11 -- UA Flight 75 -- AA Flight 77 -- UA Flight 93 -- U.S. Department of Defense -- terrorism -- domestic terrorism -- Osama bin Laden -- Taliban -- Islamism -- Afghanistan -- collective trauma -- September 11

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External Links and References

• A Terrorist Profile Emerges That Confounds the Experts The New York Times 15-September-2001
• F.B.I. Documents Detail the Movements of 19 Men Believed to Be Hijackers The New York Times 15-September-2001 To be incorporated
• FLIGHT SCHOOL: Learning Where Suspects Studied Is 'Trickier Than It Sounds' The New York Times 15-September-2001 To be incorporated

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