9/11 Explained

Katie, Matt and Al, thank you so much this morning. Good morning, everybody, again. For the second time in two weeks, the U.S. has lost an unmanned spy plane over Iraq. Iraq claims it shot down the remote-controlled Predator aircraft near Basra in the Southern No-Fly Zone. I'm Mr. Beat. This one gets personal for me. It was a Tuesday. I was a first-year student at the University of Kansas in Lawrence, Kansas, and I was living in the dorms right behind me. Yeah, on the 7th floor of Oliver Hall. I was kind of a lazy bum back then, and Tuesdays were my easy day. I had a job, but I didn't have to work that day. I had a full schedule of classes, but my first class wasn't until 7pm that night. It was an Introduction to Film class with the legendary director Kevin Wilmot, by the way. But yeah, I had stayed up late the night before, studying, as I did most Monday nights because of my easy days on Tuesday. But regardless, that Tuesday morning, at 8.30am, the phone kept ringing. This is not a cell phone, but like a regular phone. We had regular phones still back then. I was annoyed, but I finally rolled over and answered the phone. It was my roommate's mother, and she was hysterical. Turn on the TV! Turn on the TV! So I turned on the TV, and I would have seen something like this. Right, oh my god, another plane has just hit another building. Flew right into the middle of it. Explosion. Oh my god, it's right in the middle of the building. This went into the East Tower. Yes, yes, right in the middle of the building. And right now, that definitely looked like it was on purpose. Here's the story of the September 11th attacks, often simply referred to as 9-11. On the morning of September 11, 2001, 19 men boarded four planes, two Boeing 757s and two Boeing 767s, headed to California and taking off out of Logan International Airport in Boston, Newark Liberty International Airport in Newark, New Jersey, and Washington Dulles International Airport in Virginia. Fifteen of these men were from Saudi Arabia, two from the United Arab Emirates, one from Egypt, and one from Lebanon. All of them were in the country legally through visas. All of them were affiliated with the militant Islamist group al-Qaeda. The planes all had light passenger loads. The men split into four teams to board the four planes. Each team had at least one person who could fly a plane. For them, it was a suicide mission, but apparently not all the men involved knew that. Soon after takeoff, they hijacked all four planes. At around 8.14 a.m. local time, which was about 15 minutes after the flight left Boston, five hijackers injured at least three people, possibly killing one, to force their way into the cockpit. One of the hijackers, Mohammad Atta, took over flying the plane and redirected it to New York City. Nobody move, please. We're going back to the airport. Don't try to make any stupid moves. Around 30 minutes later, Atta intentionally crashed the plane into the North Tower of the World Trade Center, hitting between floors 93 and 99. It hit the building at a speed of 465 mph, or 748 kilometers per hour. The plane carried around 10,000 gallons, or 38,000 liters, of jet fuel. Most witnesses at first assumed it was an accident, that the plane had some sort of failure and was trying to land but accidentally hit the building. Well, when a second plane came roaring through Manhattan 17 minutes later, they knew it wasn't an accident. Around 8.45 a.m. local time, which was about 30 minutes after the flight left Boston, five hijackers used knives and bomb threats to take over the plane. They stabbed the flight crew and killed both pilots. Marwan al-Shahi took over flying the plane. Soon after this, the plane got just 300 feet, or 90 meters, away from hitting another flight headed from Hartford to Tampa, but al-Shahi recovered and redirected the plane toward New York City. As the plane approached Manhattan, passengers would have seen the massive smoke coming from the first plane crash. Moments later, al-Shahi intentionally crashed the plane into the South Tower of the World Trade Center, hitting between floors 77 and 85. It hit the building at an angle at 500 miles per hour, or 800 kilometers per hour. This plane carried 9,100 gallons, or 34,000 liters, of jet fuel. Because so many people already had their eyes glued to the North Tower of the World Trade Center, especially since major broadcast networks were showing it live, at least millions witnessed the impact of this second crash, live. That looks like a second plane. We just saw another plane coming in from the side. Yes, and that's the second explosion. You can see the plane come in just from the right-hand side of the screen. Explosions, multiple explosions, ladies and gentlemen. We just saw another explosion. Parts of the plane, including one of its engines, ended up blocks away from the World Trade Center. The tens of thousands who witnessed it on the ground were horrified. Some froze. Many ran away. But many heroes ran toward the Twin Towers of the World Trade Center with the intention of saving as many people as possible who were trapped in the buildings. 24 minutes later, President Bush made his first public statements about the attacks, as all of the students and teachers had gathered there. Two airplanes have crashed into the World Trade Center in an apparent terrorist attack on our country. He then quickly hopped on Air Force One to safety, landing at multiple Air Force bases throughout the day before finally making it back to the White House that night. Meanwhile, five hijackers had taken over a third plane. This one had left Virginia at 820 a.m. local time. About 34 minutes after takeoff, the hijackers took over the plane, although we don't know exactly how. Pani Honjor took over flying the plane, and it was somewhere over Pike County, Ohio, when he turned the plane around to head back toward Washington, D.C., the capital of the United States. At around 9.37 a.m. local time, it crashed into the west side of the Pentagon, which is the famous headquarters building of the United States Department of Defense. The plane hit the Pentagon at a staggering speed of 530 miles per hour, or 853 kilometers per hour, at first floor level. It was such a big impact that the front part of the plane disintegrated. The rest of the plane kept moving forward for a fraction of a second, progressively destroying segments of the Pentagon further inward. Oh, my goodness. We're looking at a live picture from Washington, and there is smoke pouring out of the Pentagon. It would appear that there has been another major explosion, this one in the nation's capital. You are looking at a scene of apparent blast aftermath. There is smoke in the air over the Pentagon. We don't know whether this is the result of a bomb or whether it is yet another aircraft that has targeted a symbol of the United States power, but there is smoke pouring out of the Pentagon. This is coming at 9.43 eastern time. Just minutes after the third plane crashed, the Federal Aviation Administration ordered all planes in the country grounded. Nine minutes before Flight 77 crashed into the Pentagon, four hijackers had taken over a fourth flight, which took off out of Newark about 45 minutes before. We don't know why the hijackers on Flight 93 waited so long before they began to take over the plane, but they apparently also used knives and possibly a bomb threat to take it over. Ziad Jarrah took over flying the plane, and many believe it had redirected also back toward Washington, D.C., possibly with the White House or Capitol Building as a target. However, on this flight, some passengers got word of what had already happened with the other three planes at the World Trade Center and Pentagon. This flight was also exceptional with the amount of passengers who were able to communicate with folks outside of the plane via cell phones. Maybe you have to listen to me carefully. I'm on a plane that's been hijacked. I'm on the plane. I'm calling from the plane. I want to tell you I love you. Please tell my children that I love them very much, and I'm so sorry, babe. I don't know what to say. There's three guys. They've hijacked the plane. I'm trying to be calm. We're turned around, and I've heard that there's planes that's been thrown into the World Trade Center. I hope to be able to see your face again, baby. I love you. At around 9.57 am local time, 20 minutes after the Pentagon crash, the passengers united on United to begin a revolt against the hijackers. According to the best evidence we have, they were able to make their way to the cockpit, but the plane would still crash in a field near Shanksville, Pennsylvania. It impacted at a crazy 563 miles per hour, or 906 kilometers per hour, leaving a crater up to 10 feet or 3 meters deep and 50 feet or 12 meters wide. Everyone on board, who wasn't dead already, died immediately on impact. Flight 93 was the only hijacker plane that did not reach its intended target. The passengers who led the revolt, to this day, are seen as heroes. The 265 passengers on all four planes died. Meanwhile, back in New York City, things were looking worse and worse. But let's go back a little bit. Completed in 1973, the World Trade Center complex was very big. So big it had its own zip code, in fact. It sat on 16 acres, but more impressively, the square footage of its seven buildings was 13.4 million. The Twin Towers were often a backdrop for establishing shots of New York City in movies and TV shows. An underground shopping mall connected six of the buildings. On a typical weekday before 9-11, the World Trade Center complex was a bustling place, home to more than 430 companies and an estimated 50,000 workers. Another estimated 140,000 visitors passed through it every day. September 11 wasn't the first time terrorists attacked the World Trade Center. On February 26, 1993, terrorists, also linked to militant Islamist groups, detonated explosives in a van parked beneath the North Tower. That ended up killing six people and injuring more than 1,000. And yet, on September 11, the Twin Towers of the World Trade Center, which at one point were the tallest two buildings in the world, were not designed for complete evacuation during a major crisis. That morning, an estimated 15,000 to 20,000 people were in the Twin Towers. After the planes crashed into the towers, thousands frantically rushed down three narrow stairwells in each one, while firefighters and others rushed into the buildings to help the injured, some even going up the stairwells. Still, thousands remained trapped. For those trapped above where the planes hit, the situation was particularly hopeless. At least 200 people either fell or jumped to their deaths from the burning towers, mostly to escape the extreme heat or smoke they were enduring above. At about 9.59, the South Tower, which again was hit more at an angle and at a lower point than the North Tower, began to collapse. Just 56 minutes after Flight 175 hit it, tens of millions see it live in horror. After the roar of the collapse ended, huge clouds of pulverized concrete and gypsum rushed through the surrounding areas. People ran in panic, trying to escape the clouds, but many got stuck in them, breathing in extremely harmful particles. 4 World Trade Center, which was next to the South Tower, was also destroyed by the debris. At about 10.28, the North Tower began to collapse, one hour and 42 minutes after the impact of the plane. As the North Tower had collapsed, it also took out buildings next to it. It destroyed a Marriott Hotel. 6 World Trade Center, also destroyed from the debris of the North Tower. Even 7 World Trade Center, which was across the street from 6 World Trade Center, got a lot of damage from the debris from the North Tower. 5 World Trade Center got the least damage in the complex. It was shocking, to say the least, to see two giant buildings just collapse like that so quickly, not that long after these two commercial planes hit them. Experts later described their fall as a, quote, progressive collapse, or a type of collapse that happens when a building's structural elements are compromised, resulting in further structural failure. But if that wasn't enough, it was so hot that aluminum from the planes melted and found its way down the staircases in the buildings. When water from sprinkler systems going off mixed with molten aluminum, it likely caused a highly explosive exothermic reaction. Down in Virginia, at 1050, five stories of the Pentagon collapsed due to a still-burning fire. Three minutes later, the Secretary of Defense at the time, Donald Rumsfeld, ordered the American military placed at DEFCON 3, which means the Air Force had to be ready to mobilize in 15 minutes. By now, politicians and journalists had speculated that these attacks were an act of war, and many already mentioned someone to blame- Osama bin Laden. More on him in a bit. After all the debris finally cleared, after the massive debris cloud finally started to dissipate, massive rescue efforts would go on the rest of the day and into the night at the World Trade Center. The last survivor would be found in the rubble 27 hours after the collapse of the North Tower. But rescuers had to pause their efforts at times due to fear of more buildings collapsing because stuff kept burning. The most notorious building that later came down was 7 World Trade Center, which caught lots of folks off guard when it collapsed around 5.21pm that evening. Its collapse later fueled lots of conspiracy theories, especially since this British journalist reported the building collapsed even though it was 30 minutes before it actually collapsed. But, other than that strange event, experts say Building 7 went down mostly due to its extreme physical damage from debris and fires, as well as its weird construction. Thankfully, no one was still in the 47-story building when it went down. At 8.30pm, President Bush gave an address to the American people. The pictures of airplanes flying into buildings, fires burning, huge structures collapsing, have filled us with disbelief, terrible sadness, and a quiet, unyielding anger. These acts of mass murder were intended to frighten our nation into chaos and retreat, but they have failed. Yeah, uh, little did he know that fear would drive most of American foreign policy for the next 20 years. So that night, after spending all day in this building behind me, glued to the TV, along with my roommates, everybody that lived on my floor at all gathered and watched the news reports as updates came in. I was like, uh, I guess I'll go to class. What else am I gonna do? So I went to my 7pm introduction to film class with Professor Wilmot. I get there, and everybody is there. We all kind of just wanted to be together. There was a sign on the board that said class is canceled, but we all just hung out anyway. On the big screen, there was CNN playing the latest reports, and Professor Wilmot and all of us students just still kind of in a daze, kept our eyes glued to the screen. The next morning, I pick up a copy of the New York Times, and it now hangs up on my wall. Oh yeah, this is when people still read newspapers. This nation stands with the people of New York City, New Jersey, and Connecticut as we mourn the loss of thousands of our citizens. I can hear you, and the people of them, all of us soon. I remember watching that impromptu speech given by President Bush three days after 9-11, and getting fired up and feeling proud of my country. The country had been divided in Bush's first year as President, but now, at least for a short time, they were united behind him. His approval rating even got as high as 92% around this time. Still, the main thing myself and many other Americans were wondering was WHY? Why did they attack us? Well, as it turns out, lots of people hated American military involvement around the world. In particular, one dude, who I mentioned earlier, was particularly outspoken about it. Osama bin Laden. Not only did the American government, and even the government of the United Kingdom, quickly assume he orchestrated the attacks, but much of the media also assumed the same. However, Bin Laden denied his involvement in 9-11. And others say it may have been this dude, Khalid Sheikh Mohammed, who was really the one who orchestrated the whole thing. Regardless, it was soon pretty clear that al Qaeda was responsible for the 9-11 attacks. And who was al Qaeda's leader? Osama bin Laden. In a video released, suspiciously, right before the Presidential election of 2004, bin Laden would finally admit responsibility for the 9-11 attacks. Before that, he said it was motivated by American support of attacking Muslims around the world, as well as the presence of American troops in his home country of Saudi Arabia, sanctions against Iraq, and American supports of Israel. Bin Laden went into hiding right after 9-11 to avoid capture by the United States military or its allies. For nearly ten years, there was a huge manhunt for bin Laden in both Afghanistan and Pakistan. They finally found him hiding in a compound in Abbottabad, Pakistan. On May 1, 2011, then-President Barack Obama ordered Navy SEALs to raid it, and they ended up killing him. Meanwhile, Khalid Sheikh Mohammed had also confessed to the 9-11 attacks. He had been captured back in 2003 and confessed in 2007. That said, his interrogators tortured him to get him to confess, so many question how big of a role Mohammed actually had in planning the attacks. He has been at the Guantanamo Bay detention camp in Cuba ever since, and at the time of the recording of this video still has yet to get a trial. In 2004, Mrs. Beat, who was not Mrs. Beat yet, and I went to New York City and we visited Ground Zero, and at that time it was just a patch of dirt with a chain-linked fence around it. All that would dramatically change over the next few years. They rebuilt the World Trade Center. Today, One World Trade Center, also nicknamed Freedom Tower, is the tallest building in the Western Hemisphere, built to memorialize and honor the victims of the 9-11 attacks. Its base can resist bombs, and the new complex is the National September 11 Memorial and Museum, and more buildings are still yet to come. The United States military also went after other Al-Qaeda leaders after 9-11, but that was just part of something much bigger known as the War on Terror. Our war on terror begins with Al-Qaeda, but it does not end there. It will not end until every terrorist group of global reach has been found, stopped, and defeated. Now, this war will not be like the war against Iraq a decade ago, with a decisive liberation of territory and a swift conclusion. It will not look like the air war above Kosovo two years ago, where no ground troops were used and not a single American was lost in combat. Our response involves far more than instant retaliation and isolated strikes. Americans should not expect one battle, but a lengthy campaign, unlike any other we have ever seen. Just days after 9-11, Congress overwhelmingly voted to overthrow the Taliban, the Islamist military organization kind of ruling in Afghanistan. The official reason? They had refused to hand over Osama bin Laden, who had been there leading his Al-Qaeda operations. Well, American troops invaded Afghanistan to mostly defeat the Taliban and their Al-Qaeda allies in what became known as the War in Afghanistan. However, the American military, along with NATO forces, found itself stuck there for nearly 20 years as it had a hard time getting the local Afghans to defend themselves, and the Taliban never went away. They just hid out in the boonies of the country. Anyway, that ended up being the longest war in American history, and ultimately the Taliban took back over 20 years later. Back home, the federal government became much more invasive in the lives of ordinary people due to the fear of terrorism. With the signing of the Authorization for Use of Military Force, Congress gave the President more power than he'd ever had before. Basically, a blank check for endless warfare in the name of stopping terrorism. Congress also created an entire federal executive department called the Department of Homeland Security that specialized in anti-terrorism and border security measures. And with the Department of Homeland Security came the Transportation Security Administration, or TSA. This is why it now takes so long to get through airport security. And if you've ever felt violated by the TSA, keep in mind this was just one new power the federal government got out of many new powers that would lead to a new threat to civil liberties. Congress also passed the Patriot Act, which expanded law enforcement surveillance capabilities and made it easier for the federal government to spy on people. It also said the indefinite detention without trial of immigrants was ok. And I haven't even mentioned the Iraq War yet. Meh. That's probably gonna have to be a separate video. Mainly because of all the controversial stuff the United States government did after 9-11, there have been many, many conspiracy theories about the 9-11 attacks. Oh, I used to go down the rabbit hole of 9-11 conspiracy theories. In 2006, in fact, I convinced Mrs. Beat to come with me to a coffee shop in Omaha when we lived there to watch this new documentary called Loose Change. Loose Change, which made the argument that the 9-11 attacks were a false flag operation, was pretty successful and even had sequels. This was at the height of 9-11 conspiracy theory mania in the late 2000s. However, nearly all their claims can now be fairly easily debunked. Look, I say this as someone who used to go deep on 9-11 conspiracy message boards. Like, really deep. Now, it's worth bringing up that the 9-11 Commission Report, a deep investigation about 9-11 released in late 2002, had some issues and left some questions unanswered. This ultimately led to many, including families who lost loved ones on 9-11, to call for a new investigation. That has yet to happen. Ok, let's somehow wrap this up. It's getting hot out here. The 9-11 attacks are the deadliest terrorist attacks in world history. They were also the deadliest attacks on American soil in the country's history. Nearly 3,000 people died. More than 6,000 were injured. Of the deaths, 2,606 were in the World Trade Center and the surrounding area, and 125 were at the Pentagon. More than 90 countries lost citizens. The ages ranged from 2 to 85. In the 20 years since 9-11, thousands of firefighters and first responders have died from cancers and other health conditions related from trying to save people that day. Thousands of others who worked or lived near Ground Zero have also been diagnosed with cancer due to being exposed to carcinogens after the buildings collapsed. And that war on terrorism I mentioned earlier lasts to this day. Even today, possibly as you are watching this right now, the United States continues to drop bombs on suspected terrorists. According to one study, this war on terrorism has displaced tens of millions of people. It has possibly taken as many as 1 million lives and cost tens of trillions of dollars. And it all goes back to September 11. 9-11 defined an entire generation. If you are watching this and you're over the age of 25, you probably grew up fearing bin Laden and terrorism and you remember exactly where you were on September 11, 2001, just like I do. Oh, by the way, these dorms where I used to live and where I first found out that Tuesday morning about the two planes that crashed into the Twin Towers will soon be demolished. It's 9-1 Tomorrow marks the 20th anniversary of the September 11 attacks. I have two questions. The first one is for the older folks. If you were old enough to remember what happened on September 11, what do you remember about that day? I'm sure you remember a lot. I want to hear all about it. And my second question is for the young folks who were either too young on September 11 to remember it or you were born after September 11. What are you actually taught about September 11 in school? Are you actually taught that much about it? Let me know in the comments. Thanks for watching.