Return to Transcripts main page
American Morning
America Under Attack: New Details on Suspects Starting to Surface
Aired September 14, 2001 - 11:09 ET
THIS IS A RUSH TRANSCRIPT. THIS COPY MAY NOT BE IN ITS FINAL FORM AND MAY BE UPDATED.
THIS IS A RUSH TRANSCRIPT. THIS COPY MAY NOT BE IN ITS FINAL FORM AND MAY BE UPDATED.
DARYN KAGAN, CNN ANCHOR: We told you right off the top about a new development in the investigation, new list that CNN has obtained of the 18 suspects that government officials believe are responsible and we onboard those four planes that were hijacked and crashed on Tuesday.
Our Mike Boettcher is following the latest on the investigation.
Go with us and take a look at the list and tell us what kind of information we can glean from that, Mike.
MIKE BOETTCHER, CNN CORRESPONDENT: Well, this list was obtained and compiled by federal law enforcement sources. It is a list of the suspected terrorists who died onboard those four aircrafts. The spelling on the list, we will show you now, are as they appear on federal documents and may vary from other spellings being used. On American Airline Flight 11 from Boston to Los Angeles that hit the second World Trade Center tower: Walid Al Sherhi; Wail Alsheri, aka Waleed Alsheri; Mohammad Atta, we'll talk about him more in just a minute; Aabdul Alomari; Satam Sugami.
Next, to United Airlines Flight 175 from Boston to Los Angeles, it hit the south tower of the World Trade Center: Marawn Alsherri; Fayez Ahmed; Mohald Alshehri; Hamza Al Ghamdi; Ahmed Al Ghamdi.
On United Airlines Flight 93 from Newark to San Francisco, that's the plane that crashed in Pennsylvania: Ahmed Al Haznawi; Ahmed Alnami; Ziad Jarrah; Saeed Alghamdi.
On American Airlines Flight 77 from Dulles to Los Angeles, that is the aircraft that struck the Pentagon: Khalid Almihdhar; Majed Moqued; Nawaf Al Hazmi; Salem Al Hazmi.
Now, let's go back now to one of the people onboard American Airlines Flight 11, that hit the second World Trade Center tower, he is Mohammad Atta. We have some information on him, perhaps more than any of the rest of these people. Let's look at his travels over the past couple of years. He was in Hamburg, Germany in the 1990s, where he studied and got equivalent of a masters in construction engineering. And then in July 2000, approximately, he showed up in Venice, Florida at a flight training school, Huffman Aviation, where he and another one of the people on the list of 18, Marawn Alsherri, obtained some initial flight training. They stayed with a man named Mr. Voss, who was their flight instructor. They didn't get along very well, apparently, with these two people in their house, and they asked them to leave. He them moved into a home in Coral Springs, Florida -- rather, an apartment; that was in December of 2000. And then also in December of 2000 he went to a company in Opa-Locka, Florida called Flight Sim. Now, at this company Atta and two other men, who we don't have the identities of, walked up and said we want to buy 727 simulator time. That's about $1500 worth of time. The instructor said OK, they paid in cash. And he said they were very interested in straight level flight and how to make turns, but weren't very interested in take-offs and landings; he thought that was very odd. And now even though Mohammad Atta carries a United Arab Emirates passport, this man said he talked an awful lot about Egypt.
From there in August of 2001 we pick up the trail again in Pompano Beach, Florida at Warrick Rental Car, where he rented two cars in succession over the period of about a month. The last car he rented, over a period of two weeks, he drove about three thousand miles, so he was traveling an awful lot there in the last part of August, in the first of September.
Then he moves to Palm Beach County, Florida, where he took two refresher flights in a piper aircraft. He said he wanted to refresh his skills, and he took only three flights, although initially he said he wanted to take 100 hours.
And then he ended up in Portland, Maine. Right before Portland, Maine, though, he went to Boston, Massachusetts, rented a car from the Alamo car rental agency there, then drove to Portland, Maine, and then caught a connecting flight on Tuesday morning from Portland to Boston. And of course we know what happened next.
We're trying to develop the same information on the rest of the people on this list, but Mohammad Atta is one of the people that we know the most about, and it gives you an idea of the amount of preparation, the amount of money that was spent, and the fact that this wasn't planned in a weekend, this was planned over a long period of time.
KAGAN: Fascinating stuff how you're connecting the dots, Mike.
Thank you for that information. We'll check back with you.
TO ORDER A VIDEO OF THIS TRANSCRIPT, PLEASE CALL 800-CNN-NEWS OR USE OUR SECURE ONLINE ORDER FORM LOCATED AT www.fdch.com
