18 years to the day since 9/11

I am currently reading a book by Simon reeve the investigative journalist and now does programmes for the BBC. he wrote a book after the first World Trade bombing alerting everyone to the problems of Al Queda and the fact that the World trade would be attacked again. No one listened and the book bombed...…. until of course it happened.
How did the worlds so called finest intelligence mob miss it but he didn't ?


Slightly off topic but relevant i suppose..... Its been mooted that it's the same reason that we couldn't crack the enigma machine in WW2 until the right team was established by Denniston. The CIA and intelligence services are predominantly white / male / well educated . (all tending to see things through the same filters).... The brits originally tried to crack the Enigma machine using mathematicians (code breakers) but didn't get anywhere. Only by opening up the group to other different ways of thinking was the solution found (Deniston even placed a crossword in the newspapers and ran a competition to identify those that could crack it)
 
Never ever forget that day. Found out I was going be a dad for the first time in the morning. Watch the towers fall down sat in a caravan in Devon.

Then went to Plymouth Swansea at night.
 
We could have been on the same flight. Wierdly I booked for myself and my 2 daughters to go about 3 days after it, figuring it would be the safest time to fly. The price was unreal and they threw everything in. The manager of the hotel reckoned that if it wasn't for the Brits still flying Florida would have shut down.
Went a year earlier and apart from airport security everything was so easy, and why not. The reality was I booked a flying lesson around the Florida Keys and didn't have to show one scrap of ID. I just pulled off the highway and 20 minutes later I was in the air..........

Just to add, I was a manager of a chauffeur Co working just off the airport at Atlas house at the end of the runway, 90% of our business was airport transfers and the boss called me in to see the TV screens. I honestly thought it was a film until the second one hit, then reality hit home. Apart from the shock of it my first thought was it was going to be a very long day, it certainly was in a very strange way.
 
I can never forget Arundhati Roy's speech in 2002 called Come September - should be required viewing for all, particularly Americans

 
I did Florida a few years before 9/11. Getting through Manchester was hard, guards checking everyone before they got to the check out, I had one dick question me because I 'had never travelled anywhere' because I had no stamps on my passport. I told him the in Europe you did not get a stamp. BUT coming back, we flew from a small airfield, Sarasota ? onto Boston and then home. There were absolutely no checks done. I remember saying to my wife that if I wanted to carry out a terrorist attack on the US I would do it from within as they were so complacent. They thought the attacks would be from abroad, it did not occur to them that the terrorist could already be in America !
I said similar after my US visit in '96. Got on one plane and there's people sat in our seats who couldn't produce paperwork to prove they were even on the right plane, they just wanted to sit near friends. We'd booked seats to sit as a group with 2 others but the other Americans on the plane just bellowed at us to sit anywhere despite us showing our paperwork proving we were right.
 
I am currently reading a book by Simon reeve the investigative journalist and now does programmes for the BBC. he wrote a book after the first World Trade bombing alerting everyone to the problems of Al Queda and the fact that the World trade would be attacked again. No one listened and the book bombed...…. until of course it happened.
How did the worlds so called finest intelligence mob miss it but he didn't ?

Well he might have predicted it, but that is still a far way away from actually knowing when and how it would be attacked again.
 
I am currently reading a book by Simon reeve the investigative journalist and now does programmes for the BBC. he wrote a book after the first World Trade bombing alerting everyone to the problems of Al Queda and the fact that the World trade would be attacked again. No one listened and the book bombed...…. until of course it happened.
How did the worlds so called finest intelligence mob miss it but he didn't ?
Well he might have predicted it, but that is still a far way away from actually knowing when and how it would be attacked again.
He's definitely not the only one who predicted it:
 
I was in a meeting most of the day where 'know-nowt' HR tossers were presenting how my job was changing.

Came out ready to hit somebody, put the radio on in the car and Parry was talking about what had happened. The meeting didn't seem to matter much as the reality dawned.
 
I flew into NYC last night, with the Twin Tower lights lit up. Eerie, but an excellent homage.

Lost a friend, First Officer LeRoy Homer, in the Shanksville crash (Flt 93). Heard the CVR of their attack. Not pretty listening to someone you know die and then listening to the person who murdered him on the aircraft radio.

There is currently a Flt 93 memorial (pictures of each crew member with a biography, flowers, flags, etc.) in Terminal C at Newark, which is where the flight left from.

To this day, there are Stars and Stripes flown (every day) at the gates from which each flight left.

It certainly changed my life!!!
 

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