Did a plane really hit the pentagon?

[Zealot]

Oh yes, I honestly believe that there was an impact that caused the explosion! Just not a 757.

[Jack_www]

Hello. I usually hang around the Civ3 forums and just came accross this today. I was just wondering what made you start questioning if a plan did indeed crash into the pentagon???? I have not heard of or seen anything that would contradict the news reports that a plane was crashed into the pentagon. First we know that something crashed into it. What other explannation do you guys have if the plane did not crash into the pentagon, then what did? I dont know why anyone would want to trick people into to thinking that a plan hit the pentagon, when really something else happened? To much media coverage to try and cover up something like that and make people think something else really happened. Too many people saw what happened. You mush remember that the plan was fully loaded with fuel for a cross country trip and most of the plane was blown in to very small pieces when it crashed into the pentagon.

[Jack_www]

Re: Re: Where's the black box?

Originally posted by Sava


If the black box always survives... why don't they make the whole plane out of a black box?

There is a very good reason for that. Today cars and planes are designed to crush when they hit something. The goal of this is to extend the time of the impact so that the force that is exereted on the people in the plane is not smaller and thus people will be able to survive the crash. If they made planes and cars like black boxes the cars and planes would come out of the crash in pretty good shape, but the people inside would not be so lucky. It all comes down to impluse. What this is the average force that is necassary to stop something over a given period of time. Say it takes 2000 lb of force to stop a car going at a certain speed. Let say it takes the car 2 seconds to stop, then that means 1000 lbs of force has to be exerted on the car each second untill it stops. But if you increase the time it takes the car to stop to lets say 5 seconds then the force that needs to be exerted on the car each second is 400 lb a second. Much smaller. Imagine if you were in the car, and it stop in 2 second, how much of a force would be exerted on you. I dont think a 1000lb of force bieing applied to your body would be very good for you. So that is why the dont have planes like black boxes, so that the time of impact and be lengthen and thus give the people inside a greator chance of living through the crash.

[Grrr]

Originally posted by Velociryx
Sava - Just out of curiosity, since when does questioning something make one an idiot or a troll? Especially in light of the fact that the pentagon's OWN FOOTAGE never actually shows a plane? I think it's a fair question....my apologies if you don't, but I can agree to disagree with you *without* calling you an idiot.

Slow - The day of the attack, they were interviewing lots of people on the street in and around the area. One group of people interviewed were sitting at some coffee bar/shop a few blocks away when a large section of the plane's engine came down on the sidewalk/street outside. This was only one of SEVERAL sizeable portions of debris that came directly from the planes that day. Nothing like that at the Pentagon site, however.

-=Vel=-

I must agree with you on this arguement Vel, but actually it there appear to be a plane in Sava's footage. In the highlighted area you can see what appears to be a planes tail. However, as to the height that Tingkai gave, it appears to be at ground level

[Arrian]

Well, yeah, that and the fact that a plane as strong as a black box would probably be too heavy to fly And certainly more expensive to build.

-Arrian

p.s. Vel, if you tire of the conspiracy theory discussion, swing by the strat forum.

[Grrr]

Zoomed

[Velociryx]

You got it, Arrian!

And Grr...yep....we're looking at that here at the office, trying to figure out exactly what it is. Don't really know....we're tying to clean up the image enough to tell.

If it IS a plane, then it's *radically* out of place....look how far it is from the building?! If that's a 45 degree angle then ummm....nahh...nevermind...lol

Anyway, yes...still trying to figure out what the heck that is....it's obvious too, in watching the film, that at least one and possibly 2-3 frames are missing...note the "jump" in the object between frames 1 & 2.

We've all seen footage of the space shuttle landing, so surely the pentagon's cameras are capable of capturing an object moving 250-500 mph on film. One would think so, at any rate.

-=Vel=-

[Grrr]

That is level, not 45°!
I put Tinkai's picture over the top. It seems to short to be a plane.

[Grrr]

That is level, not 45°!
I put Tinkai's picture over the top. It seems to short to be a plane.
Can't seem to get the PNG working, here's a JPEG.

[Grrr]

This is security camera footage right. Then why:

- Does the camera bob back and forth.
- Why are there missing frames.
- Why does the color balance constantly change, (Look at the carpark).
- Why are the corners cut off in frame two.
- How did they focus the camera?
- And WTF are those two things in front of the explosion in image two. Where are they in image one?

[Velociryx]

We've been puzzling that stuff out too, GRR...here's our analysis and answers to those questions. Not definitive, but what we've been able to piece together/deduce:

- Does the camera bob back and forth?: Unknown. Even if the camera is on a revolving base, the footage shot is too short to account for that level of movement (unless they just have the camera zipping around an rediculous speeds).

- Why are there missing frames?: Unknown. It appears obvious that there are at least a few frames missing, but that could have some "normal" explanations (if they're not using a digital recording device, it could just be old tape, rendering a frame unviewable, and so they nixed it for clarity).

- Why does the color balance constantly change, (Look at the carpark). ?: Unknown - Whatever accounts for the jittering motion of the camera may also be responsible for the change in hue in the various frames, although admittedly, the hue change makes the tape look suspect. Again, this can partly be explained away be old media, assuming a non-digital recording source.

- Why are the corners cut off in frame two?: Unknown, but it lends further credence to the notion of the footage being intentionally doctored.

- How did they focus the camera?: Given the nature of the building the camera is parked out front of, you'd expect a motion sensitive focus, however, it appears to be a static focus, given the fact that whatever the object in the background is, is so badly OUT of focus.

- And WTF are those two things in front of the explosion in image two. Where are they in image one?: This one, we got the answer for. I'm assuming you mean the boxy shaped silouette you can clearly see when the fireball begins.

If you notice, there's also a tree in front of that. Using the tree as a reference point, we were able to compare the film footage with the photos from the link that began this website. The tree is visible there as well, and near it, there's a small "outbuilding" that matches the shape of the silouette in the footage. That building is probably what you're seeing, backlit by the flames.

-=Vel=-

[Aeson]

Frame 2 does seem out of place, at first glance I thought it was doctored. In the other frames you can just barely see the round limit to the footage. The frames were cut out of this round area, to focus on the impact area. This definitely is not "clean" footage in that respect. The edges become more pronounced in frame 2 because it is cut from the top of that round footage. The smudges on the camera still maintain the same spacing in relation to the edges.

In an impact like that there is certain to be some sort of shock wave. The motion of the camera is probably due to that. Frame 2 has a much brighter subject matter (and probably moreso from the previous frame). If you stare at a bright light then look away, it takes a moment for your eyes to adjust. Camera's (especially digital) are also affected the same way. It also could just be from the digital formatting of the pictures for the web site. When the photos were compressed, the extra color range in frame 2 could have very easily caused a slightly different palette.

Overall I can't find anything wrong with the pictures other than the obviously missing frames. I'd assume a 30 fps camera. That would leave at least 4 or 5 frames where at least part of the airplane should be visable. The shock wave could have left some of them either too out of focus, or with the camera moved far enough to not include the subject matter. But the shock wave couldn't have hit until after the plane did in any case, there are missing frames.

Looking at the dark area Grrr was talking about, it seems those are trees in the background. I could be wrong but there are still similar dark shapes in the same area which remain through all 5 frames, just smudged by smoke/heat/debris in the air. The scale doesn't seem right for a 155 foot object, but it's hard to tell the exact depth, so it could be. The other problem is that I assume the plane would not be black, but rather metalic or light colored. With the angle of the sunlight there should be some reflection off a rounded object, regardless of the color. The dark area does conform to the shape quite well though, so I could be wrong.

[Tingkai]

Originally posted by Grrr
This is security camera footage right. Then why:

- Does the camera bob back and forth.
- Why are there missing frames.
- Why does the color balance constantly change, (Look at the carpark).
- Why are the corners cut off in frame two.
- How did they focus the camera?
- And WTF are those two things in front of the explosion in image two. Where are they in image one?

The ground is shaking from a/c impact, hence the camera vibrates.

There are no missing frames. Security cameras are routinely set up to record at less than 10fps, sometimes even only 1 fps because of limitation of transmission cables. This is a camera for a car park entrance. It is not a news camera. So it is not surprising that it is a rather limited.

Color balance changes as camera reacts to the changing light from the explosion.

Vibration caused camera to shift slightly. What you see is probably part of the edge of a cover.

Focus would be set at 6 ft to infinity. After all, the main purpose of this camera is to record vehicles entering and the entrance lane is about six feet from the camera.

IF the 757 is travelling at 500 mph then that is 733 feet per second. The area in view, from the building to the right side of the image is about 100 feet. The plane is approaching the building at 45 angle, so lets say about 100 feet away from point of impact. This means the 757 would be in the camera view for less than 1/7 of a second.

[Aeson]

I don't know about the fps. Granted it could be just about anything, but at a high security installation like the Pentagon? I took a telecommunications course at a small local college and even they had a 30fps security camera for us to play around with which only required a standard coxial cable. I would be suprised if the US government couldn't do as well or better.

The plane itself is 155 ft in length, so in your scenario it would be in view (at least partially) for roughly 1/3rd of a second. At 10 fps there should be 2 or 3 frames with a portion of the plane visable. In the last of those frames the tail of the plane might be engulfed by the explosion though. 1 fps seems almost worthless from a security standpoint, too much could be missed (like say, a plane hitting your building).

Also a 45 degree angle would be very steep for the purposes of hitting the side of the Pentagon. To hit the ground floor with the nose of the plane would require most of the impact to be absorbed by the lawn outside the building at that rate of descent.

[Tingkai]

Originally posted by Aeson
I don't know about the fps. Granted it could be just about anything, but at a high security installation like the Pentagon? I took a telecommunications course at a small local college and even they had a 30fps security camera for us to play around with which only required a standard coxial cable. I would be suprised if the US government couldn't do as well or better.

The plane itself is 155 ft in length, so in your scenario it would be in view (at least partially) for roughly 1/3rd of a second. At 10 fps there should be 2 or 3 frames with a portion of the plane visable. In the last of those frames the tail of the plane might be engulfed by the explosion though. 1 fps seems almost worthless from a security standpoint, too much could be missed (like say, a plane hitting your building).

Also a 45 degree angle would be very steep for the purposes of hitting the side of the Pentagon. To hit the ground floor with the nose of the plane would require most of the impact to be absorbed by the lawn outside the building at that rate of descent.

The camera was set up to check on cars entering a parking lot. In that case, even the Pentagon wouldn't spend a lot of money installing broadband cable feed to the camera. One fps would be adequate for that purpose (probably transmitted over ordinary lines)

Having said that, I'm not an expert on these cameras.

As for the 45 degree angle, I was referring to a lateral angle from point of impact (e.g., if camera is at the north then a/c is coming in from SW).

But anways, what is the point of all this? The plane is somewhat visible on the video.