Chairman Richard Myers
/
Captain Charles Joseph Leidig
1)
In its
investigation, Commission
staff
has
found
that
the FAA was not aparticipant on the
notification list
for
Significant Events Conference
or Air
Threat
Conference
calls.
• Do you
view this
fact
as a
serious impediment
to
communications that
day?
•
Given
the
fact
that
FAA is
charged with monitoring
the
national
air
space,
would
it have been prudent to add them to the
list
of conferees for
these
calls?
2)
On
9/11,
were you aware an unknown target was in the vicinity of
Washington
DC
or heading in that direction prior to the airplane that hit the Pentagon?Followingtheattackon thePentagon, what
steps
were takenby
those
inyourcommand and/or the NMCC to
identify
other potential hijacked airplanes in thesystem?
3)
Upon arriving at the NMCC DDO Shack following the attack on the Pentagon,was the air threat conference call operating? Do you recall what information wasbeing reported on the air threat conference call? Did you make any or were youprivytodecisions madeon the airthreat conference callin
response
to thehijackevents at that time? What was your understanding of communications with the
FAA
from
the
NMCC?4) Were you aware that the FAA
hijack
protocol was modified in the summer of2001 to include notification to the Secretary of Defense? If so, was that
modification
in response to the heightened threat environment?
5)
One
of
the first
places
the
NMCC
turned
to for
information
that morning,
before
the
second
tower
was
struck,
was
FAA.
There
was no
further
effective
interaction
withFAA
until much later
in the
day.
•
Why
didn't
the
NMCC take positive action
to
ensure that
its key
source
of
information,
FAA, was on the Significant Events Conference and the AirThreat Conference?
6)
On
9/11
there existed within
the FAA a
military
infrastructure
that
did not
have
a
role
in
crisis function.
•
Was the
NMCC,
and in
fact
NORAD
and
DoD, aware that there
was
militaryrepresentation within FAA, at the Headquarters, at the Command Center, and
at
the Regions?
•
Further,
did
NORAD
and the
national level know that
the FAA had
civilianpersonnel who were military operations specialists at most en
route
centers?
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