TWA Flight 800 Missile Theory
Witness Sketches Contradict Officialsby Ian Williams Goddard Trans World Airlines Flight 800 exploded on July 17, 1996 off Long Island killing all 230 passengers. Within days media reports said over one hundred witnesses indicate a missile hit the jet. [1, 2] However, officials concluded: "The witness reports and the streak of light are consistent with them having observed Flight 800 in crippled flight. They're not consistent with a missile." [3] Is that official conclusion consistent with the witness accounts? All witness sketches of the "streak of light" found in the official report contradict the official conclusion just quoted. [4] As demonstrated by physicist Thomas Stalcup, the witness sketches show a projectile heading to the crash in the opposite direction of that flown by Flight 800 in their fields of vision. [5]
Eyewitness Sketches of The Flight 800 Crash The first graphic below shows the sketch of FBI witness 649 transition into an exacting animation of that detailed account. Foreground contents and their relationship to aerial events exactly replicate the view of witness 649 thanks to a comprehensive analysis by Thomas Shoemaker. [6] The resulting animation is like the downloaded memory of witness 649 (downloading may be slow).
If an animation in this report stops, hit "reload." According to his FBI report, witness 649 observed a red-pink projectile leaving a whitish smoke trail like a firework ascending into the sky from behind the tree line. It slowly rose straight up and then turned to the right, accelerating and wiggling as it flew away in a southwest direction. It became smaller, almost disappearing as it ascended and approached another object (Flight 800). It looked like it would slightly miss the other object, then there was a white flash and puff of smoke. The firework took about 6 to 7 seconds to travel from the tree line to the other object. Two smoke trails arched up out of the puff of smoke and eventually became an expanding ball of fire that descended behind the tree line. [7] Flight 800 comes into view above slowly in order to reflect the witness's stated non-awareness of it until the projectile was closing in. Witness 649 was facing south and the projectile crossed his field of vision from left to right, the opposite direction of Flight 800's course as he would see it. This opposition is the case in every eyewitness sketch in this report. The next two graphics are animated sketches from FBI witness 530 (left) and Donald Eick (right), whose account and sketch this author found in the reading-room computer at the National Transportation and Safety Board (NTSB) headquarters. [8] 
Witness 530 (left) was west of 649 and her FBI report says she saw a red ball of fire rising from the surface followed by an explosion. [9] Her sketch shows a trajectory roughly the same as 649. The next sketch is by witness Donald Eick, a meteorologist later employed by the NTSB. His line of sight is roughly identical to 530's (see map below). He saw a reddish-orange dot like a firework that followed a course matching that of 649 and 530. Also matching 649's account Eick states that the rising projectile "zig zagged in the sky, as though it was purposely changing or adjusting its course." [8] A clear description of a target-seeking guided missile.
Witness 224 (left), a medical doctor sitting on his second-story balcony, believed he saw something ascending from left to right and then an explosion. His sketch also matches 649's. On the next sketch is by witness 174, a retired Naval Officer from the Judge Advocates Office. Witness 174 saw a "skyrocket" streak up into the sky from behind Sheffield Island, followed by an explosion. [11] Northwest of 649, his sketch also depicts a matching trajectory. The next sketch is by eyewitness Naneen Levine, who drew it during a CNN interview. [12] She was interviewed by the FBI on the night of the crash and is FBI witness 541. Her FBI report says she also drew a sketch for the FBI, however, it's not found in the NTSB report.
The next graphic places the witnesses above on a regional map showing their relationship to the flight paths of TWA 800 and the projectile that each of these witnesses reported. All of these separate accounts map onto a projectile heading toward Flight 800 from a position northeast of the jet. |
For all these witnesses Flight 800 traveled from right to left in their field of vision. However, for all of these witnesses the projectile they saw streaking toward the crash traveled from left to right, opposite to the flight path of the doomed aircraft. It follows logically that the high-speed projectile they all saw could not have been Flight 800. By historical standards of legal evidence, the uniformity of these witness sketches in the official report constitutes compelling prima facie evidence if not proof beyond a reasonable doubt that Flight 800 was struck by a missile. In fact, as we shall see, probable cause has been determined in previous air-crashes based on witness reports without corroborating physical evidence. [14] And yet as we shall also see, there may also be physical evidence of a missile strike that, like these sketches, is found in the official report. [15]
The consistency with a missile strike can also be determined by analysis of witnesses statements. That was the determination of Colonel Lawrence Pence (USAF, retired), perhaps the only expert with a background in interviewing missile witnesses to review the Flight 800 witness reports. Pence states the following in an affidavit filed in a FOIA lawsuit against the government:
One of my duties in Vietnam was battle damage assessments of our aircraft in order to increase our understanding of enemy weapons. In performing these assessments, I interviewed numerous pilots and crew members who witnessed missile attacks, both ground-to-air and air-to-air. Their descriptions were quite consistent with the eyewitness descriptions given by those who saw the TWA 800 incident. Of particular note is the internal, sequential consistency of the TWA 800 eyewitnesses, i.e., a bright light rising erratically from ground level toward the aircraft, followed by an explosion and fireball. This description and sequence of events is substantively identical to that given by anyone who ever witnessed a surface-to-air missile attack in Vietnam. [16] Additionally, while visiting the NTSB's public reading room this author discovered an official report in which the NTSB had conducted a study wherein witnesses observed and then described actual missile firings at various distances. Those known missile-witness accounts are virtually identical to Flight 800 witness accounts, as can be observed in this author's report on that study. [17]
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Overview of FBI Witness Reports
[1] Washington Times (7/24/96) cites ABC News saying 100 witnesses support missile theory.
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