http://flight800.org/sketch.htm
Witness sketches get no sunlight at 'Sunshine Hearing'
Eyewitnesses provided federal investigators with hand drawings of what they
saw happen in the sky the night Flight 800 went down, but none were
displayed or discussed at the National Transportation Safety Board�s (NTSB)
Sunshine Hearing held last August--a hearing open to the public, as required
by the "Government in the Sunshine Act."
Now, months after the Sunshine Hearing, thirty witness documents, including
various drawings and graphics, remain officially listed by the FBI as
lost.[1] Meanwhile, the available sketches are highly consistent with one
another and tell a tale far different than the government�s now official
explanation that the jetliner was downed by a spark in a fuel tank.
Click Sketches to Enlarge
Figure 1: Five eyewitness drawings depicting their respective views of the
crash. Click on individual drawings to enlarge. (Typed notations and arrows
added by FIRO) All above drawings can be found in the appendices of Ref.
[2].
The above pictures show an object rising and moving toward JFK Airport and
then exploding at its apex, followed by Flight 800's fiery descent. At the
Sunshine Hearing, NTSB Witness Group Chairman, Dr. David Mayer mentioned the
FBI�s interview summary of witness 649, saying his testimony was
inconsistent with a missile strike. Witness 649�s drawing (shown above and
attached to his summary) was never displayed.
According to Dr. Mayer, witness 649 could not have seen a missile because he
was initially looking where Flight 800 crashed, not where it exploded in
midair.[3] But according to witness 649, his attention was drawn to the west
(right) of this initial position, as the object he was watching "arced off
to the right."[4] This object then collided with a second airborne object at
a position and altitude consistent where Flight 800 lost electrical
power[5]. See above drawing by witness 649.
"object number one impacted
with object number two"
--Eyewitness 649 FBI Summary[4]
Prior to the Sunshine Hearing, the NTSB held another public hearing in
December 1997. Less than a week before, the FBI cancelled the eyewitness
portion of the hearing, stating that there was a "remote" chance that the
FBI criminal investigation could be re-opened[6]. The above pictures,
together with 736 FBI witness summaries (258 reporting a "streak of light")
would not be publicly released for another two and a half years.[2]
Access to witness names and many of their locations was exclusively reserved
for the FBI, during their active criminal investigation. FBI agents
conducted most of the early witness interviews, collecting statements as
well as the pictures shown above. Soon thereafter, according to FBI Special
Agent Ted Otto,"the FBI began to suspect that a missile might have been used
against flight 800 because so many eyewitness accounts included descriptions
of a flare-like object or fireworks in the sky prior to the appearance of a
large fireball."[2] This suspicion caused FBI agents to speculate that "any
missile must have been fired from a ship beneath the plane."[7](London
Times, 7/23/96)
Meanwhile, the Suffolk County Police spearheaded an effort to determine the
origin of the rising streak by triangulating the eyewitness' lines of sight
in different locations. The streak's origin could be approximated where
these lines crossed, helping confirm or deny the FBI theory of a
ship-launched missile. The positions[5] of various radar-tracked ships below
the aircraft could have been compared to the results of a thorough
triangulation study
But without full access to the eyewitnesses, the Suffolk County Police were
only able to complete two small-scale triangulation exercises. The FBI lost
the results of one study,[1] and the other represents only eleven out of 258
"streak of light" witnesses.[8] The FBI, with full access to all the
witnesses and their information, never organized a triangulation study. One
month after the crash, the task of re-interviewing witnesses was suspended
with most never contacted again.
The FBI, with full access to all
the witnesses and their information,
never organized a triangulation study.
The FBI shelved their investigation in November of 1997, but the NTSB
continued to focus on the mechanical malfunction theory. This theory blames
a spark inside a fuel tank for the crash. A CIA animation of the crash
sequence supporting the mechanical theory claims that what eyewitnesses saw
was the doomed jetliner "in various stages of crippled flight after it
exploded."[9]
The sketches conflict with that scenario. They show an object rising from
the surface and heading west before any midair explosions. According to
federal radar experts and debris field analysts, Flight 800 began to break
up at an altitude of 13,800 feet (2.6 miles) after a midair explosion,
crashing into the ocean over two miles east of its initial distress
position.[5] Nonetheless, the NTSB stuck to the "crippled flight"
explanation and excluded witness sketches from both public hearings on the
crash.
An ongoing, independent investigation is attempting to determine the origin
of the streak of light by conducting a thorough triangulation exercise,
which includes using eyewitness sketches. Preliminary results have
determined the origin of the streak to be consistent with the nearest
surface vessel to the crash. Although this vessel was tracked by radar, it
is the only one out of several dozen that the FBI has allegedly been "unable
to identify."[10]
Witness sketches get no sunlight at 'Sunshine Hearing'.url
