04x21 - TWA Flight 800

[bunniefuu]

Tonight, one of the

worst aviation disasters

in American history.

Planes don't just

disappear from the air.

230 people k*lled when

their jetliner explodes off

the Coast of Long Island.

Virtually, anything on the

water in the vicinity is moving

into the rescue area and

they're there so quickly

that there's actually

falling wreckage

still coming out of the sky.

We'll uncover the top theories

for why the plane blew up.

Maybe a b*mb was

placed on this airplane.

Aircraft fuel tanks are

considered expl*sive

environments

and they have to be isolated

from ignition sources.

Is the US Government engaged

in an actual government coverup?

And explore new clues that

might offer the answers?

Two missiles fired

to hit another target,

but they went awry.

What really happened

to TWA Flight 800?

July 17th, 1996, JFK

International Airport.

It's a hot humid summer

night in New York City.

TWA Flight 800 sits at the

gate awaiting departure.

TWA 800 had a flight plan

to go from New York to Rome

with a layover in Paris.

Onboard the flight that day,

there was a total of 230 people.

There were 192 passengers,

18 crew members,

and 20 off-duty employees.

Most of them, they were there

because they were working

the second leg of the flight.

The crew, they are by

the book Professional.

Chief Pilot Ralph

Kevorkian is experienced

on other aircraft, but he's

moved into the biggest airplane

in TWA's fleet the Boeing 747.

Flight

engineer Richard Campbell is

also well-trained.

Because Richard had

reached the age of 60,

which at the time, that was

the pilot retirement age,

he decided to stay on with the

airline as a flight engineer.

The first

leg of the flight from JFK

to Paris is projected to

last just over seven hours,

but the flight is

delayed for 62 minutes.

There was a baggage issue.

Apparently, the flight

attendants had found a bag

and they were not sure, who

the baggage belonged to,

so it took quite a while to

match that piece of baggage

to the appropriate passenger.

As you can imagine, the

passengers are getting restless.

They're all sitting in the

airplane ready to take off.

At 8:07 PM the

crew fires up the engines,

the plane taxis out to the

runway, and at 8:19 PM,

TWA Flight 800 takes off

into mostly clear skies.

The air traffic controller

is communicating directly

with these airplanes.

Each one has a call sign.

Each one has a transponder,

which tells the plane position

to air traffic controllers.

At 8:30 PM,

air traffic controllers

give TWA 800 clearance

to go from 13,000

to 15,000 feet.

This is their last

communication with the plane.

So, Flight Engineer

Campbell goes ahead

and adds climb thrust,

and they start climbing

up to 15,000 feet.

At

8:31 and 12 seconds,

there's a transponder ping

with a Pennsylvania Air

Traffic Control Station.

Then, something strange happens.

Just 12 minutes after takeoff,

Flight 800 disappears

from radar.

A disappearing blip

is pretty alarming

for an air traffic controller.

So, they tried to contact them

but there was no response,

and then, they were asking

for nearby airplanes

to tell us what

was going on home.

This pilot flying over

Long Island calls in

and says he's seen an

expl*si*n in the air.

The pilot reports that

this expl*si*n occurred

at about 16,000 feet

over Long Island Sound.

And suddenly,

reports start coming in from

pilots all over the area.

Something has

exploded and the debris

just rained down into the water.

And then, there's an

outpouring of reports

from people on the ground.

They report seeing

a big fireball,

and also debris just

raining out of the sky.

Emergency

radios sound the alert.

There's a major plane

crash into the ocean

and the search is

on for survivors.

Virtually, anything on the

water in the vicinity is moving

into the rescue area and

they're there so quickly

that there's actually

falling wreckage

still coming out of the sky.

There's burning debris,

it's mass chaos.

And from all of this wreckage,

they can actually

see that this was

the 747 from Flight 800.

It begins one of the longest

and most expensive aviation

accident investigations

in history.

Within 20 minutes of

the initial reports,

people in Washington, DC

begin to take action.

Our government is doing

everything we can to continue

the search for survivors

and to find out

the causes of this accident.

For the next two days,

Navy divers comb the area,

searching for survivors,

but they don't find any.

When the families first learn

that something has happened

to the airplane,

they gather at JFK

to try and find

out what happened.

And all the news photographers

and cameramen are out there

and it puts the

families on edge.

It's a terribly traumatic

moment for them,

so they make the

decision to move them

into the airport hotel,

which is about a mile away,

and that comes to be

known as Heartbreak Hotel.

Along with the

grief, there are also questions.

What happened to TWA Flight 800?

This is a very tense time.

The bombing in Oklahoma City

had just occurred in 1995.

Terrorism was in everybody's

mind, so people had this idea

that t*rrorists were

targeting aircrafts.

Go, go, get

in back, get in back!

We were a heightened alert

because we had all these things

that happened prior, just

before this happened,

we had the World

Trade Center bombing

and also the Khobar

bombing in Saudi Arabia.

In the 1990s, the idea

of a major terror att*ck

on or above American

soil is a huge story.

So, it was the first thought

that this was a

t*rror1st att*ck.

Investigators look into

how t*rrorists could have

brought down the plane,

focusing their attention on

what happened before takeoff.

There was the big

62-minute delay for a bag,

so people wondered, was

there a b*mb in that bag?

It happened earlier

with Pan Am Flight 103

over Lockerbie Scotland.

That b*mb, which was in a

bag, k*lled 259 passengers

and 11 people on the ground.

So, new high-tech

scanners were put in place

to find even thin layers

of plastic expl*sives.

But, unfortunately,

JFK did not yet have

such a system

installed and working.

The National

Transportation Safety Board

begins the long process of

reassembling the aircraft

to determine a possible

cause for the crash.

They were able to recover

close to 95% of this aircraft

from the bottom of the ocean.

And once that process was done,

the FBI was able to send

samples of the aircraft

into the lap to check

for any sort of residue,

and there was a very small

trace of an expl*sive residue

that was on a floor panel.

Because trace amounts

of expl*sives were found,

the FBI focused

on the possibility

that maybe a b*mb was

placed on this airplane.

But there's another possibility

based on eyewitness accounts.

Many of the eyewitnesses

reported seeing an actual streak

of light, so that

made the FBI think

that maybe it's not

just a b*mb on board.

Perhaps it was instead

a m*ssile att*ck.

The question is where was

the m*ssile launched from?

The leading idea was that

it was launched from a boat.

Once the residue is reported,

and then the idea of

a m*ssile is reported,

oh, that leads to

widespread tension.

People are on edge,

airport, and other security

around the world

is now tightened.

It's just a matter

of trigonometry.

I mean, any high school

kid can figure it out.

- It's a m*ssile.

- It's gotta be a m*ssile.

People really

believe that this was

some sort of t*rror1st att*ck.

But some raised doubts.

There's one huge problem here.

No t*rror1st organization is

taking credit for this att*ck.

Isn't that what t*rror1st

organizations do?

Because if they want

to create terror,

you need to know who they

are and why they did it

and we're not seeing that here.

It's not the first time

that the NTSB has investigated

an aircraft that might have

been brought down by a b*mb,

but the NTSB is a lot more

hesitant than the FBI to leap

to conclusions about the

causes of a specific incident.

They have institutionally

a long history

of carrying out

accident investigations

and they understand that by

following their procedures,

they're likely to

be able to draw

the most accurate conclusions.

The FBI's purpose is to

enforce laws and as a result,

these two are going

to come into conflict.

So, the NTSB's

explanation to this is

that this aircraft was used

before to transport troops

from the Gulf and those

troops could have had

some sort of expl*sive

residue on them.

While expl*sive residue

might have been left

over from the Gulf w*r,

investigators also

consider something else.

So, they look at the

history of the aircraft

where was the plane before that,

and maybe a month and a

half before the accident

The NTSB found that the

airplane has been used

for training canine-expl*sive

deduction dogs,

and when they checked

with the dog handlers,

one of the pouches that carry

RDX expl*sive was punctured

and traces of it may have wound

up on the back of the seat

or on the floor

in the front side.

With regards to the people

who were on the ground

who saw this all unfold, the

NTSB said they didn't see any

sort of m*ssile-like

impact on the aircraft

and those people were mistaken

based on their

perspective on the ground.

Seeing this all happen.

The Safety Board has found

no evidence that the crash

of Flight 800 could have been

caused by a b*mb or m*ssile.l

The families that are

grieving are really looking

for closure that they

can't get from the NTSB.

They want to know what happened,

but sometimes there's no way

to really rush the process.

The Transportation

Board has no firm estimate

of when its findings

will be ready,

but cautions that

it could take years.

Our work will continue,

and we will spare no effort

to determine the cause

of the crash of TWA 800.

That makes a lot of

Americans very nervous.

They want answers.

They want answers.

The NTSB is slow

delivering answers,

so independent researchers

are doing their thing.

They're looking at the data

and they come to the conclusion

that maybe we're not

looking broadly enough.

Maybe there are other ideas

that have not yet

been considered.

September

1996, it's just two months

since Flight 800 crashed,

but the two federal agencies

investigating the disaster,

are at odds.

The FBI says it's likely

a t*rror1st att*ck.

The Transportation

Board doesn't agree

but insists it's too

early to speculate.

Then, researchers from outside

the government propose

their own theory.

An NTSB official makes an

offhanded comment in the media

about the remoteness of

a m*ssile strike being

about the same as

a meteorite strike.

And so, that comment actually

does send people off looking

at the possibility that

it was a meteorite.

News corporations are

reporting on TWA 800.

This is a sensational

story and as a result,

a lot of different theories

are really starting

to circulate, in particular,

there are astronomers

that contact the NTSB to raise

the possibility that this was

in fact, a meteorite strike

based on eyewitness accounts.

The eyewitnesses report

seeing a streak of light

and a fireball, well,

guess what does both?

Meteors across Earth.

People report seeing

fireballs all the time.

There's over two tons of

meteoritic material falling

to Earth every day.

And sometimes,

those meteors make impact.

In America specifically,

we know of three cases

where cars were hit with

meteors in the last century.

That could cause real damage.

Take for example,

a recent fireball

over Chelyabinsk, Russia.

It broke windows and injured

people on the ground.

So, yeah, you could bring down

an airplane from a meteor.

Statisticians collect the data,

and crunch the numbers

about meteorites

to calculate the odds,

one could strike a plane.

About 3,000 meteorites make it

through the Earth's

atmosphere every year.

About 125 a day, and

on any given day,

there might be 5,000 aircraft

flying over the United States,

which sounds like a lot,

but the odds of a

small meteorite hitting

an aircraft are still

extremely small.

In a 100-year span,

the chance of a meteor bringing

down a plane is just 1%.

A meteor, not large enough

to be detected by NASA,

but yet not too small that

it would completely burn

as it's going through

the atmosphere.

The possibility of that

small-enough meteor

to impact a plane that's

traveling about half

the speed of sound is minute.

That said, it's

still worth a pause.

Searching for proof

that a meteor strike

took down the plane,

theorists consider the

wreckage of Flight 800.l

Based on what we understand

about meteorites entering

the atmosphere, the size of

meteor needed to take down

an airplane is only about

the size of a baseball

and if the meteor hits

the fuel t*nk in the wing,

it could definitely

trigger a big expl*si*n

like the eyewitnesses saw.

Some suggest

the plane may have been hit

by fragments from a meteor.

Some scientists' analysis

of the wreckage did lend

to the theory of a bolide,

which is a meteorite

that explodes in the air

and some of the wreckage

did reveal puncture points.

If a meteorite happened to

explode near the aircraft,

perhaps some of the meteorite

shrapnel could have punctured

the 747.

But many

witnesses say they saw a streak

of light coming up toward

the plane not coming down

on it from above.

Taken together, it's

all a quirk of perspective

and how it enters

the atmosphere.

Remember, the Earth's

surface is curved,

so that adds another dimension

to perceiving exactly

where things occurred

in the night sky.

Scientists

raising the meteorite theory,

urged the NTSB to do further

research, but they resist.

They just found

it highly unlikely.

And because these experts are

essentially inserting themselves

into a well-established

investigation,

this is another case of

non-experts

trying to dictate

how an aviation

accident investigation

will be carried out.

Not only is there a very

low-expected frequency

for this kind of occurrence,

but also even if it did occur

that it would have caused

the damage that we saw.

If it wasn't a t*rror1st

att*ck or a meteorite,

then what could have

caused the expl*si*n?

A few months into

the investigation,

the Safety Board is

convinced of one thing.

So, they put forward a theory

that the airplane

actually broke in half.

When the expl*si*n happens,

the front of the

aircraft is severed

from the back of the airplane.

So, imagine the front

of this Boeing 747

like a b*llet shearing

off and collapsing.

The back end of the aircraft

starts heading upwards

because the engines

are still spinning.

Inside, it's a nightmare.

They're looking at the sky

and there is no front end.

So, they come to the

conclusion that maybe the streak

of light that eyewitnesses

saw going upwards was

this second half of

the airplane on fire

still moving upwards in the sky

and that's why the pilots

did not have time to call in

to say there was a problem

because this was a sudden event.

February 1997, while the FBI118

still believes t*rrorists

brought down Flight 800,

Transportation Board

investigators say no.

Could the answer lie hidden

in the recovered wreckage

of the doomed 747?

This reassembled airplane

in that hangar in Calverton,

I've heard the term

Frankenstein aircraft,

which looked like literally

tiny pieces, big pieces,

whatever they could find,

they put together just trying

to find answers about

what happened that day.

Two important

factors may be the age

and condition of the airplane.

The Boeing 747, that

is TWA Flight 800,

it's a relatively old

aircraft, it's 25 years old.

It's flown for

over 93,000 hours,

which is the equivalent

of flying continuously

for 10 and a half years.

It's one of the earlier

versions of the famous 747.

And if properly maintained,

the plane could last

many, many, many years

before it reaches an age

where you can no

longer repair the parts

and you decommission it.

Around the 1980s, airline

mechanics started to notice

that there were cracks on

old Boeing 747 airplanes

and this was really on the

structural part of the aircraft

in the upper deck,

the lower deck,

as well as the nose

of the aircraft.

On TWA 800, the NTSB find

cracks that are an inch

to one-and-a-half inch.

Now, an old airplane

like this 747

that was almost 25 years

old, you get cracks,

but every airplane that has

worked that long has cracks.

It comes from the

routine pressurization

and pressurizing of

the airplane cabin.

So, if you shake up a soda,

you do the same thing,

you pressurize the

container, and what happens

if that container is punctured?

Boom.

Cracks are extremely dangerous.

Any sort of cr*ck to the

fuselage of the aircraft

when the airplane is

experiencing any sort of stress,

that cr*ck can just

tear the airplane apart.

So, if they're not addressed,

cracks could really lead

to catastrophic results.

In 1986, the FAA

required investigations

of older aircraft

including TWA Flight 800.

So, when you look

at the NTSB report,

they went through the

maintenance log books

for this aircraft and there

were no major mechanical issues.

This was an aircraft that

had flown tens of thousands

of hours, and components

do break down over time.

In the Spring of 1997,

investigators

learned of problems

with the doomed

plane's maintenance.

The inspectors who

evaluated the wreckage,

found that the people

who regularly inspected

the airplane actually

missed some cracks.

It had gone through the

normal safety checks,

but still, the plane

wasn't fully sound.

The NTSB found

evidence of metal fatigue

of some stress cracks

caused by pressurization

of the aircraft.

They found some hairline

cracks in what we call

shear ties that keep the skin

attached to the airplane,

and they also found

several hairline cracks

in the wing spar.

Spars are connected

to the keel beam

that basically keeps the wings

attached to the airplane.

But were these

cracks big enough and in areas

that could cause a

plane to break apart?

Part of the investigation

led them to take a deep dive

of the fuselage and they

found that there were cracks

in the shear ties

that were on the wing,

but it wasn't anything

that would've caused

an expl*si*n of any kind.

The investigators reported

that none of these cracks

were serious enough

to have contributed

to this tragedy.

Just like you can have a rock

hit your windshield, at first,

it's just a little tiny

star, looks like an asterisk,

but what makes it dangerous

is when it travels.

Well, the same thing is true

with the cracks in the airplane.

They had not combined with each

other to create a long cr*ck

in the structure and therefore,

could have not contributed

to the catastrophic breakup of

the airplane while in flight.

Analysis of the

wreckage confirms for the NTSB

that structural defects

didn't take down Flight 800.

So, they looked to the flight

data recorder for clues.

Along with all the

wreckage that they found,

they found the

airplane's black box

and the black box keeps

a record of the data

that the airplane is

producing as well as

all the conversations

between the pilot,

co-piloting, and crew.

Initially, there

was concern that

because the casing was cracked,

they would never be able

to recover any of

the conversations

that was going on

in the cockpit.

But as soon as they got it

back to DC and they put it

in a tape, they were able to

play the full communication.

I'm sure it was a

very emotional moment,

but it was in their final words

that the crew was able to

communicate what was going on

and that really helped

investigators get closer

to what they believed caused

the aircraft to explode.

The 1996 Flight 800 disaster

remains under investigation

for four long years as

government officials clash

and families of victims grow

increasingly frustrated.

Then, in August of 2000,

the National Transportation

Safety Board announces it

finally has what it

says are the answers

so many are waiting for.

Answers gleaned from the

airplane's black box.

There's a lot of

routine chatter.

It's the type of things that

you would expect to hear

on any civilian airline flight.

Everything seemed

routine with the exception

of just before they were

ready to close the doors.

There was this hour delay

because of this mismatch

of the bag and the passenger,

but the passenger was

on board all the time.

On the black box,

we can hear Captain Ralph

Kevorkian joke like,

"All right, we won't tell 'em

that," talking about telling

the passengers that

they made an oops.

Flight Engineer Campbell

responds, "If we do that,

we'd have a mutiny back there."

At around 8:19 PM, they

take off uneventfully,

and from the point of view

of air traffic control,

everything is going

fine with Flight 800.

At some point, Captain

Kevorkian made a comment,

"Boy, look at her, she's

climbing like a homesick angel."

That's a term we use when the

aircraft climbs very rapidly.

In other words, she's really

climbing high towards the sky.

After this was said, the

second pilot in the flight deck,

Captain Snyder had said that

the airspeed was bleeding off,

which means the aircraft

is flying faster than usual

and it really wasn't

anything to be worried about.

Cross-checking the transcript

with the flight data,

it just confirms that nothing

out of the ordinary is

really happening here.

So, at around 8:30, Boston Air

Traffic Control advises TWA

to climb from one

3,000 to one 5,000.

And at this point,

Captain Kevorkian says,

"Climb thrust."

Flight Engineer

Campbell responds,

"The power's set."

"Power's set," were the

last words that were heard

in the flight deck, and

then 37 seconds later,

the airplane explodes.

But while most

of this is all normal chatter

on a flight deck, there's

one earlier exchange

that intrigues

crash investigators.

Just a few moments before

the CVRS stops recording,

Captain Kevorkian comments,

"Check out that crazy

indication on number four."

What he's saying is sort

of equivalent to driving

in your car and having

your gas gauge malfunction.

Because this is an old airplane,

and the 747 has so many fuel

tanks that are interconnected

in each wing, those gauges

were not that reliable.

So, you occasionally get

some weird indications.

But this time,

the Safety Board believes it's

a sign of trouble inside one

of the fuel tanks.

Just a few days

after the accident,

one of the investigators sees

that the center-wing

t*nk bowed out.

So, something happened to

make the center t*nk explode

from the inside out.

Aircraft fuel tanks are

considered expl*sive

environments and they have to be

isolated from ignition sources

because you don't

wanna have any chance

that something will

ignite in those areas

because there's fuel there.

Captain Kevorkian's statement

about the strange readings

from the fuel t*nk gives

investigators a clue

as to the source of this

fuel t*nk expl*si*n.

You have electrical

components inside

the central fuel t*nk to tell

you if they're running short

on fuel, but if a short circuit

somewhere causes a

high amount of voltage

to arc between two pieces of

metal inside an area filled

with fuel vapor, a

catastrophic expl*si*n is

likely to occur.

The NTSB believes

that's exactly what happened.

So, the NTSB theory is that

there was a electrical spark

that exploded that t*nk outward

and blew the aircraft apart.

The inescapable

conclusion that the cause

of the in-flight breakup

of TWA Flight 800 was

a fuel-air expl*si*n

in the center-wing t*nk.

Investigators hone

in on the electrical system,

which connects the fuel

gauges to the t*nk,

looking for what could

have caused the expl*si*n,

they find evidence

of frayed wiring

and damaged installation

in the maintenance reports.

They see that

there are anomalies

in the electrical system.

The wire, which has gone

in 25 years earlier,

has been subjected to vibration

and salt and chemicals

and pressurization and abrasion.

The wires were the ones

installed back in 1976 or so,

and hasn't been replaced.

Some of those wires would fray.

Some of the installations

start to break,

and if they're short, now you

have your ignition source.

Not everybody is satisfied

with these conclusions.

This explanation faces

a couple of problems.

Number one, it's coming so late.

People have gotten

used to the idea

that perhaps there was

a t*rror1st involvement,

but secondly, it's

only their best guess.

Like a multiple-choice

test where you don't know

the right answer, but you can

rule out most of the rest.

They think this is

the right answer,

but they cannot point to

absolutely conclusive evidence.

We know that the

center-fuel t*nk exploded,

we've known that

for a long time.

We don't know what

initiated that expl*si*n.

While evidence strongly points

to degraded wiring, the NTSB

is never able to pinpoint

the exact cause

of the expl*si*n.

It becomes very

difficult in the aftermath

of TWA Flight 800's

destruction to determine

how such a spark might have

reached the fuel vapors inside

the central-wing fuel t*nk.

By the time the investigation

results are announced,

many people are dissatisfied

and they wanted answers

and the Federal Government

just wasn't able

to give them answers

quickly enough.

In its August

2000 official report

on the crash of Flight

800, investigators

at the National Transportation

Safety Board said

a fuel t*nk inside

the wing caught fire,

which triggered the

plane's expl*si*n.

Some believe it was a spark

created by defective wiring,

but others seek clues

in a different flight

that ended tragically.

Two years after the

tragedy of Flight 800,

there was a Swissair 111

that tragically crashed off

the East Coast of Canada,

k*lling all 229 people on board.

Examining these two flights,

Flight 800 and Swissair 111,

there are a lot of similarities

that are a bit uncanny.

Both flights took off

from the same airport, JFK,

at the same time, 8:19

PM, and the same day

of the week Wednesday.

And tragically, both

planes went down very early

in their flights.

Like TWA 800,

the Swissair plane

ignites mid-flight

without a definitive cause.

The entertainment electronics,

which were stored next

to the cockpit is where

the fire started and then

it spread to blankets,

and before you know it,

the entire plane is

engulfed in flames.

Like Flight 800, the

Canadian officials are unable

to figure out exactly

what triggered

the fire in the first place.

Investigators in both crashes,

speculate that defective

wiring is to blame

but aren't able to

pinpoint the exact source.

Given all the similarities

between these two flights,

is there something else

that could cause both planes

to go down?

As they were figuring

out the factors that led

to both of these crashes and

what they might have in common,

researchers noted

that both pilots

on the planes briefly

lost radio contact shortly

before things went haywire.

So, given these similarities,

the question becomes

what could cause

communications to go out?

And it's the same thing

that could create

navigational problems

and other electronic

problems on a flight.

Electromagnetic interference,

it's a real problem.

There's a reason that you

have to put your cell phones

into airplane mode and we

try to minimize other forms

of electromagnetic interference.

When it comes to aircraft,

they're very sensitive.

They have a lot of

instrumentation,

they have a lot of electrical

components that are subject

to the possibility

of interference.

Some argue that

there's only one source capable

of generating enough

electromagnetic interference

to bring down a plane.

The US m*llitary.

What these researchers

found was that when we look

at Swissair 111, which, again,

took off at the same time,

the same day of the week

from the same airport,

they did find

something interesting.

The fleet area control

and surveillance facility

is a Navy organization

that monitors the air and

sea space off the coast

of the United States.

Documents provided the

first couple of weeks

of September 1998 did show

m*llitary operations off

the Eastern Seaboard.

Specifically, the document

reports that during that week,

there was a small-scale

ECM notification

that stands for Electronic

Countermeasure notification,

and that's a training exercise

for electronic w*r games.

So, instead of using

bombs and b*ll*ts,

what they used was

electronic warfare.

They're sending out signals

that could interfere

with the electronics

of civilian flights.

And the records further

showed that Navy jets were

actually, in very similar

area to the Swiss 111 flight

at the time of this incident.

So, these independent

researchers put forth the idea

that the electronic warfare

jamming signals sent out

by these m*llitary jets

somehow interfered

with the electronics

of Swissair 111 leading

to the fire that ultimately

brought down the plane.

But even with the presence

of the m*llitary exercises

in the area, debate remains

whether there was enough

electromagnetic interference

to bring down these flights.

The EMS spectrum

can cause problems,

but we really haven't

had a lot of incidents

where we pointed towards

electromagnetic interference

as potentially

downing an aircraft.

Even though the surface of the

Earth is constantly bombarded

in the electromagnetic spectrum.

Times that it would

be most at risk

of causing a problem

would be in the descent

of the aircraft

and not in midair.

An NTSB report cited

about 11 sources

of electromagnetic

energy in the area.

The largest of them

emitting about 800 Watts

with a peak of

about 1,000 Watts.

This energy decays with

distance and when you tally

all the sources at an

altitude of 13,000 feet

at one airplane, I don't

think you have enough energy

to trigger an expl*si*n

in the center wing t*nk.

Even so, speculation about

the m*llitary's role in

the crash continues.

It is unfortunate

that a small number

of people pursuing their

own agendas have persisted

in making unfounded charges

of a government coverup

in this investigation.

A lot of people will

point to government coverups

and government conspiracies

because the government

isn't always good

at dispelling the rumors.

Sometimes, the government

doesn't come out

and dispel these

conspiracy theories

because to do so would

require revealing evidence

that shouldn't be in

the public domain.

It's been more

than 20 years since the

National Transportation

Safety Board released

its August 2000

report on Flight 800.

Some relatives of

the victims continued

to dispute its findings.

With the help of researchers,

these families have discovered

evidence allegedly withheld

from the NTSB of nearby

live-fire m*llitary exercises,

showing an object

headed toward the plane

just before it exploded.

Some of the family of the

victims of Flight 800 now think

that maybe there is

a coverup going on,

and maybe this was a

direct m*llitary att*ck.

The idea

that the US m*llitary could

accidentally sh**t

down a passenger plane,

isn't wild speculation.

It actually happened

just eight years prior

to the expl*si*n of Flight 800.

In 1988, the USS Vincennes

had actually sh*t down

an Iranian airliner

originating out of Tehran.

They thought that

it was actually

an Iranian Air Force

Fighter aircraft

and fired two surface-to-air

missiles downing

the civilian airliner.

That occurred in 1988.

It was still fairly fresh

in the public's mind.

Some of the family now say

that if the m*llitary is

responsible for this,

then they too should

be held accountable

for the tragedy of Flight 800.

Families of the victims

never gave up and they want

to bring their own investigators

do their investigation.

In June of 2022,

the families filed a

lawsuit against the US Navy

and two government contractors

to pursue this theory and,

hopefully, discover the truth.

The lawsuit alleges that

the government knows full well

what happened, but covered

up that information

because, they allege, the

Government caused the crash.

According to this theory,

the Navy sh*t down the

plane during w*r games,

then covered it up.

The lawsuit says that

this was a friendly fire.

There were two missiles

fired from a Navy vessel,

but they went awry.

It was supposed to

hit another target

but hit the bigger plane

with more heat signature

that was TWA 800.

According to their lawsuit,

the Navy's radar caught

the actual debris from

the airplane exploding

and measured the

velocities of the particles

and say that they were moving

at 4,000 miles per hour,

which is four times faster

than the speed of sound.

Their allegation states,

only a US m*llitary-grade

m*ssile could cause the debris

to move at that rate.

They alleged that the radar data

from those tests was withheld

from the NTSB but given

to the FBI within

minutes of the crash.

And so, with without

analyzing the radar images,

the NTSB concluded there was

no evidence of a m*ssile.

None of the participating

b*mb technicians,

nor myself, have

seen any indication

of high-expl*sive effects on

any of the wreckage recovered

from Flight 800.

This theory has its detractors.

They claim that only

a m*ssile could create

such high-velocity debris.

I'm not convinced of that. A

meteor is gonna be moving faster

than a m*ssile but the

devil's in the details.

The idea that

fast-moving debris could

only have been caused by a

m*ssile strike is contradicted

by the facts of physics.

Fast-moving debris

from the aircraft was

almost certainly created by

the expl*si*n of that aircraft

and not by an intersection

with some form of m*ssile.

But what about the allegations

that the Navy w*r games

shut down the plane?

That scenario also has no merit

because a destroyer was

alleged to have sh*t a m*ssile,

but that destroyer was actually,

maybe a hundred miles plus

south and none of the missiles

on it had the range to

bring down the plane.

No fragments from any

surface-to-air m*ssile have

ever been found in the wreckage

or near the wreckage

of Flight 800.

Also, the m*ssile

theory does not explain

why the aircraft lost

communication with the ground.

The Transportation

Board still insists

that the investigation

is and should be closed.

The recovered wreckage

of TWA Flight 800 was kept

in a hangar outside Ashburn,

Virginia for 25 years

and was used as a training aid

for other NTSB investigators.

Families had nothing.

Many of them did not have the

remains of their loved ones.

Allowing them that opportunity

to go into the hangar, seeing

the wreckage had to be a

tremendous relief to them.

You know, losing

somebody is extremely hard,

especially if you don't

get to say goodbye to them.

But this is also

such a big moment

because the lease is

done with this building

and they're gonna destroy

all of the pieces.

So, it's kind of forcing

a lot of these families

to really say goodbye.

You know, like the book is

closed, the chapter's closed.

Perhaps their

lawsuit will at last bring

the families of the victims,

the closure they seek.

But we may never definitively

know why TWA 800 crashed.

I think it continues to

capture public imagination

because it was one of the

first real sensational events

that happened at the

dawn of the internet.

And so, people got online

to share ideas and theories

and they wanted answers.

So, in that narrative

void, people came up

with their own conjecture

and their own answers.

History is full

of tragedies and in many cases,

we don't actually, ever

find a conclusive answer.

- Just went down.

- And when you have people

that are involved

because their family

members d*ed tragically,

people will still

wonder about it.

What happened to Flight 800?

While the latest theory

gets tested in a court of law,

the cause of the crash

of Flight 800 continues

to ignite debate.

I'm Laurence Fishburne.

Thank you for watching

History's Greatest Mysteries.