Before 8:30 a.m. September 11, 2001: FBI Agent Sees a Report about Bin Laden Reopening His Underground Complex

Steve Bongardt, an agent at an FBI office in Manhattan, reads a report on his computer about Osama bin Laden reopening his underground facility in Afghanistan and he will subsequently determine that this incident is related to the attacks on the World Trade Center. [Wright, 2006, pp. 356-357; Graff, 2011, pp. 309-310] Bongardt is a member of the FBI’s I-49 squad. [Wright, 2006, pp. 377] The squad is focused on bin Laden and al-Qaeda’s central command. It is based in an office on the eighth floor at 290 Broadway, across the street from the FBI’s New York field office at 26 Federal Plaza. [Graff, 2011, pp. 205-206] Bongardt is one of the first people to arrive at the office this morning, coming into work sometime before 8:30 a.m. He turns on his computer and reads some of the day’s intelligence. He is puzzled by one particular piece of information he sees. “A report had Osama bin Laden reopening his large underground facility at Tora Bora in Afghanistan and sprucing it up,” journalist and author Garrett Graff will write. According to author Lawrence Wright, the report states that “the al-Qaeda camps in Tora Bora [are] being revitalized.” [Wright, 2006, pp. 356-357; Graff, 2011, pp. 309] The Tora Bora encampment is a “natural and manmade fortress of caves and bunkers,” according to the Chicago Tribune. It comprises a “series of rooms and tunnels,” and can “comfortably house 1,000 people,” according to an Afghan who visited the complex a few months ago. [Chicago Tribune, 11/28/2001] “That can’t be good,” Bongardt thinks upon reading the report. “What the hell is [bin Laden] doing?” he wonders. Bongardt will feel the room shake when Flight 11 crashes into the WTC, at 8:46 a.m. (see 8:46 a.m. September 11, 2001), and promptly head out of the building. He will realize what has happened when he sees that both of the Twin Towers are on fire and notices a massive jetliner engine lying on the street. He will then connect what is occurring to the report he read on his computer. He will understand that “this was the work of bin Laden,” according to Wright. “This is al-Qaeda. This is why they’re polishing up Tora Bora,” he will think. [Wright, 2006, pp. 357-359; Graff, 2011, pp. 309-310]