A group of five Middle Eastern men, which includes two men who will later be identified as alleged 9/11 hijackers Nawaf Alhazmi and Marwan Alshehhi, get into a confrontation with Eric Gill, an employee at Washington’s Dulles International Airport, from where Flight 77 will take off on September 11, after they try to get to a secure area of the airport. Gill, who works for Argenbright Security, which handles the passenger security checkpoints at Dulles Airport, notices the men while supervising the west checkpoint on the upper level of the airport’s main terminal. He initially sees just two of them as they try to go through a side door next to the checkpoint that only a few people are permitted to use. People can use this door to bypass the checkpoint, but they need to swipe a card and enter a code on a keypad to pass through it. Going through the door enables a person to reach the airport’s secure, employee-only areas, including the area where planes are parked.
Men Try to Go through a Door Used by Security Personnel – One of the men trying to go through the door is wearing a green ID badge with a red “A” on it, of the kind typically worn by the airport’s baggage, ramp, and services personnel. However, use of the door is restricted to police, security personnel, and government officials. Gill then notices the other three Middle Eastern men following the first two. Two of these men are also wearing green ID badges with red As on them. Gill will describe one of the five men as Arabic or Palestinian and the other four as Middle Eastern. He will say the men appear to be aged between 30 and 35, and between 5 feet 7 and 5 feet 9 in height. The three men with ID badges are wearing dull grey striped shirts and blue pants, like the uniform worn by United Airlines ramp workers. None of the men are carrying anything and Gill does not recognize any of them.
Men Appear to Be Examining Security Procedures – As the men are approaching the side door, they stop and look around for a few moments, as if they are examining security procedures at the checkpoint. Gill finds this unusual. “Normally, people who had legitimate business would just keep walking because they knew where they were going and what they were doing,” he will comment. One of the men swipes his ID card and enters a code into a keypad in order to open the side door and allow the group to go through it. But Gill is suspicious and goes up to the men. After asking if he can help, he refuses to let them proceed through the door. The men who have ID cards show them to him. But he then notices that the other two men are not wearing uniforms and have no airport identification, and so he tells these men they cannot enter the secure area unless they have their own IDs with them.
Men Don’t Say Who They Are – Gill asks the men who they are and why they are trying to go through the side door, but they give no answer. He tells the two men without IDs that they have to come back through the door, but they say they have IDs and are going to continue on their way. Around this time, Gill is joined by his colleague Nicholas DeSilva, who subsequently witnesses the rest of the incident. Gill then notices that the uniforms worn by three of the men are very dirty, which strikes him as odd, since United Airlines managers would not usually tolerate this. He refuses to let the men in uniforms escort the other two men through the side door and says the men without IDs will have to go through the main security checkpoint.
Men Become Abusive – At this point, the men get angry and become abusive. One of them tells Gill to “f_ck off” and says they are important people he doesn’t know. Next, however, instead of the men without IDs simply passing through the security checkpoint as requested, all of the men retreat, which surprises Gill. They then head off and go down the stairs that lead to the lower level of the main terminal. Gill will never see them again. However, Ed Nelson, his supervisor, will note that if they’d wanted to access a plane at the airport, perhaps to plant weapons on it, they could have returned after 10:00 p.m., when Gill’s shift ended, and used their ID cards to activate the electronic lock and pass through the side door next to the west checkpoint.
Incident Will Be Reported the Next Day – The exact time when Gill’s confrontation with the five men occurs is unclear. Gill will tell the FBI that it occurs “[d]uring the approximate time period of 8:10 p.m. to 8:45 p.m.” But he will tell the 9/11 Commission that it occurs at around 8:00 p.m. And he will tell investigative journalists Joseph Trento and Susan Trento that it occurs at 8:15 p.m. The incident is not unusual enough to necessitate a report and so Gill will take no further action this evening. But he will report it after he comes into work at 1:00 p.m. the following day and hears about the hijacking of Flight 77.
Two of the Men Will Be Identified as Hijackers – Gill will subsequently identify two of the men he confronted as 9/11 hijackers. A week or two after 9/11, his wife will show him a story in the National Enquirer magazine that includes photos of the alleged hijackers and he will recognize two of the hijackers as having been among the group he encountered. And, at some point after this, he will be shown the photos of the alleged hijackers that are published on the FBI website by Steve Wragg, the district manager in charge of Dulles Airport for Argenbright Security. From looking at these, he will identify two of the men he confronted as Flight 77 hijacker Alhazmi and Flight 175 hijacker Alshehhi. He will say these two hijackers were among the men wearing uniforms and ID badges. He will also recognize Alshehhi as the first man to have shown him his ID and Alhazmi as the man who verbally abused him. [Federal Bureau of Investigation, 9/14/2002; 9/11 Commission, 1/19/2004 
; Trento and Trento, 2006, pp. 1-6, 43-44; Priska Neely, 10/21/2010] However, in 2004, when the 9/11 Commission shows Gill photos of numerous individuals, including Alshehhi, Alhazmi, and other 9/11 hijackers, he will say he does not recognize any of these individuals as having been among the men he confronted at Dulles Airport. [9/11 Commission, 2/10/2004 ] The FBI will not take Gill’s account seriously because it has difficulty understanding how and why one of the Flight 175 hijackers would have been at Dulles Airport on the evening before he took an early morning flight from Boston, according to a source with the bureau. [Trento and Trento, 2006, pp. 44] Khalid Almihdhar and “possibly” Salem Alhazmi—two of the alleged hijackers of Flight 77—are recorded on video at Dulles Airport at an unspecified time this evening (see September 10, 2001). [9/11 Commission, 9/29/2003 ; Federal Bureau of Investigation, 11/14/2003 ]
After 11:00 a.m. September 11, 2001: Investigators Refuse to Let a Manager at Dulles Airport Get Involved with Interviews of His Personnel
Investigators at Washington’s Dulles International Airport sternly refuse to let Steve Wragg, a manager, get involved with interviews of his employees, even just to help as a translator for workers with limited English-speaking skills. [Trento and Trento, 2006, pp. 128-129] Flight 77 took off from Dulles Airport at 8:20 a.m. (see (8:20 a.m.) September 11, 2001) and crashed into the Pentagon at 9:37 a.m. (see 9:37 a.m. September 11, 2001). [9/11 Commission, 7/24/2004, pp. 8, 10] Wragg works as the district manager in charge of the airport for Argenbright Security, which handles the passenger security checkpoints, baggage, and other services there for American Airlines and United Airlines. [Atlanta Business Chronicle, 10/12/2001; Trento and Trento, 2006, pp. 125] Having just returned from a trip to Boston, he was away from work when the crashes at the World Trade Center took place. [Brighton Argus, 9/26/2001] But after learning of the attacks, he headed to Dulles Airport to check on Ed Nelson, a security manager who works for him, and the airport’s screeners. He arrived at around 11:00 a.m. and found the place in chaos, filled with people dressed in suits who were wearing earpieces and carrying guns. He found Nelson and the two men headed to the airport’s security checkpoints where they saw personnel standing around, being interviewed by men in suits with clipboards.
Manager Is Told that the Investigation Is None of His Business – Wragg now heads to his office, where screeners are being questioned by investigators, and sees people who belong to numerous agencies, including the FBI, the CIA, airport police, the Department of Transportation, and the Immigration and Naturalization Service. However, he is unable to find anyone who can tell him who is in charge, what is going on, or who he is meant to talk to. Instead, an agent orders him to get out. “Anybody I spoke to said, ‘We need you to stay out of this, we’re taking over, this is none of your business right now,’” he will later recall.
Manager’s Offer of Help with Translation Is Rejected – Wragg calls Argenbright Security’s headquarters, and is told to “secure the records” and “make sure no one touches anything.” He explains to his bosses what the situation is like at the airport and asks what they want him to do. He is instructed to try and get involved if investigators are speaking to Argenbright employees. He then attempts to do this but the investigators refuse to let him participate. “You’re not going to be a part of this,” they tell him. Wragg thinks the investigators will need him to help translate, since many of his company’s employees are immigrants with limited English-speaking skills. Some of them are saying yes to investigators when they don’t know the answer to a question, just to pacify their interrogators, and some of the investigators are getting frustrated at the situation. Wragg wants to assist. “I’m not here for any other reason but to help,” he tells the investigators, but they still order him to “get out.” [Trento and Trento, 2006, pp. 128-129]
12:40 p.m. September 11, 2001: FBI Agents Arrive at Dulles Airport and Start Investigating the Flight 77 Hijacking
The FBI arrives at Washington’s Dulles International Airport and begins its investigation of the hijacking of Flight 77, which departed from the airport this morning. [9/11 Commission, 9/29/2003 ; Goldberg et al., 2007, pp. 161] Flight 77 took off from Dulles Airport at 8:20 a.m. (see (8:20 a.m.) September 11, 2001) and crashed into the Pentagon at 9:37 a.m. (see 9:37 a.m. September 11, 2001). [9/11 Commission, 7/24/2004, pp. 8, 10] The FBI’s Washington Field Office (WFO) was reportedly notified of the hijacking of Flight 77 at around 9:20 a.m. (see (9:20 a.m.) September 11, 2001). [US Department of Health and Human Services, 7/2002, pp. C-45 ] Dulles Airport has now been locked down, preventing people from entering or leaving it, and the terminals have been evacuated (see (Between 9:38 a.m. and 11:37 a.m.) September 11, 2001). [9/11 Commission, 10/16/2003 ; Trento and Trento, 2006, pp. 36; Priska Neely, 10/21/2010]
Fifty FBI Agents Arrive at Dulles Airport – The FBI is responsible for investigating the hijacking of Flight 77, and so Special Agent in Charge Arthur Eberhart has sent a team of 50 agents to the airport to look into it and provide additional security to prevent another hijacking. [US Department of Health and Human Services, 7/2002, pp. A-23, C-45 ] However, the agents only arrive there at around 12:40 p.m., according to a 9/11 Commission memorandum. [9/11 Commission, 9/29/2003 ] The first thing they do there is seize the security tape at the main terminal’s west checkpoint, according to Ed Nelson, a security manager at the airport. [Trento and Trento, 2006, pp. 36] They also interview ticket agents, security personnel, baggage and food handlers, and other personnel, and collect evidence. [US Naval Historical Center, 1/15/2002; Goldberg et al., 2007, pp. 161] They order the confiscation of the 52 computer hard drives that record all electronic television and security information at the airport. The hard drives contain all of the video recorded by the airport’s surveillance cameras and all records of electronic badges used to gain access to secure areas. [Trento and Trento, 2006, pp. 34]
Agents Assess the Passengers on Grounded Planes – Airport officials have received no guidance regarding how passengers on planes that have been grounded in response to the terrorist attacks this morning should be processed. But the FBI agents at the airport now take the lead in reviewing the passengers who have deboarded from planes. [9/11 Commission, 9/29/2003 ] The FBI will set up a command post and a substantial operation at Dulles Airport to carry out its investigation of the hijacking of Flight 77. Van Harp, head of the WFO, will assume responsibility for its response at the airport. [US Naval Historical Center, 12/12/2001]
After 12:40 p.m. September 11, 2001: FBI Agents Immediately Identify the Flight 77 Hijackers on Airport Security Video
FBI agents are able to identify the alleged hijackers of Flight 77 surprisingly quickly on video recorded this morning by security cameras at Washington’s Dulles International Airport, from where Flight 77 took off. [Trento and Trento, 2006, pp. 36-37; Priska Neely, 10/21/2010] FBI agents arrived at Dulles Airport at around 12:40 p.m. (see (12:40 p.m.) September 11, 2001). [9/11 Commission, 9/29/2003 ] The first thing they did there was seize the security video of the west checkpoint in the airport’s main terminal. [Trento and Trento, 2006, pp. 36] The five alleged hijackers passed through this checkpoint on their way to boarding Flight 77 (see 7:18 a.m. September 11, 2001, 7:35 a.m. September 11, 2001, and 7:36 a.m. September 11, 2001) and were captured on video as they did so (see 7:15 a.m.-7:36 a.m. September 11, 2001). [Federal Bureau of Investigation, 9/19/2001; 9/11 Commission, 7/24/2004, pp. 3]
FBI ‘Knew Who the Hijackers Were’ – FBI agents now bring Ed Nelson, the supervisor in charge of the west checkpoint, the video recorded at the checkpoint this morning for him to examine. As he watches it with them, he is surprised that they already seem to know who the Flight 77 hijackers were and what they looked like. The agents “went right to the first hijacker on the tape and identified him,” Nelson will later recall. “They would go ‘roll’ and ‘stop it,’ and showed me each of the hijackers,” he will say. He will remark that both of the metal detectors at the checkpoint were open around the time the hijackers were screened and “lots of traffic was moving through.” In light of this, he will say, “picking people out [on a video recording] is hard.” And yet the agents “knew who the hijackers were out of hundreds of people going through the checkpoints.” When an interviewer asks him, “How would they know?” since the “FBI claimed they had no idea who these hijackers were,” Nelson will reply: “Oh, exactly. Yeah, it boggles my mind.” He will comment: “I wanted to know how they had that kind of information. So fast. It didn’t make sense to me.” [Trento and Trento, 2006, pp. 36-37; Priska Neely, 10/21/2010]
FBI Knew Who the Hijackers Were ‘the Day Before,’ Journalist Will Suggest – US Customs reportedly provided the FBI with the passenger lists and the names of the probable hijackers for the four hijacked flights within 45 minutes of the terrorist attacks this morning (see (11:00 a.m.) September 11, 2001). [9/11 Commission, 1/26/2004] Whether this helped the FBI agents at Dulles Airport to identify the hijackers on the security video is unclear. Investigative journalist Susan Trento will comment on their ability to recognize the hijackers so quickly, stating, “What it says to me is… if they knew [the hijackers] that morning, they knew who they were the day before and they should have been able to catch them before they got to the airport.” [Priska Neely, 10/21/2010]
After 12:40 p.m. September 11, 2001: FBI Appears Uninterested in Flight 77’s Hijackers When Conducting Interviews at Dulles Airport
FBI and Immigration and Naturalization Service (INS) agents at Washington’s Dulles International Airport, from where Flight 77 departed earlier this morning (see (8:20 a.m.) September 11, 2001), are apparently uninterested in the alleged hijackers of Flight 77 when they interview airport personnel. [Trento and Trento, 2006, pp. 36] The FBI arrived at Dulles Airport at around 12:40 p.m. (see (12:40 p.m.) September 11, 2001). [9/11 Commission, 9/29/2003 ] FBI agents and INS agents then interview screeners there. However, nothing they are asking the screeners makes sense to Ed Nelson, a security manager at the airport, and he feels that “something [isn’t] adding up.” “They were not asking about the hijackers—they were focusing on what my screeners might have done wrong,” he will later comment. “It was as if they were working off a script,” he will add. FBI agents assigned to Dulles Airport will indicate that their actions are based on instructions they received from their superiors. One FBI supervisor will recall: “The orders came from headquarters through the local Washington-area FBI field offices and the Joint Task Force on Terrorism. The teams of agents were told to ‘get the screeners to admit they had violated FAA recommended procedures.’” [Trento and Trento, 2006, pp. 36]
After 1:00 p.m. September 11, 2001: FBI Fails to Consider Whether Hijackers Visited Dulles Airport the Previous Evening
FBI agents are apparently unwilling to look into the account of Eric Gill, an employee at Washington’s Dulles International Airport, from where Flight 77 took off this morning, regarding a confrontation he had at the airport yesterday evening with five suspicious Middle Eastern men. [Trento and Trento, 2006, pp. 38-39] The confrontation occurred sometime between 8:00 p.m. and 8:45 p.m. on September 10 while Gill was supervising the west checkpoint in Dulles Airport’s main terminal. Gill became suspicious of the men as they tried to get to a secure area of the airport (see (Between 8:00 p.m. and 8:45 p.m.) September 10, 2001).
Employee Reported the Suspicious Incident to His Supervisor – He reported the incident after coming into work at around 1:00 p.m. today and hearing about the hijacking of Flight 77. [Federal Bureau of Investigation, 9/14/2002; 9/11 Commission, 1/19/2004 ; Trento and Trento, 2006, pp. 1-6] Thinking the men he’d confronted might be involved, he went to his supervisor, Chandresh Patel, and let him know what happened. He also let Patel know that his colleague, Nicholas DeSilva, was at the checkpoint when the incident occurred. Patel therefore arranged for him and DeSilva to be interviewed immediately by FBI agents who had come to the airport to investigate the hijacking (see (12:40 p.m.) September 11, 2001).
Employee Isn’t Shown Video of the Hijackers – Gill is interviewed for about two hours by two agents. The agents seem to consider his confrontation with the Middle Eastern men to be significant. DeSilva, meanwhile, is able to confirm in his interview with the FBI that the confrontation took place. However, the two agents never show Gill video the FBI has taken possession of that shows the alleged hijackers passing through the west checkpoint on their way to boarding Flight 77 this morning, to determine if any of the hijackers were among the men he encountered. [Trento and Trento, 2006, pp. 38-39] And yet the FBI shows the video to every employee who works on the security checkpoints at Dulles Airport apart from Gill and DeSilva, according to Ed Nelson, a security manager at the airport. [Trento and Trento, 2006, pp. 43]
Employee Will Be Visited at Home by the FBI – The FBI will subsequently visit Gill at his home to show him some photos and ask if any of the Middle Eastern men he encountered are on them. Gill will later give conflicting accounts of this visit. In 2004, he will tell the 9/11 Commission that a young female agent visited him at his home a few days after the attacks and showed him about five photos, but he did not recognize the men he’d encountered in them. 9/11 Commission staffers will determine, however, that the men in the photos did not include any of the alleged 9/11 hijackers. [Federal Bureau of Investigation, 9/14/2002; 9/11 Commission, 1/19/2004 ] A couple of years later, Gill will tell investigative journalists Joseph Trento and Susan Trento that FBI agents visited him and showed him some photos a couple of days after the attacks. The agents said they were in a hurry to find out what actually happened, and so the images they had were just photocopies and of poor quality. All the same, he recognized two of the men he’d encountered in them. “The picture was bad… but I told them [one of the men in the pictures] looked like he could be the one who had been dressed in a ramp uniform with the ID card on the night of the 10th,” he will tell the Trentos.
Employee Will Identify Two Men He Encountered as Hijackers – Gill will never hear from the FBI again after this visit. [Trento and Trento, 2006, pp. 39-40] However, a superior will subsequently show him the photos of the alleged hijackers that are published on the FBI website, and from looking at these he will identify two of the men he confronted as Flight 77 hijacker Nawaf Alhazmi and Flight 175 hijacker Marwan Alshehhi. A source in the FBI will say one reason the bureau did not take Gill’s account seriously was that it had trouble understanding how and why one of the Flight 175 hijackers could have been at Dulles Airport on the evening before he took an early morning flight from Boston. [Trento and Trento, 2006, pp. 43-44]
