Pharmacist Gregg Chatterton approaches two men—later identified as 9/11 hijackers Mohamed Atta and Marwan Alshehhi—after observing them spending a suspiciously long time in the skin care aisle of his drugstore, Huber Healthmart Drugs in Delray Beach, Florida. “My hands. They’re itching and they’re burning,” says Atta. Chatterton will later recall: “Both [of Atta’s] hands were red from the wrist down. If you filled your sink with bleach and stuck your hands in there for six hours, they would come out red, and that is what they looked like.” Asked the cause of his skin irritation, Atta replies evasively. After recommending a particular lotion, Chatterton is about to turn away when Atta forcefully slaps his hand against the druggist’s chest and says, “My friend, he’s got a cough.” Chatterton gives Alshehhi a bottle of Robitussin. Chatterton will remember the pair when the FBI comes calling a few weeks later. He will say, “When somebody touches you like that, you remember that customer.” According to the St. Petersburg Times, the incident will give rise “to the theory that Atta irritated his hands while handling anthrax” (See also October 14, 2001 and March-April 2002). [Los Angeles Times, 10/13/2001; US News and World Report, 10/28/2001; St. Petersburg Times, 9/1/2002]
August 1, 2001: Moussaoui Supposedly Seen with Hijackers Atta and Alshehhi in Oklahoma
A hotel owner in Oklahoma City will later say that he sees Zacarias Moussaoui, Mohamed Atta, and Marwan Alshehhi together on or around this day. He will claim they come to his hotel late at night and ask for a room, but end up staying elsewhere. At the time, Moussaoui is living 28 miles away in Norman, Oklahoma (see February 23-June 2001). However, even though the US government will later struggle to find evidence directly connecting Moussaoui to any of the 9/11 hijackers, this account will not be cited by any US government officials or prosecutors. An article will later suggest this may be because of numerous reports and eyewitnesses claiming Timothy McVeigh and Terry Nichols stayed at the same hotel with a group of Middle Easterners in the weeks before the 1995 Oklahoma City bombing (see 8:35 a.m. – 9:02 a.m. April 19, 1995). By highlighting this encounter, it might draw renewed attention to controversial Oklahoma City bombing theories. Atta and Alshehhi briefly visited an Oklahoma flight school in July 2000 (see July 2-3, 2000), before Moussaoui arrived in the US. On April 1, 2001, 9/11 hijacker Nawaf Alhazmi received a speeding ticket in Oklahoma (see April 1, 2001), but there have been no sightings of him with Moussaoui. [LA Weekly, 8/2/2002]
Link to Oklahoma City Bombing? – Former CIA analyst Larry Johnson will say of this meeting: “One of the things that’s evident right now in connection with this investigation, the motel in Oklahoma City where the April bombing against the Murrah building was planned and executed from, that same hotel figures in two of the 9/11 hijackers and Zacarias Moussaoui, who’s currently in jail. Those three guys tried to check into that motel. And there is another fellow in Oklahoma City that links them to the April bombing against the Murrah building.… I have spoken to the owner of the motel. After the 9/11 attack, he called the FBI. The FBI came out and interviewed him, as he identified Mohamed Atta, Marwan Alshehhi, and Zacarias Moussaoui. They came in. They said, ‘We’re looking for a room.’ He said: ‘I don’t have any room. What do you need it for?’ They said, ‘We’re going for flight training.’” [O’Reilly Factor, 5/7/2002]
Intriguingly Similar Sightings Nearby – Years later, a 2002 FBI document will be made public that reveals several employees at a flight school in Bethany, Oklahoma, saw Atta, Alshehhi, and hijacker Waleed Alshehri flying small aircraft several times from early 2001 until August 2001. Additionally, Moussaoui was said to use the same airport, although there will be no mentioned sightings of him with the others. Bethany is about five miles from Highway 40, which is where the hotel mentioned above is near. Additionally, the hotel is about 28 miles from Norman, Oklahoma (where Moussaoui is living) and Bethany is about 33 miles from Norman (see Early 2001-August 2001). [Federal Bureau of Investigation, 4/19/2002]
August 6-September 9, 2001: 9/11 Hijacker Atta Drives Over 3,000 Miles in Rental Cars
On three occasions Mohamed Atta rents cars from Warrick’s Rent-a-Car in Pompano Beach, Florida. [Los Angeles Times, 9/15/2001] According to the company’s owner Brad Warrick, “a lot of criminals come here because we’re a little guy, out of the way… We don’t have software in our computer system that checks the background of drivers like the major companies do.” Atta, always accompanied by Marwan Alshehhi, appears like a businessman, yet doesn’t “rent the best car we had, he rented the cheapest, a white Escort, then a blue Chevy Corsair, then back to the Escort.” From August 15-29, he travels 1,915 miles in the Corsair. Another time, he tells Warrick he is going up to New York State. He always leaves the cars scrupulously clean after using them. [Observer, 9/16/2001; Corbin, 2003, pp. 212-213] However, Warrick later discovers a small amount of an unidentified white powder in the trunk of the Escort rented by Atta (see October 29, 2001). When, two days before 9/11, Alshehhi returns the car rented by Atta the final time, he asks that the charge be removed from Atta’s credit card and placed on his. Says Warrick, “If you’re going on a suicide mission, who cares who pays for what?” [St. Petersburg Times, 9/1/2002] Warrick comments, “I mean, if you’re going on a suicide mission, why not leave the car at the airport?” [Kansas City Star, 9/18/2001] Atta has his own car, a red Pontiac, but sells this about a week before 9/11. [CNN, 10/26/2001]
August 13-14, 2001: 9/11 Hijackers Meet in Las Vegas for Summit
The lead hijackers meet in Las Vegas for a summit a few weeks before 9/11. Investigators will believe that this is the “most crucial planning in the United States,” but will not understand why the hijackers choose Vegas, since they are all living on the East Coast at this time (see March 2001-September 1, 2001 and August 6-September 9, 2001). One senior official will speculate, “Perhaps they figured it would be easy to blend in.” [New York Times, 11/4/2001] At least three of the plot leaders are in Las Vegas at this time. Hani Hanjour and Nawaf Alhazmi fly from Dulles Airport to Los Angeles on an American Airlines Boeing 757, the same sort of plane they hijack on 9/11, and then continue to Las Vegas. Mohamed Atta also flies to Las Vegas from Washington National Airport. This is his second trip to Vegas, which was also previously visited by some of the other hijackers (see May 24-August 14, 2001). A few weeks earlier, Atta had traveled to Spain, possibly with some of the other hijackers, to finalize the plans for the attack with their associate Ramzi bin al-Shibh (see July 8-19, 2001). [US District Court for the Eastern District of Virginia, Alexandria Division, 7/31/2006, pp. 1, 17, 21 
; US District Court for the Eastern District of Virginia, Alexandria Division, 7/31/2006, pp. 57-8 ] Alhazmi will later be recalled by a hotel employee, who will say she ran into him at the Days Inn. According to her later account, he is “cold and abrupt,” in Vegas on “important business,” and will soon be traveling to Los Angeles. He asks for a list of Days Inns in Los Angeles, but does not want a reservation to be made. He also claims to be from Florida, although he is only thought to have spent a week there (see June 19-25, 2001). [Las Vegas Review-Journal, 10/26/2001] A close associate of the hijackers, Ramzi bin al-Shibh, will later say in a 2002 interview that Ziad Jarrah, Marwan Alshehhi, and Khalid Almihdhar are also present in Vegas at this time. [Fouda and Fielding, 2003, pp. 137] Newsweek calls Vegas an “odd location” and comments: “They stayed in cheap hotels on a dreary stretch of the Strip frequented by dope dealers and $10 street hookers. Perhaps they wished to be fortified for their mission by visiting a shrine to American decadence. Or maybe they just wanted a city that was easy to reach by air from their various cells in Florida, New Jersey and San Diego.” [Newsweek, 10/15/2001]
August 16, 2001: Moussaoui’s Belongings Possess Information Sufficient to Roll Up 9/11 Plot
After Zacarias Moussaoui is arrested, the FBI wishes to search his possessions (see August 16, 2001 and August 23-27, 2001). According to a presentation made by FBI agent Aaron Zebley at Moussaoui’s trial, the belongings are sufficient to potentially connect Moussaoui to eleven of the 9/11 hijackers: Mohamed Atta, Marwan Alshehhi, Ziad Jarrah, Hani Hanjour, Khalid Almihdhar, Nawaf Alhazmi, Fayez Banihammad, Ahmed Alhaznawi, Hamza Alghamdi, Satam Al Suqami, and Waleed Alshehri. The connections would be made, for example, through Ramzi bin al-Shibh, who spoke with Moussaoui on the telephone and wired him money (see July 29, 2001-August 3, 2001), and who was linked to three of the hijacker pilots from their time in Germany together (see November 1, 1998-February 2001). Bin al-Shibh also received money from Mustafa Ahmed al-Hawsawi, who was connected to hijacker Fayez Ahmed Banihammad (see June 25, 2001). [US District Court for the Eastern District of Virginia, Alexandria Division, 7/31/2006] Moussaoui’s notebook contained two recognizable control numbers for the Western Union wire transfers from bin al-Shibh and, according to McClatchy newspapers, a check on these numbers “would probably have uncovered other wires in the preceding days” to bin al-Shibh from al-Hawsawi. [McClatchy Newspapers, 9/11/2007] The discovery of the eleven hijackers could potentially have led to the discovery of some or all of the remaining eight plot members, as they were brothers (Wail and Waleed Alshehri, Nawaf and Salem Alhazmi), opened bank accounts together (see May 1-July 18, 2001 and June 27-August 23, 2001), lived together (see March 2001-September 1, 2001), obtained identity documents together (see April 12-September 7, 2001 and August 1-2, 2001), arrived in the US together (see April 23-June 29, 2001), and booked tickets on the same four flights on 9/11 (see August 25-September 5, 2001).
August 16-September 10, 2001: 9/11 Hijackers Make Series of Deposits to Bank Accounts
Several deposits are made to the 9/11 hijackers’ accounts. Details are available for some of the deposits for eleven of the nineteen hijackers: Mohamed Atta, Marwan Alshehhi, Ziad Jarrah, Hani Hanjour, Nawaf Alhazmi, Khalid Almihdhar, Ahmed Alhazmawi, Fayez Ahmed Banihammad, Hamza Alghamdi, Waleed Alshehri, and Satam Al Suqami. Over $40,000 is deposited in their accounts, much in cash. The largest amounts deposited in one day occur on August 24, when $8,000 is split equally between Hamza Alghamdi’s account and a joint account of Atta and Alshehhi, and September 5, when a total of $9,650 is split between Banihammad’s and Hamza Alghamdi’s accounts, and the joint Atta/Alshehhi account. The smallest deposit is $120, paid into Khalid Almihdhar’s First Union National Bank account on September 9. [US District Court for the Eastern District of Virginia, Alexandria Division, 7/31/2006 ; US District Court for the Eastern District of Virginia, Alexandria Division, 7/31/2006 ; US District Court for the Eastern District of Virginia, Alexandria Division, 7/31/2006 ; US District Court for the Eastern District of Virginia, Alexandria Division, 7/31/2006 ; US District Court for the Eastern District of Virginia, Alexandria Division, 7/31/2006 ; US District Court for the Eastern District of Virginia, Alexandria Division, 7/31/2006 ; US District Court for the Eastern District of Virginia, Alexandria Division, 7/31/2006 ; US District Court for the Eastern District of Virginia, Alexandria Division, 7/31/2006 ; US District Court for the Eastern District of Virginia, Alexandria Division, 7/31/2006 ] Although it is impossible to trace the exact origins of the deposits, possible sources include withdrawals from other hijackers’ bank accounts, cash and traveler’s checks brought in by the hijackers in the spring/early summer (see January 15, 2000-August 2001), car sales, and money distributed by Atta, who reportedly received around $100,000 in early August (see Early August 2001, Summer 2001 and before, and Mid-July-Mid-August 2001).
August 23, 2001: Mossad Reportedly Gives CIA List of Terrorists Living in US; at Least Four 9/11 Hijackers Named
According to German newspapers, the Mossad gives the CIA a list of 19 terrorists living in the US and say that they appear to be planning to carry out an attack in the near future. It is unknown if these are the 19 9/11 hijackers or if the number is a coincidence. However, four names on the list are known, and these four will be 9/11 hijackers: Nawaf Alhazmi, Khalid Almihdhar, Marwan Alshehhi, and Mohamed Atta. [Die Zeit (Hamburg), 10/1/2002; Der Spiegel (Hamburg), 10/1/2002; BBC, 10/2/2002; Ha’aretz, 10/3/2002] The Mossad appears to have learned about this through its “art student spy ring.” Yet apparently, this warning and list are not treated as particularly urgent by the CIA and the information is not passed on to the FBI. It is unclear whether this warning influenced the decision to add Alhazmi and Almihdhar to a terrorism watch list on this same day, and if so, why only those two. [Der Spiegel (Hamburg), 10/1/2002] Israel has denied that there were any Mossad agents in the US. [Ha’aretz, 10/3/2002]
August 25-September 5, 2001: 9/11 Hijackers Spend Over $30,000 on 9/11 Tickets
All the 9/11 hijackers book their flights for September 11, 2001, using their apparent real names. The total cost of the tickets is in excess of $30,000: 
August 25: Khalid Almihdhar, who was watchlisted two days previously (see August 23, 2001), and Majed Moqed book tickets for American Airlines flight 77 using the AA.com website. They are collected from the American Airlines ticket counter at Baltimore Washington International Airport on September 5. The tickets were not mailed, because the shipping address did not match the credit card address. [US District Court for the Eastern District of Virginia, Alexandria Division, 7/31/2006, pp. 72, 74 ] August 26: Wail Alshehri buys a ticket for American Airlines flight 11 over the phone with his debit card. His brother Waleed buys a ticket for the same flight at the AA.com website using his debit card. [US District Court for the Eastern District of Virginia, Alexandria Division, 7/31/2006 ; US District Court for the Eastern District of Virginia, Alexandria Division, 7/31/2006, pp. 72 ] August 27: Nawaf Alhazmi, who was watchlisted four days before (see August 23, 2001), buys tickets for himself and his brother Salem for American Airlines flight 77 through Travelocity from a Kinkos computer in Laurel, Maryland, using his debit card (see August 25-27, 2001). [US District Court for the Eastern District of Virginia, Alexandria Division, 7/31/2006 ; US District Court for the Eastern District of Virginia, Alexandria Division, 7/31/2006, pp. 72 ] August 27: Saeed Alghamdi uses his debit card to purchase tickets for United Airlines flight 93 for himself and Ahmed Alnami from the UA.com website. The tickets are not paid for until September 5, 2001, due to a problem with the debit card. [US District Court for the Eastern District of Virginia, Alexandria Division, 7/31/2006, pp. 72 ] August 27: Fayez Ahmed Banihammad uses his visa card to purchase tickets for himself and Mohamed Alshehri for United Airlines flight 175 over the telephone. [US District Court for the Eastern District of Virginia, Alexandria Division, 7/31/2006, pp. 72-73 ; US District Court for the Eastern District of Virginia, Alexandria Division, 7/31/2006 ] August 28: Mohamed Atta uses his debit card to buy tickets for American Airlines flight 11 for himself and Abdulaziz Alomari from the AA.com website. [US District Court for the Eastern District of Virginia, Alexandria Division, 7/31/2006 ] August 28: Waleed Alshehri purchases a ticket for Satam Al Suqami for American Airlines flight 11 in person from the company’s counter at Fort Lauderdale Airport. [US District Court for the Eastern District of Virginia, Alexandria Division, 7/31/2006, pp. 73 ] August 28: Marwan Alshehhi purchases a ticket for United Airlines flight 175 from the company’s counter at Miami International Airport. [US District Court for the Eastern District of Virginia, Alexandria Division, 7/31/2006 ; US District Court for the Eastern District of Virginia, Alexandria Division, 7/31/2006, pp. 73 ] August 29: Hamza Alghamdi books tickets for himself and Ahmed Alghamdi for United Airlines flight 175 from the UA.com website. [US District Court for the Eastern District of Virginia, Alexandria Division, 7/31/2006 ] August 29: Ahmed Alhaznawi creates a new e-mail account and Travelocity.com account and uses them to book a ticket for himself on United Airlines flight 93. [US District Court for the Eastern District of Virginia, Alexandria Division, 7/31/2006 ; US District Court for the Eastern District of Virginia, Alexandria Division, 7/31/2006, pp. 74 ] August 30: Ziad Jarrah purchases a ticket for himself for United Airlines flight 93 from the UA website. [US District Court for the Eastern District of Virginia, Alexandria Division, 7/31/2006 ] August 31: Hani Hanjour purchases a ticket for American Airlines flight 77 from ATS Advanced Travel Services in Totowa, New Jersey, paying in cash. [US District Court for the Eastern District of Virginia, Alexandria Division, 7/31/2006 ]
At least five tickets are one way only. [Los Angeles Times, 9/18/2001] There are numerous connections between the hijackers booked on the four flights by this point: Hijackers on different 9/11 flights arrived in the US on the same plane. For example, Salem Alhazmi (Flight 77) arrived with Abdulaziz Alomari (Flight 11), and Fayez Ahmed Banihammad (Flight 175) arrived with Saeed Alghamdi (Flight 93) (see April 23-June 29, 2001); Two of the pilots, Mohamed Atta and Marwan Alshehhi, train and live together, and have a joint bank account (see (Mid-July 2000 – Early January 2001), July 6-December 19, 2000, and June 28-July 7, 2000); Hijackers from different planes open bank accounts together (see May 1-July 18, 2001 and June 27-August 23, 2001); and The hijackers obtain identity documents together (see April 12-September 7, 2001 and August 1-2, 2001).
Six hijackers also provide the same phone number and three use the same address. [Miami Herald, 9/22/2001]
Between August 26 and September 9, 2001: 9/11 Hijacker Leaves Clues behind at Florida Motel
9/11 hijacker Marwan Alshehhi and a reportedly unidentified man stay at the Panther Motel in Deerfield Beach, Florida. During their stay, the manager, Richard Surma, observes that the two men have covered two paintings with towels, apparently for religious reasons, and are frequently visited by a third individual, who is also unidentified. When they leave on September 9, Surma finds several items left behind in a dumpster: a box cutter, aeronautical maps of the East Coast, martial arts books, and a tote bag from a flying school. [Boston Globe, 9/15/2001; Washington Post, 9/16/2001 ; Pittsburgh Post-Gazette, 9/30/2001; U.S.D.C Eastern District of Virginia, 7/31/2006, pp. 3 ] According to a timeline compiled by the Texas Service Center of the Immigration and Naturalization Service, Alshehhi is accompanied by fellow 9/11 hijacker Mohamed Atta when he checks out of the Panther Motel. [Immigration and Naturalization Service, 5/27/2002]
Early September 2001: Al-Marabh Sends Money to Atta, Alshehhi, and Their Supporters in US
Two months after 9/11, the Toronto Sun will report, “[Canadian] and US police probing [Nabil] al-Marabh have learned he had a flurry of phone calls and financial transactions with [Mohamed] Atta and [Marwan] Alshehhi days before the attacks.” [Toronto Sun, 10/16/2001] Additionally, Canadian authorities will claim that in the days before 9/11, al-Marabh sends money through a Toronto bank account to at least three men who will later be arrested in the US for supporting roles in the 9/11 attacks. The names of the three men have not been released. At least $15,000 is sent to the men in the days before 9/11. A source close to the investigation will say, “There are several links between this man and others in the US. There was money going back and forth.” Thousands more will be withdrawn from suspicious accounts in the days after 9/11. [Toronto Sun, 10/4/2001; Toronto Sun, 10/5/2001] US intelligence also intercepts al-Marabh’s associates making post-9/11 phone calls praising the attacks. [Ottawa Citizen, 10/29/2001] Al-Marabh sent money on other occasions. For instance, in May 2001, he made at least 15 monetary transactions, mostly sending money transfers to the US from Toronto. In late June 2001, he transferred $15,000 to an account in the US. It has not been revealed who he sent these transfers to. [New York Times, 10/14/2001; Toronto Sun, 10/16/2001] A Canadian police source will say, “There were a lot of banking activities prior to the attacks. There was a lot of money being moved through accounts, but most were small amounts.” [Toronto Sun, 10/17/2001] Canadian officials will call al-Marabh a “bureaucratic terrorist,” who provided logistical support, funding, and other services to the hijackers. [Toronto Sun, 10/30/2001]
