July 14, 2001: NEADS Personnel Are Briefed on the Threat Posed by Bin Laden

Personnel at NORAD’s Northeast Air Defense Sector (NEADS) are briefed about the threat posed by Osama bin Laden. Lieutenant Colonel Mark Stuart, an intelligence officer at NEADS, will tell the 9/11 Commission that NORAD’s Continental United States Region has developed an “Osama bin Laden… threat briefing,” which is the last briefing of its kind before 9/11. The increased threat level relating to bin Laden and al-Qaeda is then “briefed at NEADS,” he will say. Further details of the briefing NEADS personnel receive are unstated. [9/11 Commission, 10/30/2003; 9/11 Commission, 10/30/2003 ] NEADS, based in Rome, New York, is responsible for protecting the airspace in which the hijackings take place on September 11. It will therefore be responsible for coordinating the US military’s response to the hijackings. [9/11 Commission, 7/24/2004, pp. 17; Vanity Fair, 8/1/2006; Shenon, 2008, pp. 203]