July 31, 2001: FAA Issues Hijacking Warning; No Specific Domestic Threat

The FAA issues another alert to US airlines. It mentions “reports of possible near-term terrorist operations… particularly on the Arabian Peninsula and/or Israel.” It states the FAA has no credible evidence of specific plans to attack US civil aviation, but notes that some “currently active” terrorist groups are known to “plan and train for hijackings” and are able to build and conceal sophisticated explosive devices in luggage and consumer products. [9/11 Commission, 7/24/2004, pp. 259] This alert will expire by 9/11. Note that pilots and flight attendants later claim they were never told about warnings such as these. The airlines also disagree about the content of pre-9/11 warnings generally. [CNN, 3/2002; Ananova, 5/17/2002] For instance, American Airlines states these warnings were “extremely general in nature and did not identify a specific threat or recommend any specific security enhancements.” [Ananova, 5/17/2002 Sources: American Airlines]