And the official number of NORAD intercepts between 1990 and 1994 is .....

"Overall, during the past 4 years, NORAD's alert fighters took off to intercept aircraft (referred to as scrambled) 1,518 times, or an average of 15 times per site per year. Of these incidents, the number of suspected drug smuggling aircraft averaged one per site, or less than 7 percent of all of the alert sites' total activity. The remaining activity generally involved visually inspecting unidentified aircraft and assisting aircraft in distress."

--Continental Air Defense: A Dedicated Force Is No Longer Needed (Letter Report, 05/03/94, GAO/NSIAD-94-76)

http://www.fas.org/man/gao/gao9476.htm

P.S. Found this here:
http://www.team8plus.org/e107_plugins/forum/forum_viewtopic.php?4352

I'm willing to bet they weren't over land.

What happened when planes deviated from their paths over land or flew into military airspace?

telling us the number of intercepts between 1990 and 1994 doesn't tell us anything about where those intercepts occurred.

You are all talking out of your asses. Where is your evidence for this absurd assertion?

So have at it.

But go with it!

One was Payne Stewart, and that incident doesn't fit between the years specified in the OP.

The fact is, almost every one of these intercepts are over water - the direction that threats were perceived to be coming from in the event of a military attack. Hijackings were considered a criminal act, not an act of war. There would normally be no reason to get the military involved in incidents over land, where the military had precious little authority as it was.

Rant all you like about all these intercepts, but the facts surrounding them show why America was completely unprepared for the attacks of 9/11. In fact, the actions of several individuals to go AROUND procedure caused the official response to be much quicker, and it STILL was nowhere the speed needed.

9/11 CTs that play on the notion of American exceptionalism might comfort the heart a bit, but facts remain facts. The nation's defenses were woefully unprepared for the kind of attack we experienced on 9/11. And the only effective defense may be that experienced aboard United 93.

Here are the FAA regulations about suspected hijackings:

http://news.findlaw.com/cnn/docs/terrorism/chp7.html

These regulations do no differentiate between over land or over sea. Why not, if your argument isn't bullshit?

can be found anywhere? You can't provide a single date, a single flight number, a single airport, a single recollection from a pilot.

There is absolutely no proof whats so ever.

99%+ of these intercepts?

Your argument is like saying that because we can't document what FISA warrants are for, that the US must have never taken one out against a suspected terrorist.

Prove your claim. It makes no sense.

This article says that NORAD did not track domestic flights prior to 911.

http://911research.wtc7.net/cache/planes/analysis/norad/calgaryherald101301_scrables.html

military intercept over the last 15 years.

the status quo support the official story so why should I help you?

You believe that NORAD was stood down - you provide the evidence to support your case. Why is it so hard?

If you can't, why not be honest and at least admit that it is unsupported supposition that you believe to be true?

Message removed by moderator. Click here to review the message board rules.

Just because something can't be shown doesn't mean it's "secret".

Show me the number of lunches served at Lemoore, California's Lincoln Elementary school on 15 April 1967. I know there were lunches served because I was a student there then. What? You can't produce it easily and quickly? It must be secret then!

Given time and the right points of contact, I have no doubt one could indeed produce a record of every documented military intercept over the past 15 years - and it would be a surprisingly short list (to you). In 10 years of flying with the Navy I never intercepted 1 civilian aircraft - lots of other military aircraft here and in the Med, but no calls to intercept or even look at any civilian aircraft.

That's the job of the ANG.

You are going in a circular clusterpoke now. Your own example of Special Military Operations states that an escorting aircraft can be anything that is available:



Truth is I have known of a few Navy aircraft that were out in a warning area or just out on a flight who got tasking to go investigate an "unknown rider".

You really don't know any of this stuff, do you? Making it up as you go along or a classic "I Love Google" expert, apparently.

Since you like to talk about this so much, why not tell us what happens?

I'm not the one claiming something idiotic and nonsensical. You are.

You have this habit of opining loudly and in most cases obnoxiously on things you have no clue about adn you didn't let me down here.

If an aircraft "deviated from their paths over land or flew into military airspace", typically a radio call to the aircraft got them back onto their assigned flight path or out of the military operating area or restricted area. Prior to 9/11, I'd submit that there were little to no in-CONUS (continental US) airspace violations that resulted in the launch of a NORAD aircraft.

Procedures for lost aircraft and/or no radio (NORDO) aircraft are published procedures and part of any pilot/aircrew certification program. The reason that not many NORAD alert launches occur is because the vast, vast majority of aircraft that become lost (say, for example, stray into a military operating area (MOA) or "stray", as you call it, from their flight path )or lose a radio employ the appropriate procedures and as a result do not require assistance or any NORAD or military aircraft interceptions. Whether it is sqwaking 7600 and simply proceeding on a filed flight path or flying a published lost aircraft pattern, most of these events take care of themselves.

Keep posting the good stuff

when it doesn't answer the hard questions?

this administration answering the hard questions? :shrug:

Seriously. You are the one making an idiotic and nonsensical claim. Prove it.

there absolutely no recorded instances of routine NORAD intercepts over the US mainland. None.

Why haven't the Pilots for 911 Truth stepped forward on this issue? If they are really pilots with years of military and commercial flying, then surely one of them has been involved in an intercept. Why are they holding back? Whose side are they on?

intercepts over the last 15 years. Where is it?

you are the one with a CT to support. Are you admitting that you can not show that there were any intercepts over the mainland?

And what about the Pilots for 911 Truth? Why are they withholding the truth?

You are the one stating that NORAD didn't follow regulations. Provide evidence for your ridiculous claims.

Here's a pdf of the same report with a map showing air defense bases http://archive.gao.gov/t2pbat3/151250.pdf

There were a string of five bases across the northern border of the US (Great Falls, Fargo, Duluth, Selfridge, Niagara Falls) which have a total of ZERO non-drug intercepts during the report years despite being the closest responders to perhaps a quarter of the national airspace and lying under busy air routes between the coasts. Where are the routine over land intercepts?

Compare to Florida bases at 370 non-drug intercepts - tiny land mass in comparison, flanked by bases which also have fairly high numbers of intercepts in LA(77)and SC(39).

There are concentrations of intercepts along the east coast, gulf coast, Pacific coast and Mexican border. All bases near the water have intercepts. All bases in the interior report no intercepts. It's a pretty obvious pattern.

Not sure if I'm reading the document correctly, but here's how I interpret it.

Duluth, MN is an air defense unit whose status is 5 - no home alert. There is one alert site associated with it, which is Tyndall AFB, FL. Tyndall shows status 3 - detached alert site. In other words, there is no alert unit stationed in Duluth. Rather, there is some kind of command unit in Duluth; all the aircraft that are commanded by that air defense unit are deployed at a detached alert site in Florida.

Fargo is another status 5 air defense unit with no home alert. The alert unit (and therefore the aircraft) for Fargo is another detached alert site - Kingsley AFB, OR, status 3.

Selfridge, MI is the same story - a status 5 air defense unit; no home alert. It has a detached alert unit at Seymour Johnson AFB, NC, status 3.

Niagra Falls, NY is also a status 5 air defense unit - no home alert. Its alert site in Charleston, SC has a status of 4 rather than 3, which means alert site closed or planned to close. Since Charleston has some scrambles then it apparently is either planned to close in the future or else closed sometime during the period covered by this report. Other than that difference of alert site being closed or in the process of closing, this seems to be the same pattern as the others - it is an air defense unit that has no aircraft deployed locally but rather a detached alert site somewhere else.

Great Falls, MT is a status 4 air defense unit - alert site closed or planned to close. It has a detached alert site associated with it at Davis-Monthan AFB, AZ. Looking at the low number of scrambles it seems reasonable to conclude that the alert site at Great Falls was closed and that it now (and for most of the period covered in the report) has only a detached alert unit in Arizona.

So, the lack of any scrambles at those air defense units appears to have a simpler explanation - they've got no aircraft stationed there.

By the way, the air defense units on the list that are status 5 have altogether a total of zero scrambles during the four year period covered by the report. I believe that supports my conclusion that they have no aircraft at those sites.

So the idea that overland intercepts by NORAD were occurring whenever aircraft strayed off course or lost radio communication is even less plausible - vast regions of the nation (like chicago) were at least an hour from the nearest base (langley, 612nm from o'hare).

Before 9/11, if a plane was flying into the country without a transponder signal and refusing to respond to ATC, how would it have been classified other than a suspected drug run?

On edit: Please ignore this post. I should have read the entire thread and the pdf before responding.

Today, any aircraft with radio problems is suspect, no problem routine. Fighter jets are scrambled to babysit suspect aircraft or "unknowns" three or four times a day. Before Sept. 11, that happened twice a week.

Last year, there were 425 unknowns -- pilots who didn't file or diverted from flight plans or used the wrong frequency. Jets were scrambled 129 times.
http://911research.wtc7.net/cache/planes/analysis/norad/calgaryherald101301_scrables.html

Seems like they weren't intercepting over land pre-911.