|
Welcome to the International Skeptics Forum, where we discuss skepticism, critical thinking, the paranormal and science in a friendly but lively way. You are currently viewing the forum as a guest, which means you are missing out on discussing matters that are of interest to you. Please consider registering so you can gain full use of the forum features and interact with other Members. Registration is simple, fast and free! Click here to register today. |
12th October 2009, 01:53 AM | #41 |
Illuminator
Join Date: Apr 2007
Posts: 4,494
|
Dude! What worked for me was going to the video display page, and right-clicking (ctrl click) to save as quicktime movie. Bam. 38.3 MB. So it's no loss to have it at least.
Also finding other videos. Another Mebo page advertises a 60 miin introductory video, but this time it's that 60 Minutes episode from 99. Works the same, I go it too. http://www.mebocom-defilee.ch/mp4/cbs-lockerbie.html On first blush, it's like a re-make of the Dispatches episode, right down to flipping through the Fhimah diary and Bollier backed up by ol Maj Owen Lewis. Curious. |
12th October 2009, 02:31 AM | #42 |
Illuminator
Join Date: Apr 2007
Posts: 4,494
|
I'll address that now. "Around the Scottish coastline" is a phrase I stand by for these reasons:
I'm an American from the West and think of spaces in the large sense, and/or to minimize European spaces. Nothing on Great Britain seems very far from anything else to me. This is turn ties in with relative measurements of a trans-Atlantic flight, on the scale of which the distance from Heathrow to Lockerbie or to the Scottish coast ten minutes away is relatively short. I'm not sure if they would or should know the plane's schedule, but I'd think so. I'm also not sure how on or behind schedule it was, but if it was about ten minutes, they were aiming for about the coast, farther off and their goal was shallow coastal waters near Northern Ireland as well. Only light material (like a shirt collar weighted down with only tiny bits of exploded electrics?) might be retrievable, with searchers in fishing boats instead of galoshes (or in addition to, depending on wind). As opposed to aiming for a mid-point between the mid-Atlantic ridge and Manhattan, I would not aim for around the Scottish coastline. |
12th October 2009, 05:01 AM | #43 |
Adult human female
Join Date: Sep 2003
Location: NT 150 511
Posts: 50,594
|
Actually, there are any number of possible entry points. However, there were only three examined at the trial and it seems as if the investigators only looked seriously at three - Luqa, Frankfurt and Heathrow. The simple fact that has to be got round as far as the Luqa theory is concerned, is that the prosecution absolutely bust a gut trying to find evidence of something untoward at Luqa, and failed utterly. There were 55 bags on KA180, all matched to passengers who actually flew. They were counted three times, in addition to the sniffer dogs. Nobody from that flight reported a missing bag (which rather rules out that a legit bag was taken off to get something sinister on). All 39 passengers were subjected to in-depth police investigation and they all checked out as legit. The records from Luqa were all available, and checked out. To the point where Air Malta won damages from a TV company which broadcast a documentary with a "reconstruction" showing an unaccompanied bag going on flight KA180. (The TV company settled out of court when it saw the evidence Air Malta had that demonstrated that didn't happen.) It's all very well assuming security at Luqa might have been more lax, or reading a post from some guy on the internet who was there once and thought he was waved through a bit quick, but the actual evidence shows Luqa security to have been on the ball, and frankly as tight as a duck's arse. The best that could be managed in court was that a manager, asked whether it was conceivably even remotely possible that something could have been slipped past, said something like, well, anything's possible. If you were asked about something that happened ten years ago, under oath, could you say anything more certain? He was adamant that to the best of his knowledge, nothing had got past and it was extremely unlikely anything could have got past. Not only that, but it was never really disputed that getting past that security, even if it were possible, would have required Megrahi to have had an accomplice with an air-side pass. That's where Fhimah was supposed to have come in - although he'd changed jobs and no longer worked for Air Malta, he still had his pass. However, the prosecution failed to lead any evidence to show that he was even at the airport that day, and the prosecution against him was dismissed as "no case to answer". Which kind of leaves the question open, if Megrahi did get that case on the plane, who helped him? No other accomplice was suggested. The faulty reasoning of the judges seems to have been that Megrahi bought the clothes, so he must have been the bomber. Megrahi was at Luqa airport on the morning of 21st December. There is evidence that an item of luggage was routed through Frankfurt to PA103A from KA180 out of Luqa, even though no passenger from LA180 was booked on PA103A. Therefore, Megrahi somehow must have circumvented Luqa security undetected, even if we have literally no clue how. The difficulty there is that there are also huge problems with the "Megrahi bought the clothes" part, which could be yet another thread (and probably will be, in the fullness of time). He was never identified as the purchaser; the best that could be done was that he resembled the purchaser (except for being several inches too short, at least 10 years too young, and not heavily-enough built). And, as we're investigating, the evidence that an unaccompanied bag from KA180 was routed through Frankfurt on to PA103A is also pretty rocky. Which is why I've concluded (and like all conclusions, this is subject to revision if more and better evidence emerges) that neither Megrahi nor anybody else put the bag on KA180. KA180 seems to be a complete red herring. Which just leaves us with every other airport in the world. Longtabber aside, this doesn't fit with the evidence. The MST-13 timer (if we take the Official Version at face value) was very close indeed to the actual bomb, whichever way you slice it. Not only in the same luggage container, but certainly within feet of the bomb, and probably in the actual bomb suitcase. It was found lodged in the collar of a shirt which Tony Gauci was finally persuaded to state he sold to the mystery purchaser. Along with bits of shattered Toshiba radio-cassette player. Also, could you explain the point of the two-bag trick? Even assuming your timer got through Luqa because it didn't smell of Semtex to your friendly springer spaniel, what good does it do you? You've still got to get "bomb plus electronics" on somewhere, and putting the timer in a different bag doesn't make that any easier. It just adds another big risk that might go wrong. Why would anyone possibly want to put the timer in a completely different bag from the bomb? Rolfe. |
__________________
"The way we vote will depend, ultimately, on whether we are persuaded to hope or to fear." - Aonghas MacNeacail, June 2012. |
|
12th October 2009, 05:14 AM | #44 |
Adult human female
Join Date: Sep 2003
Location: NT 150 511
Posts: 50,594
|
As I said (at some length) in a different thread, what it adds is a reasonable explanation of why the bomb was set to explode at 7.03pm, by a simple timer without a barometric component. If it was actually meant to have gone on a flight that would have been way out over the Atlantic by then, you've at least answered the serious problem of why any terrorist would choose such an early time in the flight to detonate the bomb - risking a possible detonation on the ground at Heathrow if the plane has been only an hour late, risking the plane being able to make a forced landing at Prestwick (or Abbotsinch or Turnhouse) if it didn't actually break up, and risking incriminating evidence being found on the ground. It still leaves the 38-minute Khreesat-fingerprint detonation as a huge coincidence, but perhaps a coincidence that is easier to swallow like this. Rolfe. |
__________________
"The way we vote will depend, ultimately, on whether we are persuaded to hope or to fear." - Aonghas MacNeacail, June 2012. |
|
12th October 2009, 05:53 AM | #45 |
Adult human female
Join Date: Sep 2003
Location: NT 150 511
Posts: 50,594
|
There is actually better evidence than that, that the bag may have come from Frankfurt. There was a good reason for the investigators to concentrate on Frankfurt from an early stage. The bomb was in baggage container AVE4041 - not on the bottom layer of bags, but probably on the second layer. (I'm sorry, that evidence is far too good, Longtabber is right up there with Bollier in wingnut-land when he suggests otherwise.) Apart from half a dozen interline bags that were put in that container at Heathrow before PA103A landed, all the bags were from PA103A. It was assumed that the half-dozen interline bags would have been on the bottom layer, ergo, the bomb suitcase came off PA103A. The large screaming hole in this is that the assumption that the non-Frankfurt bags would all have been on the bottom layer is manifestly flawed. Even the judges went on to theorise that these bags might have been rearranged while the PA103A bags were being loaded. All we can really say about container AVE4041 is that its involvement pretty much rules out the possibility that the bomb was in a suitcase checked in by someone who began their journey at Heathrow. It could have come from Frankfurt, or any of the connecting flights that fed into PA013A, or it could have come from a non-PA flight connecting with PA103 at Heathrow, which landed before PA103A. Which is basically every airport in the world, as far as I can see. The only one we've really knocked off the list is Luqa! All we have at Frankfurt is evidence that bags were flying around in all directions, and retrospective tracking of them doesn't seem to be very easy. Also, most of the CTs that suggest the bomb was infiltrated by way of substitution for a suitcase of heroin focus on Frankfurt as the place this was happening - along with tales of a regular drug courier route out of Frankfurt that circumvented normal security. In contrast, we have the very very peculiar story at Heathrow of the break-in the previous evening involving exactly the right part of the airport, and the mysterious "Bedford suitcase" that was loaded into AVE4041 along with the interline baggage. That lot is far, far more suggestive than anything that was ever alleged about Luqa; the problem was that there was no identified perpetrator attached to that side of the story, which would have been more of a problem for the investigators. Well, Air Malta seem to have been able to say. In that they proved to every normal standard of proof that the luggage system was secure and nothing unaccompanied got through it. However, I note that The Maltese Double Cross provides some support for your suspicions regarding the Erac printout. That film is worth watching. It's the only one of the documentaries to have been banned by the US authorities. Even now, it's had very few showings and is only available in that very pixillated online version. (I asked Amazon if there was a DVD, but no. Although there is clear evidence that a lot of other people have asked Amazon exactly the same question.) I suspect there may be some dynamite in there if two and two are added together in the right order. It really needs a transcript, but the bloody thing is 2 hours 35 minutes long. Rolfe. |
__________________
"The way we vote will depend, ultimately, on whether we are persuaded to hope or to fear." - Aonghas MacNeacail, June 2012. |
|
12th October 2009, 02:46 PM | #46 |
Illuminator
Join Date: Apr 2007
Posts: 4,494
|
I've been looking over the paper documentation from FA. I've re-posted the relevant doc images, Koca's interline worksheet (shed 34 at Mebo's page) and Erac' printout (shed one, reduced size here). The other page, "worksheet" at Mebo's page has less direct value. It covers an early time frame, signed Bach-Wolf, and seems to cover a PA 638/639, very sloppy... okay, I'll have to incllude this too. It's not the number PA103A had before, that's 124).
But the main thing is I was trying to figure out the discrepancy I was on about above. As I see it, none of these gate/station papers don't show the number or type of bags at all, just number of wagons or containers. I've decided the ende time is 1310, since all others are from 3-9 minutes, mostly 5 and 6 per coding. On where the loading records are for 103A, the Cort's Opinion offers an insight, point [29], re KM180:
Quote:
On that, I did notice some good points earlier by Rolfe that have me moderating my suspicions of her apparent story change, etc. But on the other hand, I looked through that roll and found some interesting patterns. The items listed numerically by container no., which I gather is a one-item tray, and guess the numbers are assignments for the luggage within the container(s) they’ve been loaded into. Either way, a no. refers to a single item, and this one is 8849. I haven't counted the lines myself, At the bottom of the list are “TEILSUMME: and “GES. SUMME” both at 111. So that's where Mebo's chart got the number of bags. Note below the condensed header and relevant line. As it happens, this included an oddity I found right after making the graphic, so it's cooler than I thought. Look at the lines immediately above and below the one in question, at the right side, under "time at gate." From this it might seem bags were loaded alternately at gates B044 and B041. However the full list shows all loadings but these two are at gate 44, running as late as 1616. These other two were loaded later at 41, at1631. For whatever reason, these last-minute additions are items 8831 and 8992, flanking the suspicious Maltese item in container no. assignment, but apparently loaded together over an hour later than it, and coded over three hours later than it. I’m not sure what this indicates but it’s interesting. It makes the Maltese bag look inserted., at least to my suspicious eyes. To get an answer I'd need to know how they assign container no.s here. It's apparently not chronological by time of coding, or of loading. |
12th October 2009, 03:11 PM | #47 |
Adult human female
Join Date: Sep 2003
Location: NT 150 511
Posts: 50,594
|
I need to go back and transcribe the bit of The Maltese Double Cross that deals with the Erac printout. As the film tells it, it's not quite as transparently innocent as I originally thought. There is an account of the investigators trying to get the data and being told it was gone.
Rolfe. |
__________________
"The way we vote will depend, ultimately, on whether we are persuaded to hope or to fear." - Aonghas MacNeacail, June 2012. |
|
12th October 2009, 03:14 PM | #48 |
Adult human female
Join Date: Sep 2003
Location: NT 150 511
Posts: 50,594
|
Well, we who are only speculating, can suggest things an official investigator or a lawyer couldn't, if they had no proof. But as to the assignment of containers, off the top of my head, would the containers not have bar codes on them, and the clerk doing the coding just grab the next one on the stack? They'd circulate more or less at random if that was the system. Rolfe. |
__________________
"The way we vote will depend, ultimately, on whether we are persuaded to hope or to fear." - Aonghas MacNeacail, June 2012. |
|
12th October 2009, 04:12 PM | #49 |
Illuminator
Join Date: Apr 2007
Posts: 4,494
|
That sounds reasonable, and it should just be random, or semi-random based on partial recollection and occasional re-ordering. I haven't looked for all patterns, but loading time anyway seems pretty random running down the list. All that poops out is these two, which are given (by coincidence?) very close numbers. Only one is between them. And they were coded one minute apart at station SO541 very late, after the plane was loaded, and loaded right away put on at second gate 41 before final taxi and takeoff. Pilot carry-on or special intra-airline delivery? These would have a nice pattern of sequential trays, perhaps from a station using a narrower near-sequential set, if not for the Maltese bag slipped into the intervening container. By coindicence? Or because the third bag of this set had its coding station, leave store, and to gate times altered?
In short I only see one pattern here regarding container no. and it's interrupted by the suspect item 8849. That's another oddity that might not mean anything, but worth noting.
Quote:
|
12th October 2009, 04:22 PM | #50 |
Adult human female
Join Date: Sep 2003
Location: NT 150 511
Posts: 50,594
|
It was broadcast here, once, but unfortunately I didn't have my trusty Super-Betamax running that night. That would have given a great picture reproduction! The subtitles are legible though. If in doubt, pause the video.
I honestly think the film is saying more than is obvious. For example, now I'm looking at it, I think he's saying Cannestraro planted the timer fragment. He's also hinting that there's something going on as regards the Erac printout. That doesn't mean he's right, but it's worth a look. It's a lot more complex and nuanced than the later documentaries, especially the BBC effort. Rolfe. ETA: Jings, I just got to an interview of Lester Coleman. Now that is something you won't see in later documentaries. As I'm also struggling through The Trail of the Octopus, that is downright surreal. |
__________________
"The way we vote will depend, ultimately, on whether we are persuaded to hope or to fear." - Aonghas MacNeacail, June 2012. |
|
12th October 2009, 06:42 PM | #51 |
Banned
Join Date: Feb 2007
Posts: 13,594
|
http://h71000.www7.hp.com/openvms/br...t/fraport.html
Quote:
|
13th October 2009, 03:10 AM | #52 |
Illuminator
Join Date: Apr 2007
Posts: 4,494
|
Says copyright 2003 article. That may well describe the system in use in 1988 as well, and at least it's a reference point for what it might have been at the time.
Now I'm struggling to put this together here, but "switched conveyor system," perhaps like the kind at the opening of the Maltese Doublecross, "that continuously shuffles" the containers, between stations and such. then they "would be randomly assigned to any given bag" - I'm not sure what the bag is here. Would the container number be re-assigned each time a container is emptied and filled with a new item then? And if so, these would be generated by, what, a central computer just ticking them off airport-wide and rolling over like an odometer every so often? Two containers coded at the same station one minute apart get no.s 161 apart? 161 new assignments in a minute? Seems reasonable. But that wouldn't explain the Maltese bag coded hours earlier... was it numbered from a previous cycle? Or is all of that nothing but confused gibberish not even worth sorting out? I plan to look at the printout some more, but for now at least I'm unsure what' supposed to be going on there. |
13th October 2009, 03:54 AM | #53 |
Adult human female
Join Date: Sep 2003
Location: NT 150 511
Posts: 50,594
|
I think the trays would each have their own permanent bar code, and circulate randomly in the system. A free container would have a bag put in it, and its number would then be coded with the destination aircraft for that item of luggage. It would enter the system, which would periodically read the bar code and know where the contents currently in that tray were supposed to go. Once the luggage was removed from the tray to go on the plane, the tray would be reassigned as "free" and circulate back to the coding stations that needed more free trays.
I'm quite certain this was all possible in 1988 - it's not that dissimilar to the way big laboratories handle blood samples requiring different tests and so on. I've seen it in operation there for decades. I suspect it might be possible to fabricate such a printout, if you're very very determined and have an intimate knowledge of the system. It's the who, when and why that I'm stuck on. I need to recheck what The Maltese Double Cross has to say about it and see if it might be airworthy. BTW, it's also worth reading the Wiki article on the documentary.
Quote:
It's impossible to tell if these are legitimate criticisms, or a co-ordinated attempt to discredit the film. Clearly, once the thing has gone too far to put it back in the bottle, discrediting it is the way to go for the security services. The difficulty is that the criticisms largely depend on the assertion that there is indeed "overwhelming evidence" against Megrahi and Fhimah. In the film itself, Cannistraro leans very heavily indeed on Giaka's evidence, saying that he will be produced in court and then you'll see how we're right all along. Well, that didn't work out too well for them. Looking back at the film with the knowledge of what could and couldn't be proved in court leaves it looking stronger than these criticisms might suggest. And of course anyone can declare le Winter to be a hoaxer and fabricator, but no supporting evidence is given for that. Rolfe. |
__________________
"The way we vote will depend, ultimately, on whether we are persuaded to hope or to fear." - Aonghas MacNeacail, June 2012. |
|
13th October 2009, 03:56 AM | #54 |
NWO Cyborg 5960x (subversion VPUNPCKHQDQ)
Join Date: Feb 2008
Location: Starship Wanderer - DS9
Posts: 14,282
|
Originally Posted by Rolfe
Group had three members allegedly,so the third unkown terrorist could make the bag legit by accompaning it to airport making sure it reached and then disappear. Didn't report,it would be easy - have same bag to show it didn't went missing. As for check,it might not be good enough.(It would be however ironical if it would be lebanese man) However they didn't notice that bag went to wrong container.(Remember there was reported breakin,so two bag theory could be explanation to it)
Quote:
But what could more better to attack this line is to show whether those clothes culd be traced back to Malta or if they were avalable in other shops,notably near Frankfurt.
Quote:
And one thing would be the shape. Hm. What is the model of player holding semtex? I don't know how it looked.(model is enough presuming there is an image of it online)
Quote:
Once you know what container it got in (Is there a way to get that info?) you can place it.(AFAIK neither of two workers knew about those extra bags) One thing I still have on mind (so far) is,that it could become passanger-less bag when workers put it to wrong flight.(again how common it is,in 911CT it has been argued that this happend and happenes quite a lot) Anyway is there on interent raw data,image of evidence and such? (No commentary or such) In fact from where you get info yourself people? And is that verified? (Remember there are often by CTs attempts at forgery and deception) So far I am limitied to speculation,offering alternative anti-ct explanations naratives... |
__________________
ModBorg Engine: Ibalgin 400 |
|
13th October 2009, 04:33 AM | #55 |
Adult human female
Join Date: Sep 2003
Location: NT 150 511
Posts: 50,594
|
All I know is that the prosecution absolutely bust a gut trying to find a way in which they could even show it was possible for the Luqa system to be circumvented, and failed. I find it very hard indeed to imagine that your scenario might have happened, and yet the prosecution didn't even spot it as a possibility. As I understand it, the passengers on KA180 were all checked out thoroughly to see if any of them might have been a conspirator, and nothing suspicious was found. I may not be understanding you properly, but note that the possibility of an unaccompanied bag on KA180 was essentially ruled out. All 55 bags were positively identified as belonging to someone who actually travelled on the flight. Suppose a passenger did go on with the bomb bag (knowing it wouldn't explode on that leg). What was Megrahi's role? A bit silly of him to be in the airport at all then, since he was entirely unnecessary. He didn't get on that plane, or go airside. Then, somehow, the tag on the bomb bag which showed its original destination would have had to be switched for one routing it to PA103A and then PA103. The passenger couldn't do that, as he wouldn't have any further contact with his luggage - it would require an accomplice airside. That wasn't Fhimah, he wasn't even at the airport. So, you're postulating a two-person conspiracy, with two completely different people who weren't Megrahi or Fhimah. One of these with a clean enough background to come through all the subsequent checks on the passengers undetected. So not a Libyan national, then, in fact presumably no visible connection to Libya or we might have heard about this person. The other a gang member with an airside pass. This is a lot more complicated than simply accepting that the bag didn't go on at Malta! I think we should keep discussion about Gauci's identification for a separate thread. I would point out however that his job was selling clothes, which usually requires one to be a good judge of height and build. Also, this was in Malta, where Arabs are commonplace. Maltese people would not be expected to have the same difficulty with identification that most westerners would experience, being faced with a less familiar ethnic group. I have no doubt that the clothes in the bomb bag originated in Sliema. The evidence on that seems quite strong enough. The problem is, narratives have to be consistent with the known evidence, and to be plausible. I can see no reason for putting the timer in a different bag. That doesn't improve the chance of the bomb bag getting through security, it's just one more thing to go wrong. Also, postulating that the timer alone somehow got on the plane at Luqa leaves you exactly where you started as regards the route of the bomb bag itself. There are good photographs of a mock-up of an identical Toshiba containing the Semtex as it is believed it was constructed. Here you go. http://cache3.asset-cache.net/xc/510...F71A9C9BC19C35 You really need to look at the actual evidence so you can figure out what's possible and what's not. The hypothesis that an unaccompanied bag travelled from Luqa to Frankfurt on KA180, and thence to PA103A is probably the weakest part of the prosecution case. If that's wiped out, then everything becomes potentially a CT, because if the bag wasn't loaded at Malta, then Megrahi didn't do it. It's that simple. Rolfe. |
__________________
"The way we vote will depend, ultimately, on whether we are persuaded to hope or to fear." - Aonghas MacNeacail, June 2012. |
|
13th October 2009, 05:05 AM | #56 |
Illuminator
Join Date: Apr 2007
Posts: 4,494
|
1:23 in the video, Michael Jones, Pan Am security, went to Frankfurt Airport Jan 23 1989 and found loading files for 103A missing from the daily file. That does seem like a promising lead.
FWIW, the film is to long by about 150%, too full of slow-talking people of varying credibility. DeWinter and Aviv at least I don't put much stock in. The Cannistrano angle is definitely interesting. Did a quick search and found no clues on when he started that but I'll take a wild guess at a three-month range of Mar-Jun 89. I'd bet $5, which is like what, £20? That's as far as I got this time and now I have to sleep. |
13th October 2009, 05:33 AM | #57 |
Adult human female
Join Date: Sep 2003
Location: NT 150 511
Posts: 50,594
|
I'll try to transcribe that bit this evening. I don't know why it got that prize, but it seems longwinded to me. On the other hand, it was the first, and maybe it grips the viewer better in a darkened cinema when the brain is fully engaged. I don't know anything about le Winter. Aviv was employed by Pan Am to investigate the incident when it was trying to defend itself against legal action for negligence by the relatives of the victims. I have no idea why they would give that task to someone who was "a mere El Al airline security guard". There's a fair bit more about Aviv in The Trail of the Octopus, which is not obvious rubbish. Also, he (unlike le Winter) features in other documentaries also. I'd put Cannistraro's involvement later than that, personally. However I note he left the CIA completely in 1991. There should be some way to find out when he took over the Lockerbie investigation. Rolfe. |
__________________
"The way we vote will depend, ultimately, on whether we are persuaded to hope or to fear." - Aonghas MacNeacail, June 2012. |
|
13th October 2009, 11:45 AM | #58 |
Trainee Pirate
Join Date: Jun 2007
Location: An Uaimh
Posts: 3,664
|
I'm really not very good at this, but isn't that list just sorted by container number? Containers picked at random, data entered, then computer sorts the printout how you want, in this case by container number.
I know I'm doing it again, but the NWO shill pay scale is pretty good in these difficult times. Trying to base a CT on what appears next to an item of interest in a sorted list seems to be a stretch to me. |
13th October 2009, 01:42 PM | #59 |
Adult human female
Join Date: Sep 2003
Location: NT 150 511
Posts: 50,594
|
I very much doubt that the "mystery tray" could have been an addition to the genuine printout. It's very difficult to construct a narrative to make that one work.
My general opinion with this one is that it happened too early to be likely to be part of a conspiracy/coverup. I agree, there do seem to be two parts to this proposed conspiracy, and part 1 might have involved something like this. I mean, part 1 being the misdirection to try not to lay the blame on Jibril's group and part 2 being the positive incrimination of Libya. I just have trouble with the idea of two quite separate fabrications and plants in this story (one pre Cannistrato and one post?), and also with the idea that the printout is planted but the timer fragment isn't! However, I'm open to persuasion. I think the two lines to consider with the printout are either the suggestion that it's a complete fabrication (as opposed to a line being inserted), or that it's perfectly genuine, but the "mystery tray" has nothing to do with KA180. I wonder where Bollier got all that "John Hubbard" stuff. Rolfe. |
__________________
"The way we vote will depend, ultimately, on whether we are persuaded to hope or to fear." - Aonghas MacNeacail, June 2012. |
|
13th October 2009, 02:09 PM | #60 |
Adult human female
Join Date: Sep 2003
Location: NT 150 511
Posts: 50,594
|
I see the link to the Toshiba picture didn't work. I'll try again.
http://cache3.asset-cache.net/xc/510...F71A9C9BC19C35 Rolfe. ETA: Maybe it did, and my browser just hiccuped. Oh well there it is again. |
__________________
"The way we vote will depend, ultimately, on whether we are persuaded to hope or to fear." - Aonghas MacNeacail, June 2012. |
|
13th October 2009, 02:25 PM | #61 |
Illuminator
Join Date: Apr 2007
Posts: 4,494
|
Okay, so it seems I was confused and numbers are permanently set for each physical container.
Originally Posted by Rolfe
I'm working on a transcript of the MDC section with Phipps and Jones, and will look again at the printout more widely. So I'll be back. |
13th October 2009, 03:30 PM | #62 |
Adult human female
Join Date: Sep 2003
Location: NT 150 511
Posts: 50,594
|
Oh sure, don't let me stop you. I can think of a motive for fabricating the printout early on. There was a reason for not going after Jibril. This again is another thread. By March we know there was a Bush/Thatcher agreement to soft-pedal the PFLP-GC connection.
Jibril's group was based at Frankfurt. So maybe we want to direct the search for the starting point of the bomb away from Frankfurt? Well, where? Malta was the source of the clothes in the suitcase, and it's a handy entrance to Europe from a fair chunk of the Middle East. Malta is a natural choice. So let's trail the possibility that something came through from Malta. (I wonder how soon it was realised that the Malta security was so tight? Might have been little reason to question Luqa before the printout was discovered and checked - up till then it was just one of many airports two hops from PA103.) So this could have been done early, while Jibril was still Scotland's Most Wanted, simply to get the hounds away from Frankfurt, where the presence of the bomb in a luggage container mostly filled from PA103A had directed the enquiry in the very early stages. Then later, once the Bush-or-high-level-strategic-chief decision was made that pinning the blame on Libya would kill quite a few birds with one stone, and there had been some very peripheral mention of Libya already (Gauci always said the mystery shopper was a Libyan, and one of Jibril's bomb experts was originally wrongly identified as Libyan), so hey, who knows maybe that can be arranged, let's appoint our Libyan dirty tricks expert to head the case and see what he can find, off you go Vincent, and you know where we want this to go.... Maybe an earlier, successful fabrication encouraged the idea that maybe a second one would work just as well.... OK, Agatha Christie might think it was overkill, but it isn't intrinsically impossible. Rolfe. |
__________________
"The way we vote will depend, ultimately, on whether we are persuaded to hope or to fear." - Aonghas MacNeacail, June 2012. |
|
13th October 2009, 04:59 PM | #63 |
Adult human female
Join Date: Sep 2003
Location: NT 150 511
Posts: 50,594
|
OK, got it.
Originally Posted by The Maltese Double Cross
It seems we also have to explain the disappearance of so much of the original records and information. This doesn't entirely sound like, sorry officer, you're just too late, if we'd know you wanted this stuff - but it was all thrown out a week ago. Phipps doesn't seem to be saying that, he seems to be saying that flight in particular was missing, and didn't seem to have been given to the police because where were the copies. Did you have a date for Bogomira coming forward with the printout, and also for the Frankfurt police finally handing it over to the investigation? If so, source? Rolfe. |
__________________
"The way we vote will depend, ultimately, on whether we are persuaded to hope or to fear." - Aonghas MacNeacail, June 2012. |
|
14th October 2009, 12:47 AM | #64 |
Illuminator
Join Date: Apr 2007
Posts: 4,494
|
Great on the transcript. I'll come back to that in a bit.
This film is pretty amazing in what information he had at the time. It was made in Nov. 1994, wasn't it? So why does i have the $4 million reward poster for the FBI program ushered in in mid-95? Can't re-locate it now, but It's different - no Megrahi or Fhimah pics, but the same case and the headline "we'll give you $4 million reasons to fight terrorism" with app. small print beneath it. I dunno about LeWinter; from here I though 'old ex-CIA guy that's spent years repeating disposable CIA CT claims as if he knows all about them, gettin' a little slow at it now.' Others then said long-time hoaxster, so I'm like - meh. On Cannistrano his gist does make sense - it seems he was Reagan's 'make ***** up about Gaddafi' guy, and here he's in charge of the investigation that wound up, parallel to the criminal one, doing just that. His Giaka teasers are classic. The set-up between that and the total teardown in court is jaw-dropping. On when he was put in charge, there's little around. Dr. Swire's site HAD a dedicated page on him with details, sourced at Wikipedia, no longer there. It almost feels like a dead spot around these Qs, like Feraday's getting wikipedia to pull his profile. Or maybe not. But he was reportedly the CTC "Chief of Operations and Analysis" from 88-91, so would it make more sense for him to head the investigation up-front, or only after the normal guy was swapped out? We only have LeWinter's statements that he wasn't in charge at first. We can agree on guessing it was in no later than the end of 89 anyway, right? |
14th October 2009, 01:38 AM | #65 |
Illuminator
Join Date: Apr 2007
Posts: 4,494
|
I'm doing some "analysis" on the printout data. FWIW, this post only deals with more of my fumbling for patterns there, If boring to you, skip it.
Here's a question to lure an expert on statistics, combinatorics, odds, etc. to step in. I'm still finding the bunching of the two late arrivals (at gate 41 if not the plane) is statistically unlikely, though possible. Since there are 111 slots, by pure chance the odds that the other late arrival should happen to have the closest container no. as the one from station 206 is about 1 in 110, if I'm not wrong. That the other late loader should have the next closest number is itself 1 in 109. Right? So that both happened would be 1 in 110x109 or 1 in 11,990. But what this bunching could mean is beyond me so far. Probably nothing. I wasn't trying to find some debunk code, as I don't usually believe in those. But this was odd and stood out. I'm also finding little patterns at work. Ex: "time leave store" to "time at gate" is almost all six minute intervals. A few slowed items (up to 20 min so far) and late items (1600 and after) move faster - from 3 down to even one minute (at gate 41, 1631) Container numbers run up to 12244 only, so it's a partial 5-digit system, stopping well short of 99999, unless some huge random sector is just not represented. I figure about 13,000 distinct tray ID numbers? |
14th October 2009, 02:29 AM | #66 |
Trainee Pirate
Join Date: Jun 2007
Location: An Uaimh
Posts: 3,664
|
I don't intend this to be snarky, but I can't figure out a way of saying this without it possibly sounding that way.
That post reminds me of the bible code, or the comedian's (Eddie Izzard?) joke 'A funny thing happened on the way here tonight, I saw a car with the registration FN05 QVC, what are the odds of that?' You can't do statistical analysis like that on a single data point (one loading list). If you had several hundred, you could maybe identify something unique about PanAm103A's, otherwise you are looking for patterns in a big list of numbers, which you will find. Lots of them, but they mean nothing. |
14th October 2009, 02:37 AM | #67 |
Illuminator
Join Date: Apr 2007
Posts: 4,494
|
Originally Posted by The Maltese Double Cross
ETA: word searched the verdict, and Pan Am appears exactly once, in naming the crime. So no, they just completely glossed over this. ETA: OOps, PaAm nospace has several hits. Now on Bogomira's printout - this would not and did not show the loading. It seems the hard paperwork applied in tarmac-and-wheels areas: planes, wagons, and coding stations these fed into. What the system tracked was (pardon my perhaps stupid characterization as I'm picking it up) the computerized system of roller conveyors, switching stations, bar-code-scanners, and such in a large underground system: connecting coding stations, stores, and apparently up to gates. I wonder if the luggage stores had people in them keeping paper logs? No mention of store "HS33" logs where people wrote down tray no.s as they came in and out. That sounds insane. Just letting the computers running it keep track sounds smarter, but again, aren't records important? Backup tapes seems the smartest way. How hard would it be to buy a few and keep them for, say a week? Not too hard, that's what they did. Investigators should have been there well within that week. They probably were. It was probably as blank as Pan Am's daily file. Which is why they write a police report later on the printout - it was probably the first they saw and not for sluggishness on their own part. Frankfurt's records were incomplete all right, in some very poignant ways.
Quote:
Quote:
Someone hands SCOTBOM a sheaf of paper in August 89 and Marquise says: “her printout was the only record." Damning indictment of a blanked system? Nahhh "This was as much a key to the solution of the case as Tony Gauci or the Mebo chip.” Or Giaka, don't forget Giaka. Lots of prime moments in this mammoth exemplary investigation. August 89 is from Conspiracy Files, part 3, 4:45, as the month the inv. first learned of the printout. I saw that verified somewhere else, I forget where. No details tho.
Quote:
Quote:
|
14th October 2009, 03:47 AM | #68 |
Adult human female
Join Date: Sep 2003
Location: NT 150 511
Posts: 50,594
|
Fair comment, but he's not actually claiming anything here. Sometimes you actually have to look that closely at the data to convince yourself thre's nothing to find. Personally, I think there are three possibilities here. 1. The printout is entirely genuine, with the history as described, but the "mystery tray" has been misinterpreted - it was a perfectly innocent piece of luggage either from another flight (as suggested by Paul Foot), or misdirected to PA103A and later corrected (as apparently suggested by Edwin Bollier). Here is what Paul Foot said, taken from evidence and arguments presented at the trial.
Originally Posted by Paul Foot
2. The printout is entirely genuine, with the history as described, but what it reveals is in fact the introduction of the bomb suitcase at Frankfurt itself, possibly at coding station 206. This is the possibility explained in The Trail of the Octopus. This is a closer examination of the October 1989 FBI teletype (shown in The Maltese Double Cross), which seems to be a report by FBI investigators who went to Frankfurt to try to clarify whether or not there was indeed a bag from Malta on PA103A.
Originally Posted by The Trail of the Octopus
3. The entire printout is a fabrication, designed to be consistent with the surviving paper records and show a bag that appeared to come from KM180 going on to PA103A. The fourth possibility, that the data were covertly retained (in spite of the investigators finding nothing on 23rd January) and subsequently doctored to add the mystery tray before persuading/threatening/bribing Mrs. Erac to "find" the printout in her locker, seems very far-fetched compared to these three scenarios. The problem, I suppose, is that neither of my first two suggestions satisfies the feeling of incredulity over the entire "no we lost all the relevant information relating to this huge terrorist incident" followed by "oh, fancy that, here it is after all" story. Rolfe. |
__________________
"The way we vote will depend, ultimately, on whether we are persuaded to hope or to fear." - Aonghas MacNeacail, June 2012. |
|
14th October 2009, 04:05 AM | #69 |
Adult human female
Join Date: Sep 2003
Location: NT 150 511
Posts: 50,594
|
Paul Foot's account doesn't think much of the accuracy of these worksheets in general.
Originally Posted by Paul Foot
I think Paul Foot is suggesting that the worksheets were only approximate, and simply could not support the weight of inference being put on this one. I've read elsewhere of other stray bags being noted in that printout coming in from uncertain origins (reference?). Part of his thesis seems to be that the end-time may be 13.16 because actually half a wagon or so from a completely different flight showed up at station 206 at the same time as the KM180 luggage and got coded along with it, and one of these bags happened to be tagged for PA103A. Oh yes, and note yet another important witness somehow not being called. Maybe he would have been so vague about what he was coding and where it came from, it would have destroyed the entire house of cards. Rolfe. |
__________________
"The way we vote will depend, ultimately, on whether we are persuaded to hope or to fear." - Aonghas MacNeacail, June 2012. |
|
14th October 2009, 04:18 AM | #70 |
Illuminator
Join Date: Apr 2007
Posts: 4,494
|
I had that same thought, and glad you said it so succinctly since I had so much else to say. Can't cover ALL bases without busting a fuse. I think the odds are about as I say, pure statistics only. And it's only when arranged by container no. - other arrangements would reveal other oddities. I also emphasize that I can't see a reason behind or a clear clue in this, at least not one applicable to the 3-D world and that isn't pretty weird. It COULD be a clue to the reasoning behind and info set-up thing, but if so it's a pretty stupid one. But stupid is a type of real. So I dunno. Can't say. I'm ready to move on.
Quote:
Quote:
|
14th October 2009, 05:02 AM | #71 |
Trainee Pirate
Join Date: Jun 2007
Location: An Uaimh
Posts: 3,664
|
|
14th October 2009, 05:42 AM | #72 |
Adult human female
Join Date: Sep 2003
Location: NT 150 511
Posts: 50,594
|
No. This was way too early for framing Libya. I don't think they started framing Libya until early in 1990, at the earliest. If this is fabricated, it would be about drawing attention away from an introduction of the bag at Frankfurt (where Jibril's gang was based) to a completely different airport. If so, I would speculate that they picked KM180 precisely because of the clothes, to make the whole scenario seem to hang together. At this point, we have evidence that Jibril's involvement was to be down-played, but no evidence of an alternative Libya hypothesis being promoted. (I still favour the view that the printout isn't fabricated, though.) Rolfe. |
__________________
"The way we vote will depend, ultimately, on whether we are persuaded to hope or to fear." - Aonghas MacNeacail, June 2012. |
|
14th October 2009, 01:04 PM | #73 |
NWO Cyborg 5960x (subversion VPUNPCKHQDQ)
Join Date: Feb 2008
Location: Starship Wanderer - DS9
Posts: 14,282
|
Very quickly:URL is to a cache server/proxy which refuses my connection,could you please find different location or original loaction?
Anyway is there any place with raw(UNALTERED) images of evidece and data? Rolfe is right,if I don't see it I just cook from water.(Don't know how this turn of pharse is international) Anyway I may be answer rest of post,but I am now trying to do too many things in 24hour long day already without this. (Unfortunately I suspect that we all are sort of speculating and any results will be dependent upon poster) |
__________________
ModBorg Engine: Ibalgin 400 |
|
14th October 2009, 02:16 PM | #74 |
Adult human female
Join Date: Sep 2003
Location: NT 150 511
Posts: 50,594
|
Try this page. The image is smaller, but you'll get it.
http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/1145884.stm Rolfe. |
__________________
"The way we vote will depend, ultimately, on whether we are persuaded to hope or to fear." - Aonghas MacNeacail, June 2012. |
|
14th October 2009, 03:52 PM | #75 |
Illuminator
Join Date: Apr 2007
Posts: 4,494
|
On the timing, there was no final and complete decision even now to blame Libya. Officially, yes, but the old line(s) of inquiry still resides in many peoples' minds. Likewise, before the shift there may have been the future case in some minds but not others. There seems to be a period of interweave in 1989, fading into 1990 with no movement allowed on the one track that fades as the action on the other solidifies. I believe the notio to bame Libya was there to some degree from the beginning. The Naltese clothes and the bag transfer ARE both early signs pointing vaguely to Libya, but not necc. part of that plan.
It does minimize attention on Frankfurt, by showing all we need to know is this slender thread running back to the Med so all they did was unwittingly pass the evil along. The printout shows all you need - from KM180 to 206, to store HS33, to gate 44, to 103A, and gone - no closer examination needed. I could well accept that the printout is genuine, just delayed, even though I find that 206 connection just as suspicious as SCOTBOM found it useful. But either way, I think at the least this genuine copy was held at bay on purpose, along with the blanked system (within a few days of the crash I'd guess) and disappeared loading papers. Maybe they (CIA?) just wanted to make sure all was kosher before letting anyone else see what wen onto PA103A. Except the loading papers didn't resurface AFAIK. If it wasn't okay, they'd fix it, and if it was okay and didn't show any heroin suitcases, Jibril-conneting flights, or what have you, they'd release it as is, with a sigh of relief that no complex faking was necc. , to reveal what it does - a bag from station 206. You're icon's getting spookier all the time, BTW. More mysterious and noir, which seems to fit the terrain here. |
14th October 2009, 04:35 PM | #76 |
Adult human female
Join Date: Sep 2003
Location: NT 150 511
Posts: 50,594
|
There's a thread in Community doing Hallowe'en transformations on people's avatars. I have been peculiarly blessed.
Rolfe. |
__________________
"The way we vote will depend, ultimately, on whether we are persuaded to hope or to fear." - Aonghas MacNeacail, June 2012. |
|
14th October 2009, 04:56 PM | #77 |
Adult human female
Join Date: Sep 2003
Location: NT 150 511
Posts: 50,594
|
If that was really done at that stage of the enquiry (that is, within the first four weeks), it almost inevitably implies some degree of LIHOP going on. This whole thing really does have the air of a security services sting (or similar) getting completely f-ed up and going horribly and tragically wrong. How much of it is Khreesat, believed to be a Jordanian spy (thus aligned with the CIA) and so released from custody, but actually making live bombs which kill a German policeman - and 270 people at Lockerbie? How much of it is Jafaar and the drug smuggling, which may have been DEA sanctioned? How much of it was related to the CIA officers on the plane, maybe? I don't necessarily mean LIHOP as in "we know it's going to happen and we're OK with that", but somewhere between "we've a pretty good idea something is going to happen and we can't stop it because it would expose our sources and operatives" and "PA103 is the target but we're not going to cancel the flight." I suspect this examination of the evidence is leading that way in the end, but if the baggage records at Frankfurt were really spirited away in advance of the legitimate investigators, I can't see an innocent explanation for that. Rolfe. |
__________________
"The way we vote will depend, ultimately, on whether we are persuaded to hope or to fear." - Aonghas MacNeacail, June 2012. |
|
15th October 2009, 12:55 AM | #78 |
Illuminator
Join Date: Apr 2007
Posts: 4,494
|
Not necessarily. There are more routine non-explosive secrets that would normally move in an out of records unnoticed, but when police are likely to come looking, and you really don't want that info seen, you'd make sure it disappeared and laid low in some "locker" until things cleared up and blew over.
Quote:
Quote:
|
15th October 2009, 04:39 AM | #79 |
Illuminator
Join Date: Apr 2007
Posts: 4,494
|
So I put all this stuff together in a big blog post:
http://12-7-9-11.blogspot.com/2009/1...t-records.html It's still a little rough, I'm sure, and I haven't got all my sources and links lined up yet but I just needed to get it up. Along the way I double-checked the Court's opinion and found suspiciously little on any info from PanAm e: Frankfurt. Referring to the court's "production number" evidence system, I called this section "production null"
Quote:
|
15th October 2009, 04:45 AM | #80 |
Adult human female
Join Date: Sep 2003
Location: NT 150 511
Posts: 50,594
|
Do you really think the first reaction of airport authorities and managers, faced with a completely unexpected air disaster to a plane which hadn't even taken off from their airport, would be to conceal a heap of baggage loading records, just in case?
I think it's quite hard to postulate even in the situation where some spooks and law enforcement people are more than half-expecting an incident and hope to cover it up if it happens. It's surely kind of hard to swan into a major airport and make the people there co-operate with your cover-up without being exposed by someone. That's the trouble with this affair, it's just crawling with weird anomalies, but they aren't necessarily easy to explain either innocently or as some sort of cover-up. You expect some anomalies in any incident like this, that in the end simply have to be written off as "stuff happens", but the sheer number fouling up this case is extremely peculiar. Rolfe. |
__________________
"The way we vote will depend, ultimately, on whether we are persuaded to hope or to fear." - Aonghas MacNeacail, June 2012. |
|
Thread Tools | |
|
|