The pilot of United Airlines Flight 23 has told a Channel 5 documentary that he now believes his aircraft was likely intended to be used as a "weapon of mass destruction" in the 11 September 2001 attacks, and that a mistaken placement of box cutters on a neighbouring plane may have prevented that outcome.
Tom Mannello said he was moments from takeoff at John F. Kennedy International Airport when air traffic control ordered all flights to return to the gate after United Flight 175 struck the South Tower at 9:03 a.m. He and several flight attendants later learned that box cutters had been found in first-class seat pockets on an aircraft parked directly beside his, and that the neighbouring aircraft's tail number differed from his own by a single digit. Mannello told the documentary he believes those items were likely intended for Flight 23 and that a ground-level error may have foiled an attempt to seize the plane.
Mannello told the programme that the chief pilot informed him of the discovery of two box cutters in the nearby aircraft and that, after "connecting the dots" with observations made by crew members, he concluded there was a substantial chance Flight 23 was a planned target. Flight attendants who worked on Flight 23 described several passengers in first class whose behaviour they found suspicious, including one person dressed in a burka and niqab who some crew members believed was male, a passenger who requested that a child be shown the cockpit and others who declined food service and appeared unusually agitated.
Sandy Thorngren, a flight attendant on the aircraft, said she was convinced the plane was intended to be hijacked. Barbara Brockie-Smaldino, another crew member, recounted a passenger whose appearance raised doubts among staff. Mannello said he now considers it "more likely than not" that Flight 23 was to have been the fifth hijacked aircraft but was spared when crew and passengers were prevented from boarding and the airport was shut down.
The official investigation by the National Commission on Terrorist Attacks Upon the United States, commonly known as the 9/11 Commission, did not identify a fifth hijacked jet, and Flight 23 is not listed in the commission's report as one of the aircraft seized by terrorists. U.S. officials did not immediately respond to requests for comment about the claims aired in the Channel 5 programme, and there have been no confirmed arrests tied to the crew or passengers of Flight 23 in connection with the attacks.
On 11 September 2001, four commercial airliners were hijacked and flown into targets in the United States, killing 2,977 people. American Airlines Flight 11, which departed Boston for Los Angeles, crashed into the North Tower of the World Trade Center at 8:46 a.m. United Airlines Flight 175, also departing Boston for Los Angeles, struck the South Tower at 9:03 a.m. American Airlines Flight 77 departed Washington, D.C., and crashed into the Pentagon at 9:37 a.m. United Airlines Flight 93, which flew from Newark bound for San Francisco, crashed in a field near Shanksville, Pennsylvania, at 10:02 a.m. after passengers attempted to retake control of the aircraft; investigators have said the hijackers were likely aiming for the White House or the U.S. Capitol.
In the months and years after the attacks, U.S. law enforcement detained and questioned large numbers of people; authorities have said more than 1,200 people were detained at least briefly. The U.S. government established a detention facility at Guantánamo Bay, Cuba, to hold terrorism suspects; at its peak the facility held hundreds of detainees and a small number remain in custody. Al-Qaeda leader Osama bin Laden publicly acknowledged responsibility for the attacks; he was located and killed by U.S. special operations forces in Pakistan in May 2011. The attacks also precipitated U.S. military action in Afghanistan in October 2001 and a later invasion of Iraq in 2003.
Mannello's account echoes longstanding questions and anecdotal reports about disruptions, suspicious activity and security lapses at airports on the morning of Sept. 11. His statements, presented in the Channel 5 documentary, are based on recollections and interviews with crew members who were on the tarmac that morning. They do not constitute an official finding of a planned hijacking of Flight 23, and the documentary's claims have not been corroborated by a government investigation released to the public.
The documentary airs 24 years after the attacks that reshaped U.S. security policy and foreign engagements. Officials and investigators involved in the original probe have previously emphasised the extensive post-attack reviews and the limits of publicly available records, and the new account from Flight 23's crew may prompt renewed questions among family members of victims and others who continue to seek clarity about events that day.