9-11 Eyewitness Review Part 1

(Note important correction at the bottom.)

Our guest poster, BG, suggested that we all watch 9-11 Eyewitness.

I watched the first thirty minutes this morning. The first 16 minutes or so is pretty much historical footage that the filmmaker, Rick Siegel, shot with a video camera from across the Hudson River, in Hoboken, New Jersey. He also had the radio tuned to 1010 WINS, so you get the live news at the same time as the video footage. This is extremely effective and as history it's pretty good. Unfortunately he's on the wrong side to view the collapse of the south tower, and he gets chased from his spot by a cop so he missed the collapse of the north tower.

And it's not long before we wander into tinfoil hat land. Siegel (obviously in the editing room after filming) highlights every helicopter that flies into the area (see correction at bottom). Chopper #4 comes in for special attention at 5:49:



Mission accomplished, eh? Well, you can guess what happens next, the South Tower collapses.

Later we hear about "flashes" of light apparently where the helicopter is flying, although there's an obvious problem; you can't see the helicopter, and what is described as flashes looks a little phony to me.

At 22:30 he goes into how the helicopter was black, and I'm starting to think we've got a live one here. At 24:30 he remarks on how the building started to topple, but somehow it did not fall over, but instead crumbled to pieces. This is occasionally brought up by the CT crowd, as if controlled demolition could somehow have prevented the building from falling over once it started.

The film does highlight what certainly appear to be periodic explosions. This constitutes evidence (not necessarily evidence of controlled demolition, of course). But the focus on the helicopters seems bizarre. At 29:55, the film gets into some weird stuff:

Narrator: As chopper four emerges from the smoke above the north tower its white belly becomes visible from another camera angle near the church on the other side of the building. Is this a genuine New York Police Department Air/Sea Rescue chopper that simply decided not to rescue anyone? Or is it participating in the Tripod emergency war game exercise FEMA started running September 10th at the World Trade Center from the Port Authority headquarters Pier 92 and being ordered not to rescue anybody?

I'll take Door Number 3, Monty, that the helicopters couldn't get close enough to the building to rescue anybody. Note as well that now this is a black helicopter with a white belly.

I stopped the movie there; I may watch the rest of it at some later point. One thing with these 9-11 films is that you can appreciate the historical nature of the footage they provide while finding the conspiracy theory they propose completely loopy. That's definitely how I feel about 9-11 Eyewitness. The historical value of the first 16 minutes I'd rate a B plus. It's not the best angle but it's still memorable footage. I haven't figured out his conspiracy theory, but it seems pretty flaky from what I've seen so far. On the Screw Loose Change Nutbar-o-Meter I give it a:



Important Correction: I have been advised by Rick Siegel that his only involvement with this film was taping the initial historical footage and the brief interview bits which were filmed much later. Rick did not do the analysis that accompanies his historical footage. My apologies for assuming otherwise.