Loose Change 9-11 An America Coup: Barry Jennings Interview

Barry Jennings and Mr Hess, two of the men who were stranded in WTC-7 for several hours on 9-11, come in for a bunch of attention in Loose Change 9-11 An American Coup. Here are transcripts of what they have to say in the movie. The first two quotes are from interviews that they gave on 9-11; the final one is an interview Jason Bermas did with Jennings.

Hess: Yes I was, I was, I was up in the Emergency Management Center on the 23rd floor and when all the power went out in the building, another gentleman and I walked down to the 8th floor, where there was an explosion and we were trapped on the 8th floor with smoke—thick smoke—all around us for about an hour and a half. But the NY Fire Department, as terrific as they are, just came and got us out.

Jennings: Well, me and Mr Hess, the corporation counsel, were on the 23rd floor, I told him we gotta get out of here. We started walking down the stairs we made it to the 8th floor, big explosion, blew us back into the 8th floor, and I turned to Hess I said, “This is it. We’re dead, not going to make it out of here. I took a fire extinguisher and I bust a window out. That’s when this gentleman this gentleman here heard my cries for help.

Barry Jennings: Hi. My name is Barry Jennings. Um. I'm 52 years old. Um, I've worked for for 32 years in one location. Basically, that's it. I'm married. Father of 4.

It’s very funny, I was on my way to work, traffic was excellent, I received a call, a small Cessna had hit the World Trade Center. I was asked to go and man the Office of Emergency Management at the World Trade Center 7 on the 23rd floor. As I arrived there, there were police all in the lobby. They showed me the way to the elevator, we got up to the 23rd floor. Me and Mr. Hess who I didn't know was Mr. Hess at the time. We got to the 23rd floor, we couldn't get in. We had to go back down. Then, security and police took us to the freight elevators. When they took us back up, and we did get in.

Upon arriving into the OEM EOC, we noticed that everybody was gone. I saw coffee that was on the desk. Still smoke was still coming up the coffee. I saw half-eaten sandwiches. And only me and Mr. Hess was up there. After I called several individuals, one individual told me that um, to leave and to leave right away.

Mr Hess came running back in. He said: "We’re the only ones up here. We gotta get outta of here!"

He found a stairwell. When we reached the eighth, uh, the sixth floor, the landing that we were standing on, gave way. There was an explosion. And the landing gave way.
And when, I was left there hanging. I had to climb back up. And now I had to walk back up the eighth floor. After getting to the eighth floor, everything was dark. It was dark and it was very, very hot. Very hot. I asked Mr Hess to test the phones as I took a fire extinguisher and broke out the windows. Once I broke out the windows I could see outside below me, I saw, um, police cars on fire, buses on fire, I looked one way, the building was there, I look the other way it was gone.

I was trapped in there for several hours. I was trapped in there when both buildings came down. The firefighters came, they came to the window cause I was going to come out on the fire hose, I didn’t want to stay there it was too hot, I was going to come out on the fire hose, they came to the window, they started yelling, do not do that, it won’t hold you. And then they ran away. See I didn’t know what was going on. That’s when the first tower fell. When they started running, the first tower was coming down. I had no way of knowing that. Then I saw them come back. Now I saw them come back with more concern on their faces. And they ran away again. The second tower fell. So as they turned and ran the second time, the guy said “Don’t worry, we’ll be back for you.” And they did come back, this time they came back with ten firefighters. And they kept asking, “Where are you? We don’t know where you are.” I said I was on the north side of the building because when I was on the stairs I saw, north side.

All this time, I’m hearing all types of explosions. All this time I’m hearing explosions. And I’m thinking maybe it’s the buses that were on fire, the cars on fire, I don’t see no, you know. But I’m still hearing these explosions. When they finally got to us, and they took us down to what, what they, they, uh, called the lobby. 'cause I asked them, when we got down there, I said: "Where are we?" He said: "This was the lobby." And I said: "You gotta be kidding me!" Total ruins. Total ruins. Now keep in mind, when I came in here, lobby had nice escalators, it was a huge lobby. And for me to see what I saw, unbelievable.

And the firefighter that took us down, kept saying, do not look down. And I kept saying “Why?” “Do not look down.” And you’re stepping over people, and you know you can feel when you’re stepping over people. Took us out through a hole, that the, I don’t know who made this hole, in this wall, that’s how they got us out. They took us out through a hole in the wall, to safety. As they were taking me out, one firefighter had fallen, I believe he was having a heart attack, but before that, this big giant police officer came to me. And he says, "You have to run!" I said, "I can't run. My knees are swollen." He said, "You'll have to get on your knees and crawl then.” He said, “Because we have reports of more explosions." And that's when I started crawling. And I saw this guy fall behind me. His comrade came to his aid, and dragged him to safety. Um, I was looking for an ambulance, for my knees and at that time they told me you gotta walk 20 blocks, to a refuge. Before I got there, Eyewitness News grabbed me and started interviewing me. And that’s basically it. (End)

Now there are some obvious problems reconciling the accounts. Hess quite clearly states that he and Jennings were in the OEM when the power went out in the building; this indicates that the time was right around 9:59, as the power went out in WTC-7 (and much of lower Manhattan) when the South Tower collapsed. Jennings claims to have already poked out the windows and attracted the attention of the firemen at that time. It seems clear to me that Jennings has the times confused, that it was when the South Tower collapsed that they tried to evacuate, but in the darkness it took them about a half-hour to get down 17 flights of stairs, when the North Tower collapsed, providing the big explosion Jennings describes.

There are other problems. It never made much sense for me for the fireman to say "Don't look down," if they're stepping over bodies, surely you'd be more likely to trip and fall. Rather it would seem logical to say something like "Be careful where you step." And does it make any sense to tell someone who can't run because of swollen knees to crawl? Or for him to obey that suggestion? If the objective is to get out of there as quickly as possible, walking is surely faster than crawling?

Of course, there are deeper problems with the story; in his BBC interview last summer, Jennings specifically denied mentioning stepping over bodies; unless Dylan is a master at voice-morphing that seems to be untrue.

My conclusion? Jennings probably elaborated on his story over the years, making it more dramatic. Given a chance to tell his tale to the Loose Change boys, he pulls out all the stops. When the BBC comes calling and he realizes that there are real problems with the anecdote as he told it to LC, he denies it. That seems to me to be the most parsimonious explanation.

Of course to the "Troofers" Occam's razor would say that the NWO got to Jennings before the BBC interview, but afterwards they realized that Dylan had the tape of him talking about walking over bodies and they decided he had to be snuffed.

Loose Change 9-11 An American Coup Review: Part I

I obtained a "screener" copy of the new film from a media source who will go unnamed. In general, the film is something of a retreat to LCII, in that it goes back to pushing conspiratorial interpretations of Flight 77 and Flight 93, two aspects of 9-11 nuttery that were downplayed in LCFC. It's a lot to go through in one sitting, although fortunately most of the conspiracy theory stuff we've covered in the past.

Daniel Sunjata's narration is generally an improvement over Dylan's nasal twang, but it does not improve the "skeptical" comments that are sprinkled throughout the film; for those you really do need the snarky, kid-voice.

Here's my basic outline of the film:

Reichstag Fire
Pearl Harbor
Operation Paper Clip
Manhattan Project—Compartmentalization
Nuremberg Trials
JFK Assassination
Gulf of Tonkin
My Lai
WTC Construction
PNAC
9-11 Commission
Bin Laden denies responsibility
Fatty Bin Laden tape
Pre-2004 election video of Bin Laden
2006 Bin Laden tape
Hijackers not devout Muslims—drinking, lap dances, and hookers
Collins information about Hanjour
Able Danger
Atta attempt to get a loan for crop-dusting
Al-Ghamdi had flights scheduled for after 9-11
67 previous intercepts within 10 minutes
No prediction of airplanes into the buildings
Plane into Pentagon Drill too unrealistic
Amalgam Virgo
Haitian AIDS patient to fly airplane into Tindall AFB
OBL on cover of Amalgam Virgo plan
FBI has no records of this game
Wargames on 9-11
Booker Elementary—Bush saw first strike. Stayed at Booker despite being a target
Vigilant Guardian, Inputs into the screens.
Global Guardian?
Northern Vigilance
Pentagon
All Flight 77 hijackers set off metal detectors.
Flight 77 unusually light
Suspicious people on the plane, defense, and other government
Squawk hijack code not given
Hanjour should have dived into the top of the Pentagon.
Flight controllers thought it was a military plane.
Section hit was lightly occupied, recently reinforced. Important budget information lost.
No visible damage from the wings
Titanium engines.
No serial numbers.
No impact damage to the lawn
No videos show 757
The exit hole in C Ring is not explained
Mineta—50,30,10
Collapse of South Tower, 10 Seconds
North Tower collapse 10 seconds
WTC-7 collapse
Other fires
One Meridian Plaza
Lots of stuff in here recycled from earlier versions
Path of greatest resistance
NIST report
Not modelled after initiation
No tests for explosive residue
Jeanette McKinlay—weird music
Jones—red and gray chips
Red=aluminum and iron oxide
Carbon, Oxygen, Silicon, Aluminum and Iron. Carbon is in superthermite. Carbon gives explosive force to thermite.
Says a lot of energy released and explodes.
Nano thermite? Iron microspheres? Wait a minute!
Suddenly they find the iron microspheres.
Freefall speed—10 seconds
Concrete dustified
Molten metal exceeding 2000 F
Fires did not get put out until December
Need to sever core columns
Smoke at base of South Tower
Squibs (similar to earlier versions)
Turner Construction—ties to NIST and Bush
Fireproofing work on the North and South Tower.
Marvin Bush—Securacom
Jones: How did they use nanothermite; I can’t explain everything.
Debris shipped overseas and sold.
Bill Manning Fire Engineering mag complained.
Flight 93 "allegedly" crashes
Debris 6 miles away
Cockpit separated?
No jet fuel found in wells in area
Mint condition bandanna, Driver’s licenses.
WTC-7
OEM
Test status of fire alarm system that morning.
Freefall speed
Steel shipped off
Sulfidation
NIST-WTC-7
105-foot freefall
Barry Jennings and Michael Hess
Death of Barry Jennings
WTC-7 barely damages surrounding buildings
Smedley Butler reveals plot of a coup against FDR. FDR later makes deal with plotters to stay in power.
Appeal for new investigation.

Those are, of course just broad-brush impressions. Under the Reichstag Fire incident, which leads off the film, Dylan claims that historians now believe that the Nazis secretly entered the basement of the building and dowsed it with gasoline, and that Van Der Lubbe ignited the fire with his shirt. But other historians believe that the Nazis were caught by surprise by the Reichstag fire and actually worried that it was the anticipated revolt by the communists. Here's a terrific first-hand account of the blaze by a British reporter:

I am sure that he meant this seriously and was not just putting on an act. Both Hitler and Göring then still feared the possibility of a Communist coup. With six million votes at the last elections and a large number of adherents in the trade unions the Communists were still a formidable power. And they had in the past tried to capture power by coups - just as the Nazis had.

Dylan also claims that Hitler and Goring stopped by the Reichstag fire and executed some communists that same night. This is a new claim on me; Van Der Lubbe was indeed executed months later after a trial, but three other communists who were charged in the case were found not guilty, and I have found no other indication that anybody else was summarily executed.

There are a few claims that I'm going to have to bone up on. One is that there were reports that the cockpit detached from the rest of Flight 93. Steven Jones claims that after they researched the red and grey chips, a fellow scientist suggested that they search for iron microspheres; it's certainly my impression that the iron microspheres came up earlier than the red and grey chips in Jones' "work".

On the need to sever the core columns, I never tire of pointing out that if the core columns were severed at the bottom, then how did the "spire" (those same core columns) remain standing for a few seconds after the rest of the building collapsed.

In a lot of ways, Loose Change 9-11 An American Coup is really Loose Change II Recut Director's Cut. Final Cut seemed to back away from the "No-Big Boeing at the Pentagon" theories, while American Coup highlights them again. Ditto with Flight 93. The Barry Jennings' interview is as bad as John Schroeder's for confused timelines; I'll have to put together a transcript for that.

Screw Fabled Enemies

Jason Bermas, Korey Rowe and Alex Jones are collaborating on this film. Here's a clip:



Jennings is, of course, just plain wrong about the time. The Office of Emergency Management was not evacuated until 9:30. If a bomb had exploded in WTC 7 shortly after 9:00, why is Jennings the only person who describes it. There were many people in WTC-7 after 9:00, as described by the firefighters and EMS people like John Peruggia.

What he describes as an explosion is simply the collapse of the North Tower. The Terror Timeline gets this one right:

Among them are Barry Jennings, a City Housing Authority worker, and Mike Hess, New York’s chief lawyer who is also a longtime friend of Mayor Rudolph Giuliani. The two had gone up to the 23rd floor headquarters of the Mayor’s Office of Emergency Management some time before 10 a.m., but found it empty. (It was evacuated at 9:30 a.m.; see (9:30 a.m.) September 11, 2001.) They headed downstairs but became trapped around the sixth floor by smoke and debris that filled the staircase as a result of the North Tower collapsing at 10:28 a.m.

Note the editing; there are several places where the film clearly jumps. Note as well that Bermas claims they were "trapped there for the rest of the afternoon". Obviously this is incorrect; the Terror Timeline notes they were rescued between 12:10 and 12:15 PM; had they been trapped there all afternoon they would have died when the building collapsed.

Jason says he hopes to have the movie ready by September 1. Of course if you go to the website, it says "Coming in June", so they've already missed one deadline.