On September 11, 2001, 19 al-Qaeda terrorists hijacked four commercial airplanes and crashed two planes into the World Trade Center towers in New York City, one into the Pentagon near Washington D.C., and one crashed in a field in Pennsylvania. Nearly 3,000 people were killed during the attacks which changed national security policies and marked the beginning of the War on Terror. The attacks were orchestrated by Osama bin Laden's terrorist group al-Qaeda which sought to damage American interests.

1. SEPTEMBER 11TH, 2001
Lauren Halstead
(LMS 1) Nov. 26th, 2012

2. 9/11
On September 11, 2001, 19 militants associated with the Islamic extremist
group al-Qaeda hijacked four airliners and carried out suicide attacks against
targets in the United States. Two of the planes were flown into the towers of
the World Trade Center in New York City, a third plane hit the Pentagon just
outside Washington, D.C., and the fourth plane crashed in a field in
Pennsylvania. Often referred to as 9/11, the attacks resulted in extensive death
and destruction, triggering major U.S. initiatives to combat terrorism and
defining the presidency of George W. Bush. Over 3,000 people were killed
during the attacks in New York City and Washington, D.C., including more
than 400 police officers and firefighters. These attacks changed the way we
viewed terrorism, national security, and ourselves. We were no longer
‘invincible.’

3. AL-QAEDA
A loosely-knit militant Islamic organization led and funded by Osama bin
Laden, by whom it was established in the late 1980s from Arab volunteers
who had fought the Soviet troops previously based in Afghanistan; known or
believed to be behind a number of operations against Western, especially US,
interests, including bomb attacks on two US embassies in Africa in 1998 and
the destruction of the World Trade Center in New York in 2001.

4. THE WORLD TRADE CENTER
On the morning of September 11th, terrorists hijacked four commercial jet
planes and attempted to fly them into several U.S. targets. One of the planes,
American Airlines Flight 11, crashed into Tower One of the World Trade
Center at 8:50 AM. United Airlines Flight 175 crashed into Tower Two at 9:04
AM. As the world watched Tower Two collapsed to the ground at about 10:00
AM. Unfortunately, this horrible scene was duplicated at 10:30 AM when
Tower One crashed to the ground. This terrorist attack brought about the
death of approximately 3,000 men, women and children from nations around
the world.

5. THE PENTAGON
Within 30 minutes of two planes hitting the World Trade Center twin towers,
American Airlines Flight 77 departed Dulles International Airport bound for
Los Angeles. The Boeing 757 was hijacked and crashed, loaded with 10,000
gallons of fuel, at 345 mph into the west side of the Pentagon. The five-story
Pentagon is made up of five pentagonal structures arranged in concentric
rings. These rings surround a five-acre open courtyard and are connected by
10 spike-like corridors. The plane took out light poles in the parking lot, hit
the ground just outside the outermost ring of the Pentagon, turned up on its
wing, and penetrated the E ring (outermost) midway between corridors 4 and
5. It then traveled through the D ring and into the C ring

6. THE PENTAGON: CONTINUED

7. UNITED AIRLINES FLIGHT 93
United Airlines Flight 93 was a passenger flight which was hijacked by four al-
Qaeda terrorists on September 11, 2001, as part of the September 11 attacks.
It crashed into a field near Shanksville, Pennsylvania, during an attempt by
some of the passengers to regain control, killing all 44 people aboard
including the 4 hijackers. No one on the ground was injured. The aircraft
involved, a Boeing 757–222, was flying United Airlines' daily scheduled
morning domestic flight from Newark International Airport in Newark, New
Jersey, to San Francisco International Airport in San Mateo County, California.
The hijackers breached the aircraft's cockpit and overpowered the flight crew
approximately 46 minutes after takeoff. Ziad Jarrah, a trained pilot, then took
control of the aircraft and diverted it back toward the east coast of the United
States in the direction of Washington, D.C. The hijackers' specific target is
believed to have been the United States Capitol.

8. UNITED AIRLINES FLIGHT 93
CONTINUED
After the hijackers took control of the plane, several passengers and flight
attendants were able to make telephone calls and learn that attacks had already
been made by other hijacked airlines on the World Trade Center in New York City
and the Pentagon outside Washington, D.C. Some of the passengers then
attempted to regain control of the aircraft. During the attempt, however, the plane
crashed into a reclaimed strip mine in Stonycreek Township, near Shanksville in
Somerset County, Pennsylvania, about 65 miles (105 km) southeast of Pittsburgh
and 130 miles (210 km) northwest of Washington, D.C. A few witnessed the
impact from the ground and news agencies began reporting the event within an
hour.
Subsequent analysis of the flight recorders recovered from the crash site revealed
how the actions taken by the passengers prevented the aircraft from reaching the
hijackers' intended target. Of the four aircraft hijacked on September 11 – the
others were American Airlines Flight 11, American Airlines Flight 77 and United
Airlines Flight 175 – United Airlines Flight 93 was the only one that failed to
reach its hijackers' intended target.

9. PICTURES OF FLIGHT 93

10. AMERICA’S RESPONSE
Immediately after the September 11 attacks on the World Trade Center attacks
on the World Trade Center and the Pentagon, both houses of Congress made
proposals to provide legitimate legal authority to detect, deter and prevent
future acts of terror on American soil or against Americans traveling
anywhere else in the world.
We truly entered the War on Terror.
For more in-depth info on U.S. Response:
http://www.11september2001memorial.com/a1.html
http://www.history.com/topics/reaction-to-9-11

11. FOR MORE INFORMATION:
http://timeline.national911memorial.org/ (interactive) timeline(s)
http://www.history.com/topics/9-11-attacks pictures, videos, articles, etc
http://library.columbia.edu/indiv/usgd/wtc.html official documents of the
attacks