Air Force One Backup Rattles New York Nerves

reply to post by habu71


No you are quite right.

My thinking is this:

They used the plane on a test run. The Fighter escort was to ensure that no idiot (thinking of something else though!) tried to take off in a light aircraft and ram 28000.

The problem I am having is that the press release stated the backup to AF1 was used. That means it was 29000....the photo released is 28000...

reply to post by habu71


First of all... it wasn't AF1 - Obama was not on board so no AF1 call sign.

Second... If 28000 is the one the pres is on, then the back up is 29000. If 29000 has the pres, then 28000 is the backup. IE: there is no actual back up plane as such... if you get what i mean

reply to post by BSG75


Of course you are correct, AF1 is a call sign indicating the president is on board.....I was referring to the press release.....

Regarding the tail numbers, since El presidente was not flying, 28000 was the primary and 29000 was the backup.........28000 is always the primary PAG transport for the president.....

reply to post by habu71


so the big question is: why were they using the primary to fly a photo op? Are there clear guidelines about how/when the two planes are used? why was the plane referred to as Air Force One backup? this confusion of terminology might whiz past most of us, but for those in the know...why would they call it the backup when it was the primary?

reply to post by habu71


Well I live in the UK (thank god) and so am not as well versed in USAf regs as my yank colleagues.

Using FOI laws, is it possible that ATC tapes can be listened to? We need more infomation though such as flight plan. Even 28000 OR 29000 NEEDS TO file a flight plan to ATC.

No, the apparent issue is the following:

1> Did either the FAA or the military state that the "backup VC25" was used or was this press interpretation?

2> I seem to recall that the "authorities" stated it was "the backup to AF1"

assuming it was the backup, it was aircraft 29000

3> First, no photos from the alleged photo shoot (the stated reason for the flyby) were to be released. Then, following public outcry, the WH releases "the photo".

THE PHOTO WAS OF AIRCRAFT 28000!!!!!!!!!

(btw, from the darkness in the edge of the photo, it was taken from inside a fighter aircraft)

I posted this in another thread, here's a piece of the conversations between New York Approach and "VENUS01", the VC25 doing the flyby..

NY Approach/VENUS01

The governments story is total BS, they could take pictures of Air Force One somewhere else and photoshop them. Someone flew Air Force One without permission.

TO ALL THOSE WHO ARE INTERESTED:

Finally, I recieved a response to my FOIA letter requesting all info about the "flyby"...

Transparency is the new mantra!!

My letter and envelope was enclosed, along with a inkjet printed page that said, " The White House and the Office of Administration are not subject to the FOIA"

I have filed others, I at least got a letter...

I shall try the Dept of the Air Force....Any suggestions?

reply to post by habu71


odd that it took so long to refuse you. (substitute word of choice for "odd")

reply to post by earlywatcher


Yes, I find it very strange, unless the WH is in the amount of disarray and chaos that I think they are...

interesting tidbit showing up today. apparently someone is having luck getting those secret documents that provide details of the nyc flyover.

According to the Air Force One documents released through the Freedom of Information Act, a unit called the Combat Information Cell at Tyndall Air Force Base in Florida monitored the public fallout from the April 27 flight and offered recommendations for dealing with the fast-breaking story.
...
The mission quickly became a public relations disaster as panicked New Yorkers, fearing another 9/11-style attack, emptied office buildings.
...
The Combat Information Cell's first assessment of the event said "Web site blog comments 'furious' at best." Local reporting of the flyover was "very critical, highlighting scare factor," it added.

A Twitter search revealed a rate of one "tweet" per minute about a pair of F-16s chasing a commercial airliner. A tweet is a text message of up to 140 characters delivered to the author's subscribers, who are known as followers.

Media coverage over the next 24 hours "will focus on local hysteria and lack of public notification," the cell predicted. "Blogs will continue to be overwhelmingly negative."

"Damage control requires timely counter-information," but the opportunity for that had passed, the assessment said. The cell recommended acknowledging the mistake and ensuring it didn't happen again.
...
Another update on April 28 said the story was still "reverberating, surprisingly resilient." The tweet rate had grown to three per minute and the words "New York" had been pushed into Twitter's high-frequency topic category. Videos of the event posted on YouTube had been viewed more than 260,000 times, it said.

By April 30, the story had faded, the cell reported. The blogs were still very critical, but it was the White House, not the Air Force, that was taking the heat, the assessment for that day said.

air force examined twitter tracking of event

I don't know if this was the true purpose of the event but it makes more sense than the photos of the statue of liberty. It also indicates that a lot of people knew about this and were examining it from many angles.

reply to post by earlywatcher



So the truth finally comes out. This was all just a test to see how fast news of an event spreads on twitter and other sites.

reply to post by Erasurehead


the "cell" referred to in that article is Combat Information Cell at Tyndall Air Force Base in Florida. the ones who studied who this information tracked through the social networks. I'm going to keep an eye out for info on this group to see what else they might be up to, at least publicly. apparently this info cam through an FOIA request.

it makes me uncomfortable to think how much energy they spend on figuring out how to massage our perceptions.

Just a reminder.

[atsimg]http://files.abovetopsecret.com/images/member/8ef89b5bfec9.jpg[/atsimg]

another thought here. they made a big deal about not warning the public about this. no explanation for what was happening. so they were able to determine from watching twitter not only how fast the news traveled but what explanations people came up with, how they changed and traveled, how long this news took to reach different parts of the country and the world, how people felt about it.

IMHO this was strictly a psyop. they examined how people handled this situation when they had to rely entirely on "gossip" from the social networks to sort things out.

not having the most positive opinion of government, i suspect that they are still trying to discover ways to terrify us into stampeding so martial law can justifiably be implemented. i don't mean to say they are trying to do this right this miute, but it's useful information. i don't know what all conclusions they came up with, but obviously this charade didn't do it. yes people were terrified but they handled it appropriately and notified others, and everybody was angry not terrified.