(Before 8:26 a.m.) September 11, 2001: Three Flight 11 Hijackers Identified by Seat Locations

Michael Woodward. [Source: Discovery Channel]Having been told by flight attendant Amy Sweeney the seat locations of three hijackers (see 8:22 a.m. September 11, 2001), American Airlines flight service manager Michael Woodward orders a colleague at Boston’s Logan Airport to look up those seat locations on the reservations computer. The names, addresses, phone numbers, and credit cards of these hijackers are quickly identified: Abdulaziz Alomari is in 9G, Mohamed Atta is in 9D, and Satam Al Suqami is in 10B. 9/11 Commissioner Bob Kerrey later notes that from this information, American Airlines officials monitoring the call would probably have known or assumed right away that the hijacking was connected to al-Qaeda. [ABC News, 7/18/2002; New York Observer, 2/15/2004]