American Airlines Flight 11

American Airlines Flight 11 was a domestic passenger flight from Logan International Airport in Boston to Los Angeles International Airport in California. On the morning of September 11, 2001, five al-Qaeda terrorists took control of the plane as part of the September 11 attacks. The plane was flown into the North Tower of the World Trade Center in New York City. Everyone on board the flight died, and many people inside the tall building also died. The building's upper floors were destroyed.

The crash of Flight 11 was one of the saddest events in aviation history. It is the deadliest aviation incident in history. The plane was a Boeing 767 flying American Airlines' regular morning trip from Boston Logan International Airport to Los Angeles International Airport.

The plane took off at 7:59 a.m. Less than 15 minutes later, the hijackers hurt some crew members and a passenger. They broke into the cockpit and forced the passengers and crew to the back of the plane. They hurt both pilots, and lead hijacker Mohamed Atta took control of the plane. Air traffic controllers became worried when the crew stopped answering them. They realized the plane had been taken over when Atta's message to the people on board was accidentally sent to air traffic control instead of over the plane's speaker system. Two flight attendants also called American Airlines and shared what was happening on the plane.

At 8:46 a.m. local time, Atta flew the plane into the North Tower. People on the streets of New York City and in nearby New Jersey saw the crash. The news media quickly started reporting on it and thought it was an accident. Seventeen minutes later, at 9:03, United Airlines Flight 175 crashed into the World Trade Center's South Tower. This showed that the first crash had not been an accident.

The damage from the crash and the fires it started caused the North Tower to collapse at 10:28 that morning. Many more people died. During the recovery effort at the World Trade Center site, some people who had been on Flight 11 were found and identified, but many have not been identified.

Flight

The plane was a Boeing 767-200ER, with registration number N334AA. It was built and delivered in 1987. It could carry 158 passengers. On September 11, 2001, it carried 81 passengers and 11 crew members. This was more than the usual load factor for Flight 11 on Tuesday mornings. The Captain was John Ogonowski, a former Air Force transport pilot. The First Officer was Thomas McGuinness Jr., a former Navy fighter pilot. The flight attendants included Betty Ong and Amy Sweeney.

McGuinness took the assignment the day before. He had celebrated his birthday with his family on September 10. Another pilot, Steve Scheibner, had first been scheduled for the flight.

All 92 people on board died. They included Frasier creator David Angell, his wife Lynn Angell, actress Berry Berenson, Daniel Lewin of Akamai Technologies, and astronaut Charles Edward Jones. Alberto Domínguez and seven TJX employees were also on board. The oldest victim of the attacks, Robert Grant Norton, was on Flight 11. Family Guy creator Seth MacFarlane had been scheduled for the flight, but he missed it because of a hangover and a mistake about the departure time. Actor Mark Wahlberg had also planned to fly, but he canceled his ticket the day before.

Hijackers Mohamed Atta and Abdulaziz al-Omari arrived at Portland International Jetport in Maine early on September 11. A ticket agent felt suspicious of Atta, but she let it go. She was worried about racially profiling him. The two men boarded Colgan Air Flight 5930 to Boston. Both had first class tickets connecting to Los Angeles. The Computer-Assisted Passenger Prescreening System (CAPPS) picked Atta for extra luggage checks. In Boston, Waleed al-Shehri, Wail al-Shehri, and Satam al-Suqami joined them. By 07:40, all five hijackers were on the plane. Atta and al-Omari sat in business class seats. Marwan al-Shehhi, the hijacker pilot of United Airlines Flight 175, had earlier called Atta's cell phone from Logan Airport. The plane took off from runway 4R at 07:59.

Hijacking

The 9/11 Commission estimated that the hijacking began at 08:14. That is when the pilots stopped answering the Boston Air Route Traffic Control Center (Boston ARTCC). Soon after, someone in the cockpit turned off the plane's transponder signal. Messages sent to the plane through the Aircraft Communication Addressing and Reporting System (ACARS) got no reply. The commission believes the hijackers were in full control of the plane by 08:20.

Flight attendants Amy Sweeney and Betty Ong contacted American Airlines during the hijacking. They said that some people on the plane had been hurt, including two flight attendants and passenger Daniel Lewin. Ong and Sweeney believed the hijackers had locked themselves in the cockpit. The passengers did not seem to understand how dangerous the situation was. Lewin is believed to be the first person to die in the 9/11 attacks. Ong and Sweeney also gave the seat numbers of the hijackers, which later helped investigators learn who they were.

See also: Air traffic control during the September 11 attacks

At 08:24, air traffic controllers in Boston heard Mohamed Atta, one of the hijackers, speak over the radio. He told people to stay quiet and said the plane was returning to the airport. Because of these messages and the failed attempts to reach the plane, the controllers realized that Flight 11 had been hijacked. The plane turned south and followed the Hudson River toward New York City. Boston ARTCC then contacted the North American Aerospace Defense Command (NORAD) and its Northeast Air Defense Sector (NEADS) in Rome, New York. Two F-15 fighter jets at Otis Air National Guard Base in Mashpee, Massachusetts took off at 08:53. By then, Flight 11 had already crashed into the North Tower about seven minutes earlier.

Crash

At 8:37 a.m., Flight 11 began to drop quickly toward New York City and slowed as it went. At 8:46, the plane was flying about 440 miles per hour and carried a large amount of jet fuel. It hit the North Tower between floors 93 and 99. Many people died right away, including everyone on the plane. The crash blocked the stairs, so people above it could not easily get out. Fires and damage spread across many floors, and both towers shook.

Many people saw the crash, and cameras recorded it. A webcam set up by Wolfgang Staehle at an art show in Brooklyn took pictures of Lower Manhattan every four seconds. One of these pictures showed Flight 11 flying toward the tower. French cameraman Jules Naudet was filming a documentary about the Fire Department of the City of New York. His film was later used to make 9/11. He caught the only known clear video of the plane hitting the tower. Pavel Hlava, an immigrant from the Czech Republic, filmed the plane from far away while he was getting ready to drive into the Brooklyn–Battery Tunnel. Two audio recordings also captured the impact. One was made at a cafe in the Marriott World Trade Center. The other was made at a business meeting at One Liberty Plaza. The New York TV station WNYW had a camera in City Hall Park, and reporter Dick Oliver recorded what happened afterward. CNN began broadcasting at 8:49 with anchor Carol Lin. Some reporters wrongly said the plane was a "small, twin-engine jet." At 8:55, senior advisor Karl Rove told President George W. Bush at Emma E. Booker Elementary School in Sarasota, Florida that the crash "must have been caused by pilot error." Many people thought it was an accident, so the Port Authority did not quickly order everyone to leave the South Tower. Seventeen minutes after the first crash, United Airlines Flight 175 hit the South Tower. This showed that the crashes were on purpose.

Aftermath

Main article: Aftermath of the September 11 attacks

After the crash, the North Tower burned for 102 minutes before collapsing at 10:28. The crash caused heavy damage, and the long fire was blamed for the tower's fall. Although it was hit first, the North Tower fell second. It stood for nearly twice as long as the South Tower. Flight 11 hit the North Tower at a lower speed and much higher up than Flight 175 hit the South Tower, so there was far less weight above the damage. Cantor Fitzgerald L.P., an investment bank with offices on several floors of the North Tower, lost more employees than any other company.

Rescue workers at the World Trade Center site began finding remains from Flight 11 within days. Some remains suggested the hijackers may have used plastic handcuffs. Over time, people identified many victims from Flight 11, including purser Karen Martin in 2006. Other unrelated remains were found near Ground Zero around the same time. In 2007, newer DNA technology identified another Flight 11 victim. Remains of two hijackers, possibly from Flight 11, were removed from Memorial Park in Manhattan. The other hijackers' remains are still buried there without names.

Al-Suqami's passport survived the crash and landed in the street. A passerby gave it to a New York City Police Department (NYPD) detective shortly before the South Tower fell. Investigators also found Mohamed Atta's luggage, which had not been loaded onto the flight. It held papers, identification, and other items, along with a "The Last Night" document with instructions for the hijackers. The contents revealed the names of all 19 hijackers for the four September 11 flights. In a recording made a few months later in Afghanistan, al-Qaeda's leader, Osama bin Laden, took responsibility for the attack. He had expected only the floors above the plane strikes to collapse. The flight recorders for Flight 11 and Flight 175 were never found.

After the attacks, the flight number for the scheduled flight on the same route with the same takeoff time was changed. As of 2024, it is flown using an Airbus A321 instead of a Boeing 767. An American flag is flown on the jet bridge of gate B32, where Flight 11 left Logan Airport. In 2002, the first recipients of the annual Madeline Amy Sweeney Award for Civilian Bravery were Sweeney and Ong, and Ogonowski received a posthumous award. All three were residents of Massachusetts, and their relatives accepted the awards. In 2013, a piece of a Boeing 767 wing flap mechanism was found wedged between two buildings at Park Place, near other landing gear parts. In 2014, the onboard defibrillator from Flight 11 was found during roadworks near Liberty Street. At the National September 11 Memorial, the names of the Flight 11 victims are inscribed on the North Pool.