TWA Flight 800 crash story untrue, investigators claim

The reconstruction of TWA Flight 800's fuselage (Daniel Brooks/Epix)

The producers of an upcoming documentary on TWA Flight 800?which exploded and crashed into the waters off of Long Island on July 17, 1996, killing all 230 people on board?claim to have proof that an explosion outside the Paris-bound flight caused the crash. And six former investigators who took part in the film want the case reopened.

"These investigators were not allowed to speak to the public or refute any comments made by their superiors and/or NTSB and FBI officials about their work at the time of the official investigation," a news release announcing the documentary said. "They waited until after retirement to reveal how the official conclusion by the (NTSB) was falsified and lay out their case."

After a four-year investigation, the National Transportation Safety Board concluded the plane, which had just taken off from New York's John F. Kennedy Airport, was destroyed by a center fuel tank explosion likely caused by a spark from faulty wiring.

But according to Tom Stalcup, a co-producer of the documentary, the investigators "provide radar and forensic evidence proving that one or more ordinance explosions outside the aircraft caused the crash." The film, will premiere on EPIX on July 17, the 17th anniversary of the crash.

Stalcup said the investigators plan to file petition the NTSB for a new probe.

In response, the NTSB said Wednesday that it would review any petition related to the 1996 crash, which touched off one of the most complex air disaster investigations in U.S. history.

The CIA and FBI conducted a parallel investigation to determine if a bomb or missile had brought down the plane.

Dozens of eyewitnesses in the Long Island area "recalled seeing something resembling a flare or firework ascend and culminate in an explosion," the CIA said in a 2008 report. "Had the crash been the result of state-sponsored terrorism, it would have been considered an act of war":

The CIA responded to the FBI?s request within 24 hours of the crash. This support consisted primarily of help from the Counterterrorist Center in the Directorate of Operations and from a small group of analysts in the Office of Weapons, Technology and Proliferation in the Directorate of Intelligence.

But after an eight-month investigation, the CIA "concluded with confidence and full substantiation that the eyewitnesses had not seen a missile."

"Our analysis demonstrates that the eyewitness sightings of greatest concern to us?the ones originally interpreted to be of a possible missile attack?took place after the first of several explosions aboard the aircraft," the CIA's Deputy Director of Intelligence wrote in a 1997 memo.

Source: http://news.yahoo.com/blogs/lookout/twa-flight-800-crash-investigation-ntsb-141624708.html

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