WASHINGTON, July 22 (AFP) - A surveillance video taken on September 11, 2001 at Dulles International Airport outside Washington shows four or five hijackers passing security checks before boarding the plane they later crashed into the Pentagon, CNN said late Wednesday.
First described in January by the commission investigating the September 11 attacks, the videotape was broadcast publicly for the first time on the eve of the publication of the commission`s final report highlighting the failure of US intelligence to prevent the attacks but sparing the White House of any criticism.
In a chilling reminder of the ease with which the hijackers boarded the Los Angeles-bound American Airlines Flight 77 they later slammed into the Pentagon, the video showed Majed Moqued, Khalid Almihdhar, Hani Hanjour and brothers Nawaf and Salem Alhazmi arriving at the checkpoints.
Moqued and Almidhar first arrived at 7:18 am and promptly set off an alarm, said CNN citing a September 11 commission staff report. Alhidhar cleared a second magnetometer, but Moqued did not and was scanned manually with a metal detector.
They were both cleared for boarding. CNN said they presumably had small knives on them which set off the alarms -- pocket knives were not banned aboard passenger planes before the September 11 attacks.
Hanjour, who would later fly the plane into the Pentagon, arrived at the airport at 7:35am and proceeded through the security checkpoint with no problems, as did Salem Alhazmi one minute later.
His brother Nawaf, however, set off the alarm twice and was scanned manually and cleared for boarding, CNN said.
The video, segments of which were shown by CNN television, elicited comments by Donn Marshall, whose wife Shelley was killed in the Pentagon.
"Look at how easily these guys walked right through, and look at the calm. It`s just scary how easily they did it," he told CNN.
"You can`t underestimate al Qaeda," he added. "As much as I hate them, they`re smart, and they`re savvy, and they`re a terrible threat."