It’s a good thing Osama wasn’t walking through SoHo yesterday morning. Two sets of confidential blueprints for the planned Freedom Tower, which is set to rise at Ground Zero, were carelessly dumped in a city garbage can on the corner of West Houston and Sullivan streets, The Post has learned. Experts said the detailed, floor-by-floor schematics contain enough detail for terrorists to plot a devastating attack. “Secure Document – Confidential,” warns the title page on each of the two copies of the 150-page schematic that a homeless, recovering drug addict discovered in the public trash can.
“Any time a sensitive document is unintentionally left behind, it’s a treasure trove for a potential adversary,” aid Robert Strang, CEO of Investigative Management Group, a global security firm. “It enables them to look for vulnerabilities in design that they can target – an age-old military tactic.” Informed of what the homeless man, Mike Fleming, had found, shocked Port Authority officials called it an egregious security lapse. One of the identical sets was missing the first 14 pages, which is particularly alarming.
With all the hysteria surrounding the “terror threat” and “security” since Sept. 11, this is just unbelievable carelessness. Or maybe it was intentional….an attempt to mislead? Or maybe, its just BS. I’ll wait for better verification than the Post. Having said that, it is a beautiful design.
In other news…
The story in its worst interpretation is pure FUD. The only blueprint you need to attack the next Freedom Tower will be a road map or postcard of NYC.
I guess there is a trickle down theory that actually works. Spreading fear that is.
this is a pretty poetic summation, i would say
Did the 911 terrorists have detailed blue-prints of the original WTC towers?
All they needed were box-cutters and basic flight instructions.
terrorism is just a word to most politicians. when really, it’s a principle tactic of war.. feldercarb\
Once known as “playin dirty”, poison was the preffered option of king’s and queens’s.
I’m with Chuck: did the 9/11 hijackers have blueprints of the WTC?
Reminds me of Congressional nitwits from here in Oregon.
Air Force wanted to move a reserve squadron to somewhere with nicer weather for flying…
Nitwits moan about how the NorthWest will lose its protective over-flights by the fighters…
As if we could someday need to shoot-down airliners over Portland, OR.; or Seattle WA.
And don’t get me started, again, on how photographers are being hassled for taking pictures in public places – because they could be terrorists doing research for a future attack. 🙁
This sounds like a ploy to NOT get this design approved. Because the plans leaked out, “somehow”.
Bet it will never be revealed who did this. They were prepared to sacrifice the plans for some political gain (or strategy), but not to take the fall for it. I seriously doubt that the towel heads who took down the Towers had any idea it would collapse rather than tip over. They would have crashed into them much lower, trapping more people above, if they had detailed plans. Hitting them so close to the top, seems to indicate they hope to topple the towers. This isn’t the first time secret plans got “leaked”.
Back in the early days of the Space Shuttle, there was a smaller design. About a third the size of what it became. The military wanted it larger to accommodate larger spy satellites. They hadn’t counted on micro chips, shrinking the electronics way down. Apparently, somebody thought it was a good idea to get these plans to the Russians. And they did, because the version they built was the original 1/3rd size. And I think they got the plans via Hollywood. Because filmmakers needed something to base Buck Roger’s “Ranger 3” spacecraft design on. So after Universal mocked up their mini-shuttle for the 1979 movie, the plans walked. The same mockup also appeared in Battlestar Galactica TOS. Or maybe the Russians had merely saved up all of their Fruit Loops boxtops, and sent away for the plans. However they got them, they got them. And I doubt it was thru the FOIA.
One man didn’t want to see “that piece of crap” in his back yard. So he dumped the plans in the trash, and then “found them”. He was in a homeless recovering drug addict outfit. No one knew. He didn’t have to do a thing with his hair to look the part, but pulled it off with the clothes, and the standard “rummaging through the trash” thing that only recovering homeless drug addicts do. Everyone thought he belonged there. He does. It was Trump.
When will people learn? Security through obscurity is WORSE than none at all.
Hiding the blueprints from the general public is a complete waste of time, since you only need one person inside the finished building to describe the details.
I think GoogleMaps has a alpha Archcad building search right next to streetview button and GoogleEarth has created a 3D Sketchup model already. 😉
Hey now! Security is NOT about blueprints to sensitive buildings. Security is about bringing bottled water on airplanes and arresting 6 year olds who point their finger at another student and say “pachoo”.
To all the people who sais leaving these blueprints on the street was no big deal because the 911 terorrists didn’t need them…
A 911 style attack would never work again. All the pasengers on the 911 planes thought they were in a normal hijacking situation and would eventually be freed. All of them (except on the PA plane) cooperated.
Someone trying this style of attack today would be torn apart by the passengers.
The next big attack will be something completely different. Perhaps something like leaving smaller bombs near critical structural members in a sensitive building. You would need blueprints for that