TWA Flight 800: Conspiracy or Bad Investigation?

TWA Flight 800 to Paris exploded over the coast of Long Island 20 minutes after takeoff on July 17, 1996. The flight crew did not report any problems to air traffic control. All 230 people on board were killed.

Today, while theories abound, there is still no certain answer to what caused the tragedy. According to the FBI and the National Transportation Safety Board (August 23, 2000 - NTSB AAR-00/03), the crash was most likely the result of an explosion in the airplane's center wing fuel tank., where a short circuit outside of the tank was carried in by wires serving the fuel-gauge system and ignited vapors in the tank. There was no support for the missile or bomb theories, which they both said were fully investigated.

In October, 2003, a group called Flight 800 Independent Researchers Organization (FIRO) announced their findings: "A surface-to-air missile, launched from the ocean off the coast of Long Island rose up and exploded at or near TWA Flight 800."

The only thing that seems certain is what witnesses reported: They saw an explosion and then debris falling into the ocean. The recovered pieces supported that the plane was shattered by the explosion, fire, and impact in the ocean. Whichever group the investigators worked for, they had their hands full, sorting through complex-and conflicting-information. The fuselage was spread out over a debris field 1½ miles long and ½ mile wide. Divers recovered both flight data and cockpit voice recorders from 100 feet below the ocean's surface. Navy and police divers working 12-hour shifts spent more than five weeks searching for both human and aircraft remains in rough seas. (Fifteen victims were never recovered.) Ninety-six feet of the fuselage was eventually recovered and rebuilt, allowing investigators to establish the sequence of events that led to the destruction of Flight 800.

Questions that are still not answered to the satisfaction of the media and the public include:

* Flight 800 was heading east. What were the westbound "flare-like objects" that appeared to originate at from ground level and other events in the sky that a number of eyewitnesses-including three commercial pilots-reported seeing?

* On 10 June, the St. Louis Airport PD conducted bomb dog training aboard the aircraft. Residue from the explosives RDX and PETN found after the explosion was consistent with those used during the exercise. But why were some of the traces found outside the aircraft, on the right wing?

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