VERO BEACH, Fla., Sept. 13 — For the last several years, a handful of
Middle Eastern men made their way to Florida to learn how to fly. Some
took classes at a high-tech aviation center here, while at least one
learned to handle passenger jets at an aeronautical college in Daytona
Beach. Still others took lessons on propeller planes at a flight school
on Florida's Gulf Coast.
In each case, the authorities now believe, the skills they learned on
American soil may have helped them carry out the worst act of terror in
this country's history.
In Washington today, officials said that 18 men hijacked the planes that
crashed on Tuesday into the World Trade Center, the Pentagon and in
Pennsylvania. Several of the suicide fliers attended aviation academies
in Florida. At least one fellow student is at large and believed to be
armed; another is in custody, apparently cooperating with federal
agents.
Unlike the terrorists implicated in the 1993 attack on the World Trade
Center, who plotted in secretive cells, many of these men went out of
their way to live openly and to blend in.
Some knew one another and lived as neighbors in comfortable homes on
quiet streets. Some brought their wives and children with them and took
shopping trips to the mall in their Plymouth Voyagers. Their children
attended public schools and played computer games with the neighborhood
children.
Some occasionally drank too much in local bars. While apparently preparing for the most extraordinary of crimes, they
lived seemingly unexceptional lives.
Here in Vero Beach, for instance, Abdul Rahman Alomari, a Saudi Arabian
pilot who officials say helped hijack one of the planes in Boston,
arrived in July 2000 to take classes at FlightSafety Academy. He signed
a $1,400-a-month lease to rent one of the pastel stucco houses that line
57th Terrace, settling next door to another Saudi student, Adnan Zakaria
Bukhari, and just a few miles away from another friend, Amer Mohammed
Kamfar.
Neighbors watched the men come home each day dressed in the signature
white shirts and gold-and-black epaulets that identified them as
FlightSafety trainees. They had large, beautiful families, the neighbors
said. And while they did not often make heavy conversation, usually
offering just a friendly wave or hello, they also seemed not the least
bit secretive or mysterious.
Ray M. DeFossez, a truck driver who lives across the street from the
Bukharis and Alomaris, recalled today that the families typically left
their garage doors open when they left home. "They weren't hiding
anything," Mr. DeFossez said.
And so it was quite a surprise when a squad of Federal Bureau of
Investigation agents roused the neighbors at 5:30 a.m. on Wednesday and
shepherded them in their nightclothes to the end of the block, telling
them that the nearby houses they were about to search might be
booby-trapped with bombs.
The shock only deepened as the agents whisked Mr. Bukhari away to their
Miami field office for sustained questioning about the Pentagon and
World Trade Center attacks. Mr. Kamfar's neighbors, meanwhile, would
soon learn that the police had issued an all-points bulletin for the
him, warning that he might be heavily armed. And while the F.B.I. has
not confirmed the names of the suspected hijackers, local
law-enforcement officials here have suggested, at least, that Mr.
Alomari, the father of four who lived across the street from Mr.
DeFossez, was one of them.
Roy Raymond, the Indian River County sheriff here, said that some 30
F.B.I. agents and another 30 local law enforcement officers were
involved in the raids on four houses here, and that Mr. Alomari seemed
to be the bureau's primary interest. Sheriff Raymond said he understood
that Mr. Bukhari had been helpful.
"It was my indication that he was cooperative," Sheriff Raymond said,
"and that he's being treated more as a witness than a detainee."
Mr. Kamfar, meanwhile, apparently remains at large. That came as
unsettling news to his former neighbor, Hank Habora, who said that Mr.
Kamfar introduced himself simply as "John" when moving in to a rented
house next door last fall. The man and his wife, who wore a full-length
Muslim garment known as a chador and spoke little English, had four
children and possibly an infant.
"They were just regular people, didn't make a lot of noise," Mr. Habora
said. "From their trash, you could see that they shopped at Wal- Mart
and ate a lot of pizza."
Two weeks ago, Mr. Habora said, the entire family moved away abruptly,
discarding much of their clothing and other belongings in the trash. A
van pulled up to the house and honked, he said, and the family got in
and drove off.
"If he was dangerous, he never showed it while living here," Mr. Habora
said. "But it kind of makes you nervous, thinking that they lived next
door all that time."
Further up the coast in Daytona Beach, another man being investigated,
Waleed Al Shehri, learned how to fly at Embry-Riddle Aeronautical
University, a four-year institution considered a leader in training
pilots. He graduated in 1997 with a degree in aeronautical science and
the skills to handle a commercial jetliner.
As a foreign student, he hardly stood out at Embry-Riddle. The
university says its student body represents more than 100 nations, many
of them from Middle East.
Mr. Al Shehri is from Saudi Arabia, and Embry-Riddle officials said he
attended on a full, four-year scholarship paid for by the Saudi Arabian
government, an arrangement not considered unusual. He was regarded by
faculty members as studious and intelligent. Quoting law enforcement
officials, several Florida papers said Mr. Al Shehri died on one of the
planes, but federal authorities would not confirm the names of any
suspects.
"A very mild mannered person, small in stature," recalled Dr. Frank
Richey, 62, a professor in the school of aeronautical science who was
among several faculty members interviewed by the F.B.I. about Mr. Al
Shehri. "He seemed to be very friendly. He was probably one of the last
persons I'd expect to do something like this. He didn't appear to be a
religious fanatic at all."
Dr. Richey added: "He wanted to be a professional pilot. I could tell he
was well educated. He was an A or B student, and you don't get those
types of grades here without being a quality student."
Real estate records indicate that Mr. Al Shehri lived at an apartment
complex in Daytona Beach, and law enforcement officers canvassed it and
other addresses in the area on Tuesday night. But he apparently has not
lived in Daytona Beach since 1998, and records suggest that he may have
moved to Vienna, Va., for an undetermined time.
Whether Mr. Al Shehri ever overlapped with any of the other suspects in
Daytona Beach is unclear. Real estate records indicate that a man with
the same name as another suspect, Muhammed Atta, lived in Port Orange, a
neighboring town, at roughly the same time Mr. Al Shehri attended
Embry-Riddle.
Mr. Atta remains a significant focus of the F.B.I.'s attention. A
videotape taken from the Portland, Me., airport on Tuesday morning
showed him and Mr. Alomari passing through security gates before flying
to Boston, officials in Maine said. They made the connection to American
Airlines Flight 11, the first plane to hit the World Trade Center.
In the past two days, agents have searched an apartment in Hollywood,
Fla., that Mr. Atta rented from May 13 to June 13 along with another
suspect, Marwan Alshehhi, who is believed to have been on the United
Airlines flight that left Boston shortly after the American flight.
The apartment's owner, Lynn DeLano, said agents had taken "bags of
stuff," though she said that she had previously been through the unit
and had found little besides furniture, phone books and an empty Coke
bottle.
Unlike the aviation students in Vero Beach, Mr. Atta and Mr. Alshehhi
moved around more frequently. From July to November 2000, they were
students of Huffman Aviation in Venice, on Florida's Gulf Coast and for
some time in the first half of this year the two lived in Hamburg,
Germany. By mid-May, they were back in Florida.
When Brad Warrick saw Mr. Atta's picture on television on Wednesday, he
instantly recognized him as the polite, well-spoken man to whom he had
rented a car three times in the last six weeks. Mr. Warrick, who owns
Warrick's Rent-A-Car in Pompano Beach, said Mr. Atta first came into his
office on Aug. 6, and appeared to be someone who had lived in the
country for years.
"He seemed to be a businessman," Mr. Warrick said. "His driver's license
and insurance matched up to a Florida address, he had a credit card, he
spoke very good English, and he carried a briefcase. He seemed pretty
friendly."
He first rented a car on Aug. 6, kept it for a week and drove 254 miles.
After returning it, he came in for another car on Aug. 15 and kept it
for two weeks, driving nearly 2,000 miles. At one point during that
rental, Mr. Warrick said, Mr. Atta called him, saying he was in Venice,
Fla., and that the "service engine soon" light had come on. Mr. Warrick
said he told him not to worry about it.
On Aug. 29, Mr. Atta returned the car for servicing and rented a third
one, which he kept out until Sept. 9, driving 1,035 miles, Mr. Warrick
said. That car was still sitting in the parking lot, not cleaned or
serviced, when Mr. Warrick saw Mr. Atta's picture on television. He
called the F.B.I., which sent out agents minutes later and towed the car
to Miami, also taking the original rental contracts.
"I realized this car was perfect for the F.B.I. because no one had
touched it since Atta drove it," Mr. Warrick said. "It had to be full of
fingerprints and stuff."
Later, Mr. Warrick thought it odd that Mr. Atta — who he described as
nicely dressed, usually wearing a polo shirt, slacks and dress shoes —
had been concerned about the condition of the car and had returned it
two days before the hijacking.
"I mean, if you were going on a suicide mission, why not just leave the
car at the airport?" Mr. Warrick said. "But he seemed like a model
customer. I wish all my customers were like that. Well, I guess not."
As the pilots sought to hone their skills, they apparently used numerous
flight schools to "practice," as Mr. Atta told the operators of Palm
Beach Flight Training in Lantana, Fla., where F.B.I. agents showed up on
Wednesday and on Thursday seeking information. For three days last
month, Mr. Atta rented a single- engine, low-wing plane for $88 an hour
from the school, saying he wanted to increase his flying hours even
though the school's operators noted that he was a certified commercial
pilot who had 300 hours of flying time.
In addition to the men who are believed to have commandeered the planes,
there were signs today that others in Florida knew of their plans. The
manager of a Daytona Beach strip club and sports bar said tonight that
agents had collected evidence at his club after three Middle Eastern
patrons who visited the club on Monday night were heard loudly
predicting coming bloodshed in America.
John Kap, manager of the club, the Pink Pony and Red Eye Jack Sports
Bar, said F.B.I. agents on Wednesday took credit card receipts, copies
of the men's driver's licenses and a Koran. He declined to identify the
three men, but said that all three men had central Florida addresses and
spent a few hundred dollars on lap dances and drinks between 11 p.m. on
Monday and about 2 a.m. on Tuesday, hours before the attacks.
"There were a lot of anti-American things being said," Mr. Kap said in a
telephone interview, "and at one point, one of the gentlemen said, `Wait
until tomorrow, America is going to see bloodshed.´ "
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