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‘Messages’ from the 9/11 Dead

The terrorist attacks of 9/11 triggered a massive investigation and a retaliatory war. They also prompted numerous surviving family members to believe they were receiving otherworldy communications from their deceased loved ones. But were they?

JOE NICKELL

n the morning of September 11, 2001, concerted terrorist attacks on New York’s World Trade Center Oand the Pentagon building in Arlington, Virginia, claimed nearly 3,000 victims. They also resulted in Amer- ica’s largest criminal investigation, a war in Afghanistan, and endless controversy sparked by conspiracy theorists. Many of the family members and friends of the victims also began to convince themselves that there was a mystical aspect to the tragedy. Some claimed there had been intu- itive foreshadowings of the event; others claimed that they had received certain signals from, five-level garage capable of parking two or even experienced actual encounters thousand vehicles. The World Trade with, their deceased loved ones. Now Center was a huge target for terrorists. Bonnie McEneaney, whose husband, Indeed, more than eight and a half years Eamon, was a 9/11 victim, has collected before the towers were brought down, numerous such anecdotal accounts. Her the garage was the site of a massive book, Messages: Signs, Visits, and Premo- bombing that rocked the towers, led to another target—probably the U.S. nitions from Loved Ones Lost on 9 /1 1 an intense investigation by the FBI and Capitol—and instead caused it to crash (2010), bears a jacket blurb from spiri- the Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Fire - in a rural Pennsylvania field. tualist medium James Van Praagh. The arms and Explosives (ATF), and culmi- The attacks prompted an immediate evidence is revealing—if not in the way nated in the arrest and conviction of four investigation by the FBI, which linked McEneaney intended. terrorists, each sentenced to 240 years in the strikes to the terrorist organization Background the U.S. penitentiary (Nickell and Fis- al-Qaeda and its leader, Osama bin cher 1999, 237–45). Laden (who initially denied involve- At a quarter of a mile high, only eighty- The horrific events now known as ment). On July 22, 2002, the National six feet shorter than the Sears Tower in “9/11” occurred on September 11, 2001. Commission on Terrorist Attacks Chicago, the Twin Towers of Man - Nineteen al-Qaeda terrorists comman- Upon the United States issued its re- hattan’s World Trade Center were the deered four commercial airplanes, port, which gave an account of the cir- second- and third-tallest buildings in the crashing one into each of the World cumstances that surrounded the suicide United States. One steel tower was Trade Center’s Twin Towers and an- attacks—including issues of prepared- crowned with a restaurant; the other with other into the Pentagon near Wash - ness and response. an observatory. Far below, be neath the ington, DC; only the heroic actions of The United States Department of multi-building complex at the towers’ passengers and crew aboard a fourth hi- Commerce’s National Institute of Stan- bases, was a giant basement containing a jacked plane prevented it from reaching dards and Technology (NIST) con-

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9/11: Conspiracy Theories Ten Years Later

ducted a technical investigation of the and his al-Qaeda followers) and enacting writes, “Everything around me was Twin Towers’ collapse, culminating in a the USA PATRIOT (Uniting and still—not a ripple in the air. Then all of 10,000-page report explaining that the Strengthen ing America by Providing [a] sudden, somewhere above me, I crashed planes caused severe initial Appropriate Tools Required to Intercept heard the beginning rush of a gust of damage and that the subsequent fires and Ob struct Terrorism) Act, which ex - new wind building up in intensity” weakened the floors’ support trusses, panded both anti-terrorism legislation (McEneaney 2010, 10). As she looked causing floors to sag and pull on the ex- and law-enforcement powers. Osama up, “I could see the wind! It created terior steel columns, which then buck- bin Laden has been caught and killed, an such a pattern through the leaves and led and became unable to support the architect of the terrorist attacks, Khalid the trees that it was easy to follow. It structures (Dunbar and Reagan 2006). Sheikh Mohammad, and other cocon- had the outline of a river.” She con- As it happens, I was invited to lecture spirators have been apprehended, repair cludes, “I didn’t know how to explain on critical thinking at NIST on June of the Pentagon has been completed, re- the river of wind I had just seen and 28, 2007, and I was able to view some building has begun at the World Trade felt…. Yet I knew absolutely it was con- of the steel girders from the collapsed Center site, and various memorials to the nected to Eamon and that the sad mes- Twin Towers that had been analyzed by dead have been created. sage it brought was true and real.” NIST experts (see figure 1). (In 2002, I Signs This seems a classic case of wishful had visited the “Ground Zero” site where thinking and the power of expectation. the towers had stood.) It is not surprising that controversies McEneaney reveals (2010, 11) that her In time, however, conspiracy theorists and irreparable damages remain, among father had twice promised, before his began to make outlandish claims—some them the effects of the loss of so many own death in 1993, “You know, Bonnie, based on “scientific” evidence—that the victims. Although surviving family when I die, I’ll speak to you through the towers’ collapse was due not to airplane- members and friends have tried to get wind.” Thus she was predisposed to ac- crash damage and fire but to explosives on with their lives, much grief and long- cept wind as a form of spirit communi- previously installed in the buildings! ing remains—and the lure of supersti- cation, and when she witnessed a partic- Supposedly the U.S. Govern ment in- tion is not far away. Hence the quest for ular breeze after her husband’s death, she tended to frame terrorists and so gain an “messages” from the dead and the like- interpreted it accordingly. Those looking excuse to launch the Iraq War (Griffin lihood of a book such as Bonnie Mc- for a sign are likely to find something 2007, 2). Eneaney’s Messages appearing. they can interpret as such. Some pored Meanwhile, the United States has re- McEneaney gives a personal exam- over the things their loved ones left be- sponded to the 9/11 attacks by launching ple of one of the myriad “signs” that hind and selectively mined them for the War on Terror, beginning with the supposedly indicates contact with vic- signs, engaging in a process of after-the- invasion of Afghanistan (whose Taliban tims. Seeking some such indicator re- fact matching known as retrofitting. rulers had harbored Osama bin Laden garding her husband, Eamon, she Many of the supposed signs cata-

Figure 1. Steel girders from the collapsed WTC Twin Towers that have been analyzed by NIST experts. (Photo by Joe Nickell.)

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logued by McEneaney seem truly mun- awake helps identify the experience as claim to encounter spirits during waking dane: finding a coin (25–32, 195), hav- a common “waking dream,” which oc- activity, it is usually when they are tired, ing an experience with a bird or butter- curs in the interface between being performing routine work, concentrating fly (25, 28, 158), seeing a rainbow over awake and asleep. This is the explana- on some activity such as reading, or in an the place where the World Trade Cen- tion for many paranormal encounters altered state of consciousness such as ter once stood (134), and so on. A color through the ages: visits from demons, daydreaming. [Nickell 2001].) photo that graces the back cover of ghosts, aliens. Along with ordinary Children also often have ghostly ex- Messages was taken by a woman whose dreams, events that are surely waking periences just like adults. Lisa’s little husband died in the South Tower on dreams are reported frequently in Mes- daughter Jacie once told her: “Daddy is 9/11. It shows their daughter with a sages (56–59, 101). here too. He comes in the middle of the streak that she interprets as a “beam of A rather typical waking dream was night and sits at the bottom of the bed. light” (4) but is probably only an effect described by another friend of Welles Sometimes he pats your hair and kisses caused by the intrusion of her camera Crowther, who—while lying on the sofa you” (69). Such experiences typically ex- strap. (As is typical of photographic watching television (and having possibly press the percipient’s own hopes and glitches, nothing was seen until the drifted toward sleep)—heard footsteps fears: the desire for a comforting message photo was processed.) Over and over, and saw his late friend, who said, “Chuck, from a deceased loved one or the fear of McEneaney and those whose stories it’s okay. I’m okay.” Like most people who an encounter with an extraterrestrial. she features emphasize that an occur- experience a waking dream, he thought Jacie, at age four, was also seen at rence is “something that we can’t ex- he was not dreaming: times to laugh and appear “to have con- plain” (e.g., 117), as if therefore it is First of all I don’t dream very much. versations with invisible companions.” proof of the paranormal. This is a type When I do, my dreams aren’t realistic. She said they were her daddy and his of logical fallacy called arguing from ig- If this was in fact a dream, it was com- friends from work. Having invisible norance. (“We don’t know what actually pletely realistic. I was wearing exactly companions is common to those with a what I was wearing; the television was happened, so it must’ve been paranor- playing exactly what it was playing. propensity to fantasize (Wilson and mal.” In other words, “we don’t know; Everything was exactly as it is, and Barber 1983) and is not, of course, therefore we do know!”) there was no break between sleeping proof of spirit communication—no and waking ... between what hap- Visits matter how often the former is equated pened and what was going on around with the latter. me. It was of a piece. Supposed visitations by the deceased Premonitions 9/11 victims are among the most pro- He also said: “I don’t remember what found experiences described in Messages happened next. I don’t remember if I McEneaney begins her discussion of and are also among the most easily ex- blinked or if he just went away” (101). premonitions by relating a premonitory plained. Consider the seeming visit of This case illustrates many of the char- dream experienced by Abraham Lin- victim Welles Crowther to a former acteristics of a waking dream, wherein, coln, who “told several people about his roommate who stated: “I don’t remem- as the late psychologist Robert A. Baker dream, and he also wrote it down in his ber if it was one or two days after 9/11. noted, the experiencer “is unalterably journal” (119). Lincoln described seeing I don’t know if I fell asleep or not. But convinced of the ‘reality’ of the entire a corpse upon a catafalque, around what I remember clearly is Welles experience.” Baker also called attention which were military guardsmen and standing in the doorway to my bed- to the fact that after the supposed en- many mourners: “‘Who is dead in the room, saying, ‘Hey, man, everything’s counter, the percipient typically just White House?’ I demanded of one of going to be all right.’ He was there just goes back to sleep (Baker and Nickell the soldiers. ‘The President,” was his an- a second and then he said, ‘I’ve got to 1992, 130–131, 226–227). swer. ‘He was killed by an assassin.’ Then go now’” (97). Another seeming visita- Some percipients, like Lisa O’Brien, came a loud burst of grief from the tion was reported by Deborah Calan- whose husband, Timmy, was a 9/11 ca- crowd which awoke me from my dream. drillo, whose husband, Joe, had worked sualty, appear to have had both dreams I slept no more that night and although as an accountant in the North Tower. and waking dreams. “Lisa feels that it was only a dream, I have been strangely “He appeared suddenly in the bedroom Timmy is frequently in her bedroom,” annoyed by it ever since.” they had shared,” writes McEneaney states McEneaney, “communicating with Now, putting aside the fact that (2010, 51). “She was lying in bed. her in the night, sometimes when she is McEneaney’s text is corrupted (differ- His arm was draped around her pillow. asleep and dreaming and sometimes just ing from the original in some of There was a solemn expression on as she drifts off ” (67).1 Not surprisingly, its punctuation and containing—hor- his face. Deborah told me that she Lisa’s experiences have occurred only at rors!—a gram matical error) and given is positive she was awake when this night; “she has never actually seen that Lincoln did not keep (as she re- happened.” Timmy when she is wide awake and ports) a journal, he probably did relate That insistence on having been moving about” (68). (When people such a dream. However, he thought at

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New York. Grab the dogs and get them away from the windows in case they It is really not surprising that shatter” (qtd. in McEneaney 2010, 132). Another woman, known as “Julia C.,” World Trade Center workers says she had a dream just two days before and their family members had 9/11 concerning a previous country home: suddenly a big truck raced up the forebodings of disaster. driveway and disappeared into the house, The towers had already been whereupon she saw “this huge gaping black hole with jagged edges” then “a the target of a most serious flicker of a fire and black smoke”—im- ages of a truck bombing she later equated attack in 1993. with the destruction of the Twin Towers by crashing planes (135). As still another example, one victim’s the time that it was someone else who such a disaster and nothing happens” dream journal contained a reference to an was killed, as he told Ward Hill Lamon, (Gardner 1986, 9). Not only will some “atom bomb” that was “in the shape of a a friend who had accompanied him to people be motivated for various reasons paper plane,” but if that seemed signifi- Washington for his protection (Nickell to exaggerate or even fabricate such a cant in light of 9/11 (it was the last entry, 1999, 17). It was Lamon who, from dream (for personal aggrandizement, for made a month before the tragedy), it ap- memory, reconstructed Lincoln’s words example, or to promote supernatural pears less so when we note that the 9/11 some three decades after the fact beliefs), but even a completely honest disaster did not involve an “atom bomb” (Lamon 1895, 115–17). person may unconsciously exaggerate. and that, in any case, the journal’s dream The important point to make is that Gard ner explains: bomb “did not go off.” Actually, the there is nothing remarkable about Lin- After telling about a precognitive woman’s dream occurred the day after coln having dreamed of death—even dream for the umpteenth time, one she was hired to work at the World Trade his own assassination. In the Civil War no longer recalls the dream’s actual Center (McEneaney 2010, 143) and may strife, death was all around him. More- details, especially if it occurred many over, not only had an assassination plot years ago. Dreams are hard enough simply have been prompted by the pre- been thwarted prior to his first inaugu- to remember accurately ten minutes vious bombing there. It is simply retro- ration in 1861, he had subsequently re- after waking! One is soon recalling fitting to so selectively equate dream im- not the dream itself but pictures that ceived numerous death threats and ages with the 9/11 events. This is what formed in the mind during previous yet another person (with only a late once had a hole shot through his top tellings. The only way a precognitive hat by an intended assassin. Lamon and disaster dream can have evidential connection to the WTC site) obviously others around him constantly remon- value is when its details are written did. She had had a dream of “two preda- strated with him about his safety. down before a disaster and dated in tory birds”; however, McEneaney (2010, Likewise, it is really not surprising a way that can be verified, such as 139) states: “It wasn’t until later” that she being described in a letter or pub- “came to see the birds as lethal aircraft.” that World Trade Center workers and lished before the event or stated on a their family members had forebodings radio or television talk-show. Mediumistic Offerings of disaster. The towers had already been the target of a most serious attack in (In at least one instance—a prediction Following the WTC disaster, before the 1993. Osama bin Laden had issued fat- of the assassination attempt on Pres - month was out some family members was in 1996 and 1998 calling for jihad ident Reagan—even that was faked by had begun to visit so-called psychics and (holy war) against the United States. a later, backdated taping [Frazier and mediums (those who supposedly inter- And the WTC workers had not just the Randi 1981]!) cede on our behalf to relay messages same unease as everyone has about their So the after-the-fact stories Mc - from the spirit realm). Unlike the “phys- unforeseen future (even in the most Eneaney relates are simply not impres- ical mediumship” of the past—when peaceful times); they were working in sive. Take that of a woman who formerly spirits seemed to actually materialize or what was proven to have previously been worked in the South Tower who produce distinctive effects in dark-room a prime terrorist target. As Martin dreamed she was looking at “the south- séances, practices that repeatedly proved Gardner wrote (concerning supposedly ern tip of Manhattan” (i.e., in the direc- fraudulent—today’s “mental medium- precognitive dreams of the sinking of the tion of the WTC) when she beheld “a ship” carries fewer risks of exposure. At Titanic), “with respect to dreams about huge explosion” and “saw something that the same time, the dead often seem un- major disasters that make the headlines, looked almost like a mushroom cloud certain, or perhaps they mumble, as we have no inkling of the millions and over the city.” In the dream, she said to when McEneaney herself received men- millions of times that people dream of her husband, “Bin Laden just blew up tion of a man whose “name was John or

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began with the initial J ” (201). Not sur- found such offerings neither helpful nor tasizers or charlatans. Sadly, this is the n prisingly, her husband indeed had a comforting (202). legacy of McEneaney’s Messages. friend of that name. If not, a Jim or The same woman, however, was more Acknowledgments Jason or Jesse or another would have impressed with the clever, fast-talking filled the bill. “psychic medium” John Edward (real As usual, CFI Director of Libraries Timo- McEneaney was really impressed name John Edward McGee Jr.). Yet he thy Binga provided essential research mate- rials for this article. with the psychic offering, “Your hus- had mentioned not a husband and son band’s name starts with E. Is it Emile?” but a husband and father-in-law (appar- Note (200). The fact is, his name was ently the latter was also deceased). Ed- 1. There are two types of waking dreams: the Eamon—yet McEneaney is willing to ward fared much better when he told her hypnagogic experience, in which one is going to sleep, and the hypnopompic experience, in which credit the reader with a hit. She won- that she was “wearing a piece of clothing one is waking up. Sometimes the person is unable ders how a psychic could have gotten so that had belonged to her husband,” to move—experiencing what is called sleep paral- close by identifying the first letter. Per- which she was (203). That seems quite ysis—because the body is still in the sleep mode. haps it was a lucky guess; perhaps accurate, but suppose he had actually (See Baker and Nickell 1992, 130–31.) McEneaney remembers exactly what asked if she had with her something of References was said and when. Or perhaps a friend her husband’s (which would perhaps be Baker, Robert A., and Joe Nickell. 1992. Missing of hers, who had apparently been to more likely than not) and the woman Pieces: How to Investigate Ghosts, UFOs, Psy- chics and Other Mysteries. Buffalo, New York: the psychic and recommended her to retrofitted the more specific “clothing” to Prometheus Books. McEneaney, had mentioned her (and the “something.” It is difficult to judge Dunbar, David, and Brad Reagan, eds. 2006. De- her husband’s name) to the psychic— the accuracy of such claims without bunking 9/11 Myths: Why Conspiracy Theories something the friend might not even complete and precise facts. Can’t Stand Up to the Facts. New York: Hearst Books. remember having done. Edward uses a number of techniques, Frazier, Kendrick, and James Randi. 1981. Predic- McEneaney appears woefully un - including a shotgun approach: a state- tion after the fact: Lessons of the Tamara Rand aware of psychics’ techniques. Consider ment to an area of the audience rather hoax. SKEPTICAL INQUIRER 6(1) (Fall): 4–7. Gardner, Martin, ed. 1986. The Wreck of the Ti- cold reading (so called because the psy- than a single person, whereby he has tanic Foretold? Buffalo, New York: Prom - chic works “cold,” without advance multiple opportunities for someone to etheus Books. knowledge about the sitter). It is a validate one of his offerings. He has also Griffin, David Ray. 2007. Debunking 9/11 De- method of artfully fishing for informa- been known to use the technique of hot bunking. Northampton, Massachusetts: Olive Branch Press. tion while giving the impression that it reading, passing off information gleaned Houran, James, and Rense Lange, eds. 2001. comes from spirits of the dead. Often earlier as having just come from the Hauntings and Poltergeists: Multidisciplinary the reader uses what I call “the question Other Side. He was caught cheating in Perspectives. Jefferson, North Carolina: Mc- Far land and Company. trick”: he or she asks a question that, if this way on a Dateline NBC episode (for Lamon, Ward Hill. 1895. Recollections of Abraham answered in the affirmative, is consid- which I was both an advisor behind the Lincoln 1847–1865. Chicago: A.C. McClurgy ered a hit, whereas otherwise the psy- scenes and an interviewee on camera and Co. McEneaney, Bonnie. 2010. Messages: Signs, Visits, chic will treat it as only part of the lead- [Nickell 2010]). If Edward or any other and Premonitions from Loved Ones Lost on up to a statement or to additional medium could actually communicate 9/11. New York: William Morrow. questions. Using body language, the sit- with the dead under scientifically con- Nickell, Joe, and John F. Fischer. 1999. Crime Sci- ter’s own responses, and other cues and trolled conditions, he or she could accept ence: Methods of Forensic Detection. Lex ington: University Press of Ken tucky. clues, the shrewd medium operates like James Randi’s Million Dollar Challenge, Nickell, Joe. 1999. Paranormal Lincoln. SKEPTICAL a skilled magician but employs instead retire, and enjoy the accolades of science. INQUIRER 23(3) (May/June): 16–19. of legerdemain what might be call ———. 2001. Phantoms, Frauds, or Fantasies? In Conclusions Houran and Lange 2001, 214–23. “sleight of tongue.” ———. 2010. John Edward: Spirit huckster. SKEP- Such readings work better with the Given the overwhelming tragedy of 9/11, TICAL INQUIRER 34(2) (March/April): 17–18. credulous, who often count only hits, made very personal to those whose loved Wilson, Sheryl C., and Theodore X. Barber. 1983. The fantasy-prone personality. In Imagery: while misses are either interpreted as ones perished, we can well understand Current Theory, Research and Application, ed- necessary (retrofitting again) or forgot- the emotions involved: the grief, the ited by Anees A. Sheikh, 340–87. New York: ten. McEneaney does concede “that not longing for a connection with the de- John Wiley and Sons. everyone who received a message from a ceased, the wish for a final goodbye. Per- medium or psychic was happy with the ceived signs, apparent visits, premoni- Joe Nickellis CSI’s senior experience” (202). One psychic told a tions, or even pretended messages research fellow and author woman that “in another life,” her hus- supposedly relayed by psychics and (or coauthor or editor) of some thirty books, includ- band and son (both of whom had per- mediums may seem comforting—but at ing one in progress, The ished at the WTC) “liked to go out in a what expense? Such illusions come at Science of Ghosts. bang and they were to gether when least at the cost of sinking into supersti- Mount Vesuvius blew up.” The woman tion, at worst of falling vulnerable to fan-

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