Two Flight 175 Hijackers Check in at United Airlines Ticket Counter; Uncertainty Over Their Identities

[Archangel]

Two of the Flight 175 hijackers approach a customer service representative at the United Airlines ticket counter at Boston's Logan Airport. The two appear unaccustomed to traveling. One tells the representative, Gail Jawahir, that he needs a ticket, though upon examining his documents she finds he already has one. Both men have problems answering standard security questions, which Jawahir has to repeat very slowly until they give the routine, reassuring answers. There is conflicting evidence over their identities. Jawahir will place her encounter with the men at "shortly before 7 a.m." Shown photos of the alleged hijackers after 9/11, she will indicate that one of the two she encountered resembled Mohand Alshehri, suggesting the two were Alshehri and Fayez Ahmed Banihammad, who checked in at 6:53 a.m. Yet she recalls the two having the same last name and having assigned seats on Row 9 of the plane, suggesting they were Ahmed and Hamza Alghamdi, who checked in at 6:20 a.m. (9/11 Commission 7/24/2004, pp. 2, 451; 9/11 Commission 8/26/2004, pp. 17-18, 89)