Why is NORAD able to track Santa Claus yet on September 11th, 2001 the air defense network had predictable and effective procedures for dealing with just such an attack and failed to respond in a timely manner until after the attack was over, more than an hour and a half after it had started. The official timeline describes a series of events and mode of response in which the delays are spread out into a number of areas. There are failures upon failures, in what might be described as a strategy of layered failures, or failure in depth. The failures can be divided into four types. - Failures to report: Based on the official timeline, the FAA response times for reporting the deviating aircraft were many times longer than the prescribed times.
- Failures to scramble: NORAD, once notified of the off-course aircraft, failed to scramble jets from the nearest bases.
- Failures to intercept: Once airborne, interceptors failed to reach their targets because they flew at small fractions of their top speeds and/or in the wrong directions.
- Failures to redeploy: Fighters that were airborne and within interception range of the deviating aircraft were not redeployed to pursue them.
Had not there been multiple failures of each type, one or more parts of the attack could have been thwarted. NORAD had time to protect the World Trade Center even given the unbelievably late time, 8:40, when it claims to have first been notified.
It had time to protect the South Tower and Washington even given its bizarre choice of bases from which to scramble planes. And it still had ample opportunity to protect both New York City and Washington even if it insisted that all interceptors fly subsonic, simply by redeploying airborne fighters.