BBC Has Lost Tapes Of 21st Century's Defining Moment

9/11 coverage gone due to "cock up". Why is this not a world news headline?
Steve Watson
Infowars
Feb. 28, 2007

t has come to light this week that the most pre-eminent broadcasting company in the world has lost the original recordings of its output for the entire day on September 11th 2001, just over five years on, yet no major news agency has even bothered to report the fact.

Despite being currently the biggest story on the internet and in the alternative media, the only place in the mainstream the story has appeared is on a small German news website.

This highlights the fact that the mainstream media is not free to report events. The information it disseminates is strictly controlled and regulated.

The BBC was forced into claiming that the recordings covering the 9/11 attacks have mysteriously vanished in response to fierce criticism over the fact that on the day the news agency reported that World Trade Center Building 7 had collapsed almost 30 minutes before it actually came down.

Conspiracy or no conspiracy, surely the fact that the BBC has made this announcement should be reported.

A cogent precedent can be found in the relatively recent furor over the loss of the moon landing tapes by NASA. This was reported in every major newspaper and on every major news website in the world for over a week when it came to light last August. The story then hit world headlines again when the tapes were found.

In the eyes of the mainstream media the September 11th attacks in 2001, it seems, are not as important an event as the moon landing, which happened last century, 38 years ago to be precise.

Therefore it is purely as a result of the persistence of the alternative media, and its audience, that regular BBC employees are now being deluged by e mails and calls asking them to divulge what their source was for reporting the collapse of Building 7 a full 26 minutes before it happened.

The BBC editor's blog is currently carrying the following statement from Richard Porter, editor of BBC news:

"We no longer have the original tapes of our 9/11 coverage (for reasons of cock-up, not conspiracy). So if someone has got a recording of our output, I'd love to get hold of it. We do have the tapes for our sister channel News 24, but they don't help clear up the issue one way or another."

The BBC is claiming that it cannot verify that it reported building 7 had collapsed too early because it no longer has its own tapes. Mr Porter then says he would love to get hold of a copy. Yet it is blatantly clear that he is writing about the copy of the BBC's output that kick started the entire controversy! So there he already has a copy, why can't he watch that?

Even more incredibly he then goes on to declare that the News 24 footage, which the BBC DOES still have, fails to clear up the issue. This is patently false as we have today proven. Footage from the BBC's News 24 channel that shows the time stamp at 21:54 (4:54PM EST) when news of the Salomon Brothers Building is first broadcast, a full 26 minutes in advance of its collapse. You can view the footage here.

Remember that both the official FEMA and the NIST reports on building 7 concluded that the building collapsed unexpectedly.

So why is the BBC continually lying to us and attempting to cloud this controversy instead of explaining it?

Even more remarkable is the fact that if the BBC maintains that its footage is indeed lost, this means that at least THREE copies have been lost from DIFFERENT LOCATIONS.

The BBC's policy on retaining recordings of all television and radio broadcast outputs, last reviewed: 18/02/03 - which you can view online at the BBC's own website, clearly states:

The following components to be retained:- · Two broadcast standard copies of all transmitted/published TV, Radio and BBCi output – one to be stored on a separate site as a master · One browse-quality version for research purposes, to protect the broadcast material · All supporting metadata to enable research and re-use · A selection of original (i.e. unedited) material for re-use/re-versioning purposes · Hardware/software/equipment to enable replay/transfer of the media

Furthermore:

"A retention schedule for each set of records kept /archived must be created as defined in the Core Records Policy. Retention periods are set according to the status and value of the record."

This means that the safe retention of archived recordings is checked at regular intervals, and the more valuable they are deemed to be, the more frequently they are checked.

And yet more:

"All transmitted/published media content will be kept for at least five years to fulfil legal requirements and to enable re-versioning and re-use."

This means that if the footage was "lost" prior to September 11th 2006 then the BBC has broken British broadcasting law.

So all in all we have a situation here whereby the BBC is either lying when it says all records of its World output on 9/11 are gone, or the BBC has categorically failed to uphold its own policy, and UK law, and is dismissing this as merely a "cock up".

This is not some two bit cable TV station, the BBC is paid for by every person in the UK and thus has a strict legal responsibility to uphold its written policies. If this was ever to be challenged legally would the editors of the BBC maintain as their defence that they "cocked it up"? That is simply not good enough. People that "cock up" at that level should no longer be in a job and should be explaining themselves in a court of law.

We know for a fact that the BBC are very concerned about how this whole fiasco has impacted upon their reputation. Corporation chiefs are also worried that head of BBC World Richard Porter's brief response to the matter has only made them look worse.

At this time Mr Porter is still ludicrously feigning ignorance and stupidity by suggesting that the BBC has been "accused of being in on the conspiracy".

Whether they have lost the tapes or not, the BBC simply doesn't want to verify one hundred per cent their monumental foul-up, because they know it would only increase the exposure of this issue and lead to further questions.

As a citizen of the UK and a BBC license payer I demand an explanation as to what has happened to at least three copies of BBC news footage of a moment in time that will define history. I want to know PRECISE DETAILS of when the tapes were last checked, how they could have simply vanished and who is ultimately responsible and so should all other UK residents.

You can put these requests to the BBC here. My advice is to be succinct, to the point and polite. No more than two sentences are required.

Furthermore, everyone who reads this article, whether British or American, should immediately contact their local and national media outlets and demand to know why they consider this huge story not to be newsworthy.

Paul Joseph Watson Contributed to this report.