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WORLD NEWS TONIGHT WITH PETER JENNINGS, APRIL 11, 1997

Content and programming copyright (c) 1997 American Broadcasting Companies, Inc. All
rights reserved. No quotes from the materials contained herein may be used in any media
without attribution to American Broadcasting Companies, Inc. This transcript may not be
reproduced in whole or in part without prior permission. For further information please
contact ABC's Office of the General Counsel. Transcribed by Federal Document Clearing
House, Inc. under license from American Broadcasting Companies, Inc. All rights reserved.

ABC NEWS

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SHOW: WORLD NEWS TONIGHT WITH PETER JENNINGS (6:30 pm ET)

APRIL 11, 1997

Transcript # 97041103-J04

TYPE: PACKAGE

SECTION: NEWS

LENGTH: 686 words

HEADLINE: AIR FORCE GIVES DETAILS OF MISSING A-10 ATTACK PLANE

BYLINE: TOM FOREMAN, PETER JENNINGS

HIGHLIGHT:
IT SAYS THE PILOT WAS IN CONTROL BEFORE PLANE VANISHED

BODY:

PETER JENNINGS: The Air Force today has given its most detailed account yet of what it
knows about the A-10 attack plane that has been missing for nine days now.

(voice-over) We ve known for a while that Captain Craig Button took off from Tucson,
Arizona, a week ago Wednesday and disappeared. And we know they ve been searching near
Vail, Colorado.

(on camera) Today, the Air Force has made it clear that Captain Button was in control and
not unconscious before his plane disappeared. Here s ABC s Tom Foreman.

TOM FOREMAN, ABC News: (voice-over) For more than a week, searchers have been fighting
snowstorms, bitter cold and low clouds trying to find the missing warplane. Today, Pentagon
officials confirmed that the plane made several sharp turns in the minutes before it
disappeared, suggesting pilot Craig Button purposely changed course.

Maj. Gen. DONALD PETERSON, Air Force: Whether, you know, he was fully under control or
not, I couldn t speculate, but we do believe that the airplane was not flying itself.

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Daily News (New York) April 12, 1997, Saturday

Copyright 1997 Daily News, L.P.

Daily News (New York)

April 12, 1997, Saturday

SECTION: News; Pg. 6

LENGTH: 430 words

HEADLINE: ZIGZAG DEATH FLIGHT

AIR FORCE PILOT'S COURSE CLOUDS THEORIES

BYLINE: By ROBERT GEARTY in New York and RICHARD SISK in Washington

BODY:
Capt. Craig Button flew his warplane in a zigzag course over the Colorado Rockies as it ran
out of fuel, and witnesses later reported hearing explosions and seeing smoke, the Air Force
said yesterday.

"I cannot say why he may have taken this action," said Maj. Gen. Donald Peterson at a
Pentagon briefing. "This is a little bit abnormal."

Search teams in the rugged terrain southwest of Vail, Colo., were investigating about 20
witness reports of "explosions, noise and smoke" in the area where the Massapequa, L.I.,
pilot's A-10 attack jet vanished from radar April 2.

Peterson said the last radar track of Button's plane came at 1:39 p.m. Colorado time near
12,500-foot New York Mountain. "It could have flamed out at that point, it was at a very low
fuel stage," Peterson said.

Fierce snowstorms have hindered the search for wreckage, he said.

Radar reports showed the plane varied altitude and turned several times on its 800-mile
journey after the A-10 mysteriously peeled away from a three-plane formation over Arizona
and flew northeast to Colorado without explanation.

Peterson said the route flown cast doubt on the theory that Button may have put the plane
on automatic pilot just before blacking out.

"Whether it was fully under control, I couldn't speculate, but the plane was not flying itself,"
Peterson said.

"Unfortunately, we may never know" what caused the disappearance, Peterson said. But no
evidence has surfaced that Button was psychologically unstable or may have been involved in
a bizarre plot to steal the plane and its four 500-pound bombs.

Friends and teachers on Long Island, where Button grew up, also dismissed reports that he
might have been upset over his mother's recent conversion to the anti-war beliefs of the
Jehovah's Witnesses.

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CNN NEWSDAY, April 14, 1997

Content and programming copyright 1997 Cable News Network Transcribed under license by
Federal Document Clearing House, Inc. Formatting copyright 1997 Federal Document
Clearing House, Inc. All rights reserved. No quotes from the materials contained herein may
be used in any media without attribution to Cable News Network. This transcript may not be
copied or resold in any media.
CNN

SHOW: CNN NEWSDAY 12:00 am ET

April 14, 1997; Monday 12:03 am Eastern Time

Transcript # 97041402V11

TYPE: LIVE REPORT

SECTION: News; Domestic

LENGTH: 869 words

HEADLINE: No New Developments In Search For Missing Air Force Pilot

GUESTS: LEXIS-NEXIS Related Topics + Full Article + Related Topics Overview

This document contains no targeted Topics.

BYLINE: Sonia Ruseler, Charles Zewe

HIGHLIGHT:
Another day, and very few new clues to the Rocky Mountain mystery. The Air Force is now in
its 13th day of searching for a pilot who disappeared with his A-10 jet during a routine
training flight.

BODY:
SONIA RUSELER, CNN ANCHOR: Another day, and very few new clues to the Rocky Mountain
mystery. The Air Force is now in its 13th day of searching for a pilot who disappeared with
his A-10 jet during a routine training flight.

Well, CNN's Charles Zewe is at the latest -- was at the latest briefing about an hour ago.
Charles, what did you learn?

CHARLES ZEWE, CNN CORRESPONDENT: Well, Sonia, we learned that there is still no trace
yet of Captain Craig Button and his A-10 Thunderbolt that vanished on April 2nd. Air Force
planes and helicopters are back in the air again today searching a very wide area, about 20
miles south/southwest of Vail, Colorado, where it is believed possible that the plane went in
on April 2nd, when it veered off course on a routine training mission out of Tucson, Arizona
and then headed up toward the Vail area.

Radar, both civilian and military radar, tracked it into the Vail area, and it's believed that
the plane may have gone down in this area you're looking at right now: in the rugged White

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Chicago Tribune, April 18, 1997

Copyright 1997 Chicago Tribune Company

Chicago Tribune

April 18, 1997 Friday, NORTH SPORTS FINAL EDITION

SECTION: NEWS; Pg. 18; ZONE: N

LENGTH: 473 words

HEADLINE: TOP GENERAL DOUBTS MISSING JET LINKED TO OKLAHOMA ANNIVERSARY;

BUT PRECAUTIONS STILL WILL BE TAKEN, HE SAYS

BYLINE: Associated Press.

DATELINE: WASHINGTON

BODY:
The nation's top general discounted a suggestion Thursday that the mysterious
disappearance of an Air Force A-10 is connected to the Oklahoma City bombing.

But he said military commanders will be warned to take precautions just days before the
second anniversary of the bombing.

"It is prudent to re-evaluate the security situation" at military installations, Gen. John
Shalikashvili, chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, told reporters at the Pentagon.

"We will remind all commanders of the upcoming anniversary (Saturday), and we'll urge
them to take the measures appropriate in their particular locations," the general said.

Shalikashvili was questioned about theories that Capt. Craig Button ~ or some dissident
group — stole the bomb-laden A-10 to carry out some kind of incident at the Denver trial of
Timothy McVeigh, who is accused in the April 19, 1995, bombing of the Oklahoma City
federal building that killed 168 people.

"I do not have enough information to lead me to believe there's somehow a connection
between that incident in Oklahoma City . . . and the disappearance of this airplane," the
general said.

For two weeks, the Air Force has used everything from high-tech satellites to spy planes with
sensitive radars to search for Button, who vanished April 2 with the $9 million warplane
armed with four 500-pound bombs.

Shalikashvili said the military has not overlooked the idea that the plane might have landed
somewhere, and "we have looked at a number of places where that could have happened, so
far without any results."

The Army general said he does not want to "add to the speculation" and that his concern is
that everything is done to find Button and his jet.

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NewStandard: 4/18/97 http://www.s-t.com/daily/04-97/04-18-97/b08wn090.htr

South s£

Warplane rumors are downplayed

By Lisa Hoffman, Scripps Howard News service
WASHINGTON - Top Pentagon officials
yesterday slapped down speculation that the
disappearance of an Air Force warplane is connected
with either the upcoming anniversary of the
Oklahoma City bombing or the trial of two suspects
now under way.
The chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, Gen.
John Shalikashvili, said a possible security threat at
the command center for U.S. air defenses has come
and apparently gone, and he dismissed similar
speculation that there was any connection with the
missing plane or bombing anniversary.
Security had been increased this week at the
U.S.-Canadian North American Aerospace Defense Command, or NORAD, in Colorado Springs, Colo.,
after officials learned of a security threat, which they would not describe.

"They simply had some information that someone was going to try to threaten the facility and so they
took the necessary precaution. Since then ... that time has come and gone," Gen. Shalikashvili said. "I
suspect that in the not too distant future they will return back to normal."
He and chief Pentagon spokesman Kenneth Bacon also dismissed the notion that there was some
sinister link between the NORAD alert, the trial in Denver of Oklahoma City bombing suspect Timothy
McVeigh, the second anniversary Saturday of the bombing, and the disappearance April 2 of Air Force
Capt. Craig Button. The pilot disappeared with his A-10 attack jet loaded with a ton of conventional
bombs.
The fact that Capt. Button's plane mysteriously disappeared from radar tracking in Colorado spawned
theories traded on the Internet, and even in the mainstream media, that the confluence of events might have
some significance. One conspiracy theory, based on no discernible evidence, posited that Capt. Button was
heading to Denver to bomb the federal courthouse where Mr. McVeigh is on trial.
Mr. Bacon scoffed at the speculation, saying, "Everybody seems to believe that a crash is the most likely
outcome of what happened to this plane."
Gen. Shalikashvili agreed. "I do not have enough information to lead me to believe that there's
somehow a connection between that incident in Oklahoma City ... and the disappearance of this airplane,"
he said.
Even so, military and civilian authorities are investigating other possibilities, including that Capt.
Button might have landed the plane somewhere.
"We have looked at a number of places where that could have happened, so far without any results,"
Gen. Shalikashvili said.
Capt. Button, 32, disappeared while on a training flight over the Arizona desert with three other
warplanes. Hundreds of witnesses and radar tracking indicated that the plane flew northeast for nearly two
hours before falling off the radar tapes about 12 miles southwest of Vail in the rugged Rocky Mountain

4/4/03 8:00 AM
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FDCH Federal Department and Agency Documents October 27, 1997; Monday

Copyright 1997 Federal Document Clearing House, Inc.

FDCH Federal Department and Agency Documents

October 27, 1997; Monday

LENGTH: 860 words

AGENCY: DEPARTMENT OF DEFENSE

SIC-MAJOR-GROUP: 09 - General Classification

HEADLINE: SUICIDE SUSPECTED IN A-10 CRASH

CONTACT: 703/545-6700

BODY:
Released: Oct 27, 1997

Suicide suspected in A-10 crash

WASHINGTON (AFNS) -- Air Combat Command has released the

Accident Investigation Board report of the April 2 crash of an A-
10 near Eagle, Colo., that killed its pilot, Capt. Craig Button.
The Oct. 27 report concludes that -- for undetermined reasons and
lack of credible evidence to the contrary ~ the pilot apparently
committed suicide by crashing his aircraft into the side of a
mountain.

The A-10, assigned to the 355th Wing at Davis-Monthan Air

Force Base, Ariz., was part of a three-ship formation on a
routine training mission to familiarize pilots with the delivery
of live ordnance on a bombing range. The mishap aircraft was
carrying four, 500-pound conventional bombs and 575 rounds of 30
mm training ammunition.
Just before the formation reached the range, the flight
leader directed a formation change to allow all aircraft an
opportunity to perform updates of their bombing computers in
preparation for range entry. Button was directed to assume a pre-
briefed position about 9,000 feet behind the lead aircraft. As
the other aircraft maneuvered to their positions, Button's
disappeared from sight.

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