umm it really depends….

To be fair, I don’t see the attorney’s explanation as being contradictory to the family’s. And last I checked, it’s almost a required ritual for college guys to go off on long half-planned road trips and do whatever comes up along the way.

They could be innocent (relative to the terror suspicion), but given their foreign status, religion, college of origin, and the fact that at least one is an engineering major (remember terrorists prefer engineering or medical degrees), I think a strong dose of suspicion and investigation is warranted. Not enough for an indictment, maybe, but certainly for bunch of search warrants.

According to their attorney they were headed to some beach resort for a birthday celebration. Maybe they were going to launch the rockets from the beach.

boomer on August 7, 2007 at 12:09 AM

That’s just one of three explanations of what where they were going.

The first is from the LEO who stopped them, who said they couldn’t explain what they were doing in that area or where they were going. (Which increased the officer’s suspicion, naturally.)

The second one, that you quote, was reported by their attorney, after the arrest. It’s somewhat convenient, since they were, at the point they were stopped, heading north through South Carolina, although that route requires a major detour from the more direct one to the major No. Carolina beaches, described above by angryoldfatman.

The third, reported today in the St. Petersburg Times, is from Megahed’s family, who live in Tampa, as reported by the head of Tampa CAIR chapter:

Megahed had hatched a plan for a road trip. He wanted to see the coast, see the Carolinas, Bedier said.

He asked his friends to come along, said it would only cost $30 to $40 per person in gas money, Bedier said. Mohamed took him up on the offer, and the two left Tampa on Friday night, sometime around midnight. Megahed’s family isn’t sure where the men went or whether they had a destination, Bedier said.

Pardon my cynicism, but since the lawyer, CAIR and the family seem to have covered all the bases on where they were going, I imagine they are now conferring on the most plausible explanation of what they were doing with the “stuff” in the trunk.

Now compare your PVC rocket to a Qassam rocket, not much difference.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Qassam_rocket

According to their attorney they were headed to some beach resort for a birthday celebration. Maybe they were going to launch the rockets from the beach.

boomer on August 7, 2007 at 12:09 AM

I live in Myrtle Beach, SC and have driven to and from Florida many times. Their attorney is full of it.

There are many, many beaches that are a lot closer to their college in Florida.

There are huge rural areas in Georgia, the state which sits between Florida and South Carolina.

The quickest and easiest way to drive anywhere on the Eastern Seaboard is Interstate 95. There is even a decently fast route from I-95 to Myrtle Beach, which is absolutely the most popular beach in South Carolina.

The fastest way to any North Carolina beach is to stay on I-95 all the way through South Carolina and head east once you get to North Carolina.

I-95 is a fairly old corridor, and would be plainly marked on every paper map, on every single GPS map device, and every internet map site.

Through South Carolina there are fireworks stands on pratically every I-95 off-ramp, including (as mentioned by someone else before) a huge one in the tourist trap “South of the Border”.

Unless their friend lived in Charleston, Georgetown, Moncks Corner, or Goose Creek, or they were so inept that Stevie Wonder could drive better than them, there is absolutely no reason they should have been 50 miles from I-95, or anywhere near I-26 for that matter. I-26 goes mostly east-west and is used for travel to Columbia, the center and capital of South Carolina.

check out this bit I found from the AP article boomer links to above, via FNC

Mohamed, 24, said he made pipe bombs from items he bought at Wal-Mart, according to an affidavit with his arrest warrant.

Again, this isn’t conclusive, but it certainly sounds pretty damning.

Prosecutor Scarlett Wilson asked for high bond, which was set at $500,000 for Mohamed and $300,000 for Megahed, because she said the men were dangerous and a risk to flee.

And you knew this was coming…

Ahmed Bedier, the executive director of a civil rights organization for Muslims in Tampa, criticized the arrest as racial profiling, an accusation South Carolina police refuted.

Some surmised that this may be “Flying Imams II”, which after reading that I think is definitely a possibility, but we’ll see.

I agree with ya crosspatch. It’s a lot of circumstantial evidence. Unless they find something on that computer I think they may have a hard time proving their case. Especially after seeing the site with the pvc rocket motors.

When I was a kid we used to fill balloons with oxygen and axcetalene (sp?). We then put them under 5 gallon buckets and lit them off with a trail of gas. Those bucktes would go about 75 feet in the air. These days we would be charged with some explosives crime. Yes, there have been rules around for awhile about rockets and motors and lauching areas and altitudes but, it is possible these guys thought they would be having harmless fun. According to their attorney they were headed to some beach resort for a birthday celebration. Maybe they were going to launch the rockets from the beach. Or, it could be as some have said and they were experimenting with the rockets for a precise attack.

I’m trying to figure out how I am going to spend the $20 I bet a friend of mine that one of them would be named Mohammed.

wordwarp on August 6, 2007 at 10:55 PM

Lol, in fairness it’s just one of their last names. But I think the same thing every time I hear one of these stories, “I bet one’s name is Mohamed”.

What would the gasoline be used for?

The car?

They put harmless rocket motors (which look like pipe bombs) in their trunk, then start speeding, then look suspicious with a laptop, then give vague answers to the cops.

For those who believe that a rocket needs movable fins to be effective then I guess you also believe that all those rockets launched into Israel are the product of Hezbollah and PAL model rocket enthusiast since they aren’t guided and are only launched in the general direction of an Israeli city at a preset distance.

Terror often has more to do with symbolic attacks as opposed to huge explosive results. Even a unarmed rocket striking a US military base here in the homeland would be a huge victory in their minds.

http://www.angelo.edu/faculty/kboudrea/demos/instant_fire/instant_fire.htm

it makes a cool purple smoke and flame. Could be used in ground based fireworks shows