Claim: Al-Qaeda executed the September 11 attacks.

American Airlines Flight 77 was a scheduled American Airlines domestic transcontinental passenger flight from Washington Dulles International Airport in Dulles , Virginia , to Los Angeles International Airport in Los Angeles , California . The Boeing 757-223 aircraft serving the flight was hijacked by five men affiliated with al-Qaeda on September 11 , 2001 , as part of the September 11 attacks . They deliberately crashed the plane into the Pentagon in Arlington County , Virginia , near Washington , D.C. , killing all 64 people on board , including the five hijackers and six crew , as well as 125 people in the building .   Less than 35 minutes into the flight , the hijackers stormed the cockpit . They forced the passengers , crew , and pilots to the rear of the aircraft . Hani Hanjour , one of the hijackers who was trained as a pilot , assumed control of the flight . Unknown to the hijackers , passengers aboard made telephone calls to friends and family and relayed information on the hijacking .   The hijackers crashed the aircraft into the western side of the Pentagon at 09:37 EDT . Many people witnessed the crash , and news sources began reporting on the incident within minutes . The impact severely damaged an area of the Pentagon and caused a large fire . A portion of the building collapsed ; firefighters spent days working to fully extinguish the blaze . The damaged sections of the Pentagon were rebuilt in 2002 , with occupants moving back into the completed areas that August . The 184 victims of the attack are memorialized in the Pentagon Memorial adjacent to the crash site . The 1.93 acre park contains a bench for each of the victims , arranged according to their year of birth and ranging from 1930 to 1998 .