And Let's Continue that Discussion about Ian Henderson

<< Douma Chemical Massacre
January 19, 2020
rough, incomplete

last edits January 21

The award-"winning" Bellingcat investigation team turns its attention to the whistleblowers * helping expose the politicized use and distortion of the OPCW's Syria "Fact-Finding Mission" (FFM). Bellingcat gets paid and paraded to do work like this - creating a big misleading mess. By the time volunteers like myself can get the mess cleaned up, hardly anyone notices and the damage is done. As it gets trumpeted all over town, "independent" open-source analysis supports the claims of the powerful yet again, and everything to the contrary was, like, Russian disinformation or something.

The OPCW Douma Leaks Part 2: We Need To Talk About Henderson *
January 17, 2020
By Bellingcat Investigation Team
https://www.bellingcat.com/news/mena/2020/01/17/the-opcw-douma-leaks-part-2-we-need-to-talk-about-henderson/comment-page-1/#comment-253214

* (I've learned Mr. Henderson doesn't think the term whistleblower applies to him, and on reflection, it might not - depending how one defines the term, if he leaked the EST report himself, and if speaking to a UN meeting qualifies as the short of shrill "help! anyone!" image of someone blowing a whistle, as opposed to reporting a problem through proper channels, which seem blocked and probably did not include special UN sessions, normally, so … yeah, that had to get pretty shrill to be heard). 

A part 1 just a couple days earlier had forced a lame discussion about the more recent whistleblower "Alex" and the toxicology evidence. The comments, which I was able to own without too much effort, are worth a skim. Now they turn to Ian Henderson, the only qualified engineer on the FFM team, or never on the FFM team at all, depending who you ask. He produced an engineering report that makes complete sense or is irrelevant plus wrong, depending who you ask, and which the OPCW FFM's leadership suppressed and kept secret until it was leaked to the Working Group on Syria, Propaganda and Media in May, 2019.

Of course they see no need to talk about Sebastien Braha, Bob Fairweather, Sami Barrek, etc. Just the ones blowing the whistle on their machinations.

To the extent I get this post finished, it will mainly consider these two questions Bellingcat raises, but in order of importance:
1 was Ian Henderson part of the Fact-Finding Mission whose work should be considered?
2 either way, was his assessment correct?

0) Is Henderson an untrustworthy possible Russian agent?
But first, a third question - or question #0 - is suggested by Bellingcat; having answered both of those in the negative, they at least lead the reader to question whether Mr. Henderson made all these errors on accident or as part of some dishonest or even conspiratorial project to get Russia's client off the hook by distorting the science.

“Henderson’s report was first leaked on May 13, 2019, however, the Russian Federation appears to have had access to it well before this date. On April 26, 2019, the permanent representative of the Russian Federation to the OPCW sent a critique of the final FFM report to the OPCW, sections of which were remarkably similar to Henderson’s report. The Director-General of the OPCW said that he learned this report may have been leaked as early as March 2019. ”

Hey, that’s a conspiracy theory. The Russians did do an investigation, and the timing of this re-packaging of it would line up with a response to the FFM report issues almost 2 months earlier. But Henderson’s and the Russians’ reports reach similar conclusions, so it “appears” like one was copied from the other. Did Henderson slip it to the Russians? A hacking attempt by Russia is alleged at this time, so maybe they got in and later got hold of this report? Bellingcat didn't specify that, so perhaps they want the reader to wonder about that other option. It would help cast some kind of doubt on the man and his findings.

And didn't someone slyly hint at this, referring to him as "Ivan Henderson?" That was a hoot. Anyone remember who and where, and can drop the link in comments?

And by their definition of suspicious similarity, the possible conspiracy "appears" to be much wider than that. Let's bust it open. Here’s WGSPM's Michael Kobs also reaching remarkably similar conclusions shortly prior to the leak, in that same span:

https://twitter.com/CL4Syr/status/1131213353714454528

I and others had also reached similar conclusions from early on – even back in April, 2018, considering this and the other site. Henderson leaked his findings to all of us and we’ve kept it quiet? Maybe Henderson copied us before the Russians copied him?
https://twitter.com/CL4Syr/status/987631873730822144
https://twitter.com/CL4Syr/status/1012294879513178113

Peter Hitchens spoke with an engineer who agreed on the scenes not lining up, back on March 9. His thoughts on using sledgehehammers, etc. is not too far-fetched for location 4, and the Russian investigators suggested the same: the variously bent rebar there suggested "a crater mechanically widened from the outside." (if either suggested the same for location 2, however, I would not agree) So that's another likely conspirator, huh?
https://hitchensblog.mailonsunday.co.uk/2019/03/some-thoughts-on-the-latest-opcw-report-on-alleged-use-of-poison-gas-at-douma-syria-april-2018.html

We think this similarity of findings - shared by pretty much everyone outside the FFM's chosen experts, with their consistently dubious results - is due to us looking at the facts and assessing it honestly. But for disagreeing with those experts, we have to “appear” suspicious in our general agreement.

Special case (question posed to Bellingcat team, unanswered): did Henderson leak me this lie about the amazing mesh pattern that proves impact? Bellingcat vouches for this numbskull notion that helped get the New York Times an Emmy award, and even the FFM seemed to find it compelling. Forensic Architecture supports this project – can they EVER show us a 3-D modeling of how this proof of airdrop would play out in real life? Please? Would love to see that.
https://twitter.com/CL4Syr/status/1218505170759208961

And here’s the Russian report image noting traces of ‘blast fragmentation’ on the balcony (middle image). This is correct, but it was missed in Henderson’s report. So that point anyway is not copied from it. (he didn’t get to visit there himself and apparently didn’t notice it in photos as he only claimed the secondary fragmentation also seen on the upper walls of the room below.)

Okay, so … if he makes a lot of suspicious mistakes, etc. Bellingcat may be onto something. They act like they are.

2) Is Henderson's assessment correct?
Continuing with location 2 blast damage - this is evident once you look closely and reason it out. Every mystery of the damage can be explained. No one can show otherwise except by deferring to the FFM's conclusion as if it were an unassailable fact. Bellingcat does this again in the current article:
"The final FFM report directly disagrees with these findings. They also considered the possibility that the crater was a result of an explosive device, but concluded that it was “unlikely given the absence of primary and secondary fragmentation characteristic of an explosion”. " They also cite their engineering and ballistics experts with an alternate explanation for those marks: it's from the cylinder's impact. Reasoning out how, they must mean uniform bits of concrete were knocked free and hurled with such force into other, intact concrete, that it punched these bullet-like holes in this dense band just partly shown here (green marks, including some punch-throughs seen from inside).

Repeat it and defer to I all you want, but this is a bald-faced falsehood, not a valid rebuttal. Essentially, they just said "nuh-uh" to Henderson's findings here. But there is no other logical explanation for the location 2 damage than explosive fragments from a mortar shell (most likely) that hit that corner, tore down the canopy, and then punched that hole.
https://libyancivilwar.blogspot.com/2019/05/douma-location-2-explosives-damage.html

The FFM was never able to adequately explain these other features everyone else can see - and Bellingcat offers nothing further to help.
* extreme rebar bend, coupled with some intact bars in the uppermost layer (best explained by a powerful blast wave, as opposed to a physical object of any size or force)
* secondary frag marks (claiming they don't exist is not adequate. They do exist, and beg for an explanation, which is best provided by energized pieces of concrete flying laterally into the upper walls, leaving these dents and chips)
* spalling (the grid pattern in the roof suggests a shockwave through the rebar support grid, most consistent with a powerful blast wave, or a very heavy impact - which would have torn through ALL the rebar)

Bellingcat: "The report also appears to dismiss other circumstances that could have affected the impact," like the cylinder's prior impact on the upper balcony corner, that might slow its impact so it can't fall thrugh a hole it did still have the energy to violently punch. That seems worth dismissing.
"this scenario was dismissed," the Bellingcat team complains, "due to lack of observed damage on the rest of the cylinder, as well as the perception that this intermediate impact would not have been consistent with the secondary impact that created the crater." The report cited the mild damage,
which does include two soft, rounded dents or buckle points at the front (one for each impact?), and an apparent buckle point behind that. It does not include the kind of flattening one usually sees in impacts with steel-reinforced roofs (relevant examples shown), nor the kind of narrow indents you might expect from where it hit the steel reinforcing bar, sending a few bars of it flying across the room below. As an example Bellingcat may know - this cylinder was said to pierce such a roof at Latamnah surgical hospital a year earlier. I don't know if it did, but by the look it, maybe. Apparent rebar indentation marked.

You might notice how this looks different from the cylinder in Douma, but then that one apparently didn't fully penetrate. Here's the rebar that bent and broke in Lataminah. Compare with the more limited damage (?) from the pre-slowed impact in Douma. Does that explain the lack of distortion to the cylinder?

 "It is not made clear in the report whether Henderson actually simulated this scenario or not."
Henderson, or the experts he consulted with, did simulate the impact with reinforced concrete, with or without that prior impact, as some shared images show. You might notice this looks similar to what we saw in Lataminah, for example, though more extreme (the model's variables might not be at the most applicable settings).

If the FFM's chosen experts modeled this and the expected warping, it's not clear if they showed it (one seems to show a dent like the kind seen, but it seems to be from the corner impact only. What changes - if any - were added in the final impact are not shred. Were they not points of pride?

Analysis Of Location 4
Bellingcat:
"Henderson included a graphic in his report that showed the cylinder at Location 4 overlaid on the hole in the roof. Although this was included for “illustrative purposes”, the manner in which it has been placed, with the front of the cylinder jutting out over the hole, appears to support Henderson’s claims that this cylinder could not have passed through this hole with the “valve still intact… and the fins deformed in the manner observed”.
Bellingcat and Forensic Architecture worked together to re-create the cylinders based on dimensions found in various OPCW reports. The final FFM report noted the height of both cylinders found at Douma to be 1.4 m. They also noted the width of the cylinder at location to be 0.35 m. Additionally, the final FFM report reported the dimensions of the hole in the roof to be 1.66 x 1.05 m. We assessed these measurements and noticed that the cylinder used in the image above appears to be approximately 8 cm too long, a notable difference in the stated measurements.
It is also notable that Henderson used an image of the cylinder post-deformation to “illustrate” his work, when it is much more informative to compare the pre-deformed cylinder to the hole. In short, this “illustration” is unsuited to show the cylinder in relation to the hole. Its format in the report is potentially misleading.
https://www.bellingcat.com/news/mena/2020/01/17/the-opcw-douma-leaks-part-2-we-need-to-talk-about-henderson/comment-page-1/#comment-253214

The result of their team effort: an illustration of the size given in Henderson's engineering report vs. the supposedly more accurate dimensions given by the FFM. Note wile accepting a width of 35cm, for some reason they add a centimeter to the width in the top image, which - if kept proportional - will add some 4-5 cm to its length, exaggerating a mismatch that comes out at just 8 cm total.

Okay. I worked by myself using GIMP2 (great program), layering, scaling, and comparing the questioned sketch from the EST report (with another example from the same to its left), the two depictions in the FFM final report's annex 7, image A.7.5, and the image produced from the 4:1 proportions (also shown) the FFM gave.
First, that's not THE measurement they give in the report's text. Therein it gives:
* an approximate size "described by witnesses" - about 1.5 by 0.4 meters. (verbal 1)
* stated by FFM: "approximately 1.4 x 0.4 meters" (verbal 2)
* stated by FFM: "the dimensions of cylinder of 140 x 35 cm" (verbal 3)
So they took the one of three that might be more definitive, but also happens to be the shorter of the two - and quite different - lengths that they mentioned as relevant.

Updated graphic: the first one had a labeling mix-up.

Updated text: the graphic mix-up was copied from here. Duh.
source   - h/w prop.  = height (prop. x35/35)
EST   – 4.26:1 = 149.1 cm
FFM final A.7.5 – 4.406:1  = 154.21 cm
FFM verbal 1:  - 3.75:1 = 150 cm (w 40)
FFM verbal 2:  - 3.5:1  = 140 cm (w 40)
FFM verbal 3:  - 4.00:1 = 140 cm
B'cat visual OF
FFM verbal 3:  - 4.03:1  = 141.05 cm

I tried comparing some side-view photos, but the two I tried came out drastically foreshortened, seeming even stubbier than Bellingcat's picture. Not knowing how to properly correct for that, I stuck to the graphic renderings. Other depictions could be checked, but might vary and be non-gospel. The measurement taken as gospel is the same way. Isn’t there a tape measure photo showing the right end? If not, is there a reason the FFM left the exact sizes vague like this?

This is not a good basis on which to declare certainty over the size and use that to discount a potentially valuable assessment like Henderson's.

But just based on this comparison, a possible explanation: the FFM verbal 3 dimensions were given about 10 cm short, possibly to enable just such an argument that the cylinder truly would fit. In fact, they specifically use this measure in a sentence where it was "in keeping" with "a crater with dimensions of approximately 166 x 105 cm" (after what appears to some us to be manual widening). If it were more like 149-153 cm plus the valve, harness and fins, the point wouldn't be so clear. Funny how their errors help bring clarity, but only in a certain direction...

If so, Bellingcat and Forensic Architecture just failed to check whether this 140 was the best measur, or knowingly used the distortion as they worked together to create a potentially misleading graphic. This was done in the pursuit of sowing doubt and suspicion on a whistleblower who seems to be targeted mainly for being right, not wrong. This is why they have to distort a few things to create errors (or Russian-sponsored lies?) that don't actually exist.

Re-doing Bellingcat's "correction" with the same FFM final report, we get this (the blue-shaded one if the FFM's, with some unclear additions around the nosecone removed to simplify things):

So Bellingcat took all this support they get and used it to make that cylinder finally seem to fit. The lauded Forensic Architecture helped. But so far, with all their heads put together, they can only do this by distorting things, which rather underlines the point that the actual physical reality does not fit the opposition's claims.

Another issue I noticed the Russian investigators bringing up in their NV759 refuting the FFM's final report: the hole is also too big. Someone asked me about this question recently - loc. 4 hole too big. I had no idea what they meant, until just now. Yes - too small on the lengthwise axis, and too big on most of the other. The ceiling construction could perhaps explain this away, but in the meantime it seemed worth mentioning.

Bellingcat: "We can also call into question Henderson’s statement that “The observed deformation… were clearly consistent with a cylinder having impacted in a flat configuration on a horizontal surface, and not that of a cylinder having penetrated through a crater.” In response to this, they cite images showing "that the fins have been bent in a manner that suggest it has passed through a gap, while at least one of the securing bands has ruptured in a way that indicates it was pulled apart, which could have been the case if the cylinder had passed through a hole in the roof."

He meant hitting an unyielding surface - the ground. Check the words used: impacting "ON" a surface, not crashing "through" one. The cylinder ifs flattened along that axis in a fairly extreme way I've seen in other sideways impacts with solid earth. AFAIK it could also be consistent with the alleged impact (some degree of flattening would result), but would be better explained by an impact on solid earth, that clearly would have happened somewhere else previously - just like the hole it supposedly came though (but couldn't have) appears to have been created previously.

Let's NOT talk about the guys making the cylinder fit with these graphics from the draft report (never published), then from the final report of the FFM. 

...

Actual errors?

A few valid points are/might be raised - no assessment is perfect. Here's a short list that might grow, at least to say I'm not ignoring the point, and perhaps to help improve the record (time depending):

- 500m presumption? "The major assumption which potentially influences Henderson’s analysis was that the cylinders could not have fallen from an altitude of less than 500m. Although helicopters do usually operate at a higher altitude in Syria, it is entirely possible this helicopter was deliberately flying lower than 500m." 

This is "the major presumption," so let's consider it. Obviously a helicopter CAN fly lower than that, and it might be with testing. But Higgins/team now acts like if it was below 500m, then it WOULD have low enough speed to possibly explain the non-penetration of a cylinder of that weight.

First, that could not explain the intermixed heavy damage suggesting a high drop or probably explosives. A central problem Bellingcat ignores is how NO SINGLE DROP ALTITUDE can explain this mix of actual damage and the impression created by a cylinder just sitting there next to it. That can only be explained reasonably by manual placement next to prior, apparently explosives-related, damage. I suspect that's just why Henderson and the engineering sub-team in general decided on it.

But let's consider just the non-penetration anyway, as if it could be considered apart from the physical damage, for good measure: more specifically, as I recall, they'd need to get down to about 150-180m or lower for that to work (considered some over here and it's lower, most people finding in the range of 50-150 meters, but I'll stick with the upper edge to not aggravate anyone's hay fever). Something in that range appears to have been used by the FFM's plan B experts to make it stay on the balcony - 30m/s was the final velocity, about 50m/s before corner impact. A figure 12 in the final report (referring to a similarly low-speed cylinder at location 4 - 60 m/s) includes H150 (150 meters height?). Russian Federation NV759 notes the following to conclude the FFM used something between 45 and 180 meters. 

500 is not the threshold. But if the pilot's goal was to create this scene and make Bellingcat's argument correct, he just might dip to 150-200m, if not 50-100, risking fire from just about any kind of gun at that point. It is possible.

Other raised issues that are at least partly valid:

- rust suggests advanced age,

- fire linked to blast,

- distorted fins shown - flat ones would better show the initial impact, but the added value of this method is we can see some of the alleged distortion of the impact right against the allegedly distorting material. I for one would expect more extreme bending of those fins than what we see. Bellingcat might have agreed. Anyway, they didn't like that effect.

- expecting signs the harness was ever attached - no bolts or welds are expected - scrapes perhaps, but these could be present among the scrapes there - so it's hard to be so sure that aren't such marks.

- missing primary frag marks, but that WEAKENS his case against the case finally decided on.

1) Was Henderson a member of the FFM?
...