re: September 11

I posted this a few years back. It's my experience deploying to the Pentagon after the attacks. We were there for about 10 days.

First off, I’m a local to the BR area, as I graduated from Zachary High in the early 90’s. I’ve worked in Technical Rescue for my entire career specializing in collapsed buildings, collapsed excavations and confined spaces. When 9/11 happened, I was living in ABQ, New Mexico and was a member of NMTF-1 Urban Search and Rescue. We were deployed to the Pentagon on the afternoon of the attacks.

We reached the site late (after extensive security checks) on the night of the 11th and began setting up our equipment. That night when we took a break some of us sat on light poles that the plane had knocked over.

That night one of our first priorities was to fill in a large hole that was located about 50 - 60 feet in front of the damage you all saw on tv. The plane had struck the ground fairly hard there and lost a lot of its momentum.

If you look at an aerial photo of the Pentagon, you’ll see that building is 5 independent buildings with a large outdoor “corridor” between them.

The plane went through the first three buildings. The inside wall of the third building had large hole in it that was made by plane’s front landing gear. If you were inside the third building and walked through the hole (which I did many times) you came out into the corridor that is between third and fourth buildings. The front landing gear damaged the fourth building’s outer wall but did not penetrate it.

Almost all of the plane seats and passengers were piled up just to the right of the hole (if you were standing inside the third building). I didn’t see a single seat or passenger from this area that was wholly intact. It was a terrible scene especially since there was a group of young kids on the plane.

To me the plane seems to have turned towards the left as it went through the building because on the 3rd day our group found the “pilot’s” remains. The Captains Chair with the harness style seat belt had protected him more than the passengers. He was still strapped into the chair, which was laid over on its right side and nestled up next to a concrete column. He was only missing the lower part of his right leg and his right arm.

There was a slurry type mixture of water from the fire trucks and jet fuel everywhere. We had to keep charged fire suppression lines everywhere because we kept accidentally lighting it on fire.

My main memory though is of being terrified while in inside the building and listening to the upper floors creek and moan. It sounded like it wanted to all come down at any moment.

Sorry for the morbid details but sometimes you need those.

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Where were you?
What did you do?
How did you take it?

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Had just dropped a child off at school, then turned on the radio. They were talking about the first plane. I thought it ironic because I had watched a History channel show about a B-25 that crashed into the Empire State building. Then they broke in to say another plane hit the WTC. Knew it was an attack then.

Drove home, turned on the TV, and called a friend. We had a mutual friend who worked in the WTC. I asked if he still worked there. She said she thought so and asked why I wanted to know. All I could say was, "turn on the TV." Fortunately, he had changed jobs a couple months earlier and was no longer on the 86th floor.

I later drove in to my office. There was no traffic on the Atlanta interstates and the signs flashed "National Emergency." It was very eerie. The office was on the 11th floor and my window faced Dobbins AFB. No one was there and it looked like they all just ran out, leaving the computers on and coffee cups half full. I watched Dobbins for a while -- looked like a hornets nest with fighters going in and out -- then went home.

Pissed me off immensely. Still does.

At work
I had no idea
My coworker came in late that day and that was the first I heard about it when she told me
Couldn't get on the internet after it was so slow

My boss had a tv in his office so we watched coverage on that

In today's age I guess everyone probably should have been sent home not knowing if additional targets in major cities were at play

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We reached the site late (after extensive security checks) on the night of the 11th and began setting up our equipment. That night when we took a break some of us sat on light poles that the plane had knocked over.

That night one of our first priorities was to fill in a large hole that was located about 50 - 60 feet in front of the damage you all saw on tv. The plane had struck the ground fairly hard there and lost a lot of its momentum.

If you look at an aerial photo of the Pentagon, you’ll see that building is 5 independent buildings with a large outdoor “corridor” between them.

The plane went through the first three buildings. The inside wall of the third building had large hole in it that was made by plane’s front landing gear.

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Get Sao and Cajunhawk in here.

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What ever came of your sister? I assume she was OK?

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That was very kind of you to ask. Yes, she was fine. I later came to find out that her court appearance in Manhattan had be cancelled. My Mom being in Florida, me being in Northern Virginia, and my sister being in NY just added to the confusion of not being able to get in touch.

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One idiot ran through the halls yelling, "The British are coming, the British are coming!" He got yanked up by the principal and got an arse chewing.

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We had an idiot chanting "WWIII! WWIII!"

Your post took my breath away.

At work, we had the TV on in our communication room, four or five folks in there.

Mostly in silence.

Didn't know anyone first-hand that died or were at the sites; and only a few second-handedly.

Comes from growing up and living away from NYC I guess.

A real tragedy for those impacted.

With the ripple effects on defense costs, security costs, economic disruptions, etc. that the subsequent responsive tally is in the Trillions of Dollars category.

Never forget what your government did to you. This tragedy, which was either a complete failure of our intelligence and law enforcement agencies or a direct attack by said agencies on the American people, was used to justify wars that killed thousands of young American men, hundreds of thousands of Iraqi and Afghani civilians, cost TRILLIONS of dollars that are largely unaccounted for in taxpayer funds, and the conversion of every aspect of our technological infrastructure into a device of espionage used to spy on every American citizen in a police state that would make George Orwell blush.

Your phone, your tv, your computer, your bank, your doctor, your employer, school, car, everything reports on you to the government, all without a warrant. As soon as they have an excuse to look into you, they will find a crime or create one to punish you for any alleged wrongdoing or for simply peacefully protesting your government.

Whether 9/11 was a failure or a deliberate attack by our government, the actions taken in the wake of that tragedy have served to destabilize the world’s political system and economy, bankrupt our nation, enrich defense contractors at the expense of the taxpayers, turn the entire nation into a massive dragnet of every citizen, and make criminals out of us all to be prosecuted by a corrupt FBI that views parents at PTA meetings as domestic terrorists.

So, no, I will NEVER forget 9/11 and what it meant for the death of liberty in this country.