For those at the tip of Lower Manhattan, the only viable evacuation route turned out to be the water. A makeshift, unorganized armada of more than 130 ferries, pleasure yachts, sightseeing vessels, Coast Guard and police vessels, fireboats, and tugboats gathered—many without being asked—at Battery Park and nearby piers. By the end of the day, they had collectively evacuated somewhere between 300,000 and 500,000 people from Manhattan—a maritime rescue larger than the World War II evacuation from Dunkirk.
Lt. Joseph Torrillo, director of fire education safety, FDNY: Two of the ambulance crews, they were digging and digging and they found me. They got me out from underneath the rubble. They put me on this long, stiff piece of plastic called a spine board and strapped my hands to my chest. They taped my neck onto the spine board—they thought I had a broken neck—and they ran with me to the marina in the back of the World Financial Center and they put me on the deck of a boat.
With that, there was a loud rumble and a roar and the people on the boat started screaming, “Oh, my God! Here comes the other building!” Everybody jumped off the boat. I was left all alone and was getting hit with the glass from the North Tower. Frantic, I bent my finger and the release belt opened and my hands were free, and I ripped the tape off of my neck. I rolled off the stretcher, and I jumped into the doorway, not knowing I ended up diving headfirst into the engine room of the boat. The North Tower was hitting the deck of the boat. The boat was rocking. I thought it was going to go under.
Peter Moog, officer, NYPD: I heard a lady yell, “Help, TARU!” She had read the shirt I had on which said “TARU” [Technical Assistance Response Unit] on the back. She was a lieutenant I knew, Terri Tobin, and she had a huge piece of concrete embedded in her head and two very large jagged pieces of glass in her back, both left and right of her spine. She was lying on the ground.
Lt. Terri Tobin, public information officer, NYPD: He was a real cutie. He said, “I think I should carry you down to the water.” I responded, “Peter, that’s okay, I saw EMS. They wrapped my head.” He said, “No, through your blouse—between your shoulder blades—there’s a shard of glass sticking out of your back.”
Peter Moog: I carried her down to the water. Another officer and I got her down on a boat by the North Cove Marina.
Lt. Terri Tobin: An NYPD harbor boat pulled up, and the captain—who I knew—hopped out and saw me. He said, “You need to go to a hospital.” But I couldn’t get on board with a shard of glass in my back because they were afraid that if the boat rocked, it would cause more damage. He called over two EMS workers, and as I held on to a railing, they put their feet up against the railing, and ripped this glass out of my back.
Peter Moog: There were one or two fireboats and some civilian boats that people were being loaded onto. One of our harbor boats pulled in, and I knew a guy on it, Keith Duvall. He said, “Grab a sledgehammer. We’ll break into one of these yachts and take it.” There were about a thousand people there, all waiting to get the hell off the island. Keith and I broke into a boat. I said, “Rich people always leave the keys in the boat.” We ended up finding the keys and Keith got the boat started. I think he made about 10 trips back and forth to Jersey, taking about a hundred people a trip.
Jeff Johnson, firefighter, Engine 74, FDNY: I was heading toward the water, and I ended up coming out at the south end of the marina. There was a hose from the marina, and that was the first time I was able to flush my eyes. I ran into somebody else I knew, Det. Keith Duvall, who was on a boat. He was shuttling people back and forth to Jersey. All we basically said was, “Keith, are you okay?” “Yeah. Jeff, are you all right?” “Okay.” Just friends, just checking.
Lt. Joseph Torrillo: Maybe about a half hour later, as I was losing consciousness, I heard banging on the deck of the boat and I heard voices, and I heard somebody say, “Start the engines. Start the engines.” Somebody came down that long, steep flight of stairs to start the engines, and in the darkness, he stepped on my chest. I let out this loud scream. I scared the daylights out of him.
James Luongo, inspector, NYPD: We were down by the Hudson, and New York Waterways had pulled up and there was a line of people to evacuate. It was surreal because the people on the boat were saying, “Women and children. Women and children. Women and children.”
Rick Thornton, ferry captain, Henry Hudson, New York Waterways: It was like being the last lifeboat on the Titanic.
Tom Sullivan, firefighter, Marine 1, FDNY: Mothers and nannies with infants in their arms were dropping their children down to us. At one point we had four or five of them wrapped in little blankets, and we put them in bunks down in the crew quarters. I put four babies in one bunk, like little peanuts lined up in a row.
Lt. Michael Day, U.S. Coast Guard: There was a small boat that was at the lower tip of Manhattan. I thought the boat was going to flip over because so many people were trying to get on.
Jack Ackerman, Sandy Hook harbor pilot: At any given time, Battery Park was ringed by 10 or 12 boats waiting for people.
Herb Jones, engineer, Mary Gellatly: We went back and forth all day long, carrying as many as our boat would hold. It was a lot of people—a lot of people.
Jacqui Gibbs, vice president, JPMorgan Chase: When we arrived at the pier, thousands of people were waiting in line—thousands. Yet you could hear a pin drop—that was the scariest part of it. We walked blocks and blocks trying to find the end of the line. The wait lasted three hours.
Rick Schoenlank, president, United New Jersey Sandy Hook Pilots Benevolent Association: They started hanging sheets over the bows of these tugs that said “New Jersey” or “Brooklyn.” People were getting on. They were in bad shape, these people, and they needed to get off the island.
Lt. Michael Day: We decided to make the call on the radio. “All available boats, this is the United States Coast Guard aboard the Pilot boat, New York. Anyone available to help with the evacuation of Lower Manhattan, report to Governors Island.” About 15, 20 minutes later, there were boats all across the horizon.
Rick Schoenlank: All these commercial boats, tugs, ferries, fishing boats, launches, dinner boats—everybody converging on the lower part of Manhattan to conduct the evacuation.
Capt. James Parese, Staten Island Ferry: Tugboats—I’ve never seen so many tugboats all at once.
Keturah Bostick, student, HSLPS: My classmates Chante, Luis, and I met up in a men’s bathroom at the ferry. We stayed there until we saw Mr. Sparnroft and some other students going on the Staten Island Ferry.
Heather Ordover, English teacher, HSLPS: All I wanted to do was get off that island. I joked with a teacher I had never wanted to go to Staten Island so badly.
Keturah Bostick: From a pay phone close by I called my mother, crying, saying, “Mommy, I’m all right—don’t worry about me. Some students are going to Staten Island, I’ll call when I get there.”
Heather Ordover: I looked at the water and saw another ferryboat. In my book Jersey was currently a helluva lot safer than crossing any bridge to Brooklyn. We rounded up whoever wanted to go with us and muscled over to the boat. All we had to do was yell, “We’ve got students,” and the adults parted like the Red Sea.
Tim Seto, student, HSLPS: There were thousands and thousands of people on this little ferry. Everyone was standing, trying to make room for as many people as possible.
Keturah Bostick: As we rolled by the Statue of Liberty, I wondered if the statue was going to blow up. Was all of Manhattan going up in flames, and, if so, was my family okay?
Heather Ordover: We were underway—wearing life vests that the ferrymen kept saying we didn’t need. That may have been the funniest thing I heard all day. Try telling someone who is fleeing a crumbling building that they don’t need a life vest—what, like we’re having a good-luck day?
Bert Szostak, equity broker, 100 Wall Street: A blue New York Waterway ferryboat was there, about half full, and we got on, not caring where it would take us. There were three passengers aboard of Arab descent who had backpacks, and people—average people, not police officers—demanded to know what was in them. The guys looked scared and opened their backpacks. Inside were just books.
Capt. James Parese, Staten Island Ferry: There was dust all over the boat. People were crying, people were covered with dust, and some people had no shoes. We had at least 6,000 people on the boat.
Lt. Michael Day: We had hundreds of people waiting to get over here and we had a captain—he said, “I don’t have a crew.” The ferry had 350 people on it. He said, “I need some help.” There were some New Jersey state troopers, and I said, “Hey, would you mind helping this guy?” They said, “No problem, whatever we can do.” I was like, I hope nothing happens to this ferry. I broke more rules that day than probably I’ve enforced in my whole Coast Guard career.
Paul Amico, dock builder, Amico Ironworks: If we had injured people on board—mostly firemen—we immediately released the ladder and sent that boat back to Jersey.
Lt. Joseph Torrillo: The boat skipped across the Hudson River, and I could hear a lot of commotion, people yelling on the deck to people on the shore of Jersey City. There were ambulances waiting there.
Joseph Lott, scheduled to attend the Risk Waters conference, had escaped the building after going to change his shirt to wear his new tie. He evacuated south toward Battery Park, where he ended up on one of the escaping boats.
Joseph Lott, sales representative, Compaq Computers: We sat on the ferry for maybe four or five minutes and then all of a sudden the ferry took off. Within two minutes, we were in bright sunshine. Beautiful day, Statue of Liberty was in front of us, the water was lapping against the ferry. I looked around, the ferry was completely packed: there were some injured people, most of us were covered in soot and ash and dust. We were all sitting there, and all I could think about was how much burnt asbestos was in my mouth at that point—it was very gritty. I said, “I’ve got to have something to drink.” I went up to the little snack bar on the ferry, and there was nobody there. Inside were all these beers, sitting on ice. I grabbed a handful of beers, and I walked back to my colleagues, and I said, “Look what I found! Does anybody have an opener?” And so somebody produced an opener, and said, “I’ll open if you give me one of those!” We all sat down, and we drank this beer, and I can’t remember a beer that ever tasted that good.
Frank Razzano, guest, Marriott Hotel: As we were going across the river, I was looking back at the city, expecting to see the World Trade Center—expecting to see a tower with the top off. They weren’t there. I said to the guy driving the boat, “Where is the World Trade Center?” He said, “Buddy, they’re gone.” I said, “Look, I was there when the tops of the buildings came down, but where’s the rest of the building?” He said, “Buddy, it wasn’t the tops of the buildings. They collapsed down to the foundations.”
Michelle Goldman, labor attorney, One Battery Park Plaza: As we got off the boat in Jersey City, rescue workers formed a pathway for us. They helped people who had trouble walking. They gave us bottled water, food, and towels. It almost felt like reaching a finish line.
* * *
Across New York City, everyone seemed dazed in the wake of the collapses. Officials struggled to discover who had survived. Those who had been injured sought treatment amid the chaos.
Dan Nigro, chief of operations, FDNY: As you got back to the scene and saw what was left of it, it looked like war.
Monsignor John Delendick, chaplain, FDNY: Dan Nigro came walking down Chambers Street. He said, “Who’s in charge? Do we know who’s in charge?” I said, “Chief, I don’t know. I think you are.”
Dan Nigro: I was told the command center was now at Barclay and Broadway, at the tip of City Hall Park, and Deputy Chief [Tom] Haring from Division 6 was in charge. I felt that if that was the case, that meant everyone else had been killed—every other ranking member of the department.
Monsignor John Delendick: A lot of stuff at that moment was a blur. People started combing through the stuff, trying to find people.
Dan Nigro: I wanted to get back to the fire command post and see if the people I left at West Street survived. On the way there, I ran into someone I knew and he said, “Dan, Pete’s gone. Pete’s gone.”
Sharon Miller, officer, PAPD: My husband had started driving home to New York from Florida. His daughter somehow got through to him, and said, “Dad, I saw Sharon. She’s out of the building, she’s all right. She’s with two other officers.” While we were running up West Street, she had seen me on TV. He didn’t really believe her. Then another of his friends called him: “Ray, Sharon’s fine. I saw her on TV. Ray, I have a 50-inch TV. I saw her.” He was at a rest area. He sat down and he lit a cigar. Then he drove the rest of the way home.
Al Kim, vice president of operations, TransCare Ambulance: I started to see clean shirts. That was a big deal. The cavalry had arrived, if you will. I remember seeing people I knew with no dust, no burns—they were normal. It was a welcoming sight.
Richard Grasso, chairman and CEO, New York Stock Exchange: My colleague Howard turned to me with the phone in his hand and said, “It’s the mayor.” I took the phone, and he said to me, “How you doing?” I was numb—my only thought was to repeat his question and I said, “How you doing?” It sounded like the Budweiser commercial. “No, how you doing?” I finally said, “How am I doing? You’re supposed to be dead.” He said, “I’m not dead, I’m fine.”
Det. David Brink, Emergency Service Unit, Truck 3, NYPD: We were walking up and we saw a church, St. Paul’s. One of the doors was open so we all piled up inside, the five of us. I hid in the front by the altar and started praying. I fell to my knees and said, “Thank you, God, for letting me survive this,” and I said, “Please give me the strength to go on and help other people that are there.” I said, “I know we lost a lot of guys in there. God, please watch over them.”
My eyes were crusted through with pieces of glass and dust and debris. I couldn’t see. I found the holy water there—I was looking for any water—so I scooped my hands in the holy water. I was washing off my eyes, and my face was wet.
I needed something to wipe my face off with. My uniform was covered from head to toe in the dust. I went in by where the altar is, and they had the vestments and the other little cloths that were used for the rituals and ceremonies of the Catholic Church. I found the little one—it was a little white cloth that they would put over the chalice when they were doing the wine ceremony—and it had a little red cross stitched into it.
I dipped that in the holy water and started wiping my eyes off. I looked up, and the priest had come out. I said, “Oh, boy. I’m in trouble now.” He says, “No, my son. That’s what they’re supposed to be used for. It’s okay.” I said, “Thank you, Father,” and I dipped it again in the holy water. Then I put it around my neck, and tied it there because the cool water felt good on the back of my neck.
Richard Eichen, consultant, Pass Consulting Group, North Tower: I managed in a meandering way to get into Beekman Downtown Hospital. They had a ramp and stairs and I said, “I’m taking the ramp. I had it with stairs for today, thank you.” They put me in an elevator, downstairs, to what must have been a cafeteria they set up as a triage center. A woman in scrubs came over and set me up. She opened up some water and poured it over me, over my front, trying to figure out how badly I was hurt. They led me to a seat in front of a doctor—a young woman—and she did maybe three or four big X stitches on my forehead, to close it up.
I heard what happened for the first time in the nurses station—they were playing the television. I was still not really comprehending it. I remember thinking, Holy crap. I don’t know who did this, but they knocked down our building. We’re all in the street. This is a time to do something antipersonnel. Biological. What do I know about this stuff? I put my shoes back on, no socks, put my pants back on—they were gray at this point. My shirt was in a bag—it was a hospital bag—and I was wearing the gown, and I walked out.
By late morning, officials realized few survivors would still be found inside the Pentagon. They labored to grasp the extent of the damage to the massive building, contain the still-spreading fires, and gather evidence of the attack. Meanwhile, evacuated Pentagon workers spread out across Arlington, beginning an anguished journey home as the initial shock of the attacks wore off. The morning’s collective nervous anxiety that more attacks might be afoot wouldn’t lift until the military arrived at the scene overhead.
Chris Combs, special agent, FBI, at the Pentagon: I grabbed a DPS guy—their SWAT team was there—and said I wanted the SWAT team. We had learned from studying with the Israelis that oftentimes after an attack the terrorists knew there would be a command post, and they would run a suicide bomber into the middle of it.
Stephen Holl, deputy chief, Arlington County Police Department: We put up a couple of our countersnipers on the Drug Enforcement Administration building on the other side of [Interstate] 395. That way they could overlook the entire south parking lot, where a lot of the relief efforts were set up.
Chris Combs: The other thing I requested right away was for the FBI to send our surveillance teams. If there was a truck bomb sitting somewhere else in Arlington or if there were four guys in a minivan with automatic weapons, we needed to find that before they hit us. We took our surveillance teams and had them drive around the Pentagon on the outskirts, looking for any other type of attack.
Scott Kocher, contractor, SAIC, Pentagon: This woman pulled up her car, turned on the radio. The announcer mentioned one of the Trade Centers had collapsed. Nobody could make much sense of that, because it seemed impossible. It wasn’t till later that we fully understood what that had meant.
Stephen Holl: One of the detectives brought a small television set to the command post, set it up on the back of one of the SUV tailgates. I looked occasionally, but I couldn’t watch it. What we had at the Pentagon was mind-numbing enough. I couldn’t even imagine what was happening in New York City.
Mike Walter, senior correspondent, USA Today Live : There was a guy from the Wall Street Journal. I remember him coming up to me later in the day, and he said, “Both the towers have collapsed.” I was like, “What?” He’s like, “There’s nothing left.” He pointed to the Pentagon and said, “Look at that—this is the biggest story we’ll ever cover in our lives.” He said, “I’m not even sure it’s going to end up on the front page tomorrow.” That was pretty amazing. Obviously the Pentagon did end up on the front page, but I think it’s always been a secondary story to what happened in New York.
Thomas O’Connor, special agent, FBI, at the Pentagon: We really didn’t know that the other buildings in New York fell until late that first night. We were so engulfed in what we were doing.
James Schwartz, assistant chief for operations, Arlington County Fire Department: I did not know of the collapse of the World Trade Center until after ten o’clock that night.
Chris Combs: We were really working frantically to collect as much evidence on the outside of that building that we could.
Thomas O’Connor: The FBI evidence recovery was based out of the back of my bureau car for several hours until we got more people down there.
Jean O’Connor, special agent, FBI: We started doing line searches outside. You put individuals side by side, and you walk in one direction, and you are looking for evidence on the ground.
Chris Combs: We’re trying to find any piece of an airplane, any personal effects. We’re very conscious of any remains. There were pieces of aircraft in every direction hundreds of yards away. In fact they found pieces of the airplane in Arlington Cemetery, which was across a four-lane highway and another 200 yards of grass.
Jean O’Connor: The plane had actually hit one of the tall light poles as it was coming in, shearing the light part of the pole off, and it went through a cab’s windshield and landed right next to the driver’s leg. The cab driver, we called him one of the luckiest men that day. Had he been six inches in the other direction he wouldn’t have fared so well. Tom actually handed the guy his cell phone and said, “Call your family and let them know that you’re okay.”
Chris Combs: Very early I knew we didn’t have enough people on the scene. We had people in D.C., and more people in Northern Virginia in Tysons Corner who were sent to Dulles Airport because the hijacked plane left from Dulles. We had to have people there to grab evidence. I had two major sites in Virginia operating at the same time.
Jean O’Connor: Tom was talking to one of the other FBI team leaders, who had gone to our equipment warehouse. He said, “What do I need to bring?” Tom said, “Bring everything.”
* * *
Lt. Jim Daly, Arlington County Police Department: I was at the command post—we were on the ramp from 395 down to Washington Boulevard—and I looked over to South George Street. If there was ever an image of Armageddon, that was it. All I saw were hundreds and hundreds of people walking with nowhere to go. These were civilians, they were military, but there was no one telling them where to go—a block of humanity going down George Street.
David Allbaugh, technical services, Pentagon Library: We walked up Army Navy Drive, walked past the Navy Annex on Columbia Pike down under the overpass for Fort Myer, talked a little bit, trying to figure out what was happening.
Bruce Powers, director of readiness analysis, U.S. Navy, Pentagon: I knew there was a shopping center about a half-mile away. I knew there were public telephones that I could use. I arrived at the phone banks, and each one had 25 people standing behind it. I knew a phone in the garage, got there, phone was available, rang up my wife—busy—because people were calling her to say, “Is Bruce okay?” I called our daughter and asked her to let her mom know as quickly as possible that I was okay, and that I was starting to walk home.
Scott Kocher, contractor, SAIC, Pentagon: We decided we were going to go home. Our first stop, as we were going on Columbia Pike, was a hotel. We walked in, and there was a long line for all the phones. We walked for a ways down Columbia Pike.
Bruce Powers: I walked and walked and walked and after seven miles I finally got home.
Lt. Col. Ted Anderson, legislative liaison officer, U.S. Army, Pentagon: Along with a buddy of mine, we were trying to figure out how we were going to get home. Everything was inside, including my car keys. We started strolling off, two well-dressed guys who looked like they had fallen off the turnip truck and dragged through an onion field. We were caked in soot and blood. It was nasty-looking. We got on a Metro train headed toward Springfield, Virginia, and people looked at us in disbelief. Nobody spoke on the train. It was total silence. Everybody was in shock.
Robert Hunor, contractor, Radian, Inc., Pentagon: I felt guilty about it later, but you almost have a feeling of elation. You’re not supposed to be happy—you realize the gravity of the situation, you realize that this is really bad. But there’s a survivor’s Hey, I walked away from it euphoria that hits you. Wow! I’m still here. I survived! My colleague and I both felt that way. I ended up staying with that coworker for the rest of the day. We ended up walking all the way back to Falls Church [about seven and a half miles]. They’d shut down the Metro. They’d shut down Route 66. They shut down all the bridges into Washington, D.C.
* * *
Jennifer Meyers, dispatcher, Arlington County Emergency Communications Center: All of us who worked that day can recall moments that will stay with us for the rest of our lives. Mine was a phone call from a man who spoke with extreme calmness—I believe he might have been in shock. He told me he knew his wife had been on the plane that went into the Pentagon, and he knew she was no longer alive. What he was requesting was for me to assist him in finding out who was sitting next to her. He wanted to know what her last words had been—he wanted to speak to the survivors. My heart sank. His voice is ingrained on me forever. What I was not allowed to release to the public yet was that they were almost certain there were no survivors on the plane.
Maj. James Phillips, Defense Protective Service, Pentagon: My wife was on my mind. She works in the building for the army. During the course of the day, I continued to try to contact her. From what I saw from the outside—I’ll be honest with you—I thought she was gone. I didn’t say anything to anybody until after four or five hours had passed. Around 2:45, I got a call from home. I thought it must be her, but it was my daughter, who was a freshman. She asked, “Did you hear from Mom?” I said, “No, baby, I haven’t.” About an hour later, I received a call—and it was her. You don’t know how that made me feel.
Robert Hunor: I saw one of my coworker’s wives—she was very pregnant, and she had an ashen look on her face. I didn’t realize it at the time, but her husband was still missing. Out of the four people from my team who were missing, they managed to locate two that day, but her husband was never located. No remains were ever found.
Rep. Martin Frost (D-Texas), chair, House Democratic Caucus: At the time, my wife was the adjutant general of the army—she was a one-star general—and she’d been scheduled to be at a meeting with her boss in the Pentagon that morning. She was not able to go—she sent two of her staff. The point of impact of the plane at the Pentagon was her boss’s office—a three-star general. He was killed, and my wife’s two staff who were attending the meeting were killed. Had my wife gone to that meeting, she would have been killed. If events had gone slightly differently, I might’ve been killed, and my wife might have been killed on that day.
Chris Combs, special agent, FBI, at the Pentagon: A gentleman came up to me and said, “I have to get into the Pentagon.” I said, “Sir, nobody is going in the Pentagon. It’s a crime scene. We still have the fire throughout the building. Nobody’s getting in.” Then I noticed that there was somebody standing behind the guy who was talking to me, and he kept tapping his shoulder—his own shoulder—trying to tell me something. I looked at the guy that I was talking to, and he had four stars on his uniform. I quickly realized this was a four-star general from the army. He said, “I’m in charge of the national command center. I have to get in that building.” I realized, “Yes, you do.” We had to grab a group of Pentagon police and FBI agents to escort them in.
Lt. Jim Daly, Arlington County Police Department: A young lady came up to me, looking very distraught. She had left the office about four or five minutes prior to the plane hitting to deliver mail to another portion of the Pentagon. As she was walking down the corridor she felt the heat of the explosion. Everyone in her office had been killed.
Capt. Randall Harper, Defense Protective Service, Pentagon: I was looking at an officer I had worked with for a couple of years, and all of a sudden he breaks out crying. The sergeant said to me that he had seen some pretty traumatic things. I had to collect myself. You had a chaotic situation going on, but you still had to be concerned about people. It was that kind of day. In combat you expect it. You never expect anything like that in America.
John Milton Brady Jr., safety technician investigator, Department of Defense: A general who was in charge of the army personnel was trying to enter the building to save his people. He kept saying it was his staff in there and he wanted to get to them. He broke down and cried. He was a two-star.
James Schwartz, assistant chief for operations, Arlington County Fire Department: We transported 94 people to the hospital that morning. Only one of the 94 that we transported that morning subsequently succumbed to her injuries—meaning that if you got out of the Pentagon that morning either with assistance or on your own, you lived.
* * *
Continuing confusion and alerts about incoming planes that might be hijacked left Pentagon rescuers and first responders off-balance, unsure of whether they themselves were still a target and wishing for more security.
Capt. David Herbstreit, Arlington County Police Department: We were called away from the Pentagon proper two or three times because of incoming airplanes.
Capt. Charles Gibbs, Arlington County Fire Department: There was another “everybody-out-of-the-pool evacuation, unknown incoming plane.” Everybody drops everything and pulls back. You watch. That was another 15- to 20-minute delay.
Thomas O’Connor, special agent, FBI, at the Pentagon: I got on the radio—and I know you’re not supposed to swear on the radio—and called back to the desk and said, “Tell somebody to get some f’ing air support up here!” Like, who the heck am I to be calling for air support? It was literally 30 seconds later that a fighter jet flew over the Pentagon—had nothing to do with any of us FBI guys. It hit the sound barrier, went over, and there was a big boom when it went by. All the guys we’re standing there with are like, “That’s a pretty powerful guy.” I’m like, “Yeah!”
Maj. Dean Eckmann, F-16 pilot, Langley Air Force Base: NEADS wanted to know the extent of the damage to the Pentagon. I flew by the Washington Monument, turned back, and flew low over the Pentagon. I told them the two outer rings have been damaged. Nobody indicated to me anything about an airplane hitting the Pentagon, and they asked me if I knew what had happened. I told them I guessed it was a big fuel tanker bomb because of the amount of the smoke and flames coming up.
Dennis Smith, maintenance inspector, Pentagon Building Manager’s Office: I saw that F-16 up there fully loaded, and I was like “YES! It’s all cool now.”
Staff Sgt. Christopher Braman, chef, U.S. Army: I saw an American jet fighter, “Guys, I’m here, guys I’m here.” It was the prettiest thing I’ve ever seen.