9-11 Timeline
The following was written by MCPO USN NYC (Ret) and posted at his request;
Lest we forget 16 years ago today . . .
7:59 am – American Airlines Flight 11, a Boeing 767 with 92 people aboard, takes off from Boston’s Logan International Airport en route to Los Angeles.
8:14 am – United Airlines Flight 175, a Boeing 767 with 65 people aboard, takes off from Boston; it is also headed to Los Angeles.
8:19 am – Flight attendants aboard Flight 11 alert ground personnel that the plane has been hijacked; American Airlines notifies the FBI.
8:20 am – American Airlines Flight 77 takes off from Dulles International Airport outside of Washington, D.C. The Boeing 757 is headed to Los Angeles with 64 people aboard.
8:24 am – Hijacker Mohammed Atta makes the first of two accidental transmissions from Flight 11 to ground control (apparently in an attempt to communicate with the plane’s cabin).
8:41 am – United Airlines Flight 93, a Boeing 757 with 44 people aboard, takes off from Newark International Airport en route to San Francisco. It had been scheduled to depart at 8:00 am, around the time of the other hijacked flights.
8:46 am – Mohammed Atta and the other hijackers aboard American Airlines Flight 11 crash the plane into floors 93-99 of the North Tower of the World Trade Center, killing everyone on board and hundreds inside the building.
8:47 am – Within seconds, NYPD and FDNY forces dispatch units to the World Trade Center, while Port Authority Police Department officers on site begin immediate evacuation of the North Tower.
9:03 am – Hijackers crash United Airlines Flight 175 into floors 75-85 of the WTC’s South Tower, killing everyone on board and hundreds inside the building
9:08 am – The FAA bans all takeoffs of flights going to New York City or through the airspace around the city.
9:21 am – The Port Authority closes all bridges and tunnels in the New York City area.
9:24 am – The FAA notified NEADS of the suspected hijacking of Flight 77 after some passengers and crew aboard are able to alert family members on the ground.
9:37 am – Hijackers aboard Flight 77 crash the plane into the western façade of the
Pentagon in Washington, D.C., killing 59 aboard the plane and 125 military and civilian personnel inside the building.
9:59 am – The South Tower of the World Trade Center collapses.
10:07 am – After passengers and crew members aboard the hijacked Flight 93 contact friends and family and learn about the attacks in New York and Washington, they mount an attempt to retake the plane. In response, hijackers deliberately crash the plane into a field in Somerset County,
Pennsylvania, killing all 40 passengers and crew aboard.
10:28 am – The World Trade Center’s North Tower collapses, 102 minutes after being struck by Flight 11.
5:20 pm – The 47-story Seven World Trade Center collapses after burning for hours; the building had been evacuated in the morning, and there are no casualties, though the collapse forces rescue workers to flee for their lives.
8:30 pm – President Bush addresses the nation, calling the attacks “evil, despicable acts of terror” and declaring that America, its friends and allies would “stand together to win the war against terrorism.”
. . .
Editorial Note: At approximately 0100 on May 2, 2011, a 79 member joint team, including MWD Cairo, delivered by the Night Stalkers and operating with Naval Special Warfare Development Group (DEVGRU aka SEAL Team SIX) RED Squadron raided a compound in Abbottabad, Pakistan and killed Osama bin Laden with one shot to the head followed by another shot to the chest. Mission Commander of OPERATION NEPTUNE SPEAR and DEVGRU RED Squadron OIC on scene reported, “for God and country … Geronimo, Geronimo, Geronimo”, and then, after being prompted for confirmation, “Geronimo E.K.I.A.” (enemy killed in action). Within 24 hours of his death, the lifeless and soulless body of bin Laden was unceremoniously dumped in to the Indian Ocean by a lone junior Sailor from the USS Carl Vincent for the sharks and sea snakes to feed upon.
Category: Historical
Roger.
Position of Attention and Hand Salute.
Flags at half staff all day.
Out.
No offense meant, but it was sixteen years ago today. If you can do so, please change 15 to 16. Thank you.
And I was at a restaurant having breakfast before going to work when someone came up from the lower level of the restaurant, desperately upset, in teas, and said something about ‘all those people killed’.
I went to work, got on the internet to find out what was going on, and went down to the ground level to get some cash out of the ATM, because I didn’t know if the banks were going to shut everything down.
We were all sent home. The bank across the street from us was 60 stories tall and I worked on the 40th floor of the building opposite the bank. Sears Tower was shut down. People were seen leaving with their computer hard drives. The entire Loop was evacuated.
I got home just in time to see the first building collapse and wondered what was happening in my country.
It was republished from last year.
I thought so.
Many memories. Lots of emotion surrounds this date.
It was a true honor to participate in the military recovery. Lots of formal and informal stuff going on in the days following. Found myself accidently serving in a fairly significant position, rubbing noses with all sorts of wonderful people.
Tend to now remember some of the silly things that occurred – like being ordered to write a classified message for wide distribution from a high ranking official. Panic set in after the obligatory, “Yes, sir.” I had zero admin skills, and ended up dictating the message to an O-4 who did know how to construct such a piece of paperwork. Yeah, we found an isolated office to do the deed – the visual of an NCO leaning over an officer at a typewriter – well, sometimes ya just gotta do what it takes to complete a mission.
I was a 1stLt at the Combined Arms Staff Trainer (CAST) in Camp Lejeune. There was a TV in the building and someone came in shortly after the first plane hit and said they saw that the WTC had been hit by a plane. I thought to myself, “How does a plane get that turned around that it would hit a huge building like that?” I was also think it was a Cessna or something. A few minutes later someone said another plane hit the other tower and everything came into focus – we had been attacked. The pictures were unreal. I called my wife who had been called by her mom to turn on the TV. She was nursing our first boy (now a junior in High School!) The exercise was put on hold until about noon and I went to our base house only a few minutes away. We reconvened at noon and continued our work on the CASTex since we figured we would need the training in the near future. . .
What I remember most is the immediately-post-collapse footage, on which dozens (at least) of Scott integrated PASS distress tones can be heard. Each of those bizarre-sounding electronic screeches was coming from a firefighter who wasn’t moving. I hate that goddamn sound.
Never Forget.
Always remember all the talking heads wondering who had thought of ramming a loaded plane into a building, and wondering how NONE of those idiots had ever read Tom Clancy… damn book concerned (“Debt of Honor”) had only been out like 7 years by then.
News on TV this morning and most Internet pages are making no mention if it, they are more interested in the Texas beauty contestant bad-mouthing the President.
Well, the media is populated with morons. Example: the news show that headlined the Costa Concordia as the “real-life Titanic.” Any rational, intelligent individual would think that description applies only to the actual RMS Titanic and her loss with 1500 souls on April 14, 1912, but not these idiots, evidently.
None of them were sent home from school or told to take the day off or anything like that. They probably didn’t bother watching the TV at all, because the only thing showing on TV during that week was the news about what happened in New York and WDC, and in Pennsylvania.
Never forget.
I was on shore duty serving at NSSF NLon at Subase Groton. First word anyone in my shop heard about was when my fiancée (now wife) called and left me a voice mail that a plane had hit the World Trade Center. By the time I called her back, the second plane had hit. I immediately turned the shop radio to a news station (WINS out of NYC if I recall) and a short time later they announced the Pentagon had been hit. It was that moment I knew we were at war! Then entire Subase came to a halt as everyone tried to figure out what was going to happen. By the time WTC2 fell, the base was on Condition Delta. The command almost refuse to let anyone leave until it was pointed out many of the sailors (like myself) were single parents with kids that would be getting out of school or child care in just a few hours.
Ironically, the worse day came on Sept 12, when it became near impossible to drive onto the base. I had to park a mile outside the gate and walk in, and that was after scrambling to find child care for my daughter because base-run child care was considered “non-essential.”
NEVER FORGET.
NEVER FORGIVE.
Roger that. Never ever will forget or forgive.
I was working as a Liaison planner on the 757 Final Assembly line at the Boeing Renton facility when the word came in that the first plane had hit the towers. I pulled up a news feed just in time to see the second plane hit the south tower. Having been stationed in NYC I knew that as many as forty thousand people could be working there. I expected the death toll to be much higher than it turned out to be.
Just after the second tower collapsed, we went outside to have a smoke. I mentioned to one of the guys that this had to be the work of Osama Bin Laden. Unlike many of my coworkers I was familiar with his name and his goals. It could be no one else to my mind. Within a couple of hours the sky was empty. No airliners were stacked up to land at Sea Tac. It was eerie not to see four or five planes lined up on final for the Seattle airport.
I now know how my parents felt on Dec 7, 1941. I’m sure they had felt the same rage that I felt on 9/11.
I was in my office in the barracks. We just graduated a class of AIT students the week before, had a 4-day pass and were back to work that day to prepare for the next class happening in a couple weeks.
One guy came in from the mess hall and said, “hey a plane hit the world trade center” because he saw it on the news. Then someone else said another plane hit. I jumped on the internet (2001 speed), and couldn’t even connect to anything because it was so slow that day. We all sat in the day room watching what was going on.
We started going back to work and just as I was going to leave myself, the first tower fell. Such a shock and very surreal.
That night we went home to watch it on TV too. We came back in the next day and it took my buddy and I six hours to get to work. It took some troops 12-18 hours to get onto base that day because they were checking every single vehicle 100%. We slept in our offices that night because we didn’t want to wait to get on post. We ended up on guard duty for a couple weeks after that in various shifts before our next class showed up. Live ammo and all.
I remember seeing a documentary about Marine Boot Camp and they showed the date in one scene as 9/8/11 and I thought, “huh, I wonder what will happen in three days.” I think any time today’s date or something close to it happens, it is a reminder.
The positive is that we all pulled together as a country. It is a shame that it takes a 9/11 or Harvey or Irma to prove that we can be that good and that united. “Are you a 9/10 American or a 9/12 American?”
I was in Marine bootcamp. We were briefly told there was an attack in New York after they shut down all training for the day, but beyond that getting information was essentially non existent. I didn’t get the experience of many did watching it or knowing what even happened until months later when I was out of boot.
So for me it will always be surreal because it was such a massive shocking event, but I might as well have been on the Moon for it.
This morning, I sent out an e-mail reminding everyone that we were attacked by religiously observant Muslims from the Kingdom of Saudi Arabia.
On the morning of Tuesday 11 September 2001, I was serving my mission for The Church of JESUS CHRIST of Latter-day Saints guarding the Rocking “G” Ranch in Jensen, Utah, and had just woke up, turned on my computer, and saw a very strange message about a bomb exploding at the State Department, and blood donors were desperately needed.
When I went to the DRUDGE REPORT web site, and saw the photograph and headline, my first thought was that someone had hacked into his web site and was playing a cruel joke.
But, then I turned on the television.
One of the most vivid images remaining in my mind to this day was of the man and woman holding hands as they leapt to their deaths.
That night, I called my father in Raeford, North Carolina, and he told me that he had told Alma (my stepmother) earlier in the day that he knew I would call.
He passed away a little over a month later.
*Sigh*
JRM, the Pentagon (portions of it) not the State Department, as well as the Twin Towers in NYC, were hit by two different hijacked American Airlines planes. No bombs. No bombings.
Additionally, another AA airline was hijacked with possible destination of the WH. The heroes that day overtook the hijackers-the plane went down over PA. No one survived.
15 of the 19 terrorists (all afflilated with al-Qaeda) were from Saudi Arabia. The other 4 were from the United Arab Emirates, Egypt and Lebanon.
As you, I remembeded that day. Had just PCS from the Pentagon a couple of months before 9-11. Got a call @0900 hours from one of my Soldiers who was deployed in the Middle East and informed me an airplane struck one of the WTC. All of us gathered in our Boss’s Office and turned on the TV. We were horrified to watch live the 2nd plane crashing into the other WTC.
Then, we heard the Pentagon was attacked. It broke my heart when I learned later that the DCSPER office was hit. I lost three fellow Soldier friends that day.
Sorry about the loss of your Dad.
P.S. Am guessing by your silence that you have chose to ignore my inquiries.
@ ANOTHER PAT:
I know there was no bomb at the State Department.
I was referring to the unusual message(s) I’d received on my computer, which in retrospect, was misinformation being distributed during the first moments of mass hysteria.
Not only were the majority of attackers religiously observant Muslims from the Kingdom of Saudi Arabia (I had read that it was all but one), but the attacks were financed by Saudi money, which is where Bin Laden got his support.
I know about the attack on the Pentagon and the crash in Pennsylvania.
I was glued to the television and the computer, learning all I could.
I tried to volunteer to go back into the United States Army, but they never responded to my request.
At one of the Army’s birthday parties at the Pentagon, I was taken inside the chapel, which is closed to the public, that was built where the aircraft impacted.
I’m also aware, as I’m sure you are, of all the allegations of hoaxes and conspiracy theories regarding the enemy sneak attacks on Tuesday 11 September 2001.
As for any inquiries, I haven’t been back to the WEEKEND OPEN THREAD.
I was in Northern Indiana delivering a load and was looking for a news radio station when I came across a program where they were discussing the collapse of the World Trade Centers. I was in total disbelief thinking it was a “War of the Worlds” kind of gag until I turned on the TV in my cab sleeper, saw the footage and just sat there in total shock for a few.
In case anyone is interested, here is the URL for Ann Barnhardt’s post about the enemy sneak attacks on Tuesday 11 September 2001:
https://www.barnhardt.biz/2017/09/11/t-plus-16-and-evergreen/
I was in drawing class. It was sophomore year at Columbus College of Art and Design. I remember I was wearing a black Gumdo T-Shirt, blue jeans, and black combat boots.
The radio was on NPR and I was working on shading the drawing I was working on when I subconsciously realized something had changed on the radio and I started listening. That’s when I learned about the first airplane and I also knew that it had to have been intentional. I packed up my stuff since I also knew the next thing that would happen was the school would be closed and all the students sent home.
The rest of the class hadn’t noticed but my instructor asked where I was going. I told him I was going to the recruiters office to re-enlist. That’s when they announced the second plane.
The Navy told me they didn’t need me right now so I ended up staying in school, but damn I wanted to go back.
Thanks for posting this Jonn.
I was a first responder at the WTC site on September 11, 2001.