The Moment Everything Changed.

September 11, 2001 was a day that changed every American, not to mention millions of people around the world. 3,000 lives were lost that day. Thousands more have been lost from the physical and mental health collateral impacts. 7,000 American lives have been lost in the military actions that have followed in its wake. Our country lost a sense of security and domestic tranquility that will likely never return. For me it was a personally profound moment, simultaneously witnessing the best and worst of humanity in all its rawest reality. I've never really shared my own experience, until now.

I've tried to make it to the services at the Pentagon each year since 2001. At a minimum, I focus the day on honoring and remembering those we lost, reflecting on what we experienced and learned on September 11th. I journal as a habit and usually spend the anniversary writing down my thoughts.

But I've just never been able to openly talk about that day.

Now my children have reached the ages when they start asking about our life experiences. With the 17th anniversary of September 11th fast approaching, their schools were educating them about it and preparing to honor the anniversary. 

"Weren't you there, Dad?" my son asked. "In the Pentagon?" 

"No," I said simply.

"Well..." I hesitated.

He looked at me, perplexed because he knew I had been involved in some way related to my work. I finally felt the need to explain. And then I thought, as a father who isn't getting any younger, it is probably time to write it all down and share it.

I think I also realized its time to get it out of me.

THAT MORNING

It was stunningly beautiful. Our brick coach house just four blocks from the U.S. Capitol and Supreme Court was overwhelmed in vining green, the morning sun was bright and there was the slightest hint of cool fall air left from overnight. I headed to my office at a global communications firm at 15th and M, just a few blocks from the White House. I was booked for an early conference call with a client group. My coffee was hot and perfect. Lauren dropped me off at my office and continued on to hers at the Watergate.

Day was off to a solid start.

We were well into our 8:30AM conference call when my assistant came into my office and turned on the TV to CBS, showing a smoking tower. I looked up and covered the phone.

"Just a heads up, apparently a plane flew into the World Trade Center. Sounds like just a small private plane or something. Not an American plane. Typical private pilot knuckleheads." 

We always monitored any aviation incidents because I was a member of our firm's crisis response team for client American Airlines. DC was not a huge hub for the airline so their emergency response personnel there was somewhat limited and we needed to be prepared to play a significant role in communications, both external and with employees, passengers and families on any events on the East Coast. We had developed crisis response scenarios for a hijacking and different plans for a crash. 

We had not prepared for a hijacking that resulted in an intentional crash with massive adjacent casualties. No one had. 

But certainly nothing like that could be happening here. Just a goofball private pilot gone wrong.

I went back to my call while Bryant Gumbel blabbered in the background. Turned my chair away from the TV to focus on my clients. 

Coffee was getting a little cold, but it still tasted great.

THAT MOMENT

That first moment came for me right around 9:00AM. My assistant returned to my office to inform me that American had a plane unaccounted for and they feared it was the plane that hit the World Trade Center. 

Now things were getting serious.

I informed my conference call client that I needed to get off the call and check in with our Dallas-based American team, led by my friend Ken Luce. I'd likely be jumping on the Amtrak to head up to midtown soon and meet my New York colleagues to manage the response to this "accident".

That was around 9:02AM. 

At 9:03, Bryant Gumbel was interviewing a woman on the phone about the North Tower, broadcasting live footage of the World Trade Center. As I stood up to leave my office another plane flew directly into the middle of the South Tower. 

Time stood still. That was it. That was the moment when everything changed.

We spoke to Dallas and soon it was confirmed that the first plane was American flight 11 that had originated at Boston's Logan Airport, bound for LAX. We scrambled our colleagues in Boston and Los Angeles, where impacted families were going to need help. We mobilized in New York where the crash had happened. Our travel agent began booking me a train ticket to Manhattan. 

It was going to be an insane day driven by adrenaline and accountability to others. I didn't need any more coffee.

Dallas opened a conference call line for our team to connect with realtime updates throughout the day. 

We had no idea that conference line would remain open for four days.

THE WHITE HOUSE IS BURNING

I remember hearing on the crisis team conference line, "We have reason to believe that there are possibly two more planes compromised, another of ours and perhaps a United flight."

Rumors swirled that DC was a target, among countless other cities.

At 9:40 we were standing in my boss's office, listening to updates from various team members around the country on the line. Our receptionist ran in.

"The White House is burning!" 

From a corner window, looking down 15th Street we could see faint smoke trails in the sky but it was too far away to be the White House. 

Shortly after, Dallas confirmed that American Flight 77 from Dulles, en route to Los Angeles, had been hijacked and crashed into the Pentagon at 9:37AM. 

The rumor of the White House persisted, as did rumors of another plane, headed for the White House or Capitol, just a few blocks away my office and right by our home. 

"The airline has ticket agents and a customer service person there who is the technical response lead, but that's pretty much it. We need you to get this situation pulled together there," Ken told me.

There was much to be done. Media, of course, but more important were the families. The passenger manifest needed to managed, all contact with the families handled with precision and sensitivity. The airline had their CARE teams to be mobilized to help impacted families with everything from childcare to groceries to funeral arrangements. 

And there was also just the need to navigate the general chaos and get everyone organized somewhere, somehow.

I canceled the train ticket to New York, grabbed my bag, blackberry and old school Nokia cell phone and headed to the elevator.

SCENES FROM THE APOCALYPSE

I walked out onto M Street and the first thing I encountered was a pair of women holding their hands together in the air, chanting "Praise you, Jesus! Praise you, Jesus! We must trust in the Lord!"

Cars were gridlocked, many going the wrong direction on one way streets. A colleague's husband was driving by to get her and get to Virginia. We walked forever to meet him and then jumped in to go toward the Pentagon.

My cell phone didn't work. I was able to sporadically connect to Lauren, in tears. She was leaving her office at the Watergate in a mass of humanity literally walking like refugees to get out of DC.

"We are walking over the Memorial Bridge to Arlington. One of my colleagues is just having us all to his place a few miles out to get away from the District. Where are you? What is happening?"

She wanted to go get our dog from our home on the Hill, fearing the worst given the rumors of the Capitol being targeted. 

"Don't be crazy. Get the hell out of here," I told her.

TOWARD THE SMOKE

We drove toward the smoke to stage somewhere near the Pentagon, have a place for families and help any way we could. It seemed like it would be difficult to get to the site. But everyone was going away from it. 

Except first responders. 

Local and military police were scrambling but it was still shockingly easy to get there.

I've never in my life seen, smelled or experienced anything like that place. I can't do it justice in words. I honestly can't talk about it. It is difficult to even think about and is a reason I haven't typically shared much about my experience that day.

Things again changed in that moment for me: I learned that first responders are superheroes. They are literally superhuman and they should be held to a level of esteem and honor that is second only to those who give their own lives in defense of our freedom. 

We had to stage somewhere and it was clear it couldn't be anywhere near the crash. 

A soldier also made it clear it wouldn't be.

"Go," he said, towering over us from his rocket mounted Humvee. 

I'LL TAKE IT ALL

I finally got a cell signal again and checked in with Dallas. We were to stage from the Marriott hotel.

When I arrived there I was met by two Airport Authority Police officers who handed me a radio. They had a million questions about how we would be organizing for the press and the victim's families. There was also a volunteer coordinator for the local Red Cross. Then the FBI showed up too.

"We have clergy and therapists coming. When will the families arrive here? Where will they go?" the Red Cross asked.

Satellite vans jammed the front lot of the hotel. Cameras were everywhere.

At one point the radio squawked talk of a suspicious white truck headed our direction. Then something about an aircraft in the area. I looked to the beautiful blue sky for one quiet second and wondered if any of this was real. It was beyond comprehension.

The FBI was quickly annoyed with the chaos. "Get these reporters out of here. Where is your command center? Where are you staging?" 

And then a young stringer for a Washington news outlet grabbed me by the arm. 

"Hey, you know we are the local news leader here and we have local families impacted. You should really give us the passenger manifest so we can break the news of the names."

"Knock it off. This is not the time," I said.

I ran to the check-in desk past the lobby bar packed with people watching events unfolding on the televisions. 

"I need ballrooms or conference rooms, what do you have available?"

"We have plenty of capacity available. How much do you need?" she replied.

I handed her my credit card. 

"I'll take it all."

THE BEST OF HUMANITY

The entire scene was utter madness. We had 18 TV crews, and many more print, radio and online media outlets. 

My colleague printed credentials at the hotel business center and we sequestered the press in a conference room to keep them away from the families who had been informed to come to the hotel conference center. 

We had a ballroom full of therapists, cots, tables, tissues, copies of every conceivable religious text and clergy of every sect. The Red Cross was amazing that day. All these people were there for all the right reasons. It was so good to see at such a horrible moment.

At one point that day the only commercial aircraft in the air was an American flight delivering volunteers to serve on the CARE teams for the impacted families. These people gave of themselves and did amazing things for others in their time of need. It was so powerful and so truly human.

We had placed Airport Authority Police officers at all the entrances to that wing and they checked everyone for credentials. We turned a conference room into a command center with designated tables for the Police, the airline, the Red Cross, the FBI. We had four TV's tracking the key national news outlets. We had two entire floors of rooms for people and volunteers to stay overnight as needed.

I heard that the first grieving family was nearby so I went to the entrance to escort them in. 

When I first saw them I almost lost my composure. This was forever for them. An instant widow. A fatherless child. No turning back. No choice. They were completely inside out. It crushed me but I know they needed our help in that moment.

I rushed them through and past the Police checkpoint, pausing long enough to lean into one of the officers to say "Obviously anyone who is this upset doesn't need a credential. Just let them through."

He affirmed with a steady - but heavy - head.

AND THE WORST

"How about that passenger manifest?" I heard as I passed through the lobby to find the second family. There he was again.

"You need to be in the press room." I kept going, focused on the family. 

As the day progressed, we heard from him a few more times. And again, we returned him to the Press Room. 

We moved through the rest of the day in a fog, bringing in families, providing them the support that we could. Connecting them to those who could truly help. 

Media speculated all day about who was on each flight. Celebrities, political figures and the identities of the terrorists. 

Rumors persisted that there were explosions on Capitol Hill and fires burning on the National Mall.

Around midnight I was watching ABC on one of the televisions in the command center when I looked over and our aspiring Pulitzer Prize Winner had somehow circumvented the checkpoint and was rifling through the papers on the airline table. Trying to find that passenger manifest in order to release the names. 

My rage was uncontrollable. I grabbed him by his neck and shoved him toward an Airport Authority Policeman. I don't want my kids to know the words I used, but we contacted his editor and never saw him again. 

We later learned that he got through by attaching himself to a grieving family as they came through the hotel. Truly sad.

ALL TOO REAL

A couple hours after dispensing with the young troublemaker, I walked out into the corridor near the ballroom full of cots and clergy. The hallway was empty, except for one woman leaning against a wall with her phone and wads of tissues in her fist. She was finishing a phone call, fighting back more and more tears. 

She hung up her phone and buried her face in her hands, grunting through the most visceral cry I'd ever heard. I don't know if it was the appropriate thing to do, but I needed to help. I just walked up and embraced her. She cried - more like waled - into my chest for what seemed like hours. I just held her until she stopped. She glanced at me, patted my chest and went back into the ballroom. I don't know who she was, I didn't get her name and it didn't really matter. I just wanted to do anything I could do in that moment. 

My colleagues and I planned to take shifts sleeping in one of the hotel rooms and then staffing the command center. I stayed on the clock until about 3:00AM but then I couldn't bring myself to go sleep in a hotel bed. I had 3-4 hours and it wasn't going to be spent there. 

We didn't have kids yet, but I needed to see Lauren. I needed to see our dog's joy. I needed to be in our home. 

Despite some friends and family suggesting it wasn't safe, she had been able to return to our Capitol Hill home that evening. I borrowed a car and drove that direction. The Pentagon was still burning. Humvees and tanks sat at many intersections. Metrobuses were parked two deep across key corners near government buildings to prevent truck bombs from getting too close. I parked in front of our place and looked up at a clear, dark night sky. 

Two blinking white lights circled overhead. F16's were the only planes flying that night.

Everything had changed. 

NEVER FORGET

This day is always one of deep reflection for me. I will never forget that day 17 years ago and the things I experienced. Truly the worst and best of humanity. 

The sites and smells at the Pentagon. The faces of those families as they arrived will be in the fiber of my being as long as I live.

And there is, of course, the massive transcendent tragedy we all saw playing out in New York. Those images.

And those heroes who died in a field in Pennsylvania. 

We all had our 9/11 experience and we've never been the same.

We should honor those who died that day by living the life they didn't get to live - embracing the freedom we have because of the sacrifice of others.

Each year, take a moment to remember those we lost. Don't brush it off to the sands of time.

Remember that day when everything changed. 

But especially how much changed for those families.

Whenever I think about them - that woman and all the others like her - I find some comfort in what are among the most powerful words ever written:

"I feel how weak and fruitless must be any word of mine which should attempt to beguile you from the grief of a loss so overwhelming. But I cannot refrain from tendering you the consolation that may be found in the thanks of the Republic they died to save. I pray that our Heavenly Father may assuage the anguish of your bereavement, and leave you only the cherished memory of the loved and lost, and the solemn pride that must be yours to have laid so costly a sacrifice upon the altar of freedom.” - Abraham Lincoln, 1863

I hope sharing my experience helps my children never forget the value of their freedom. I hope they'll maybe better understand how to respond to a tragedy. Maybe they'll better understand the importance of unwavering compassion. 

And maybe they'll get to know their dad just a little better.

Thanks for taking the time to read.

-B