Arlington County Government, VA Most Recent, 11 Sep 2020

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From YouTube: 9/11 20 Years Later | Arlington County

Description

This documentary project was sponsored by Arlington Public Library and the Historic Preservation Program.

To learn more, full interviews will be available at the Center for Local History, Arlington Central Library.

If you served in Arlington on 9/11 and wish to share your experience, please contact:

Diane Kresh, Director, Arlington Public Library at dkresh@arlingtonva.us

Arlington County Government will commemorate the lives lost in the Sept. 11, 2001, terrorist attacks, and express gratitude to all those who responded that day during a 20th Anniversary of 9/11 Remembrance Ceremony on Friday, Sep. 10. Learn more: https://topics.arlingtonva.us/arlingtonremembers/

A

Yes, we're aware of the explosion. We heard that it was a plane down. Can you confirm.

B

You know when people say what keeps you up at night. Well back then I mean it was literally keeping us up all the time heavy smoke showing.

C

B

D

Structure every single day we still grieve with those families and those co-workers.

A

You're functioning and going this is not really happening. I mean.

E

It's something of a blur. You just can't drive past the building without having flashbacks and.

C

It's okay, not to be okay right.

A

Engine 101 thought go town.

E

I guess the easiest way to describe it was organized chaos.

D

People were literally running out, you know just in disbelief, it was. It was scary, it was terrifying.

F

The recollection that has always etched in my mind, a completely burnt tree silhouetted in the background by the the pentagon and the huge gaping hole.

A

The smell of the fire and just the whole scene, just was it felt like I was walking around in a war zone.

C

We would take like the little survey flags and identify body parts.

B

20 years later not everybody has absorbed the lessons.

A

We closed the courthouse down that eliminated. You know the need for my staff, all of them to be in the courthouse and allow them the opportunity to go out and assist the police department with traffic control and whatever else they might need assistance with. As you know, the events of the day unfolded.

D

The immediate scene was just mass chaos. We just initially rendered aid to those that were coming out. We had people.

C

Who, who were retired that day that were coming in and saying put me in coach? You know, I know I've been gone for you know five years, but you know it's give me something to do I want to be here. I want to help.

F

The emergency preparedness team kicked in, we.

G

Are working aggressively to shore up the building and ensure structural stability? We are, at the same time working those efforts to search for live victims and try and work with the evidence response teams of the fbi, the airplane.

B

Struck the building at 9 37 and my official arrival time was 9 48.. I am joined very quickly by special agent chris combs from the washington field office of the fbi on september, 8th three days before september 11th chris and I were involved in a full-scale exercise in fairfax county that employed all of the regional northern virginia regional fire and police departments and the fbi's national capital response squad.

B

So when chris shows up he's not flashing, his badge telling me he's with the fbi. I know who he is. We have you know an understanding for what his role is and what my role.

B

Chris gets a report from the washington field office of another airplane believed to be headed to the dc area and told us. We had 20 minutes.

C

To the pentagon, I don't know what he's doing.

A

That radio call went out- and I remember we all just like ducked and started looking around in the sky- to see if there was a.

D

Plane and so just knowing that they were still air flow and we were trying to you know, assist people out of the building attend to those that we could. It was just. It was terrifying.

B

So I make a decision to evacuate the incident scene and.

E

We all have to turn and run. You know away from the building.

B

When the 20 minutes goes by, um we actually got nothing. It was a couple of more minutes before the field office comes back and says you're in the clear that airplane has crashed.

E

That turned out ultimately to be the plane that wound up going down in pennsylvania.

G

Good afternoon, first off, I'd like to echo general jackson's comments about the level of cooperation among all the agencies, all the levels of government represented here uh in in the effort here over the last couple of days. I.

B

Formed a unified command team or unified incident management team with the arlington county police department, the fbi, the department of defense and a representative from fema.

F

The arlington response- it was a very positive review.

B

There's a quote in that report that says that while no emergency response is flawless, the response to the 9 11 attack at the pentagon can be considered a success for three reasons: the relationships and trust that existed between the responders.

B

Second, the use of the incident command system and, third, the long-standing investment in a regional approach to response.

F

And it was one year to the day that the plan for the region, a newly enhanced plan for coordination and communication was was finalized as well.

B

As the incident wears on, there are other threats, other risks associated with this incident like the hazards 20 years later, not everybody has absorbed the lessons, and so there's still a demand for people to hear these things and try and understand how they can do better to prepare and to think differently about their responsibilities to their community.

B

We lost through early retirements, I think a dozen people, many to post, traumatic, stress and understand you know the that didn't come just from 911. You know what we learned about pts before is that it's a life accumulation of trauma, exposure.

E

I grew up in new york in long island and my friend, terence, uh was a commodities broker at one point, and I figured that he would have known a bunch of people that would have been you know, potentially in new york city at the time.

E

I learned that terence had been in the world trade center uh for a breakfast meeting at windows on the world, which was on 107th floor and he called his wife three times after the plane hit the building, trying to figure out how to get out. But nobody above that made it out.

E

So how much time do you have to process that when you're like okay now I gotta go to work.

A

I felt like I was sitting on the edge of my seat for months, and you know that you just waited for the other shoe to drop.

D

Knowing that we were all going through, it together was comforting to know that we that we were still you know, we went through it and we experienced it, but we all lived through it.

C

People who are not in the fire service or public service as a whole like that just well, you could sit here for hours and days on end. They just won't understand that connection.

E

We had a command staff debrief weeks after the pentagon, and that was the first time I allowed myself to process.

E

The loss of my best friend just suddenly hit me like a ton of bricks, and it was weeks after because I didn't have time to grieve when we were still. You know neck deep and dealing with the situation. So um you know I still see his his wife and kids and you know never forget.

B

Arlington has a place at the table that is respected and we play a role that is appreciated and for me personally, it's just been so rewarding to to be a part of something like that with others and through the service to others. You know.

G

B

People in a community has just been a great way to spend a life.

B