I will never forget.

Where were you?

We must tell our children

that evil does exist.

Much of our current world is adapted due to this day.

Many people enlisted in the military because of those events.

My brother who was piloting American Airlines 737s (the model the terrorists had trained on and used) was out on a trip. He was still on the ground but he could have been on one of those planes.

I was at my last W2. Got a call from a colleague in TN who said to turn on the TV. We got it on and saw the second plane hit.

Kellogg's Cereal Plant,

Battle Creek, MI.

Traveling Skilled Trades, Journeyman Sprinkler Fitter.

The skies were deafening silent as ground word spread

and U.S. flags appeared to be everywhere !

Remember the Alamo.

The what?

That place where about 200 texas volunteers held off Mexican general Santa Anna's force of almost 1,500 regulars in a pitch battle that was a pivotal role in Texas becoming a state in the USA.

Oh.

*wink

I'm a history major, so perhaps I can be forgiven for having a little chide in this. We always forget our history. One reason is there's simply too much to remember. Ask any US citizen on the street who the two main belligerents were in the American Civil war, and you'll be lucky to find 3 out of 5 who can tell you "The Union (North) and the Confederacy (South)."

So, don't be surprised when people forget 9-11. An entire generation of kids have been born and graduated high school since that happened, and then some. I think a couple years have already graduated college.

So yes... those of us who are older will remember where we were, how we felt, and what we saw, and the aftermath. The younger will read about it in history textbooks, or more likely online in an article. To them, it's just a story, just as to us are the journey of the Mayflower, the Revolutionary War, the Mexican American War, WW1, WW2, and for many of us the Korean War and even the Vietnam War. Over 70% of Americans alive today weren't born when Vietnam ENDED....just to give some perspective. They don't know Ho Chi Mihn. They don't know the Cold War. They don't know McCarthyism.

They do know who the latest TikTok influencers are.

It's the doom of Mankind that we forget, except for a few curmudgeon History buffs... *wink

I was working at a at a nuclear facility. Watching the plane hit was the beginning of some very long months working out of the emergency operations center making substantial changes to the security posture as many organizations across the US were. Thousands upon thousands of excess concrete road barriers (Jersey bouncers) stacked up on road construction sites across America got a new life and sent to every major government facility in the US. Just getting employees who were spread across the US on company travel home was a huge feat that took 3 weeks. We had some in foreign countries that took nearly 3 months to repatriate and then only thanks to help from the Air Force.

I was commuting to work in Northern NJ the time which was about 25 miles or so from Manhattan. I was listening to my radio show when the news broke in saying that a plane had hit one of the towers. Then shortly thereafter, the news broke again about the other tower being hit. It was at that moment I knew something was up. When I got to my office, my next door neighbor had the TV on and we all watched. It occurred to me that I should maybe drive back out to PA considering how close we were to Manhattan just in case there were more attacks on the way. Heading back west to PA with my radio on, the announcement came on that there was a plane down in western PA--my immediate thought was that I'm heading the wrong way.

I was on active duty.

Lots of confusion that day. Much of our battle plans were built on the cold war and stopping a mass invasion from an invading Russian Bear.

When word was out we were under attack, many folks reacted in a programmed way. Other made a different response plans and they were in various rates and phases of execution.

I made it a career tracking down billion dollar submarines. That day, I went out to the piers and help toss moor lines off to get the fleet out to sea. No one told me to do this, I was at the top2% of the rating structure so it had been 16 years since I last handled a mooring line. The strip on your uniform didn't mean much. I wished I was on that ship or any ship that day. Instead I was a ship riding instructor and this was an emergency sortie. If it floated, it was to go out to sea.

Air traffic stopped for about three days after that first day. On the second day it resumed, I was flying up to a VLS Cruiser in the PacNorWest as a Combat System Leader. VLS Platforms were not my specialty and the area that was was my specialty was not the reason why this ship was headed overseas. The Captain that sent the dozen or so of us across the globe gave us specific guidance about every other day on what to get the ship ready for. Knock on wood, the ships I trained - had nearly everyone return.

I often think about the one that didn't come back.

I still have mixed emotions about 9-11. Anger, resentment, rage, and lots of what ifs. Some of the corners that were cut in the immediate aftermath 9-11 in my opinion resulted in various Naval mishaps especially over in 7th fleet. That hit home to me as I was retired by then. I did what I could with the tools that I had with the info that we had. It still doesn't make this cranky old senior chief, master trainer with a BS in Workforce Education and Training happy about the training mishaps back in his old back yard.