I was just waking p to go to work. I lived not too far down the road from LUV W at the time. My mom called me and told me to turn on the TV that a plane had crashed into the World Trade Center. I flipped on the news to Fox saw the smoke and my first thought was that someone at La Guardia was gonna get fired.
While Jon Scott is talking with someone about the crash...I see the second plane hit the South Tower. “That’s no accident that’s an attack” is what I said to myself as I quickly got dressed and sped down I-20 to work.
The radio station group I worked for has switched all 5 stations to the AM station which was broadcasting live updates from AP Radio News. That’s when I heard AP Reporter Ron Fournier’s voice crack as he said that a plane had just hit the Pentagon.
I went racing into my station with my Alert Roster (I was in the National Guard) in my hand. My General Manager (a former Force Recon Marine) asked me as I came in the door “are you gonna have to go?” I told him I didn’t kno yet I had to call in and see. He told me “if you have to leave just go don’t worry about the time off I’ll cover it.”
I remember on 9/11 leaving wife’s house (we were just dating at the time) and looking towards downtown about 11pm on 9/11 and for the first time in my life seeing the whole of the Midland skyline shrouded in darkness. That’s when the reality and the gravity of the situation we were facing that day really began to set in with me. I didn’t sleep a wink that night...I just kept replaying what had transpired that day over and over in my head.
A month later I was on State Active Duty in Austin when the first NG soldiers started patrolling Bergstrom Airport and the bombing campaign in Afghanistan began.
Hi, neighbor. I think we turned toward the TV at about the same time. Then while you were on I-20 racing to work, I was on 191 headed toward the Midland mall for work, wondering what on earth was happening.
Thank you for your 20 years of service to our country.