The Day The Skies Went Silent-9/11

CNN | 8-13-02 | My Favorite Headache

[ladyinred]

Just reading this brings back the horror of that day to me, and I was in my living room watching it on TV. To be an air traffic controller that day must have been a nightmare.
Thanks for a very interesting post.

[My Favorite Headache]

Helpless and Rage are the words I believe you are looking for.

[thegreatbeast]

What I want to know about this is what did they do in those eleven minutes between Flight 11 crashing and Flight 175 turning toward Manhattan? What did they do? What is possible for them to do today? If nothing has changed in answering this question since September 11th, then we have learned nothing, and we need new leadership up & down the line.

[Danette]

Does anyone know the site that you can view the current flights in air (like this one)?

[sixmil]

"The air traffic controllers in the eastern region, out of 6,000 airplanes, were able to identify four aircraft whose sole mission in life was to avoid detection: flying low, flying fast, shutting off all electronic means of communication," said Hatfield.

I thought they were saying 6 planes back in September. Which number is correct? Are those other 2 planes part of the investigation, so they are keeping them under wraps for now? I am still convinced there was another plane heading for the Sears Tower and mayber another headed for D.C., but maybe they never got hijacked before all planes got grounded.

[Grampa Dave]

Thanks for posting this.

We need these constant reminders of the brutal actions of the Islamakazis who killed so many innocent Americans on 9/11/2001.

Far too many Freepers and others leap to defend the Islamakazis and their financial backers the Opecker Princes and never spend an instant of concern about the Americans slaughtered on 9/11.

The first anniversary of that terrible nightmare is coming up. We must not allow the Islamakazi apolgists on both sides of the political spectrum to sugar coat what happened or try to get Americans to forget.

[Dog]

The silence of no planes in the sky is what I will always remember about the period after 9/11.

[Prodigal Son]

Lot's of details here on this thread- it's long but chock full of details: Terror attacks brought drastic decision: Clear the skies (a USA Today 9/11 must read Part I)

They thought they had a lot more than 4 planes that had been hijacked.

[OldFriend]

August 12 and August 12, today, USA has the most amazing articles on that terrible day. If at all possible save the papers for these two days.

[OldFriend]

Oops, make that August 12 and August 13....

[OldFriend]

Feel better now that you've ranted?

[OldFriend]

No doubt the decision to have ZERO planes in the sky averted further tragedy. Subsequently, some suspected hi jackers were caught on a train with a luggage full of very suspicious items....

Stopping the planes as quickly as they did and shutting down the inflight maps kept any hijackers from knowing where the planes were as they proceeded to land immediately.

We owe the traffic controllers a tremendous debt, they got all the planes down safely. No doubt in my mind that the hand of g-d was helping them.

[billbears]

I saw something about that as well. Apparently they used to have to go through a process that took several minutes to even get approval to contact the military. Now all they have to do is push a button and the military is contacted. The way it was portrayed on the news was that it was instantaneous

[Dan Day]

The Day The Skies Went Silent-9/11

Not entirely silent...

The night of 9/11, I went to a convenience store to pick up some items. A man in the parking lot caught my eye, and pointed up at the night sky.

Where normally there would be a few noticeable straight-line vapor trails marking where jetliners had passed up to an hour before, there were instead about a dozen round loop-the-loop contrails.

It gave me a renewed burst of gratitude for the US military, knowing they were up there alone patroling in the skies over Houston watching for renewed threats.

[jae471]

I remember the loop-the-loop contrails, F-16s flying high around D.C. Occasionally I would see the heavier trails of the C-17s going into Andrews AFB. It was rather eerie, not hearing commercial planes going into National, or even the G.A. planes going into College Park. I still miss the sound of Cessnas and Pipers flying overhead -- there are not nearly as many of those as there used to be flying nearby

[hellinahandcart]

I remember hearing, on some radio program or other last fall, an interview with a man on a United Airlines flight to LA on the morning of 9/11. It had been an extremely uneventful flight until the pilot went on the intercom and announced that "due to a national emergency, we will be landing shortly in Kansas City". The pilot's voice was cracking a bit, and the passenger realized later on that the pilot must have known that one of the WTC planes was a United, and that maybe he had even known the pilots of that plane.

The other passengers started making calls to find out what was going on, and the news spread quickly, and I can just imagine the horrified exchanges on board.

[Gabz]

The silence of no planes in the sky is what I will always remember about the period after 9/11.

I understand exactly what you mean.

Having lived in a flight path of the -5s stationed at Dover AFB for 10 years, I had become immune to the noise. Not any more.

The silence of those huge engines gave me the eeriest of feelings.

I do a lot more praying these days, because I say one everytime I see or hear one of those giants. As my 4 year old puts it whenever she sees one - "Look mommy, tha plane is going to help President Bush."

[Dog]

You might find this interesting...

Clear the skies.....

[Dog]

See my post 19...