9 11 2001 September 11, 2001 I had just finished my tour of duty to the National Capitol Region, Bolling Air Force Base, Washington DC (1999-2001). It was a great opportunity to serve my country and experience our national capitol. Tuesday morning, September 11th Connie and I met at the American Express Travel Agency on Menwith Hill RAF, near Harrogate UK. We were wanting to purchase an airline ticket for Toby to come visit us in England. I walked over from the Chapel and she drove across base so that she could pick up some groceries up at the Commissary. We were laughing about a ticket on Pakistani Airlines was only $75 from New York City to London. Connie said they probably carried livestock on the airplane too. Toby wouldn’t want to fly on such a plane. Then a man from the office next door came in and said to turn on the telle; an airplane had just flown into a building in New York City. My first thought was that with all the air traffic in NYC that it was inevitable that an airplane would crash into a tall building. But when the second airplane targeted the North Tower of the World Trade Center and we could see people actually falling or jumping out of the buildings to their deaths, we knew it was not an accident. The world view of most Americans changed forever. We put the ticket purchase on hold. I went back to the Chapel and then to the 451st IOS office in the unit. I contacted Chaplain, Hart in DC to see if I should try to come back to the DC area because the need must be great and all the AF Chaplains at Bolling AFB were all new except him. He pointed out that he appreciated my offer, but how would I get back to the States? There was no flights coming from Europe. And how many AF Chaplains were at Menwith Hill? One! I had a job to do here. I went to work. The Army Chaplain refused to open the Chapel for prayer. I had to go to the base American Commander to request permission to open the Chapel for prayer, going over the head to the Army Chaplain. We did have a come and go type of service so that there wasn’t a lot of people gathered in one place, because that was the main concern of the Army Chaplain. We prayed as a community of believers concerned for our nations. Thom
Posted on: Wed, 11 Sep 2013 14:38:51 +0000