This is a column I wrote in 2008. Unfortunately the last paragraph is no longer accurate. West River ranchers would know this man; ask me if you want. By Peggy Sanders Have you forgotten September 11, 2001? One Army officer who hails from West River, South Dakota certainly has not. While on a visit to Ft. Carson, at Colorado Springs, Colorado, I had the privilege of hearing first hand the details of that day and how close the plane that crashed into Pentagon was to him—seventy-five feet. He said that the area near his office had recently been steel-reinforced and had bulletproof glass doors installed. Those improvements kept the fire and heat from coming on in where he was. After the first plane hit the tower in NYC, someone called his office and told them to turn on a TV. When they did, they saw the second plane take out the other tower. This colonel told me that when he heard the plane coming in at the Pentagon, he knew what it was going to do. After it hit—and all of the noise and commotion died down somewhat—somehow he and his fellow office workers got out of the building. At first everyone was in the courtyard then they were told to disburse; most of the people started one way into a tunnel. The colonel and four others started walking the other way as it was less congested. They walked for five miles before they found a telephone that they didn’t have to stand in line to use. (The cell phone system was too clogged to function.) They made a few personal calls, then were able to get onto a train and go home. Meanwhile, the colonel’s wife was on the phone at her place of employment. A secretary came into the room and announced that the Pentagon had been hit and everyone in a certain section (which the secretary specified) had been killed. That was the area where the colonel worked and of course, ultimately and thankfully, it turned out to be a false report. The colonel’s wife handed the phone she was talking on to someone, and though she heard others talking, nothing they said registered. She got her purse and keys, left the office, and somehow made it home though she has no recollection of how she got there. The phone kept ringing, the colonel’s mother, brother, and other relatives called; each time the colonel’s wife said, “I don’t know anything yet,” and quickly hung up the phone. Every time the phone rang, she thought it might be her husband. Finally it was and he was ok, heading home, one of the lucky ones. The colonel is now retired but the memory is all too real. No one knows any better than he why we are fighting terrorists on the other side of the world. There have been no more terrorist attacks within the US since that awful day in September and the aim is to keep it that way.
Posted on: Wed, 11 Sep 2013 17:31:29 +0000
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