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Well written and so very true. We will never forget!!! At least I will not.
Well written and so very true. We will never forget!!! At least I will not.
A good article. At the time, I was a safety consultant to Continental Airlines before the United merger ruined them. I was scheduled to fly up to Shreveport, LA to look over a new hangar they were occupying, but the trip got put on hold due to the travel ban following 9/11. We took the trip the first mmorning the government opened up commercial flights again. It was truly a strange feeling to come into the airport, which was almost totally empty, and see armed national guard troops patrolling the concourses and the check in lobby. I was traveling with four other Continental employees, which was handy since it made check-in much easier. When we boarded the plane, there were 7 passengers; the five of us (all non-revs) and two paying customers. The return trip was similar - maybe ten pax total. A strange time indeed.
Your remarks about young people remembering 9/11 are right on. But, age does that. To them, 9/11 is somewhat abstract, while those of us that lived it will always remember. Just like our parents who were so passionate about Pearl Harbor and D-Day, while those of us born after WWII regard them similar to today’s youth - important, but more historical. They have their own issues (right now, mainly school violence). Such is the passage of time.
Nice piece. Concerning the commercialized sentimentality that has replaced any real understanding of what happened that day, the mantra chant of ‘We will never forget’ has been largely confounded and thankfully forgotten. Present day politics and our social ethos of ‘I’m right and you’re wrong’ shows we’ve learned little from the Civil War or WW2, because the lesson is not to ‘never forget’ but to always remember it can happen again.
It’s a matter of work, not emotion. If we don’t do the work, dangerous turns in our democracy could be made, like moving from patriotism to nationalism, and the great experiment could implode.
I will never forget. I had just returned home from an all night cargo flight when my now wife calls me in a panic to tell me what had happened. I turned on the TV just in time to see the second tower hit. That night after all flights were grounded my company called in to the office all pilots to help with washing one of the Caravans. Since we were all concerned for our jobs no one complained. In fact we washed three Caravans that night. The fourth one was stuck in Syracuse due to the groundings. The owner thanked us and said he only expected one plane to be washed. When pt 135 ops were authorized again I flew a late night trip in an Aerostar with a passenger to fly her home. Her company paid for the flight. Late night radio chatter is usually light but that night it was so quiet it was almost spooky out. I called several times just to get a radio check to make sure I was still in contact with center. Three weeks later I airlined to Memphis for sim training on a new airplane and all of those flights were nowhere near full.
Now all we have to do is convince the Secret Service and TSA that pilots and other aviation professionals are not a security risk. Implementation of the DC SFRA and most TSA rules have done more damage to general aviation than anything (even the FAA) the terrorists could imagine. As president Bush and other government officials have said, if we do not return to our normal routine, then the terrorists have won.
As it happens every year this week, my mind went back to 9/11/01. I had a similar feeling coming back from lunch to our hangar at Dulles, seeing F-15’s flying CAP over the airport.
One statement hit me - “They often bring appreciative comments, especially by older folks and those in the heartland.” It really hits to the core of current patriotism, which seem to be only applicable to us old folks and those in Flyover Country.
They won.
Freedoms lost.
Let’s not forget that.
Exactly!!!