The International Cessna 170 Association

The night before 9-11-2001 I was in PIT getting ready to depart to ITH (Ithaca, NY) We were running late and the gate agent told me we had 10 pax that were landing on another flight in a few minutes. We were the last flight out to ITH that night and I decided to wait for them. 20 minutes later we got them on board and not one of them had any checked baggage only carryons so that worked out great. Landed at ITH just after midnight and we hit the hotel. The next morning my FO called me saying turn on the TV. I asked what channel he said any channel. That brought me awake immediately. Even the home shopping channel was covering it. My flight attendants girlfriend works in the south tower. He couldn't get in touch with her for 3 days. But as luck would have it she had a dental appointment that morning and wasn't at work. We flew out on the morning of the 14th.

On the morning of 9/11 I was the single pilot in a chartered helicopter over Red Bank NJ flying my passengers into West 30th St helipad on the Hudson River. If was a gorgeous day. The owner of the helicopter happened to be on board and he and I were discussing his next aircraft purchase. At some point I noticed and point out to Charlie some unusual smoke rising from about the Twin Tower area. Our eyes became fixed on it as well as all the other eyes in the full helicopter. I made several calls in the blind to any traffic on the Hudson as to what was going on and that usually would have brought a response, but there was none. We were not talking to ATC as we were not required to do so in the exclusion. We never saw any other traffic on our route and as we got closer we could see more and more smoke and flying paper from the north side of the west tower. As we past the tower at about 800ft and well within 1/8th of a mile of the tower over the Hudson River, we looked back at the tower and could clearly see the hole left my an airplane. I believe to this day I was the first aircraft to pass the tower after the first impact.

We landed at 30th St and stayed hot for the passengers to depart. I had a another charter later that morning departing from our base at Linden NJ and declined to get fuel but quickly departed 30th St and headed south down the river climbing to 1000 ft and passing the tower again looking at the gapping hole and wondering what had just happened. By this time a NYPD helicopter was arriving on the scene as well as News12 helicopter. I flew past the towers and turned toward the Statue of Liberty and made my call to Newark tower for clearance through the Class B. With my back to the twin towers, Newark issued me my clearance and just as the controller finished speaking the News12 pilot broke in to report another airplane had just hit the second tower behind me. The controller said matter of factly " Roger, understand a plane just hit the second tower".

I crossed Newark at 1000ft and turned south towards LInden and at that point as I descended for landing could turn and look back at the towers. The second airplane made a much bigger mess of things and there was smoke billowing out and paper flying everywhere. I landed at Linden and looked at the towers a few minutes and went in to report to the dispatchers that something big and terrible was going on and to turn on the TV which they did. I had about an hour and a half till I was to depart for my next charter and so we watched the TV and paced the floor wondering what it was I'd just witnessed.

When the TV reported that the Pentagon was hit by a plane, I turned to my boss, our dispatcher and told him I doubted my charter was going to go or any other flying and I was leaving to go home. I went outside and fired up my 170 which I used to commute to LInden from my home airport in Quakertown Pa. Linden is uncontrolled and there was no reason to talk to approach and I usually did not. So upon reaching the departure end of the east/west runway I advanced the throttle and started rolling down the runway. As I came up on the mains and lifted off I noted 3 or 4 police cars rushing into the Linden Airport with lights and sirens going. I just kept flying west to PA as I normally would have. For few seconds I did turn up Newark tower and listen to them landing all the planes. I didn't listen long and turned off the radio. I had no idea I was not suppose to be flying.

Upon my landing at Quakertown on what was otherwise an uneventful flight, the airport manager came running out and asked if I'd been forced down. I said what. Forced down? No, in fact I'd seen no other traffic. He informed me the FAA was grounded all airplanes and forcing them to land.

I was pretty glad to be home.

I will never forget the image of the hole in the west tower which was obviously made by an airplane. I will never forget, the thought that people had likely been killed in front of my eyes and I wondered how many. I remember thinking how could a plane accidentally fly into one of the towers. I will never forget the call from News12 helicopter about the second planes impact and I will never forget the controllers response.

That's me in the TWA 767-200 in the for-ground, the airport is Gander my home for the next 3 plus days. All those busses were there to take all of us to various outposts, our passengers went to the equivalent of a VFW hall.

I had just finished working the morning MSP rush at Badger High Sector at Chicago Center; and I started making my way to the cafeteria to have some breakfast. In the hallway on the way there I was stopped twice by guys saying an airplane had hit the World Trade Center in New York. My thought was, it must be really lousy weather in NYC for some GA aircraft to hit one of the towers. As I walked into the cafe, I couldn’t believe what I was seeing, the tv was showing an airliner hit one of the towers. I thought holy cow they just showed a replay of the “accident”. Then I noticed the other tower was already on fire, and it was actually the second tower being struck. In the next couple of minutes the PA system in the building requested “all personnel return to the control room”. As I entered my area of specialization, our operations supervisor briefed us that we had to land all aircraft at the nearest suitable airport, no exceptions. We asked how do we explain this to the pilots? We were told just tell them, it was a “national emergency”. The next question was; what if they won’t comply? The answer I got shook me, my supervisor said, “the F16’s from MSN are scrambling right now, and will be on station over Chicago soon, and they have orders to down any aircraft not complying”. As I took my position at Badger High Sector again, I was amazed that all of the domestic airlines were already asking to divert to ORD or MDW. The flight crews were getting ACARS messages from their companies to divert and get on the ground immediately. I did not have to explain to any of them what was going on. The only crew I needed to convince was JAL9 (Japan Air 9, Tokyo to JFK) I tried to clear him to ORD, but he insisted he needed to continue on to his intended destination of JFK. I had to use the “national emergency” statement, and then told him he “needed to trust me, and he would understand when he got on the ground”. In 30 minutes Chicago Center was able to empty its entire airspace. The next two weeks were surreal. It was definitely a sad time, for all aviation professionals. We are still feeling it’s effects today.

My own story is unimpressive…I was in my living room drinking coffee and watching it on TV. But my Brother-in-Law (sisters’ husband) story is “another story”.

He was a minor executive with a large insurance corp. (AIG) who held annual exec-meetings in the hotel within the towers. Their company had just the month previously merged with another very large insurance underwriter and …in order to impress their new “bosses” had decided to demonstrate some austerity and move the annual meeting to a less expensive, less impressive hotel….the Sheraton in Teterboro… the conference-room of which has a view of the Hudson.

My bro-in-law was strolling into the conference-room with his first cup of coffee and found a group of other presenters hovering around a television watching the first tower smoldering ….so he asked them…”What movie is this?”

They turned around and pointed to the large windows on the East side of the room (behind my BIL)…and he turned-around just in time to see the second plane strike the second tower….where all the room occupants were supposed to presently be… except for the last minute decision to impress their new bosses….

Bruce Fenstermacher wrote:On the morning of 9/11 I was the single pilot in a chartered helicopter over Red Bank NJ flying my passengers into West 30th St helipad on the Hudson River. If was a gorgeous day. The owner of the helicopter happened to be on board and he and I were discussion his next aircraft purchase. At some point I noticed and point out to Charlie some unusual smoke rising from about the Twin Tower area. Our eyes became fixed on it as well as all the other eyes in the full helicopter. I made several calls in the blind to any traffic on the Hudson as to what was going on and that usually would have brought a response, but there was none. We were not talking to ATC as we were not required to do so in the exclusion. We never saw any other traffic on our route and as we got closer we could see more and more smoke and flying paper from the north side of the west tower. As we past the tower at about 800ft and well within 1/8th of a mile of the tower over the Hudson River, we looked back at the tower and could clearly see the hole left my an airplane. I believe to this day I was the first aircraft to pass the tower after the first impact.

We landed at 30th St and stayed hot for the passengers to depart. I had a another charter later that morning departing from our base at Linden NJ and declined to get fuel but quickly departed 30th St and headed south down the river climbing to 1000 ft and passing the tower again looking at the gapping hole and wondering what had just happened. By this time a NYPD helicopter was arriving on the scene as well as News12 helicopter. I flew past the towers and turned toward the Statue of Liberty and made my call to Newark tower for clearance through the Class B. With my back to the twin towers, Newark issued me my clearance and just as the controller finished speaking the News12 pilot broke in to report another airplane had just hit the second tower behind me. The controller said matter of factly " Roger, understand a plane just hit the second tower".

I crossed Newark at 1000ft and turned south towards LInden and at that point as I descended for landing could turn and look back at the towers. The second airplane made a much bigger mess of things and there was smoke billowing out and paper flying everywhere. I landed at Linden and looked at the towers a few minutes and went in to report to the dispatchers that something big and terrible was going on and to turn on the TV which the did. I had about an hour and a half till I was to depart for my next charter and so we watched the TV and paced the floor wondering what it was I'd just witnessed.

When the TV reported that the Pentagon was hit by a plane, I turned to my boss, our dispatcher and told him I doubted my charter was going to go or any other flying and I was leaving to go home. I went outside and fired up my 170 which I used to commute to LInden from my home airport in Quakertown Pa. Linden is uncontrolled and there was no reason to talk to approach and I usually did not. So upon reaching the departure end of the east/west runway I advanced the throttle and started rolling down the runway. As I came up on the mains and lifted off I noted 3 or 4 police cars rushing into the Linden Airport with lights and sirens going. I just kept flying west to PA as I normally would have. For few seconds I did turn up Newark tower and listen to them landing all the planes. I didn't listen long and turned off the radio. I had no idea I was not suppose to be flying.

Upon my landing at Quakertown on what was otherwise an uneventful flight, the airport manager came running out and asked if I'd been forced down. I said what. Forced down? No, in fact I'd seen no other traffic. He informed me the FAA was grounded all airplanes and forcing them to land.

I was pretty glad to be home.

I will never forget the image of the hole in the west tower which was obviously made by an airplane. I will never forget, the thought that people had likely been killed in front of my eyes and I wondered how many. I remember thinking how could a plane accidentally fly into one of the towers. I will never forget the call from News12 helicopter about the second planes impact and I will never forget the controllers response.

Wow talk about timing ! That was a close one Bruce.

I was working at Wolf Creek nuclear plant, Burlington KS that morning and just happened to look out the window at the beautiful, clear blue sky. I saw a bunch of aircraft contrails going in circles. I thought, that sure is unusual….then someone yelled , “Hey come and look at what’s on TV”. The rest is history.

I had just flown in from ORD to EWR late on the evening of the 10th and was still sleeping in when I got a call to check the TV. I had been flying those aircraft and those trips, but as fate would have it not those exact trips.

I was flying my friend from LI to Middlebury Vermont in my 250 Comanche. He was going to get his Super Cub from his private strip to bring it back to LI. When I landed at Middlebury I called my wife to tell her we made it safely and she said an airplane had hit the WTC. I went into the FBO and asked them to turn on the TV and we saw the second plane hit. I called Flight Service and they said they were stopping all commercial flights but didn’t know about VFR little guys.

We took my friend’s car over to his farm strip and while he was getting the Cub out, I was watching TV and saw the Pentagon get hit. I told him we weren’t flying anywhere anytime soon, which I confirmed with FSS. I realized we had been working Boston Center probably at the same time they realized something was wrong. We got in Don’s car and drove to New London CT and got the ferry to Orient Long Island, complete with armed guards.

When they opened up IFR flying about a week later we drove back to Middlebury and got the Comanche. It was a very tense flight home. You didn’t dare miss a hand off or you were sure to be the subject of an intercept.

On a side note on September 9, 2001 I had my first introduction flight with the Skytypers and did a 5 hour mission as a ride along in the back seat of an SNJ-2. I was supposed to start training on the tenth. I used that year to get my CFI ratings. I never did get back with the Skytypers which is probably for the best. They can only type on nice days with few clouds, the kind of weather I would rather be doing something else with.

I was standing at a makeshift plywood operations counter at Al Jaber Airbase in Kuwait. We were preparing to have our twice weekly Combat Search And Rescue alert brief. I distinctly remember the small 13" color TV set on the counter that was tuned to CNN 24/7 back in the day. Some one said 'look at that" and we began to absorb the scene of black smoke rising from the first tower and the initial reports of a small plane that likely had hit the tower. We went about our preparations, somewhat distracted, and I remember shortly there after seeing the then minutes old video of the Airliner hitting the second tower and saying to myself and those around us that is no accident. That is an attack!

A few minutes later the assembled crews of A-10's, HH-60s and supporting agencies stepping into the adjacent main briefing room from the classified briefing. In the military you just do not interrupt a classified briefing. 10 to 15 minutes into the formal brief there was a knock on the door and we were told that the Pentagon had just been hit by another plane and that the base was going to high alert.

Being a deployed A-10 unit from Connecticut my thoughts went first and foremost to my family members and those of the other hundreds of deployed airmen in our unit that needed to know how things were back home. We were just fine in our heavily defended forward base. We had no idea how those back home were feeling and who had lost loved ones.

That was one strange day. One that we will hopefully prevent from ever occurring again! Diligence is the price of Freedom!