Profile: US Secret Service

President Nixon gives antiwar demonstrators a chance to physically protest the Vietnam War during a campaign rally in Michigan, hoping for favorable press coverage that would denigrate the protesters. According to notes taken by chief of staff H. R. Haldeman, when the demonstrators “tried to storm the door” of the auditorium “after we were in,” they “really hit the motorcade on the way out.” The notes also say: “We wanted some confrontation and there were no hecklers in the hall, so we stalled departure a little so they could zero in outside, and they sure did. Before getting in car, P [Nixon] stood up and gave the ‘V’ sign, which made them mad. They threw rocks, flags, candles, etc, as we drove out, after a terrifying flying wedge of cops opened up the road. Rock hit my car, driver hit brakes, car stalled, car behind hit us, rather scary as rocks were flying, etc, but we all caught up and got out. Bus windows smashed, etc. Made a huge incident and we worked hard to crank it up, should make a really major story and might be effective.” The local police chief says only “an act of God” allows Nixon to escape; the Secret Service goes into an assassination alert. Nixon is so excited and pleased by the events that he nearly burns down his house in San Clemente, California, trying to light a fire in the fireplace. Laughing, Nixon refuses to leave the house, saying he likes the smell of smoke, and retells the story of the rally over and over to his aides. [Reeves, 2001, pp. 270-271]

President Nixon, regretting his removal of the secret tape recorders in the White House left behind by former president Lyndon Johnson, orders the installation of a sophisticated, secret taping system in the Oval Office and Cabinet Room, which will, when activated, record every spoken word and telephone conversation in either chamber (see July 13-16, 1973). The Oval Office’s microphones will be voice-activated; the Cabinet Room’s with a switch. Nixon orders his chief of staff H. R. Haldeman to see to the installation, and to keep it extremely quiet. Haldeman delegates the installation to aides Lawrence Higby and Alexander Butterfield. Haldeman decides the Army Signal Corps should not install the system because someone in that group might report back to the Pentagon; instead he has the Secret Service’s technical security division install it. The work is done late at night; five microphones are embedded in Nixon’s Oval Office desk, and two more in the wall light fixtures on either side of the fireplace, over the couch and chairs where Nixon often greets visitors. All three phones are wiretapped. By February 16, the system in both chambers is in place. All conversations are recorded on Sony reel-to-reel tape recorders, with Secret Service agents changing the reels every day and storing the tapes in a small, locked room in the Executive Office Building. [Reeves, 2001, pp. 305]

Prosecutor Earl Silbert. [Source: Washington Post]The five men caught burglarizing the Democratic National Committee’s headquarters in the Watergate hotel (see 2:30 a.m.June 17, 1972) are arraigned in a Washington, DC, city court on charges of felony burglary and possession of implements of crime. All five originally gave the police false names. [Washington Post, 6/18/1972] The real identities of the five are:
Bernard Barker of Miami, a Cuban-American whom Cuban exiles say has worked on and off for the CIA since the 1961 Bay of Pigs invasion. Barker was one of the principal leaders of the Cuban Revolutionary Council, the exile organization established with CIA help to organize the Bay of Pigs invasion. Barker’s wife reportedly told attorney Douglas Caddy, one of the team’s lawyers, that, as Caddy says, “her husband told her to call me if he hadn’t called her by 3 a.m.: that it might mean he was in trouble.” [Washington Post, 6/18/1972; Washington Post, 6/19/1972] Barker owns a Miami real estate firm, Barker & Associates. [O.T. Jacobson, 7/5/1974 ]
Virgilio Gonzalez, a Miami locksmith of Cuban extraction. Gonzalez’s boss, Harry Collot, says Gonzalez came to the US about the time Fidel Castro became well-known, and is an ardent opponent of the Castro regime. Collot describes Gonzalez as “pro-American and anti-Castro… he doesn’t rant or rave like some of them do.”
Eugenio Martinez, a real estate agent from Miami, who authorities say is active in anti-Castro activities in Florida, and violated US immigration laws in 1958 by flying a private plane to Cuba.
James W. McCord, the security director for the Committee for the Re-election of the President (CREEP). McCord initially identifies himself as “Edward Martin,” a former CIA agent and “security consultant” who resides in New York City and possibly the DC area. Neither the police or the press are aware, at the moment, of McCord’s true identity (see June 19, 1972).
Frank Sturgis, a former Cuban army intelligence officer, mercenary, and now the agent for a Havana salvage firm in Miami. Sturgis uses the alias “Frank Florini” during the arraignment. “Fiorini” was identified in 1959 by the Federal Aviation Agency as the pilot of a plane that dropped anti-Castro leaflets over Havana. Previous news reports describe “Fiorini” as a “soldier of fortune” and the former head of the International Anti-Communist Brigade, an organization formed after the disastrous Bay of Pigs invasion of 1962. The Brigade trained and ferried 23 Cuban exiles into Cuba, where they began guerrilla operations against Castro. “Florini” reportedly fought with, not against, Castro during the Cuban revolution and was originally slated to be named overseer of Cuba’s gambling operations before Castro shut down Cuba’s casinos. Apparently, Sturgis is involved in trying to orchestrate Miami Cubans to demonstrate against the Democratic National Convention, to be held in Miami in July. Sturgis is also involved in the John Birch Society and the Reverend Billy James Hargis’s Christian Crusade.
During their arraignment, one of the burglars describes the team as “anti-Communists,” and the others nod in agreement. Prosecutor Earl Silbert calls the operation “professional” and “clandestine.” The court learns that four of the five, all using fictitious names, rented two rooms at the Watergate, and dined together in the Watergate restaurant on February 14. A search of the two rooms turns up $4,200, again in sequential $100 bills, more burglary tools, and more electronic surveillance equipment, all stashed in six suitcases. Currently, FBI and Secret Service agents are investigating the burglary. Caddy, who says he met Barker a year ago at the Army Navy Club and had a “sympathetic conversation [with Barker]—that’s all I’ll say,” attempts to stay in the background during the arraignment, instead having another attorney, Joseph Rafferty Jr, plead before the court. Caddy is a corporate lawyer with no criminal law experience. [Washington Post, 6/18/1972; Washington Post, 6/19/1972] Interestingly, Caddy shows up at the arraignment apparently without any of the burglars contacting him (see June 17, 1972). [Woodward, 2005, pp. 35] Silbert argues unsuccessfully that the five should be held without bail, citing their use of fictitious names, their lack of community ties, and the likelihood that they would flee the country after they post bail. “They were caught red-handed,” Silbert tells the court. [Washington Post, 6/18/1972; Washington Post, 6/19/1972]

David Lane, a member of the secretive white supremacist group The Order (see Late September 1983) and one of the group members responsible for murdering Denver radio host Alan Berg (see June 18, 1984 and After), gives $30,000 in counterfeit bills (see December 3-23, 1983) to Thomas Martinez in Philadelphia. Martinez is not a member of The Order, but has reluctantly agreed to pass on the bills on the group’s behalf. Martinez ignores Lane’s advice to pass on the bills in New Jersey and not his own neighborhood, and passes over $1,500 in neighborhood stores. On June 28, he is arrested after a liquor store owner alerts authorities about the fake bills. Martinez is questioned by the Secret Service, but though he is fully aware of The Order’s array of crimes, tells his questioners nothing. He telephones Order leader Robert Jay Mathews, asking that he give him $1,600 for an attorney. Mathews tells Martinez to be patient, that the group is planning another robbery (see March 16, 1984 and April 19-23, 1984), and he will then send him the money. [HistoryLink, 12/6/2006]

Frank Corder piloted this Cessna, which crashed into the White House lawn and skidded up to the side of the building. [Source: Getty Images]A suicidal and apparently apolitical pilot named Frank Corder steals a single-engine plane from an airport north of Baltimore, Maryland, and attempts to crash it into the White House. He crashes into a wall two stories below the presidential bedroom (President Clinton is not there at the time). Corder is killed on impact. [Time, 9/26/1994; New York Times, 10/3/2001] A Time magazine story shortly after the incident notes, “The unlikely incident confirmed all too publicly what security officials have long feared in private: the White House is vulnerable to sneak attack from the air. ‘For years I have thought a terrorist suicide pilot could readily divert his flight from an approach to Washington to blow up the White House,’ said Richard Helms, CIA director from 1966 to 1972.” The article further notes that an attack of this type had been a concern since 1974, when a disgruntled US Army private staged an unauthorized helicopter landing on the South Lawn. Special communications lines were established between the Secret Service and Washington’s National Airport control tower to the Secret Service operations center, but the line is ineffective in this case because no flight controller pays attention to the flight in time. [Time, 9/26/1994]

The Alfred P. Murrah Building after being bombed. [Source: CBS News]A truck bomb destroys the Alfred P. Murrah Federal Building in Oklahoma City, killing 168 people in America’s worst domestic terrorist attack. Timothy McVeigh, later convicted in the bombing, has ideological roots both in the Patriot world and among neo-Nazis like William Pierce, whose novel, The Turner Diaries (see 1978), served as a blueprint for the attack. [Washington Post, 4/20/1995; Southern Poverty Law Center, 6/2001; Clarke, 2004, pp. 127] Initially, many believe that no American set off the bomb, and suspect Islamist terrorists of actually carrying out the bombing (see 10:00 a.m. April 19, 1995 and After). Their suspicions prove groundless. Investigators will find that the bomb is constructed of some 5,000 pounds of ammonium nitrate and fuel oil, carried in 20 or so blue plastic 55-gallon barrels arranged inside a rented Ryder truck (see April 15, 1995). The bomb is detonated by a slow-burning safety fuse, most likely lit by hand. The fuse is attached to a much faster-burning detonation cord (“det cord”) which ignites the fertilizer and fuel-oil mixture. [New York Times, 4/27/1995] The Murrah Federal Building houses a number of federal agencies, including offices for the Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco and Firearms (BATF); the Social Security Administration; the Housing and Urban Development (HUD), Veterans Affairs, and Agriculture departments; and the Secret Service. [Washington Post, 4/20/1995] It encompasses an entire city block, between 5th and 4th Streets and Harvey and Robinson Streets, and features a U-shaped, indented drive on 5th that allows for quick pickup and delivery parking. The entire building’s facade on this side is made of glass, allowing passersby to see into the offices in the building, as well as into the America’s Kids day care center on the second floor, which by this time is filling with children. It is in this driveway that McVeigh parks his truck. [Serrano, 1998, pp. 99-102]
Entering the City - McVeigh drives into Oklahoma City, entering around 8:30 a.m. from his overnight stop in Ponca City, Oklahoma; the details reported of his entrance into the city vary (see 7:00 a.m. - 8:35 a.m., April 19, 1995). At 8:55 a.m., a security camera captures the Ryder truck as it heads towards downtown Oklahoma City [Douglas O. Linder, 2006] , a sighting bolstered by three people leaving the building who later say they saw the truck parked in front of the Murrah Building around this time. At 8:57, a security camera captures an image of McVeigh’s Ryder truck being parked outside the Murrah Building in a handicapped zone. One survivor of the blast, Marine recruiter Michael Norfleet, later recalls seeing the Ryder truck parked just outside the building next to the little circle drive on 5th Street leading up to the main entrance of the building. Norfleet had parked his black Ford Ranger in front of the Ryder.
McVeigh Lights Fuses - McVeigh drives the Ryder truck west past the Murrah Building on NW Fourth Street, turns north on a one-way street, and turns right on Fifth Street. He pulls the truck over and parks near the Firestone store, next to a chain-link fence. He then lights the five-minute fuses from inside the cab (see 8:15 a.m. and After, April 18, 1995), sets the parking brake, drops the key behind the seat, opens the door, locks the truck, exits, and shuts the door behind him. A man later claims to have hit his brakes to avoid someone matching McVeigh’s description as he crossed Fifth Street around 9:00 a.m. McVeigh walks quickly toward a nearby YMCA building where he has hidden his getaway car, a battered yellow Mercury Marquis (see April 13, 1995), in the adjoining alleyway, crossing Robinson Street and crossing another street to get to the alleyway. He begins to jog as he approaches his car. He later says he remembers a woman looking at him as she is walking down the steps to enter the building; he will describe her as white, in her mid-30s, with dirty blonde hair. According to McVeigh’s own recollection, he is about 20 feet into the alley when the bomb goes off. [Stickney, 1996, pp. 184-185; PBS Frontline, 1/22/1996; Serrano, 1998, pp. 158; Douglas O. Linder, 2006; The Oklahoman, 4/2009]
Truck Explodes - At 9:02 a.m., the truck explodes, destroying most of the Murrah Building and seriously damaging many nearby buildings. Eventually, it will be determined that 168 people die in the blast, including 19 children. Over 500 are injured. The children are in the second-story day care center just above the parking space where McVeigh leaves the Ryder truck. McVeigh will later tell his biographers that he is lifted off his feet by the power of the blast.
Devastation and Death - When the bomb detonates, the day care center and the children plummet into the basement. The building, constructed with large glass windows, collapses, sending a wave of flying glass shards and debris into the building and the surrounding area. The oldest victim is 73-year-old Charles Hurlbert, who has come to the Social Security office on the first floor. Hurlbert’s wife Jean, 67, also dies in the blast. The youngest victim is four-month-old Gabeon Bruce, whose mother is also in the Social Security office. One victim, Rebecca Anderson, is a nurse who runs towards the building to render assistance. She never makes it to the building; she is struck in the head by a piece of falling debris and will die in a hospital four days after the blast. Her heart and kidneys will be transplanted into survivors of the bombing. [Denver Post, 6/3/1997; New York Times, 6/3/1997; Serrano, 1998, pp. 153-154; Oklahoma City Journal Record, 3/29/2001] Sherri Sparks, who has friends still unaccounted for in the building, tells a reporter in the hours after the blast, “Oh, I can’t stand the thought of… those innocent children, sitting there playing, thinking they’re safe, and then this happens.” The explosion leaves a 30-foot-wide, 8-foot-deep crater in the street that is covered by the wreckage of the building’s upper floors. The north face of the nine-story building collapses entirely. [Washington Post, 4/20/1995; Washington Post, 4/22/1995] Mary Heath, a psychologist who works about 20 blocks from the Murrah Building, says the blast “shook the daylights out of things—it scared us to death. We felt the windows shake before we heard the noise.” In a neighboring building, a Water Resources Board meeting is just commencing; the audiotape of the meeting captures the sound of the blast (see 9:02 a.m. and After, April 19, 1995). [Washington Post, 4/20/1995; The Oklahoman, 4/2009] Norfleet, trapped in the Marine Corps office, is thrown into a wall by the explosion. His skull is fractured, and a shard of glass punctures his right eye. Three separate arteries are pierced, and Norfleet begins bleeding heavily. Two supply sergeants in the office are far less injured; Norfleet asks one, “How bad am I hurt?” and one replies, “Sir, you look really bad.” One of the two begins giving Norfleet first aid; Norfleet later recalls: “He immediately went into combat mode and started taking care of me. He laid me on a table and he started looking for bandages to administer first aid. And while I was laying on that table, I just knew that I was losing strength and that if I stayed in the building, I would die.” Norfleet wraps a shirt around his head and face to slow the bleeding, and the two sergeants help him to the stairs, through the fallen rubble, and eventually out. Norfleet will later say that he follows “a blood trail of somebody that had gone down the steps before me” to get outside, where he is quickly put into an ambulance. He loses almost half his body’s blood supply and his right eye. He will never fly again, and will soon be discharged for medical incapacity. [Serrano, 1998, pp. 161-162] Eighteen-month-old Phillip Allen, called “P.J.” by his parents, miraculously survives the blast. The floor gives way beneath him and he plunges 18 feet to land on the stomach of an adult worker on the floor below, Calvin Johnson. Landing on Johnson’s stomach saves P.J.‘s life. Johnson is knocked unconscious by the blast and by the impact of the little boy falling on him, but when he awakes, he carries the toddler to safety. P.J.‘s grandfather calls the child “Oklahoma’s miracle kid,” and media reports use the label when retelling the story of the miraculous rescue. P.J. is one of six children in the day care center to survive the blast. [Stickney, 1996, pp. 275-277] Some people later report their belief that the Murrah Building was rocked by a second explosion just moments after the first one, the second coming from a secure area managed by the Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco and Firearms (BATF) that illegally stored explosives. Law professor Douglas O. Linder will later write, “Both seismic evidence and witness testimony supports the ‘two blast theory.’” [Douglas O. Linder, 2006] That theory is later disputed (see After 9:02 a.m. April 19, 1995).
Explosion's Effects Felt Miles Away - Buildings near the Murrah are also damaged, seven severely, including the Journal Record newspaper building, the offices of Southwestern Bell, the Water Resources Board, an Athenian restaurant, the YMCA, a post office building, and the Regency Tower Hotel. Two Water Resources Board employees and a restaurant worker are killed in the blast. The Journal Record building loses its roof. Assistant Fire Chief Jon Hansen later recalls, “The entire block looked like something out of war-torn Bosnia.” Every building within four blocks of the Murrah suffers some effects. A United Parcel Service truck 10 miles away has its windows shattered by the blast. Cars in parking lots around the area catch fire and burn. Millions of sheets of paper, and an innumerable number of glass shards, shower down for hundreds of feet around the building. [Stickney, 1996, pp. 28-30]
Truck Axle Crushes Nearby Car - Richard Nichols (no relation to bomber Timothy McVeigh’s co-conspirator Terry Nichols), a maintenance worker standing with his wife a block and a half away from the Murrah Building, is spun around by the force of the blast. They throw open the back door of their car and begin taking their young nephew Chad Nichols out of the back seat, when Richard sees a large shaft of metal hurtling towards them. The “humongous object… spinning like a boomerang,” as Richard later describes it, hits the front of their Ford Festiva, smashing the windshield, crushing the front end, driving the rear end high into the air, and sending the entire car spinning backwards about 10 feet. Chad is not seriously injured. The metal shaft is the rear axle of the Ryder truck. Later, investigators determine that it weighs 250 pounds and was blown 575 feet from where the truck was parked. Governor Frank Keating (R-OK) points out the axle to reporters when he walks the scene a day or so later, causing some media outlets to incorrectly report that Keating “discovered” the axle. The scene will take investigators days to process for evidence. [Stickney, 1996, pp. 32; New York Times, 6/3/1997; Serrano, 1998, pp. 187-189]
First Responders Begin Arriving - Within minutes, survivors begin evacuating the building, and first responders appear on the scene (see 9:02 a.m. - 10:35 a.m. April 19, 1995).
McVeigh's Getaway - McVeigh flees the bomb site in his Mercury getaway car (see 9:02 a.m. and After, April 19, 1995), but is captured less than 90 minutes later (see 9:03 a.m. -- 10:17 a.m. April 19, 1995).

After Presidential Decision Directive 39 (PDD-39), issued in June 1995 (see June 21, 1995), requires key federal agencies to maintain well-exercised counterterrorist capabilities, the number of counterterrorism exercises being conducted increases significantly. According to a 1999 report by the General Accounting Office, whereas 32 counterterrorist exercises are held between June 1995 and June 1996, from June 1997 to June 1998, 116 such exercises are conducted. Some of the exercises held between June 1995 and June 1998 are “tabletop exercises,” where participants work through a scenario around a table or in a classroom and discuss how their agency might react; others are “field exercises,” where an agency’s leadership and operational units practice their skills in a realistic field setting. Four exercises during this period are “no-notice” exercises, where participants have no advance notice of the exercise. These four exercises are conducted by either the Department of Defense (DoD) or the Department of Energy. DoD leads 97 of the exercises—almost half of the total—held between June 1995 and June 1998. The Secret Service leads 46, the FBI 24, and the Federal Emergency Management Agency (FEMA) leads 16. Most of the exercises are conducted in the US and are based around the scenario of a domestic terrorist attack. Although intelligence agencies have determined that conventional explosives and firearms continue to be the weapons of choice for terrorists, the majority of exercises are based around scenarios involving weapons of mass destruction (WMD)—chemical, biological, or nuclear weapons or agents. More than two-thirds of the exercises have WMD scenarios, with the most common WMD being chemical agents, such as sarin. The other exercises have more traditional and more likely scenarios involving conventional weapons and explosives. [United States General Accounting Office, 6/25/1999 ; Washington Post, 10/2/2001]

Ptech logo. [Source: Ptech]Ptech is a Boston computer company connected to a number of individuals suspected of ties to officially designated terrorist organizations (see 1994). These alleged ties will be of particular concern because of Ptech’s potential access to classified government secrets. Ptech specializes in what is called enterprise architecture. It is the design and layout for an organization’s computer networks. John Zachman, considered the father of enterprise architecture, later will say that Ptech could collect crucial information from the organizations and agencies with which it works. “You would know where the access points are, you’d know how to get in, you would know where the weaknesses are, you’d know how to destroy it.” Another computer expert will say, “The software they put on your system could be collecting every key stroke that you type while you are on the computer. It could be establishing a connection to the outside terrorist organization through all of your security measures.” [WBZ 4 (Boston), 12/9/2002] In late 1996, an article notes that Ptech is doing work for DARPA, a Defense Department agency responsible for developing new military technology. [Government Executive, 9/1/1996] In 1997, Ptech gains government approval to market its services to “all legislative, judicial, and executive branches of the federal government.” Beginning that year, Ptech will begin working for many government agencies, eventually including the White House, Congress, Army, Navy, Air Force, NATO, FAA, FBI, US Postal Service, Secret Service, the Naval Air Systems Command, IRS, and the nuclear-weapons program of the Department of Energy. For instance, Ptech will help build “the Military Information Architecture Framework, a software tool used by the Department of Defense to link data networks from various military computer systems and databases.” Ptech will be raided by US investigators in December 2002 (see December 5, 2002), but not shut down. [Wall Street Journal, 12/6/2002; CNN, 12/6/2002; Newsweek, 12/6/2002; Boston Globe, 12/7/2002] A former director of intelligence at the Department of Energy later will say he would not be surprised if an al-Qaeda front company managed to infiltrate the department’s nuclear programs. [Unlimited (Auckland), 12/9/2002] Ptech will continue to work with many of these agencies even after 9/11. After a Customs Department raid of Ptech’s offices in late 2002, their software will be declared safe of malicious code. But one article will note, “What no one knows at this point is how much sensitive government information Ptech gained access to while it worked in several government agencies.” [WBZ 4 (Boston), 12/9/2002]

Bill Clinton is re-inaugurated as president. An extensive set of security measures to prevent airplanes as weapons crashing into the inauguration is used. These measures, first used at the 1996 Atlanta Olympics and thus referred to as the “Atlanta Rules,” include the closing of nearby airspace, the use of intercept helicopters, the basing of armed fighters nearby, and more. This plan will later be used for the 1999 North Atlantic Treaty Organization’s 50th anniversary celebration in Washington, the 2000 Republican convention in Philadelphia, the 2000 Democratic convention in New York, and the George W. Bush inauguration in 2001. [Clarke, 2004, pp. 110-11; Wall Street Journal, 4/1/2004]
Plans for Permanent Air Defense Unit Rejected - At some point near the end of the Clinton administration, the Secret Service and Customs Service will agree to create a permanent air defense unit to protect Washington. However, these agencies are part of the Treasury Department, and the leadership there will refuse to fund the idea. White House counterterrorism “tsar” Richard Clarke will later recount: “Treasury nixed the air defense unit, and my attempts within the White House to overrule them came to naught. The idea of aircraft attacking in Washington seemed remote to many people and the risks of shooting down aircraft in a city were thought to be far too high.” The permanent unit will not be created until after 9/11. [Clarke, 2004, pp. 131; Wall Street Journal, 4/1/2004]

Counterterrorism “tsar” Richard Clarke chairs a tabletop exercise at the White House, involving a scenario where anti-American militants fill a Learjet with explosives, and then fly it on a suicide mission toward a target in Washington, DC. Officials from the Pentagon, Secret Service, and FAA attend, and are asked how they would stop such a threat. Pentagon officials say they could launch fighters from Langley Air Force Base, Virginia, but would need authorization from the president to shoot the plane down, and currently there is no system to do this. The 9/11 Commission later states: “There was no clear resolution of the problem at the exercise.” [Slate, 7/22/2004; 9/11 Commission, 7/24/2004, pp. 345, 457-458]

Paul Nenninger. [Source: KRCU]The US Secret Service runs training exercises that involve computer simulations of planes crashing into the White House, in order to test security there. [Nenninger, 2005, pp. 175]
Plane Crash Scenarios Test White House Security - Secret Service agent Paul Nenninger has, since 1997, been assigned to the Secret Service’s James J. Rowley Training Center in Beltsville, Maryland, where he serves as program manager in charge of the Security and Incident Modeling Lab (SIMLAB). [Nenninger, 2005, pp. 299] In a 2005 book, he will write that from 1998 up until the time of the 9/11 attacks, the Rowley Training Center is “crashing planes into the White House… on a simulation program provided by the military.” This is done “to test the security responses of the various agencies that interact to provide security and support to the White House.” [Nenninger, 2005, pp. 175] The plane crash scenarios are perhaps inspired by an incident in 1994, when a suicidal pilot crashed a Cessna into the White House grounds (see September 11, 1994). Time magazine reported at the time that “security officials have long feared in private [that] the White House is vulnerable to sneak attack from the air.” [Time, 9/26/1994; New York Times, 10/3/2001]
Exercises Held Based on 'Terrorist Attacks on the White House' - Nenninger will not state whether the simulated plane crashes are imagined to be part of a terrorist attack. However, he will comment that simulations “allow you to practice scenarios that can be attempted by a terrorist or other deranged individual.” [Nenninger, 2005, pp. 177-178] And in May 2001, Secretary of the Treasury Paul O’Neill testifies that the Secret Service “holds interagency tabletop exercises in preparation for terrorist attacks on the White House.” However, it is unclear if he is referring to the same exercises as those described by Nenninger. [US Department of the Treasury, 5/8/2001]
Secret Service Uses Advanced Analytical Software - For the simulations, the Secret Service has what Nenninger will describe as “a very good piece of analytical software” called the Joint Conflict and Tactical Simulation (JCATS). This program was developed by the Lawrence Livermore National Laboratory (LLNL) in California. It was released by LLNL in 1998 and distributed to the Secret Service by the Joint Warfighting Center at Fort Monroe, Virginia. [Science and Technology Review, 9/2000; Nenninger, 2005, pp. 176] JCATS can handle things like “alarms” and “FAA radar” in the simulations, according to Nenninger. The computer simulations are particularly popular with the Secret Service’s special operations units, which request “more and more time in SIMLAB.” [Nenninger, 2005, pp. 184-185]
Colleague Says 'You Know All about That' in Response to Attack on WTC - On the morning of September 11, 2001, Nenninger is at the Secret Service headquarters in Washington, DC, for a board meeting. When he and the others there for the meeting learn that a plane has crashed into the World Trade Center, another Secret Service agent in the room points at Nenninger and, referring to the computer simulations he has been involved with, comments, “You know all about that.” [Nenninger, 2005, pp. 175]

Nelson DeMille. [Source: Sandy DeMille]Members of the New York Joint Terrorism Task Force (JTTF) tell a best-selling author that they believe the next terrorist attack in the United States will involve suicide pilots deliberately flying planes into the World Trade Center. [Demille, 2010, pp. xii; Connecticut Post, 8/3/2010] The New York JTTF has exclusive jurisdiction over local terrorism investigations. [City Journal, 10/2001] It has over 140 members, including personnel from the FBI, the New York City Police Department, the Port Authority Police Department, the Secret Service, and the CIA. The task force is “on the forefront of the war against terrorism,” according to the FBI Law Enforcement Bulletin. [FBI Law Enforcement Bulletin, 3/1/1999; Washington Post, 10/23/2002] Thriller writer Nelson DeMille interviews some of its members while carrying out research for his novel The Lion’s Game, which he writes in 1999 and is published in January 2000. [Demille, 2010, pp. xi-xii; Al-Masry Al-Youm, 4/27/2010]
Author Told that 'Suicide Pilots' Will Fly Learjets into the WTC - DeMille will later recall that while he is at 26 Federal Plaza, where the New York JTTF is located, “Just in passing we were talking about the 1993 attack on the World Trade Center” (see February 26, 1993). DeMille wonders if there will be another terrorist attack in the United States. He asks the JTTF personnel: “What do you think the next attack would be? Will there be another attack?” They reply: “Yeah. It’s gonna be the World Trade Center again. They missed it.” [Sirius XM Book Radio, 6/16/2010] (Presumably, when the JTTF personnel say, “They missed it,” they mean that the terrorists failed to cause the WTC to collapse when they bombed it in 1993.) DeMille then asks, “What’s gonna happen?” The JTTF personnel say the next attack will involve “two or three or four Learjets, private jets full of aviation fuel and explosives, flying into the towers.” [WOR, 6/14/2010] The planes, they say, will be “flown into the North and South Towers of the Trade Center” by “suicide pilots.” [Demille, 2010, pp. xii; Connecticut Post, 8/3/2010] The suicide pilots will be “guys who know how to fly and not [how] to land” a plane. [New York Daily News, 9/11/2011]
Terrorists Will Want to Cause 'Maximum Death' - DeMille asks the JTTF personnel why they think the terrorists will specifically target the WTC again. He says: “Why not any other iconic landmark? Why not the Empire State Building?” They tell him it is because the terrorists will be “looking for maximum death.” [WOR, 6/14/2010] This discussion, according to DeMille, takes place “almost two years before the actual events of September 11, 2001.” [Demille, 2010, pp. xii]
JTTF Knows about Arabs Learning to Fly in the US - DeMille will tell the New York Times that the members of the New York JTTF “were all obsessed with the 1993 attack on the World Trade Center, and they were convinced we’d be attacked again.” [New York Times, 11/9/2006] He will say that JTTF personnel “knew” the target of the next terrorist attack in the US would be the WTC. “They were pretty, pretty definite about that,” he will add. [WOR, 6/14/2010] They also “knew that Arabs were training in the United States to fly small planes,” according to DeMille. [Newsweek, 1/23/2002]
JTTF Has 'Foreknowledge' or 'Forethought' of 9/11 - DeMille will write that because of what he is told by the JTTF personnel: “[W]hen the events of the morning of September 11, 2001, unfolded, I was not taken completely unaware. And neither were the people who had spent years investigating terrorist threats to this country.” [Demille, 2010, pp. xii] He will note that the JTTF personnel he talks to are “close to right” about the nature of the next attack in the US. He will say, “They knew the target and they knew the method” the terrorists would use. [Sirius XM Book Radio, 6/16/2010] DeMille will also say that when he sees the attacks on the WTC on September 11, he finds it “just chilling to think that [members of the JTTF] had some, if not foreknowledge, at least some forethought of this.” [77WABC, 5/22/2010] Radio host Glenn Beck will comment that what the JTTF personnel tell DeMille shows that the US government “knew specifically” what the 9/11 attacks would involve. [Premiere Radio Networks, 6/9/2010]

A 1998 presidential directive gave the National Security Council authority to designate important upcoming events as National Special Security Events (NSSEs) (see May 22, 1998). The US Secret Service is in charge of planning and implementing security for NSSEs, and the FBI and FEMA also have major security roles. [CSO Magazine, 9/2004; Scripps Howard News Service, 1/11/2005] Louis Freeh, director of the FBI for much of the 1990s until June 2001, will later tell the 9/11 Commission that in the years 2000 and 2001, the subject of “planes as weapons” was always one of the considerations in the planning of security for “a series of these, as we call them, special events,” and “resources were actually designated to deal with that particular threat.” He confirms that “the use of airplanes, either packed with explosives or otherwise, in suicide missions” was “part of the planning” for NSSEs. [9/11 Commission, 4/13/2004] According to the Secret Service, “there is a tremendous amount of advance planning and coordination” for NSSEs, sometimes taking months or even years. Various training initiatives are conducted, including “simulated attacks and medical emergencies, inter-agency tabletop exercises, and field exercises.” [United States Secret Service, 2002; US Congress, 7/9/2002] Presumably the use of airplanes in suicide missions is incorporated into some of these simulated attacks.

President Clinton visits Pakistan. It is later revealed that the US Secret Service believes that the ISI was so deeply infiltrated by Islamic militant organizations, that it begs Clinton to cancel his visit. Specifically, the US government determined that the ISI had long-standing ties with al-Qaeda. When Clinton decides to go over the Secret Service’s protestations, his security takes extraordinary and unprecedented precautions. For instance, an empty Air Force One is flown into the country, and then Clinton arrives in a small, unmarked plane. [New York Times, 10/29/2001] In an effort not to be seen endorsing Musharraf, he stays in Pakistan for only five hours after visiting India for five days, and he is not photographed shaking hands with Musharraf. Clinton gives a brief speech televised nationally in Pakistan, warning that Pakistan cannot use jihad as foreign policy. “This era does not reward people who struggle in vain to redraw borders with blood,” he says. [Rashid, 2008, pp. 49-50] Clinton meets privately with Pakistani President Pervez Musharraf. Clinton will later recall that he told Musharraf, “If he chose to pursue a peaceful, progressive path, I thought he had a fair chance to succeed, but I told him I thought terrorism would eventually destroy Pakistan from within if he didn’t move against it.” Musharraf is non-committal on most issues Clinton tries to discuss with him. [Clinton, 2005, pp. 902-903]

It is reported that the US Secret Service is using an “air surveillance system” called Tigerwall. This serves to “ensure enhanced physical security at a high-value asset location by providing early warning of airborne threats.” Tigerwall “provides the Secret Service with a geographic display of aircraft activity and provides security personnel long-range camera systems to classify and identify aircraft. Sensor data from several sources are fused to provide a unified sensor display.” [US Department of Defense, 2000; US Department of the Navy, 9/2000, pp. 28 ] Among its responsibilities, the Secret Service protects America’s highest elected officials, including the president and vice president, and also provides security for the White House complex. [US Congress, 5/1/2003] Its largest field office with over 200 employees is in New York, in Building 7 of the World Trade Center. [Tech TV, 7/23/2002] Whether the Secret Service, in New York or Washington, will make use of Tigerwall on 9/11 is unknown. Furthermore, in New York the Secret Service has a Stinger missile secretly stored in the WTC, to be used to protect the president if the city were attacked when he visited. Presumably it keeps this is in Building 7, where its field office is. [Weiss, 2003, pp. 379] As well as Tigerwall, the Secret Service appears to have other air surveillance capabilities. Counterterrorism “tsar” Richard Clarke will describe that on 9/11, the Secret Service had “a system that allowed them to see what FAA’s radar was seeing.” [Clarke, 2004, pp. 7] Barbara Riggs, a future deputy director of the Secret Service who is in its Washington, DC headquarters on 9/11, will describe the Secret Service “monitoring radar” during the attacks. [PCCW Newsletter, 3/2006; Star-Gazette (Elmira), 6/5/2006] Furthermore, since 1974 the Secret Service operations center has possessed a special communications line from the control tower of Ronald Reagan Washington National Airport. This hotline allows air traffic controllers monitoring local radar to inform agents at the White House of any planes that are off course or appear to be on a “threatening vector.” [Time, 9/26/1994]

Abu Hamza al-Masri. [Source: BBC]The Italian Secret Service SISDE records a meeting in the Finsbury Park mosque, in northern London, Britain. Sheikh Abu Hamza al-Masri (an Afghanistan war veteran heading a radical Islamic group), Mustapha Melki (linked to al-Qaeda member Abu Doha—see February 2001), and a man only known as Omar talk to each other. Notes of the meeting state, “Abu Hamza proposed an ambitious but unlikely plot which involved attacks carried by planes.” This is apparently a reference to an attack on the upcoming G8 summit in Genoa, Italy, scheduled in several weeks (see July 20-22, 2001). But unlike other reports of an al-Qaeda attack on that summit, this refers to an attack using more than one plane. The notes of the meeting conclude, “The belief that Osama bin Laden is plotting an attack is spreading among the radical Islamic groups.” [Discovery News, 9/13/2001]

At the request of National Security Adviser Rice and White House Chief of Staff Andrew Card, counterterrorism “tsar” Richard Clarke leads a meeting of the Counterterrorism Security Group, attended by officials from a dozen federal agencies, including the Immigration and Naturalization Service (INS), the FAA, the Coast Guard, the Secret Service, Customs, the CIA, and the FBI. The CIA and FBI give briefings on the growing al-Qaeda threat. [Washington Post, 5/17/2002; Time, 8/4/2002; 9/11 Commission, 7/24/2004, pp. 258] Then Clarke later recalls saying, “You’ve just heard that CIA thinks al-Qaeda is planning a major attack on us. So do I. You heard CIA say it would probably be in Israel or Saudi Arabia. Maybe. But maybe it will be here. Just because there is no evidence that says that it will be here, does not mean it will be overseas. They may try to hit us at home. You have to assume that is what they are going to do.” [Clarke, 2004, pp. 236] Two attendees later recall Clarke stating that “something really spectacular is going to happen here, and it’s going to happen soon.” One who attended the meeting later calls the evidence that “something spectacular” is being planned by al-Qaeda “very gripping.” [Washington Post, 5/17/2002; Time, 8/4/2002; 9/11 Commission, 7/24/2004, pp. 256] Clarke directs every counterterrorist office to cancel vacations, defer non-vital travel, put off scheduled exercises, and place domestic rapid-response teams on much shorter alert. However, there is very poor follow up to the meeting and the attendees don’t share the warnings with their home agencies (see Shortly After July 5, 2001). By early August, all of these emergency measures are no longer in effect. [CNN, 3/2002; Washington Post, 5/17/2002]

The Minnesota FBI office e-mails FBI headquarters on this day, saying it is “imperative” that the Secret Service be warned of the danger that a plot involving Zacarias Moussaoui might pose to the president’s safety. However, no such warning is ever sent. [US Congress, 10/17/2002; New York Times, 10/18/2002]

After 9/11, both the SEC and the Secret Service announce probes into an unusually high volume trade of five-year US Treasury note purchases around this time. These transactions include a single $5 billion trade. The Wall Street Journal explains: “Five-year Treasury notes are among the best investments in the event of a world crisis, especially one that hits the US. The notes are prized for their safety and their backing by the US government, and usually rally when investors flee riskier investments, such as stocks.” The value of these notes has risen sharply since the events of September 11. The article also points out that with these notes, “tracks would be hard to spot.” [Wall Street Journal, 10/2/2001]

Infocom logo. [Source: Infocom]The US Joint Terrorism Task Force conducts a three-day raid of the offices of InfoCom Corporation, a Texas-based company that hosts about 500 mostly Arab websites, including Al Jazeera, the Arab world’s most popular news channel. [Guardian, 9/10/2001; Web Host Industry Review, 9/10/2001] Three days after the initial raid, the task force is “still busy inside the building, reportedly copying every hard disc they could find. It is not clear how long these websites remain shut down.” [Guardian, 9/10/2001] InfoCom began to be seriously investigated by the FBI in late 1998 when the name of an employee was discovered in the address book of bin Laden’s former personal secretary. There also was evidence of a financial link between InfoCom and a top Hamas leader (see October 1994-2001). InfoCom is closely connected to the Holy Land Foundation. Not only are the two organizations across the road from each other in Richardson, Texas, a number of employees work at both organizations. For instance, Ghassan Elashi is both the vice president of InfoCom and chairman of Holy Land. [Guardian, 9/10/2001; New York Times, 12/20/2002] A local bank closes Holy Land’s checking accounts totaling about $13 million around the same time as the raid on InfoCom, but Holy Land’s assets are not officially frozen by the government. [Dallas Business Journal, 9/7/2001] The US will shut down Holy Land and freeze their assets two months later (see December 4, 2001) for suspected ties to Hamas. Holy Land is represented by Akin, Gump, Strauss, Hauer & Feld, a Washington, D.C., law firm with unusually close ties to the Bush White House. [Washington Post, 12/17/2001] In 2002, the five brothers running InfoCom will be charged of selling computer equipment overseas in violation of anti-terrorism laws and of supporting Hamas by giving money to Hamas leader Mousa Abu Marzouk through 2001. In 2004, the five brothers will be convicted of the first charge, and in 2005, three brothers will be convicted of the second charge.(see December 18, 2002-April 2005). On a possibly connected note, in the Garland suburb adjoining Richardson, a fifth-grade boy apparently has foreknowledge of 9/11 (see September 10, 2001). [Houston Chronicle, 9/19/2001]

President Bush has just spent the night at the Colony Beach and Tennis Resort on Longboat Key, Florida. [Sarasota Herald-Tribune, 9/10/2002] He wakes up around 6:00 a.m. and is preparing for his morning jog. [New York Times, 9/16/2001; Daily Telegraph, 12/16/2001; MSNBC, 10/27/2002] A van occupied by men of Middle Eastern descent arrives at the Colony Beach Resort, stating they have a “poolside” interview with the president. They do not have an appointment and are turned away. [Longboat Observer, 9/26/2001] Some question whether this was an assassination attempt modeled on the one used on Afghan leader Ahmed Massoud two days earlier (see September 9, 2001). [Time, 8/4/2002] Longboat Key Fire Marshal Carroll Mooneyhan was reported to have overheard the conversation between the men and the Secret Service, but he later denies the report. The newspaper that reported this, the Longboat Observer stands by its story. [St. Petersburg Times, 7/4/2004] Witnesses recall seeing Mohamed Atta in the Longboat Key Holiday Inn a short distance from where Bush was staying as recently as September 7, the day Bush’s Sarasota appearance was publicly announced (see September 7, 2001). [Longboat Observer, 11/21/2001; St. Petersburg Times, 7/4/2004]

UN General Assembly Hall. [Source: UN]Preparations are underway in New York City for the upcoming meeting of the United Nations General Assembly. [US Congress, 4/23/2002] The Secret Service has an additional 100 employees in the city for this event. [PCCW Newsletter, 3/2006] Four communications soldiers from the 1108th Signal Brigade are also temporarily assigned to New York to support the Secret Service. [Fort Detrick Standard, 10/18/2001] Presumably, the specific event being prepared for is the General Assembly’s annual gathering of world leaders, scheduled for September 24 to October 5, which President Bush is due to address on September 24. [Reuters, 9/12/2001; Associated Press, 10/29/2001] For example, one report says Secret Service Officer Craig Miller is in New York today “to do advance security work for President Bush’s then upcoming visit to the United Nations General Assembly.” [American Rifleman, 2/2002; United States Secret Service, 4/29/2002 ] The General Assembly is designated as a National Special Security Event (NSSE). [New York Times, 11/10/2001; US Congress, 7/9/2002; US Department of Homeland Security, 7/9/2003] Since 1998, the National Security Council has been authorized to designate important upcoming events as NSSEs (see May 22, 1998), which puts the Secret Service in charge of the planning and implementation of security. [United States Secret Service, 2002] It is unclear whether the UN General Assembly received NSSE status prior to 9/11, or is later designated as an NSSE due to the attacks. However, the UN’s previous ‘Millennium Summit’ in New York in September 2000 was an NSSE. [US Department of the Treasury, 2000, pp. 177 ; US Congress, 6/29/2000; White House, 1/10/2002] And in 2003, Secret Service Director Ralph Basham states: “Each year, the UNGA [United Nations General Assembly] is a manpower and resource intensive effort for the Secret Service.” [US Congress, 5/1/2003] So it seems likely that it was designated as an NSSE before 9/11. There are questions about how preparations for an NSSE could have affected security in New York. The Secret Service says it conducts a “tremendous amount of advance planning and coordination” for NSSEs, involving a “variety of training initiatives,” which include, “simulated attacks and medical emergencies.” [United States Secret Service, 2002] Furthermore, former FBI Director Louis Freeh will later tell the 9/11 Commission that in 2000 and 2001, the use of airplanes by terrorists in suicide missions “was part of the planning” for NSSEs. [9/11 Commission, 4/13/2004] Whether any such preparations are taking place in New York on or around 9/11 is unknown. The Secret Service is also mandated to create capabilities for achieving “airspace security” over NSSEs, which include “air interdiction teams” used to detect and identify aircraft that violate the restricted airspace above the event. [US Congress, 3/30/2000; Security Management, 2/2002] Again, whether such capabilities are already available in New York in advance of the UN General Assembly is unknown. Even though only four or five events per year are designated as NSSEs, preparations are also underway in the Washington, DC area for a separate NSSE (see 8:30 a.m. September 11, 2001). [US Department of Homeland Security, 7/9/2003; US Department of Homeland Security, 11/8/2004] The UN General Assembly’s gathering of world leaders will be cancelled due to the 9/11 attacks but is rescheduled for November. [CBS News, 9/19/2001; BBC, 11/10/2001; Guardian, 11/10/2001]

Preparations are already underway for the annual meetings of the International Monetary Fund (IMF) and the World Bank, which are scheduled to take place in Washington, DC on September 29-30, 2001. Many of the agencies that will be involved in the emergency response to the Pentagon attack, including the Arlington County Fire Department, are engaged in preparations for the IMF/World Bank event (see 8:30 a.m. September 11, 2001). [United Press International, 9/6/2001; US Department of Health and Human Services, 7/2002, pp. A-4; 9/11 Commission, 5/19/2004; 9/11 Commission, 7/24/2004, pp. 314] The meetings have been designated as a National Special Security Event (NSSE). [New York Times, 8/18/2001; Euromoney, 9/1/2001] The Secret Service is in charge of security for NSSEs. [United States Secret Service, 2002] The FBI and FEMA also have key roles. [CSO Magazine, 9/2004; Scripps Howard News Service, 1/11/2005] There are questions about how preparations for an NSSE might have affected security around Washington. When preparing for such an event, the Secret Service carries out “a tremendous amount of advance planning and coordination in the areas of venue and motorcade route security, communications, credentialing, and training.” It conducts a “variety of training initiatives,” including “simulated attacks and medical emergencies, inter-agency tabletop exercises, and field exercises.” [United States Secret Service, 2002] According to former FBI Director Louis Freeh, in 2000 and 2001 the use of airplanes by terrorists in suicide missions is “part of the planning” for NSSEs. [9/11 Commission, 4/13/2004] Also, the Secret Service is mandated to create capabilities for achieving “airspace security” over NSSEs. [US Congress, 3/30/2000] But whether it has such capabilities already in place around Washington is unknown. Though there are only about four or five NSSEs each year, preparations also happen to be underway in New York for another possible NSSE (see 8:30 a.m. September 11, 2001). [US Department of Homeland Security, 7/9/2003; US Department of Homeland Security, 11/8/2004] The IMF/World Bank event will be cancelled due to the 9/11 attacks. [CBS News, 9/17/2001]

Soldier firing a Stinger missile. [Source: US Army]In New York, the Secret Service has a Stinger missile secretly stored in the World Trade Center, to be used to protect the president if the city were attacked when he visits it. Presumably it keeps this is in WTC Building 7, where its field office is. [Tech TV, 7/23/2002; Weiss, 2003, pp. 379] Stinger missiles provide short-range air defense against low-altitude airborne targets, such as fix-winged aircraft, helicopters, and cruise missiles. They have a range of between one and eight kilometers. [Federation of American Scientists, 8/9/2000; GlobalSecurity (.org), 4/27/2005] Whether the Secret Service makes any attempt at defending New York from the two attacking planes with its Stinger missile is unknown. The agency is also known to have air surveillance capabilities. These include a system called Tigerwall, which provides “early warning of airborne threats” and “a geographic display of aircraft activity” (see (September 2000 and after)). And according to Barbara Riggs, who is in the Secret Service’s Washington, DC headquarters on this day, the agency is “able to receive real time information about other hijacked aircraft,” through “monitoring radar and activating an open line with the FAA.” [US Department of the Navy, 9/2000, pp. 28 ; PCCW Newsletter, 3/2006; Star-Gazette (Elmira), 6/5/2006] These capabilities would presumably be of use if the Secret Service wanted to defend the World Trade Center. Furthermore, according to the British defense publication Jane’s Land-Based Air Defence, “the American president’s residences in Washington and elsewhere are protected by specialist Stinger teams in case of an aerial attack by terrorist organizations.” [Jane's Land-Based Air Defence, 10/13/2000] Knight Ridder has previously reported “several sources” telling it, “Stinger missiles are in the Secret Service’s arsenal.” [Knight Ridder, 9/12/1994] And according to the London Telegraph, the Secret Service is “believed to have a battery of ground-to-air Stinger missiles” ready to defend the White House. [Daily Telegraph, 9/16/2001] Flight 77 reportedly comes within four miles of the White House before turning toward the Pentagon. [ABC News, 10/24/2001; USA Today, 8/13/2002] Whether the Secret Service makes any attempt at defending the place with its Stinger missiles is unknown. However, the Washington Post will later claim it is an “urban legend that Stinger missiles are mounted on the White House roof.” [Washington Post, 4/4/2002]

Shortly after the WTC is hit, the FAA opens a telephone line with the Secret Service to keep the White House informed of all events. [ [Sources: Richard (“Dick”) Cheney] A few days later, Vice President Cheney will state, “The Secret Service has an arrangement with the FAA. They had open lines after the World Trade Center was…” (He stopped himself before finishing the sentence.) [MSNBC, 9/16/2001]

According to a statement by two high-level FAA officials, “Within minutes after the first aircraft hit the World Trade Center, the FAA immediately established several phone bridges [i.e., telephone conference calls] that included FAA field facilities, the FAA command center, FAA headquarters, [Defense Department], the Secret Service, and other government agencies.” The FAA shares “real-time information on the phone bridges about the unfolding events, including information about loss of communication with aircraft, loss of transponder signals, unauthorized changes in course, and other actions being taken by all the flights of interest, including Flight 77. Other parties on the phone bridges in turn shared information about actions they were taken.” The statement says, “The US Air Force liaison to the FAA immediately joined the FAA headquarters phone bridge and established contact with NORAD on a separate line.” [9/11 Commission, 5/23/2003] Another account says the phone bridges are “quickly established” by the Air Traffic Services Cell (ATSC). This is a small office at the FAA’s Herndon Command Center, which is staffed by three military officers at the time of the attacks (see (Between 9:04 a.m. and 9:25 a.m.) September 11, 2001). It serves as the center’s liaison with the military. According to Aviation Week and Space Technology, the phone bridges link “key players, such as NORAD’s command center, area defense sectors, key FAA personnel, airline operations, and the NMCC.” [Aviation Week and Space Technology, 6/10/2002; 9/11 Commission, 6/17/2004] According to an FAA transcript of employee conversations on 9/11, one of the phone bridges, between the FAA Command Center, the operations center at FAA headquarters, and air traffic control centers in Boston and New York, begins before Flight 11 hits the World Trade Center at 8:46 (see 8:46 a.m. September 11, 2001). [Federal Aviation Administration, 10/14/2003, pp. 3-10 ] If these accounts are correct, it means someone at NORAD should learn about Flight 77 when it deviates from its course (see (8:54 a.m.) September 11, 2001). However, the 9/11 Commission will later claim that the FAA teleconference is established about 30 minutes later (see (9:20 a.m.) September 11, 2001). The Air Force liaison to the FAA will claim she only joins it after the Pentagon is hit (see (Shortly After 9:37 a.m.) September 11, 2001).

While he is waiting outside Vice President Dick Cheney’s office for a scheduled meeting, Cheney’s chief speechwriter John McConnell has been chatting with Cheney’s secretary Debbie Heiden and the Secret Service agent posted at the door. They all see the news about the first plane hitting the World Trade Center on the television above Heiden’s desk. McConnell later recalls, “There wasn’t any kind of alarm. It was just kind of, ‘Oh man, look at that.’” The Secret Service agent then receives an urgent call from the agency’s intelligence division. According to McConnell, “He put the phone down and told me: passenger jet. And that’s when you go, Geez. And then you start getting a sick feeling. Because a passenger aircraft is not going to crash into the World Trade Center.” [Hayes, 2007, pp. 329-330] But, according to the 9/11 Commission, it is not until they learn of the second crash at 9:03 that nearly everyone in the White House realizes this is not an accident (see (Between 8:46 a.m. and 9:00 a.m.) September 11, 2001). [9/11 Commission, 7/24/2004, pp. 35]

According to a soldier at the scene, WTC Building 7 is evacuated before the second tower is hit. [Fort Detrick Standard, 10/18/2001] The National Institute of Standards and Technology (NIST) states, “As the second aircraft struck WTC 2, a decision was made to evacuate WTC 7.” This would be just after the Port Authority Police Department called for the evacuation of the entire WTC complex (see 8:59 a.m.-9:02 a.m. September 11, 2001). But by this time, “many WTC 7 occupants [have] already left the building and others [have] begun a self-evacuation of the building.” [National Institute of Standards and Technology, 9/2005, pp. 109] All individuals in the Secret Service’s New York field office, located in WTC 7, were ordered to evacuate after the first attack, and they are in the process of doing so when the second plane hits the South Tower. [PCCW Newsletter, 3/2006] The Secret Service has a Stinger missile secretly stored in the WTC, to be used to protect the president if there were an attack on the city when he visits it. [Weiss, 2003, pp. 379] Presumably, this missile is abandoned with the evacuation. The Office of Emergency Management’s command center, on the 23rd floor of WTC 7, is not evacuated until later, at 9:30 a.m. (see (9:30 a.m.) September 11, 2001).

Bill Balkwill. [Source: Sarasota County Sheriff's Office]According to Sarasota County Sheriff Bill Balkwill, just after President Bush enters a Booker Elementary classroom, a Marine responsible for carrying Bush’s phone walks up to Balkwill, who is standing in a nearby side room. While listening to someone talk to him in his earpiece, the Marine asks, “Can you get me to a television? We’re not sure what’s going on, but we need to see a television.” Three Secret Service agents, a SWAT member, the Marine, and Balkwill turn on the television in a nearby front office just as Flight 175 crashes into the WTC. “We’re out of here,” the Marine tells Balkwill. “Can you get everyone ready?” [Sarasota Herald-Tribune, 9/10/2002] However, Bush stays at the school for another half-hour. Who makes the decision to stay—and why—remains unclear, and the Secret Service won’t comment on the matter. Philip Melanson, author of a book on the Secret Service, comments, “With an unfolding terrorist attack, the procedure should have been to get the president to the closest secure location as quickly as possible, which clearly is not a school. You’re safer in that presidential limo, which is bombproof and blastproof and bulletproof.… In the presidential limo, the communications system is almost duplicative of the White House—he can do almost anything from there but he can’t do much sitting in a school.” [St. Petersburg Times, 7/4/2004] The decision to allow the president to remain in the classroom seems odder still considering that, according to the Tampa Tribune, the reason that Sandra Kay Daniels’ classroom has been selected for Bush’s photo-op is “not because [it] fulfilled some complicated formula; her classroom merely was situated next to the school’s north door, making it easier to organize elaborate security.” [Tampa Tribune, 9/1/2002]

Soon after the second WTC tower is hit, a senior Secret Service agent who is responsible for coordinating the president’s movements establishes an open line with his counterpart at the FAA. This FAA official tells him of further planes, on top of the two that have already crashed, that are unaccounted for and possibly hijacked. Although the Secret Service agent asks someone to pass this information on to the Secret Service’s operations center, the 9/11 Commission says that either this does not happen or else the message is passed on but not disseminated. Therefore the information fails to reach agents assigned to the vice president and, consequently, “the Vice President was not evacuated at that time.” [9/11 Commission, 7/24/2004, pp. 464] However, some other accounts contradict this, saying the vice president is indeed evacuated from his White House office by Secret Service agents at around this time. [New York Times, 9/16/2001; Daily Telegraph, 12/16/2001; ABC News, 9/14/2002]

Nelson Garabito. [Source: CNN]A senior Secret Service agent at the White House establishes a direct phone line with his counterpart at the FAA and is told there are more suspect planes that are unaccounted for, but this information supposedly does not lead to the evacuation of the vice president from his White House office.
Secret Service Liaison Calls FAA - Secret Service agent Nelson Garabito, who is responsible for coordinating the president’s movements and is also the agency’s liaison to the FAA, is at the Secret Service Joint Operations Center (JOC) at the White House, attending a 9:00 a.m. meeting. After seeing the second attack on the World Trade Center on television, he calls Terry Van Steenbergen, his counterpart at the FAA. According to Garabito, the TV’s sound is off, so it takes a few minutes before he realizes a second plane has hit the WTC and makes the call. But Van Steenbergen, who is at FAA headquarters in Washington, DC, will say Garabito calls him “within 30 seconds” of the attack.
Warning Not Passed On - Shortly into the call, Van Steenbergen tells Garabito there are two unaccounted for planes that are possibly hijacked, in addition to the two that have crashed into the WTC. Garabito tells someone with him to run upstairs and pass this information on to other Secret Service agents, but, according to the 9/11 Commission, “it either was not passed on or was passed on but not disseminated.” As a result, Van Steenbergen’s information “failed to reach agents assigned to the vice president, and the vice president was not evacuated at that time.” [9/11 Commission, 7/28/2003, pp. 9-11; 9/11 Commission, 3/30/2004; 9/11 Commission, 7/24/2004, pp. 464]
Conflicting Evacuation Times - According to the 9/11 Commission, the Secret Service does not evacuate Vice President Dick Cheney from his office at the White House until “just before 9:36.” [9/11 Commission, 7/24/2004, pp. 39] However, some accounts will say Cheney is evacuated around the time of the second attack on the WTC (see (9:10 a.m.) September 11, 2001), which would suggest that Van Steenbergen’s information is indeed passed on and disseminated. [New York Times, 9/13/2001; ABC News, 9/14/2002] Garabito and Van Steenbergen will remain in contact over the phone—via a direct line, not a conference call—for the next 14 hours. Garabito feeds information to Van Steenbergen, though Van Steenbergen does not know how Garabito is getting this information. [9/11 Commission, 3/30/2004]

An officer with the District of Columbia Air National Guard (DCANG) at Andrews Air Force Base, just outside Washington, calls the Secret Service and asks if it needs any help, but, after a “quick, confusing conversation,” the agent he speaks with only says he will call back. [Filson, 2003, pp. 76; Spencer, 2008, pp. 124]
Caine Concerned about Jets on Training - Major Daniel Caine is the supervisor of flying this morning with the 113th Wing of the DC Air National Guard, which is based at Andrews. After learning of the second attack on the World Trade Center (see (9:04 a.m.) September 11, 2001), he went to the operations desk. His “primary concern,” he will later recall, is three of the wing’s jets, which are away on a training mission over North Carolina (see 8:36 a.m. September 11, 2001), and that he wants to get back to base promptly. [9/11 Commission, 3/8/2004 ; Spencer, 2008, pp. 122-123] Caine has called the control tower at Andrews and asked if any air traffic measures are going into effect due to the attacks. [Filson, 2003, pp. 76] He was told during that call that the tower had just received a message that the Secret Service wants fighter jets launched over Washington (see (Shortly After 9:04 a.m.) September 11, 2001). [9/11 Commission, 8/28/2003; 9/11 Commission, 3/8/2004 ; 9/11 Commission, 7/24/2004, pp. 465]
Caine Offers Help to Secret Service - Caine then calls Kenneth Beauchamp, his contact at the Secret Service. The exact time he makes this call is unclear. Caine asks: “Do you have any additional information? Are you guys going to need some help?” Beauchamp replies, “No, but I’ll call you back if that changes.” Caine will later say Beauchamp tells him that “things were happening and he’d call me back.” Caine describes this as “a very quick, confusing conversation.” [Filson, 2003, pp. 76; 9/11 Commission, 3/8/2004 ; Spencer, 2008, pp. 124] Lieutenant Colonel Marc Sasseville, the acting operations group commander under the 113th Wing, will later comment: “At that time, we weren’t thinking about defending anything. Our primary concern was what would happen to the air traffic system.” [Aviation Week and Space Technology, 9/9/2002]
Beauchamp Does Not Call Back - Despite saying he will call Caine back, Beauchamp does not do so. [9/11 Commission, 3/8/2004 ] However, someone else from the Secret Service will subsequently call Caine, and ask if his unit can get some planes launched (see (Shortly After 9:33 a.m.) September 11, 2001). [Filson, 2003, pp. 78; Spencer, 2008, pp. 156]
Secret Service Has Authority over DCANG - According to author Lynn Spencer, “Given that the Secret Service provides protection to the president—and that the president, and the vice president when the president is not available, is the ultimate commander in chief of the military—the Secret Service also has certain authority over the military and, in this case, the DC Guard.” [Spencer, 2008, pp. 123] The 113th Wing also works closely with Secret Service agents that are across the runway at Andrews, in the Air Force One hangar. [Washington Post, 4/8/2002; Vogel, 2007, pp. 445]

Andrews Air Traffic Control Tower. [Source: FAA]The Secret Service tells FAA headquarters that it wants fighter jets launched over Washington, DC, and this message is then relayed to the air traffic control tower at Andrews Air Force Base, which is 10 miles from Washington. The District of Columbia Air National Guard (DCANG) at Andrews is notified, but no jets will take off from the base until 10:38 a.m. [9/11 Commission, 8/28/2003; 9/11 Commission, 7/24/2004, pp. 44, 465] The request for fighter jets is apparently made by Secret Service agent Nelson Garabito, who is responsible for coordinating the president’s movements, during a phone call with his counterpart at FAA headquarters in Washington, Terry Van Steenbergen. This call began shortly after the second tower was hit at 9:03 a.m. (see Shortly After 9:03 a.m. September 11, 2001). [9/11 Commission, 7/28/2003; 9/11 Commission, 3/30/2004; 9/11 Commission, 7/24/2004, pp. 464]
FAA Headquarters Calls Andrews Tower - According to the 9/11 Commission, “The FAA tower” at Andrews is then “contacted by personnel at FAA headquarters” who are “on an open line with senior agents from the president’s detail,” and is informed that the Secret Service wants fighters airborne. Karen Pontius at FAA headquarters tells Steve Marra, an air traffic controller at the Andrews control tower, “to launch F-16s to cap the airspace over Washington.”
Message Passed to DCANG - Marra then relays Pontius’s message to the 113th Wing of the DC Air National Guard, which is based at Andrews. [9/11 Commission, 7/28/2003 ; 9/11 Commission, 7/24/2004, pp. 465] Marra apparently passes the message to Major Daniel Caine, the 113th Wing’s supervisor of flying, when Caine phones the control tower (see (Between 9:05 a.m. and 9:32 a.m.) September 11, 2001). Caine will later recall that the tower controller (i.e. Marra) tells him “that they just received the scramble order.” But Caine will also tell the 9/11 Commission that the Andrews tower “would not have been in the loop for any Secret Service orders to scramble aircraft.” [Filson, 2003, pp. 76; 9/11 Commission, 3/8/2004 ] Despite receiving this message from the Secret Service, the DCANG will not launch its first fighter jet until 10:38 a.m. (see (10:38 a.m.) September 11, 2001). [9/11 Commission, 7/24/2004, pp. 44]

Counterterrorism “tsar” Richard Clarke is driving up to a gate outside the White House when Lisa Gordon-Hagerty—a member of his staff who is already at the White House—calls and tells him, “The other tower was just hit.” He responds: “Well, now we know who we’re dealing with. I want the highest level person in Washington from each agency on-screen now, especially the FAA.” He ordered Gordon-Hagerty to set up a secure video conference about five minutes earlier. A few minutes later, according to his own recollections, Clarke finds Vice President Dick Cheney and National Security Adviser Condoleezza Rice in Cheney’s White House office. Clarke tells Cheney: “It’s an al-Qaeda attack and they like simultaneous attacks. This may not be over.” Rice asks Clarke for recommendations, and he says, “We’re putting together a secure teleconference to manage the crisis.” He also recommends evacuating the White House. (A slow evacuation of the White House will begin around 9:20-9:25 (see (9:20 a.m.) September 11, 2001).) Rice notes the Secret Service wants them to go to the Presidential Emergency Operations Center (PEOC) below the White House, and as Clarke leaves the other two, he sees Cheney gathering up his papers. In Cheney’s outer office, Clarke will recall, he sees eight Secret Service agents instead of the usual two, ready to move to the PEOC. [Clarke, 2004, pp. 1-2; Australian, 3/27/2004]

Andrew Card speaks to President Bush and tells him of the second World Trade Center crash. [Source: Agence France-Presse]President Bush is in a Booker Elementary School second-grader classroom. His chief of staff, Andrew Card, enters the room and whispers into his ear, “A second plane hit the other tower, and America’s under attack.” [Education Channel, 9/11/2001; New York Times, 9/16/2001; Daily Telegraph, 12/16/2001; Albuquerque Tribune, 9/10/2002; ABC News, 9/11/2002; Washington Times, 10/8/2002] Intelligence expert James Bamford describes Bush’s reaction: “Immediately [after Card speaks to Bush] an expression of befuddlement passe[s] across the president’s face. Then, having just been told that the country was under attack, the commander in chief appear[s] uninterested in further details. He never ask[s] if there had been any additional threats, where the attacks were coming from, how to best protect the country from further attacks.… Instead, in the middle of a modern-day Pearl Harbor, he simply turn[s] back to the matter at hand: the day’s photo-op.” [Bamford, 2002, pp. 633] Bush begins listening to a story about a goat. But despite the pause and change in children’s exercises, as one newspaper put it, “For some reason, Secret Service agents [do] not bustle him away.” [Globe and Mail, 9/12/2001] Bush later says of the experience: “I am very aware of the cameras. I’m trying to absorb that knowledge. I have nobody to talk to. I’m sitting in the midst of a classroom with little kids, listening to a children’s story and I realize I’m the commander in chief and the country has just come under attack.” [Daily Telegraph, 12/16/2001] Bush continues to listen to the goat story for several more minutes. [9/11 Commission, 7/24/2004, pp. 38-39] According to author Christopher Andersen, the reason he does this is, “Without all the facts at hand, George Bush ha[s] no intention of upsetting the schoolchildren who had come to read for him.” [CBS News, 11/1/2002] Sarasota-Bradenton International Airport is only three and a half miles away. In fact, the elementary school was chosen for the photo-op partly because of its closeness to the airport. [Sarasota Herald-Tribune, 9/12/2002] Why the Secret Service does not move Bush away from his publicized location (see September 7, 2001) that morning remains unclear.

Laura Bush, the president’s wife, leaves the White House in her limousine, on her way to Capitol Hill where she is scheduled to testify before a Congressional committee, but she is unaware that a second plane has crashed into the World Trade Center. [Us Weekly, 10/15/2001; National Journal, 8/31/2002; Bush, 2010, pp. 198] Bush is set to appear before the Senate Committee on Health, Education, Labor, and Pensions, where she will talk about early childhood education. [CNN, 9/12/2001; CNN, 9/11/2002] She was informed of the first crash at the WTC by her lead Secret Service agent as she was getting into her limousine (see (8:55 a.m.) September 11, 2001).
First Lady Unaware of Second Crash - The limousine leaves the White House at 9:07 a.m., according to Noelia Rodriguez, the first lady’s press secretary. [National Journal, 8/31/2002] The second aircraft, Flight 175, hit the WTC four minutes earlier (see 9:03 a.m. September 11, 2001). [9/11 Commission, 7/24/2004, pp. 8] However, Bush and those with her in the limousine are unaware of this. [Bush, 2010, pp. 197-198]
First Lady Thinks about Canceling Hearing - Nevertheless, Bush already thinks the Senate hearing she is on her way to should perhaps be canceled, because New York Senator Hillary Clinton is on the education committee and is therefore supposed to attend. Bush will comment, “Even after the first [crash], when I thought it was just an accident, I thought we probably should cancel, because Mrs. Clinton was on the committee and she’s from New York, and she’d probably want to rush home at that time.” [USA Today, 9/10/2001; Gerhart, 2004, pp. 162] All the same, Bush continues with the two-mile journey from the White House to Capitol Hill. She will learn of the second crash, and realize this is a terrorist attack, shortly before arriving at the Russell Senate Office Building, where the hearing is set to take place (see (9:14 a.m.) September 11, 2001).
Secret Service Allows Bush to Head to Event - Members of Bush’s Secret Service detail apparently raise no objection to Bush going ahead with her trip to Capitol Hill. [CNN, 9/11/2002; Gerhart, 2004, pp. 162; Bush, 2010, pp. 198] The Secret Service is responsible for protecting the first lady, and she is considered to be one of the nation’s “most visible targets.” [US Department of the Treasury, 5/8/2001; Office of Management and Budget, 7/2001, pp. 82 ] The agency’s mission includes keeping her “in sight and out of harm’s way,” according to a book about the Secret Service by author Philip Melanson. [Melanson, 2002, pp. 273] And, as one of the Secret Service’s “permanent protectees,” the first lady, like the president, has a detail of special agents assigned to her. [United States Secret Service, 2002] Bush currently travels with four Secret Service agents and two Secret Service cars. [Kessler, 2006, pp. 136; Kessler, 2009, pp. 181] However, the Secret Service will only take her away from Capitol Hill to a “secure location”—actually the agency’s headquarters—after the terrorist attacks have ended (see (10:10 a.m.-10:55 a.m.) September 11, 2001). [Associated Press, 9/11/2001; National Journal, 8/31/2002; Kessler, 2006, pp. 136]

Vice President Dick Cheney goes from his White House office to the Presidential Emergency Operations Center (PEOC), a bunker below the East Wing of the White House, at about this time, according to counterterrorism “tsar” Richard Clarke and others. There is no video link between response centers in the East and West Wings, but a secure telephone line is used instead. [New York Times, 9/16/2001; Daily Telegraph, 12/16/2001; ABC News, 9/14/2002; Clarke, 2004, pp. 3-4]
Cheney Leaves Office 'Just after 9 a.m.' - One eyewitness, David Bohrer, a White House photographer, will later say Cheney is taken to the PEOC by two or three Secret Service agents just after 9:00 a.m. [ABC News, 9/14/2002] Another eyewitness, President Bush’s personal secretary, Ashley Estes, will recall seeing Secret Service agents running down the hall, carrying Cheney along, just after she saw the second plane hit the World Trade Center on live television at 9:03 a.m. (see 9:03 a.m. September 11, 2001). [White House, 8/29/2002] White House adviser Karl Rove, who is with the president in Florida, will appear to corroborate this account, later telling NBC News that when Bush tries phoning Cheney at around 9:16 a.m., he is unable to contact him because “the vice president was being… grabbed by a Secret Service agent and moved to the bunker” (see (9:16 a.m.-9:29 a.m.) September 11, 2001). [MSNBC, 9/11/2002] And Transportation Secretary Norman Mineta will say that when he arrives at the PEOC, at around 9:20 a.m.-9:27 a.m., Cheney is already there (see (Between 9:20 a.m. and 9:27 a.m.) September 11, 2001). [MSNBC, 9/11/2002; 9/11 Commission, 5/23/2003; Academy of Achievement, 6/3/2006]
Cheney Leaves Office 'Just before 9:36' - However, there will be a second account claiming that Cheney does not leave his office until sometime after 9:30 a.m. (The 9/11 Commission will say he is evacuated “just before 9:36.”) In this account, Secret Service agents burst into Cheney’s office. They carry him under his arms—nearly lifting him off the ground—and propel him down the steps into the White House basement and through a long tunnel toward the underground bunker. [New York Times, 10/16/2001; Newsweek, 12/31/2001; Washington Post, 1/27/2002; BBC, 9/1/2002; MSNBC, 9/11/2002; 9/11 Commission, 6/17/2004] According to journalist and author Stephen Hayes, it takes “[l]ess than a minute” for the Secret Service agents to escort Cheney from his office down to the secure tunnel leading to the PEOC. [Hayes, 2007, pp. 335] Although its specifications are highly classified, two sources will tell journalist and author Barton Gellman that the PEOC is located two floors below ground. [Gellman, 2008, pp. 420]
Arrives at PEOC 'Shortly before 10:00' - Despite admitting that there “is conflicting evidence about when the vice president arrived” in the PEOC, the 9/11 Commission will conclude that the “vice president arrived in the room shortly before 10:00, perhaps at 9:58.” [9/11 Commission, 7/24/2004, pp. 40] In addition to the eyewitness accounts of Clarke, Mineta, and Bohrer, several accounts will claim that Cheney is in the bunker when he is told Flight 77 is 50 miles away from Washington, at about 9:26 a.m. (see (9:26 a.m.) September 11, 2001). This further supports the claims of Cheney going to the PEOC earlier on, rather than after 9:30.

Noelia Rodríguez. [Source: Harvard University]Laura Bush, the president’s wife, is told that a second plane has crashed into the World Trade Center and realizes this is a terrorist attack while she is being driven from the White House to Capitol Hill, where she is scheduled to testify before a Congressional committee. [Us Weekly, 10/15/2001; CNN, 9/11/2002; Bush, 2010, pp. 197-198] Bush is set to appear before the Senate Committee on Health, Education, Labor, and Pensions at 10:00 a.m., where she will talk about early childhood education. [USA Today, 9/10/2001; CNN, 9/12/2001; CNN, 9/11/2002] Her lead Secret Service agent informed her of the first crash at the WTC as she was getting into her limousine, outside the White House, but she’d thought the crash was an accident (see (8:55 a.m.) September 11, 2001). [National Journal, 8/31/2002; Gerhart, 2004, pp. 162]
First Lady Told of Second Crash, Knows It Is Terrorism - The Secret Service agents traveling with Bush now tell the first lady about the second crash at the WTC while her limousine is driving up Pennsylvania Avenue, approaching Capitol Hill. “The car fell silent; we sat in mute disbelief,” Bush will later recall. “One plane might be a strange accident; two planes were clearly an attack.” She will note, “We knew then that it was terrorism.” [CNN, 9/11/2002; Bush, 2010, pp. 198]
Members of First Lady's Staff Learn of Crash - Members of Bush’s staff also learn about the second crash around this time, while they are on their way to Capitol Hill. Ashleigh Adams, the first lady’s deputy press secretary, learns of it while traveling in the press van. “It must have been only a couple of minutes after we departed the White House,” Adams will recall, “that the reporters’ and photographers’ pagers and cell phones started to go off, and someone shouted to me, ‘Ashleigh, the second Twin Tower was hit.’” Adams calls Noelia Rodriguez, the first lady’s press secretary, who is traveling in the staff van, and tells her the news. After Rodriguez arrives on Capitol Hill, she will jump out of the staff van, run to Bush’s limousine, and get inside. But she will find that the first lady has already been informed of the second crash. [National Journal, 8/31/2002]
First Lady Learns of Crash 11 Minutes after It Occurs - Bush will recall that she arrives at the Russell Senate Office Building, where the hearing she is set to attend is supposed to take place, two minutes after she is told about the second crash, at 9:16 a.m., meaning she learns of the crash at 9:14 a.m. [Bush, 2010, pp. 198] This is 11 minutes after the second plane, Flight 175, hit the WTC (see 9:03 a.m. September 11, 2001). [9/11 Commission, 7/24/2004, pp. 8]

David McNulty. [Source: Air National Guard]An intelligence officer with the District of Columbia Air National Guard (DCANG) at Andrews Air Force Base, 10 miles outside Washington, is unable to obtain further information about the attacks from other agencies, and instead has to make do with what he can learn from television reports. [Filson, 2003, pp. 79; Spencer, 2008, pp. 155-156] Having learned of the two attacks in New York, Major David McNulty, the senior intelligence officer of the 113th Wing of the DCANG, checks the SIPRNET—the Department of Defense’s classified version of the Internet—for pertinent information, but apparently without success. He phones anyone he can think of who might be able to provide information, including the Air Combat Command Intelligence Squadron at Langley Air Force Base in Virginia, the 609th Air Intelligence Squadron at Shaw Air Force Base in South Carolina, the FBI field office in Washington, and the Secret Service’s White House Joint Operations Center. Yet, as he will later recall, the agencies have “nothing to report.” Even his call to the FBI is “a fruitless effort.” [9/11 Commission, 3/11/2004 ; Spencer, 2008, pp. 155-156] McNulty will say, “I even called the National Security Agency 24-hour information desk and they knew nothing more than I did.” He adds, “We were all getting our information from CNN.” [Filson, 2003, pp. 79] According to Knight Ridder, “Air defense around Washington, DC, is provided mainly by fighter planes from Andrews Air Force Base.” [Knight Ridder, 9/11/2001] However, author Lynn Spencer will claim that because the DCANG “is a general purpose F-16 unit, no one is specifically tasked with keeping the squadron informed.” [Spencer, 2008, pp. 156]

The Russell Senate Office Building. [Source: Senate Photography Studio]Laura Bush, the president’s wife, spends time in the office of Senator Edward Kennedy (D-MA) after arriving at the Russell Senate Office Building on Capitol Hill, where she was originally scheduled to testify before the Senate education committee. [Bush, 2010, pp. 197-199] Bush was set to appear before the Senate Committee on Health, Education, Labor, and Pensions, which Kennedy chairs, at 10:00 a.m., to talk about early childhood education. [USA Today, 9/10/2001; CNN, 9/12/2001; CNN, 9/11/2002]
First Lady Arrives at Senate Building - She arrives at the Russell Senate Office Building at 9:16 a.m. [National Journal, 8/31/2002; Bush, 2010, pp. 198] Her Secret Service agents informed her of the first crash at the World Trade Center as she was getting into her limousine for the drive from the White House to Capitol Hill (see (8:55 a.m.) September 11, 2001) and told her about the second crash a couple of minutes before she arrives at the Russell Office Building (see (9:14 a.m.) September 11, 2001). [CNN, 9/11/2002; Bush, 2010, pp. 197-198] Kennedy, who has been informed of the attacks in New York, goes to greet Bush when she arrives. [CNN, 9/11/2002; Kennedy, 2009, pp. 492]
First Lady and Kennedy Discuss 'Mundane Things' - After Kennedy meets Bush, the two agree immediately to postpone the Senate hearing. [Us Weekly, 10/15/2001; Andersen, 2002, pp. 4] Instead of going to the hearing room, they go to Kennedy’s office, accompanied by members of Bush’s staff. [National Journal, 8/31/2002; Kessler, 2006, pp. 135] A television is on in the corner of the room, showing the coverage of the burning WTC towers. However, rather than focusing on the attacks in New York, Kennedy takes Bush on a tour of his office, pointing out various pictures, furniture, and pieces of memorabilia. He also presents her with a print of a painting he has done. [Bush, 2010, pp. 198] Bush will later recall that she and Kennedy talk about “mundane things,” such as the Capitol and the offices there. [CNN, 9/11/2002; Gerhart, 2004, pp. 162]
Senator Gregg Joins First Lady and Kennedy - After a time, they are joined by Senator Judd Gregg (R-NH), who is on the education committee and is a Bush family friend. While Gregg and Bush sit on couches in the office, Bush will recall, Kennedy continues “chatting about anything other than the horrific images unfolding on the tiny screen across the room.” Gregg will say: “I think Senator Kennedy was trying to distract everybody, keep us thinking about other things, maybe. But we were talking about some other items [besides the terrorist attacks], actually.” However, Bush keeps glancing at the television to see the coverage of the attacks. [CNN, 9/11/2002; Bush, 2010, pp. 198-199]
Secret Service Agents 'Frantically' Seek Details of Attacks - While the first lady is in Kennedy’s office, her Secret Service agents and senior staff “frantically worked their earpieces and cell phones to get a handle on the unfolding attacks,” according to Us Weekly magazine. Although those in the room aren’t catching everything about the attacks that is being shown on television, Bush will recall that they “knew what was happening because people kept coming in.” [Us Weekly, 10/15/2001] However, members of Bush’s staff have difficulty contacting others. Noelia Rodriguez, the first lady’s press secretary, will say, “Nobody could get a cell [phone call] to get through, and we took turns using the office phone.” [National Journal, 8/31/2002]
First Lady Works on Public Statement - The first lady and those with her watch President Bush delivering a short statement to the nation from the Emma E. Booker Elementary School in Sarasota, Florida, at 9:30 a.m. (see 9:30 a.m. September 11, 2001) on a small television on the desk of Kennedy’s receptionist. [White House, 9/11/2001; CNN, 9/12/2001; Bush, 2010, pp. 199] Although Jim Manley, Kennedy’s spokesman, initially tells reporters that the senators and the first lady will not be making any statements to the press, Kennedy subsequently decides they should. [Gerhart, 2004, pp. 161] Therefore, after watching the president’s statement, the first lady goes to a private room with Rodriguez and they start writing down what she will say. [National Journal, 8/31/2002] Kennedy, Gregg, and Bush will appear before the press at around 9:41 a.m. (see 9:41 a.m. September 11, 2001). [CNN, 9/11/2001; Bush, 2010, pp. 199]

Frank Brogan. [Source: Publicity photo]The Secret Service later tells the 9/11 Commission that while he is in the holding room at the Booker Elementary School (see (9:16 a.m.-9:29 a.m.) September 11, 2001), they are “anxious to move the president to a safer location, but did not think it imperative for him to run out the door.” [9/11 Commission, 7/24/2004, pp. 39] Yet according to Philip Melanson, who is an expert on the Secret Service, “With an unfolding terrorist attack, the procedure should have been to get the president to the closest secure location as quickly as possible, which clearly is not a school.” [St. Petersburg Times, 7/4/2004] Bush himself later recalls that at this time, “[T]he Secret Service and the Mil Aide [military aide] was in the process of getting information about where the president ought to go. One thing for certain, I needed to get out of where I was.” [Sammon, 2002, pp. 93] Yet he does not immediately leave the school, and will remain there to give a brief statement in its library (see 9:30 a.m. September 11, 2001). According to Frank Brogan, the lieutenant governor of Florida, who is also in the holding room at this time, the Secret Service tries to get the president to return to Air Force One immediately. But Bush refuses, saying he is “committed to staying on the ground long enough to write a statement about what was happening, read it to the nation and lead a moment of silence for the victims.” [UP Online, 9/18/2003] Bush himself later says that while he is in the holding room, “I didn’t spend that much time about my own safety because I knew others were worried about that. What I was interested in is making sure that the response mechanism that was under my control was sharp and ready to go. And that meant defense, for starters.” [Sammon, 2002, pp. 93] Yet he reportedly will not make any decisions about the response to the attacks until after 9:55 a.m. (see (Between 10:00 a.m. and 10:15 a.m.) September 11, 2001). The 9/11 Commission later claims that, while Bush is in the holding room, “No one in the traveling party had any information… that other aircraft were hijacked or missing. Staff was in contact with the White House Situation Room, but as far as we could determine, no one with the president was in contact with the Pentagon.” [Washington Post, 1/27/2002; 9/11 Commission, 7/24/2004, pp. 39-41] In contrast to the Secret Service’s inaction in removing Bush from the school, Vice President Dick Cheney is reportedly “seized by the arms, legs and his belt and physically carried” out of his office by Secret Service agents around this time, in order to get him to the bunker below the White House. Cheney himself says the agents “hoisted me up and moved me very rapidly down the hallway, down some stairs” (see (9:10 a.m.) September 11, 2001). [NBC, 9/16/2001; Daily Telegraph, 12/16/2001]

The White House begins slowly evacuating around this time, according to some accounts. In a 9:52 a.m. report, CNN White House correspondent John King will state that “about 30 minutes ago,” the White House had begun “slowly evacuating.” [CNN, 9/11/2001] White House pastry chef Roland Mesnier will write in his 2006 memoirs that the evacuation begins at “exactly 9:18.” At this time, Secret Service agents tell Mesnier to “go out, right now,” because, Mesnier is told, “a plane was targeting the White House and would be there soon.” [Mesnier and Malard, 2006, pp. 361] The evacuation proceeds in an orderly fashion. But later on, around 9:45 a.m., those evacuating will be ordered to run (see (9:45 a.m.) September 11, 2001). [CNN, 9/11/2001]

Thomas Von Essen. [Source: Publicity photo]The headquarters of New York’s Office of Emergency Management (OEM), which is on the 23rd floor of WTC Building 7, is evacuated at approximately 9:30 a.m., according to the 9/11 Commission. The headquarters was opened in 1999 and was specifically intended to coordinate the city’s response to disasters such as terrorist attacks (see June 8, 1999). A senior OEM official orders the evacuation after being told by a Secret Service agent that additional commercial planes are unaccounted for (see (9:30 a.m.) September 11, 2001). [9/11 Commission, 7/24/2004, pp. 283-284 and 305] OEM personnel do not initially respond to the evacuation order with a sense of urgency. According to a 2003 report by the Mineta Transportation Institute, “They calmly collected personal belongings and began removing OEM records, but they were urged to abandon everything and leave the building quickly.” [Jenkins and Edwards-Winslow, 9/2003, pp. 16] However, there are contradictory accounts of when the OEM command center is evacuated. The National Institute of Standards of Technology (NIST) claims the evacuation happens slightly later than stated by the 9/11 Commission, at “approximately 9:44 a.m.” [National Institute of Standards and Technology, 9/2005, pp. 109] Other accounts suggest it may have happened before 9:03, when the second attack occurred (see (Soon After 8:46 a.m.-9:35 a.m.) September 11, 2001 and (Shortly Before 9:03 a.m.) September 11, 2001). Fire Commissioner Thomas Von Essen will arrive at WTC 7 shortly before the collapse of the South Tower, looking for Mayor Giuliani. Learning that the OEM headquarters has been evacuated, he later claims that he thinks, “How ridiculous. We’ve got a thirteen-million-dollar command center and we can’t even use it.” [Essen, 2002, pp. 26] He says in frustration, “How can we be evacuating OEM? We really need it now.” He will later tell an interviewer that he’d headed for the OEM headquarters because, “I thought that was where we should all be because that’s what [it] was built for.” [Fink and Mathias, 2002, pp. 230] All civilians were evacuated from WTC 7 earlier on, around the time the second WTC tower was hit (see (9:03 a.m.) September 11, 2001).

Chris Stephenson, head flight controller at Washington’s Reagan National Airport tower, says that he is called by the Secret Service around this time. He is told an unidentified aircraft is speeding toward Washington. Stephenson looks at the radarscope and sees Flight 77 about five miles to the west. He looks out the tower window and sees the plane turning to the right and descending. He follows it until it disappears behind a building in nearby Crystal City, Virginia. [USA Today, 8/11/2002] However, according to another account, just before 9:30 a.m., a controller in the same tower has an unidentified plane on radar, “heading toward Washington and without a transponder signal to identify it. It’s flying fast, she says: almost 500 mph. And it’s heading straight for the heart of the city. Could it be American Flight 77? The FAA warns the Secret Service.” [USA Today, 8/13/2002] In short, it is unclear whether the Secret Service warns the FAA, or vice versa.

Kevin Down, a Sarasota police officer, recalls that immediately after President Bush’s speech concludes, “The Secret Service agent [runs] out from the school and [says] We’re under terrorist attack, we have to go now.” [BBC, 9/1/2002] The motorcade departs a few minutes later.

Based on an analysis of radar data for Flight 77 as it approaches the Pentagon and makes a 330 degree loop (see 9:34 a.m.- 9:37 a.m. September 11, 2001), experts will later say that the plane is being flown so smoothly that “it’s clear there [is] no fight for control going on.” [CBS News, 9/21/2001; Boston Globe, 11/23/2001] The plane gets near the White House during this turn. “Sources say the hijacked jet… [flies] several miles south of the restricted airspace around the White House.” [CBS News, 9/21/2001] The Daily Telegraph will later write: “If the airliner had approached much nearer to the White House it might have been shot down by the Secret Service, who are believed to have a battery of ground-to-air Stinger missiles ready to defend the president’s home. The Pentagon is not similarly defended.” [Daily Telegraph, 9/16/2001] White House spokesman Ari Fleischer will suggest the plane goes even closer to the White House, saying, “That is not the radar data that we have seen. The plane was headed toward the White House.” [CBS News, 9/21/2001 Sources: Ari Fleischer]

A supervisor at Washington Dulles International Airport contacts the Secret Service at the White House and informs it that an unidentified aircraft is heading toward Washington at a high rate of speed. [Federal Aviation Administration, 9/17/2001 ; 9/11 Commission, 7/22/2003 ] Air traffic controllers at the Terminal Radar Approach Control (TRACON) at Dulles Airport have recently noticed this aircraft on their radar screens (see (Between 9:25 a.m. and 9:30 a.m.) September 11, 2001 and 9:32 a.m. September 11, 2001). Its identity and type are currently unknown, but it is later determined to be Flight 77. [Federal Aviation Administration, 9/17/2001 ; 9/11 Commission, 7/24/2004, pp. 9, 25]
Supervisor Calls White House over Hotline - The Dulles TRACON has a direct phone line to the Secret Service at the White House. After a controller alerts him to the suspicious aircraft, John Hendershot, the operations supervisor, calls the Secret Service over this line. [9/11 Commission, 7/22/2003 ; 9/11 Commission, 12/22/2003 ] He says, “We have an unidentified, very fast-moving aircraft inbound toward your vicinity, eight miles west.” [ABC News, 10/24/2001]
Supervisor Uncertain about Response - Hendershot is unsure what response his call elicits. He will tell the 9/11 Commission, “I guess the operator picked it up,” and say that he assumed the information he provided was relayed to the relevant people at the White House. He will also tell the Commission that, following his call, “no one from Dulles tower was talking to the White House during the minute-minute countdown concerning the unknown primary approaching from the west.” [9/11 Commission, 12/22/2003 ] A supervisor at Washington’s Reagan National Airport also contacts the Secret Service around this time, to notify it of the approaching aircraft (see (9:33 a.m.) September 11, 2001). [Federal Aviation Administration, 9/17/2001 ; 9/11 Commission, 7/24/2004, pp. 9] But, while the White House is alerted, personnel at Dulles Airport will tell the 9/11 Commission that there is no discussion about notifying the US Capitol of the unidentified aircraft. [9/11 Commission, 7/22/2003 ]

A supervisor at Washington’s Reagan National Airport calls the Secret Service Joint Operations Center (JOC) and warns it about an unidentified aircraft that is heading toward the White House. [Federal Aviation Administration, 9/14/2001; Federal Aviation Administration, 9/17/2001 ; 9/11 Commission, 7/24/2004, pp. 9] Controllers at Reagan Airport have just been contacted by controllers at Washington Dulles International Airport, and notified of the unidentified aircraft, later determined to be Flight 77, approaching Washington (see (9:33 a.m.) September 11, 2001). [Washington Post, 9/11/2001; 9/11 Commission, 8/26/2004, pp. 33 ]
Supervisor Calls Secret Service - Immediately after he learns of this aircraft, Victor Padgett, the operations supervisor at the Terminal Radar Approach Control (TRACON) at Reagan Airport, picks up a direct line to the White House and informs the Secret Service JOC there: “We have a target five [miles] west. He’s turning south but he’s still on our scope. We’re not talking to him. It’s definitely a suspicious aircraft.” [Federal Aviation Administration, 9/14/2001; Spencer, 2008, pp. 146] According to the 9/11 Commission, this is “the first specific report to the Secret Service of a direct threat to the White House.” [9/11 Commission, 7/24/2004, pp. 39] Padgett provides the Secret Service with continuous updates on the aircraft’s actions. [Federal Aviation Administration, 9/14/2001; Federal Aviation Administration, 9/17/2001 ] After traveling almost 10 miles south of Reagan Airport, the aircraft turns back toward Washington and again appears to be heading for the White House. Padgett tells the Secret Service: “What I’m telling you, buddy, if you’ve got people, you’d better get them out of there! And I mean right g_ddamned now!” [Spencer, 2008, pp. 158] (People will begin rapidly evacuating from the White House at about 9:45 a.m. (see (9:45 a.m.) September 11, 2001). [CNN, 9/11/2001; CNN, 9/12/2001]
Cheney Not Evacuated - According to the 9/11 Commission, when Padgett initially calls the JOC, “No move [is] made to evacuate the vice president” from his White House office. The officer who takes the call will explain, “[I was] about to push the alert button when the tower advised that the aircraft was turning south and approaching Reagan National Airport.” According to the Commission, Vice President Dick Cheney is not evacuated until “just before 9:36.” [9/11 Commission, 7/24/2004, pp. 39] (However, other accounts indicate he was evacuated earlier on, shortly after 9:00 a.m. (see (9:10 a.m.) September 11, 2001). [New York Times, 9/13/2001; ABC News, 9/14/2002] ) A supervisor at Dulles Airport also contacts the Secret Service around this time to notify it of the approaching aircraft (see (9:33 a.m.) September 11, 2001). [Federal Aviation Administration, 9/17/2001 ]

Bush’s motorcade on its way to the Sarasota airport. [Source: CBC]President Bush’s motorcade leaves Booker Elementary School bound for Sarasota-Bradenton International Airport. It initially heads off in the wrong direction, though, and has to perform a U-turn in order to proceed toward the airport. [Daily Telegraph, 12/16/2001; Washington Times, 10/8/2002; Wall Street Journal, 3/22/2004 ; 9/11 Commission, 6/17/2004; Canadian Broadcasting Corporation, 9/10/2006] A few days after 9/11, Sarasota’s main newspaper reports: “Sarasota barely skirted its own disaster. As it turns out, terrorists targeted the president and Air Force One on Tuesday, maybe even while they were on the ground in Sarasota and certainly not long after. The Secret Service learned of the threat just minutes after Bush left Booker Elementary.” [Sarasota Herald-Tribune, 9/16/2001] Kevin Down, a Sarasota police officer at the scene, recalls, “I thought they were actually anticipating a terrorist attack on the president while we were en route.” [BBC, 8/30/2002] ABC News reporter Ann Compton, who is part of the motorcade, recalls, “It was a mad-dash motorcade out to the airport.” [BBC, 9/1/2002]

Daniel Caine. [Source: White House]The Secret Service calls the District of Columbia Air National Guard (DCANG) at Andrews Air Force Base, just outside Washington, and asks if it can get fighter jets launched. [Filson, 2003, pp. 78]
Secret Service Calls DCANG - Major Daniel Caine, the supervisor of flying with the 113th Wing of the DC Air National Guard, which is based at Andrews, called his contact at the Secret Service earlier on to see if they needed assistance from his unit, but was told they did not (see (Between 9:05 a.m. and 9:32 a.m.) September 11, 2001). But the Secret Service has just learned of a suspicious aircraft five miles from the White House (see (9:33 a.m.) September 11, 2001 and (9:33 a.m.) September 11, 2001), and so one of its agents now calls Caine back. [Federal Aviation Administration, 9/17/2001 ; Spencer, 2008, pp. 124, 156] Caine’s previous call to the Secret Service had been with agent Kenneth Beauchamp, who told Caine he would call back. However, he did not do so. The name of the agent that makes the current call is unstated. [9/11 Commission, 3/8/2004 ]
Agent Wants Planes Launched - The Secret Service agent asks, “Can you get airplanes up?” He then tells Caine to stand by, and says somebody else will call. Caine will later recall, “When I heard the tone in his voice, I called our bomb dump and told them to uncrate our missiles.” [Filson, 2003, pp. 78] But before Caine does this, Lieutenant Colonel Marc Sasseville, the acting operations group commander under the 113th Wing, calls Brigadier General David Wherley, the commander of the 113th Wing, to get permission to use their “war-reserve missiles.” Wherley gives the go-ahead, and then Caine calls the weapons loaders across the base and orders them, “Get some live AIM-9s [missiles] and bring them over!” At the same time, Sasseville calls the unit’s maintenance officer and orders that their jets be prepared for launch (see (9:35 a.m.-11:05 a.m.) September 11, 2001). [Aviation Week and Space Technology, 9/9/2002; 9/11 Commission, 3/8/2004 ; Spencer, 2008, pp. 156-157] Someone from the Secret Service’s White House Joint Operations Center will soon call Caine, and request that armed fighters be launched over Washington (see (Shortly After 9:35 a.m.) September 11, 2001). [Filson, 2003, pp. 78; 9/11 Commission, 3/11/2004 ]

The District of Columbia Air National Guard (DCANG) at Andrews Air Force Base, just outside Washington, receives a call from the Secret Service at its White House Joint Operations Center (JOC), requesting armed fighter jets over the capital.
JOC Calls DC Air National Guard - Major Daniel Caine is the supervisor of flying with the 113th Wing of the DC Air National Guard at Andrews, and is currently at the operations desk, where a Secret Service agent recently called him and asked if the DCANG could launch fighters. The agent then told Caine to stand by and said someone else would call (see (Shortly After 9:33 a.m.) September 11, 2001). Now the phone rings, and Caine answers it. The caller, from the JOC, asks for armed fighter jets over Washington. Caine is unsure how the JOC has got the operations desk phone number. He will later speculate that it got it from Secret Service agent Kenneth Beauchamp, who he’d contacted earlier on (see (Between 9:05 a.m. and 9:32 a.m.) September 11, 2001).
Caine Possibly Hears Cheney in Background - The name of the caller is unstated. However, Caine believes he can hear Vice President Dick Cheney’s voice in the background. He will tell author Lesley Filson: “I could hear plain as day the vice president talking in the background. That’s basically where we got the execute order. It was ‘VFR [visual flight rules] direct.’” He will later tell the 9/11 Commission that he “thought, but would not swear to it, that he heard the vice president’s voice in the background.”
Caine Learns of Pentagon Attack - Around this time, Caine learns that the Pentagon has been hit. Even though the Pentagon is just 10 miles from Andrews Air Force Base, he will later recall that he only learns of the attack from news reports, and “no other source.” The result of learning this, according to Caine, is that “the intensity level increased even more.” [Filson, 2003, pp. 76, 78; 9/11 Commission, 3/8/2004 ; 9/11 Commission, 3/11/2004 ]
Commander Arrives, Takes over Call - At some point during Caine’s call with the JOC, apparently soon after the Pentagon attack, Brigadier General David Wherley, the commander of the DC Air National Guard, finally arrives at the headquarters of the 121st Fighter Squadron, where Caine and his colleagues are (see (Shortly After 9:39 a.m.) September 11, 2001). (The 121st Fighter Squadron is part of the 113th Wing of the DCANG.) At this time, Caine has a phone to each ear. He passes the phone with the call from the JOC to Wherley, saying, “Boss… here, you take this one!” He passes the other to Lieutenant Colonel Phil Thompson, the chief of safety for the 113th Wing. Caine has decided he is going to fly, and so Thompson will be replacing him as the unit’s supervisor of flying. Caine then goes to join the other pilots that are suiting up, ready to take off in their jets. [Aviation Week and Space Technology, 9/9/2002; Filson, 2003, pp. 78-79; 9/11 Commission, 3/8/2004 ; Spencer, 2008, pp. 184] Caine will take off from Andrews at 11:11 a.m. (see 11:11 a.m. September 11, 2001). [Filson, 2003, pp. 84; 9/11 Commission, 2004; 9/11 Commission, 2/17/2004]

Barbara Riggs. [Source: Miles B. Norman / Elmira Star-Gazette]Counterterrorism “tsar” Richard Clarke learns of an aircraft heading toward the White House. Clarke, who is in the White House Situation Room, is passed a note by Secret Service Director Brian Stafford, which says, “Radar shows aircraft headed this way.” [Clarke, 2004, pp. 7] Around this time, the FAA’s Boston Center is reporting a low-flying aircraft six miles southeast of the White House (see 9:36 a.m. September 11, 2001), so this is presumably the same airliner to which Stafford’s note refers. [Vanity Fair, 8/1/2006] Clarke later comments that the Secret Service is aware of the approaching plane because it has “a system that allowed them to see what FAA’s radar was seeing.” [Clarke, 2004, pp. 7] Secret Service agent Barbara Riggs, who is in the agency’s Washington headquarters, will later corroborate this, recalling: “Through monitoring radar and activating an open line with the FAA, the Secret Service was able to receive real time information about… hijacked aircraft. We were tracking two hijacked aircraft as they approached Washington, DC, and our assumption was that the White House was a target.” [PCCW Newsletter, 3/2006] Stafford informs Clarke that he is going to evacuate the White House complex. (This evacuation appears to take place at around 9:45 (see (9:45 a.m.) September 11, 2001).) Those in the Situation Room are then informed that there has been an explosion at the Pentagon, and soon after that a plane has hit it. [Clarke, 2004, pp. 7]

Michael Miller. [Source: US Navy]A number of White House staffers who are visiting New York make their way back to Washington, DC, following the attack on the Pentagon. About 15 members of the White House staff, including Joseph Hagin, the deputy chief of staff for operations, and Captain Michael Miller, the deputy director of the White House Military Office, are in New York conducting the “survey trip” for President Bush’s appearance at the United Nations General Assembly later in the month (see September 10, 2001).
Staffers Learn of Crashes while Visiting US Mission to the UN - Earlier this morning, they went to the US Mission to the United Nations for some preliminary meetings with the mission staff about the president’s forthcoming visit. In a conference room there, shortly after Flight 11 hit the World Trade Center (see 8:46 a.m. September 11, 2001), Miller informed Hagin of the crash. After seeing the early coverage of the incident on television, Hagin called the military aide who is with the president in Sarasota, Florida, to check if he was aware of what had happened. The military aide told him, “We’re on it.”
Staffers Taken to Police Station - After the White House staffers watched the second plane hitting the WTC live on TV, a State Department security officer told Hagin: “Sir, you need to get out of here as quickly as possible. There are reports of other planes inbound into the city.” The White House staffers were then taken by the Secret Service to a police station in Midtown Manhattan, where it was thought they would be safe. From there, Hagin called Josh Bolten, the deputy White House chief of staff for policy, who is at the White House. As the attacks were considered to be “just a New York incident” at that time, Hagin will later recall, Bolten and his colleagues decided that Hagin “should go down and be with the mayor, and… be the federal face in New York for the time being.”
Some Staffers Fly toward Nebraska to Meet President - The New York City police and the Secret Service had been trying to work out how to get Hagin to Ground Zero. But when the Pentagon is attacked at 9:37 a.m. (see 9:37 a.m. September 11, 2001), they decide that the White House staffers should return to Washington. The staffers are driven to Dover Air Force Base in Delaware. There, they are split up. Eight of them, including Hagin, get on a military plane and head toward Offutt Air Force Base in Nebraska to meet the president, who has been taken to the base (see 2:50 p.m. September 11, 2001). However, as they are flying over Missouri, they learn that Bush has decided to come back to Washington (see (4:00 p.m.) September 11, 2001 and (4:33 p.m.) September 11, 2001). Therefore, their plane turns around and heads to the capital.
Hagin and Other Staffers Return to White House - After they land at Andrews Air Force Base, just outside Washington, the staffers are driven to the White House. The time when they arrive there is unstated, but it is presumably around late afternoon or early evening. At the White House, Hagin goes to work immediately. [National Journal, 8/31/2002; Cincinnati Enquirer, 1/20/2003] As the deputy chief of staff for operations, he is a key member of the White House staff. He is responsible for the management and administrative functions of the White House, plans all of the president’s travel, and oversees the president’s schedule. [Cincinnati Enquirer, 10/10/2002; Washington Post, 7/4/2008] Hagin will recall that, after reaching the White House, he is “very involved in the continuity of government and just how, operationally, we were going to deal with this.” He will remain at the White House for the next two days. [National Journal, 8/31/2002; Cincinnati Enquirer, 1/20/2003]

Brigadier General David Wherley, the commander of the District of Columbia Air National Guard (DCANG), speaks to a Secret Service agent over the phone, but declines the agent’s request to launch DCANG fighter jets without first receiving an order to do so from someone more senior. [Spencer, 2008, pp. 184]
Wherley Takes over Call - Wherley has just arrived at the headquarters of the DCANG’s 121st Fighter Squadron at Andrews Air Force Base, near Washington (see (Shortly After 9:39 a.m.) September 11, 2001). At the operations desk there, Major Daniel Caine passed Wherley a phone he was talking over, before heading off to prepare to get airborne. [Filson, 2003, pp. 78; Vogel, 2007, pp. 445]
Caller Wants Jets over Washington - Wherley finds that the caller Caine was speaking with is from the Secret Service. They want the DCANG to put up a combat air patrol (CAP) over Washington. But, according to author Lynn Spencer: “Wherley knows that there has never been a CAP anywhere over this country, much less over Washington. Such a request—coming from someone not even in the military—is unheard of.” Wherley understands the power of the Secret Service, and knows that with its responsibility to protect the president it clearly has some authority over other agencies, including the military. “But still, such an order from a Secret Service agent seems rather far-reaching.” He therefore tells the caller, “I would feel more comfortable receiving such an order from someone higher in the chain of command, preferably in the military.”
Wherley Told to Call 'Operations Center' - According to Spencer, the agent gives Wherley “a phone number and tells him to call over to the White House Operations Center, where Vice President [Dick] Cheney has been ushered.” [Spencer, 2008, pp. 184] Presumably the “Operations Center” is the Presidential Emergency Operations Center (PEOC) below the White House, where Cheney is evacuated to by his Secret Service agents (see (9:10 a.m.) September 11, 2001). [ABC News, 9/14/2002; 9/11 Commission, 7/24/2004, pp. 39-40] However, other accounts, including Wherley’s interview with the 9/11 Commission, will state that Wherley subsequently calls someone at the Secret Service’s White House Joint Operations Center (JOC), not the PEOC (see (9:45 a.m.) September 11, 2001). [Filson, 2003, pp. 79; 9/11 Commission, 8/28/2003] (Wherley’s current call is also with an agent at the JOC. [9/11 Commission, 3/8/2004 ; 9/11 Commission, 3/11/2004 ] )

A US Park Police helicopter that is responding to the attack on the Pentagon and flying above the building transmits a live video feed of the crash scene to the FBI and other agencies, providing them with instant information about the extent of the damage and destruction at the Pentagon. [US Congress. House, 9/11/2002; National Park Service, 9/21/2002] The helicopter, which has the call sign “Eagle I,” is one of two helicopters belonging to the Park Police Aviation Unit that arrived at the Pentagon minutes after the attack there (see Shortly After 9:37 a.m. September 11, 2001). [Rotor and Wing, 11/2001] It has microwave “downlink” capability, which enables its crew to fly over a particular location and transmit instantaneous video images to the Park Police chief’s command post and other locations.
FBI Requests Video of Crash Scene - Shortly after Eagle I arrives over the Pentagon, the crew receives a request from the FBI to send it information using the downlink on their helicopter’s video camera. [McDonnell, 2004, pp. 22 ] According to Sergeant Ronald Galey, the pilot of Eagle I, the FBI arrives on the scene “within 10 minutes or 15 minutes” of his helicopter reaching the Pentagon. Galey will later recall: “We heard from them immediately: ‘Start your downlink, we want to capture everything that we can.’” [US Naval Historical Center, 11/20/2001] The downlink capability then enables the crew of Eagle I “to transmit real-time images and information to people who needed them to make decisions,” according to the National Park Service’s account of 9/11. As well as the FBI, the images are sent to the Secret Service, the Washington, DC, Metropolitan Police, and Park Police headquarters. Eagle I spends “the next four or five hours flying overhead and transmitting video images to the FBI.” [National Park Service, 9/21/2002; McDonnell, 2004, pp. 23 ]
Fire Department Chief Goes Up in Helicopter - The Park Police’s two Bell 412 helicopters are packed with sophisticated equipment. As well as the microwave downlink, they have an infrared heat detection system known as FLIR (forward looking infrared). When the Arlington County Fire Department later has difficulty getting its equipment to the proper locations to fight the fires in the Pentagon, its chief will be taken up in Eagle I and flown low over the building. The infrared imagery will help him locate the fires under the roof so he can better position his firefighting crews and equipment. [National Park Service, 1/17/2002; Rotor and Wing, 2/2002; McDonnell, 2004, pp. 23-24 ]

Bush boards Air Force One in Sarasota, Florida, waving to people below as if the day were like any other. [Source: Agence France-Presse]President Bush’s motorcade arrives at Sarasota-Bradenton International Airport, racing across the tarmac there and pulling up close to Air Force One. Bush ascends the stairs by the left wing onto the plane. [Sammon, 2002, pp. 98-99; 9/11 Commission, 7/24/2004, pp. 39] He pauses in the doorway to wave to photographers. The St. Petersburg Times will later note that this raises “further questions about security [on 9/11].” [St. Petersburg Times, 7/4/2004] Meanwhile, 13 members of the press, and others such as US Representatives Dan Miller (R-FL) and Adam Putnam (R-FL), hurry onto the plane through its rear entrance. [Sarasota Magazine, 9/19/2001; BBC, 9/1/2002] Secret Service agents with dogs hurriedly check people’s luggage. [St. Petersburg Times, 9/8/2002] Even White House employees who are wearing special lapel pins identifying themselves as such have their belongings checked by the bomb-sniffing dogs. According to journalist and author Bill Sammon, the mood is “extraordinarily tense.” A military aide snaps: “We gotta hurry up and get out of here. Let’s go!” [Sammon, 2002, pp. 99] Secret Service agents are yelling, “Move it, move it, move it!” [BBC, 9/1/2002] But White House chief of staff Andrew Card is reportedly “frustrated because so many guests [have] come on the plane and [are] delaying the takeoff.” [St. Petersburg Times, 9/8/2002] Air Force One will not take off until about 9:56 (see 9:54 a.m. September 11, 2001). [Washington Post, 1/27/2002]

President Bush’s daughters Barbara and Jenna. [Source: ABC News]After boarding Air Force One, President Bush is concerned about the safety of his wife and daughters. He heads directly to his private cabin near the front of the plane, and then his first act is to order his Secret Service agents to get additional protection for his twin daughters, Barbara and Jenna, who are both at university, and his wife Laura, who is on Capitol Hill (see 9:16 a.m.-9:40 a.m. September 11, 2001 and 9:41 a.m. September 11, 2001). At about 10:37 a.m., Bush will be informed that all three have successfully been moved to safe locations (see (10:37 a.m.) September 11, 2001). [New Yorker, 9/25/2001; Woodward, 2002, pp. 16; Sammon, 2002, pp. 99-100, 108]

Secret Service with automatic weapons directing people away from the White House. [Source: Associated Press]The White House is evacuated after the Secret Service receives what the Associated Press describes as a credible threat of a terrorist attack against it. [Associated Press, 2001 ; CNN, 9/11/2001; CNN, 9/12/2001] Minutes earlier, in the White House Situation Room, Secret Service Director Brian Stafford informed counterterrorism “tsar” Richard Clarke that an aircraft was heading in their direction, and said he was going to order the evacuation of the White House (see (9:37 a.m.) September 11, 2001). [Clarke, 2004, pp. 7] The Secret Service learned of this aircraft by monitoring radar and over an open line with the FAA (the “hijack net”), which enable them to receive real time information about the hijacked aircraft. The Secret Service, which has been using an air surveillance system called Tigerwall for some time (see (September 2000 and after)), tracks both American 77 and United 93 as they approach Washington and assumes the White House is a target. Secret Service agent Barbara Riggs will later say, “The Secret Service prepared to defend the facility,” although the precise nature of the preparations is unclear. [New York Times, 9/12/2001; MSNBC, 9/22/2001; Daily Telegraph, 12/16/2001; Washington Post, 1/27/2002; Associated Press, 8/21/2002; 9/11 Commission, 6/17/2004; PCCW Newsletter, 3/2006] A slow and orderly evacuation of the White House had in fact begun earlier on (see (9:20 a.m.) September 11, 2001). But now the Secret Service orders people to run so as to evacuate faster. [CNN, 9/11/2001; ABC News, 9/11/2002]

Brigadier General David Wherley, the commander of the District of Columbia Air National Guard (DCANG) at Andrews Air Force Base, near Washington, calls the Secret Service at the White House, seeking instructions from someone senior—preferably a military person—to launch his fighter jets, but the only people available are Secret Service agents. [Filson, 2003, pp. 79; Spencer, 2008, pp. 184-185]
Wherley Calls Joint Operations Center - Wherley has just spoken over the phone with a Secret Service agent. After he asked to talk to “someone higher in the chain of command, preferably in the military,” the agent gave him a number at the White House to call (see (Shortly After 9:40 a.m.) September 11, 2001). [Spencer, 2008, pp. 184] Wherley now calls the Secret Service’s White House Joint Operations Center. He will later recall making this call “while watching TV footage of employees evacuating the White House complex.” [Filson, 2003, pp. 79; 9/11 Commission, 8/28/2003] This would mean he makes it at around 9:45 a.m., when people start running from the White House, or shortly after (see (9:45 a.m.) September 11, 2001). [CNN, 9/11/2001; CNN, 9/12/2001]
Delay before Call Answered - It takes some time before anyone answers the call. [Spencer, 2008, pp. 184] According to Wherley, “the phone rings about eight times before somebody picks up.” [Filson, 2003, pp. 79] The Secret Service agent that answers is Kenneth Beauchamp. Wherley knows Beauchamp from other routine work with the DC Air National Guard. [9/11 Commission, 8/28/2003] Beauchamp had spoken to DCANG officer Major Daniel Caine earlier on and told him the Secret Service did not require help from his unit (see (Between 9:05 a.m. and 9:32 a.m.) September 11, 2001). [9/11 Commission, 3/8/2004 ; Spencer, 2008, pp. 124]
Beauchamp Requests Fighters - But now Beauchamp asks Wherley to launch aircraft to protect Washington. He implores: “We want you to put a CAP [combat air patrol] up over the city. We need some fighters now.” However, Wherley is reportedly “not very comfortable taking orders from a Secret Service agent. That’s just not how things are done.” He wants to “speak to someone a little higher up the food chain,” and asks, “Is there anybody else there from the military available to talk?” [9/11 Commission, 8/28/2003; Spencer, 2008, pp. 185] But, as Wherley will later comment, “[T]hey have nobody in uniform, it was all Secret Service people and a team communicating with the president.” [Filson, 2003, pp. 79] Wherley therefore decides he will accept orders from the Secret Service, and says to Beauchamp: “Okay, then. What exactly do they want me to do?” [Spencer, 2008, pp. 185]
Wherley Wants Precise Instructions - Wherley wants specific instructions about setting up a CAP over Washington, and Secret Service agents at the White House will work hard to get these for him. He will wait until senior agent Becky Ediger comes on the line and gives him the information he needs (see (10:15 a.m.) September 11, 2001). [Filson, 2003, pp. 79; 9/11 Commission, 8/28/2003; Wall Street Journal, 3/22/2004 ; Spencer, 2008, pp. 218] Wherley will reportedly receive the instructions for his pilots “within a half-hour.” [Washington Post, 4/8/2002]

National Security Adviser Condoleezza Rice heads down to the Presidential Emergency Operations Center (PEOC), the bunker below the White House. [Felix, 2002, pp. 227] According to her own later recollections, Rice was in the White House Situation Room when the Pentagon was hit at 9:37 a.m., and had subsequently looked up and seen the television footage of the burning building. [9/11 Commission, 7/24/2004, pp. 464; Bumiller, 2007, pp. xiii] She will recall: “[T]he picture had just come up on television of the plane lodged in the side of the Pentagon. And no one had told me. I literally turned and looked at the picture and saw it.” She describes: “And then there were incoming reports that there had been a car bomb at the State Department, that there was a large fire on the Mall near the Washington Monument, and [I was] just trying to sort through the information when a Secret Service agent came and said: ‘You have to go to the bunker. The vice president is already there. There may be planes heading for the White House.’” [MSNBC, 9/11/2002] Rice phones President Bush and warns him not to return to Washington, either before she leaves the Situation Room or while on her way to the PEOC (see (Between 9:45 a.m. and 9:58 a.m.) September 11, 2001). [Felix, 2002, pp. 227; PBS Frontline, 7/12/2002] However, counterterrorism “tsar” Richard Clarke will contradict Rice’s account, indicating that she headed to the PEOC significantly earlier, roughly around 9:15 a.m. (see (9:15 a.m.) September 11, 2001). [Clarke, 2004, pp. 3-4]

The Russell Senate Office Building Caucus Room. [Source: Architect of the Capitol]First Lady Laura Bush and those accompanying her head toward the office of Senator Judd Gregg (R-NH) after they learn of the attack on the Pentagon and Bush’s Secret Service agents instruct them to go to the basement of the building they are in. [CNN, 9/11/2002; Bush, 2010, pp. 200] Bush has just appeared before reporters in the Caucus Room of the Russell Senate Office Building, on Capitol Hill, alongside Gregg and Senator Edward Kennedy (D-MA) (see 9:41 a.m. September 11, 2001).
Advance Man Told of Pentagon Attack - As Bush and the senators are walking out of the Caucus Room, John Meyers, the first lady’s advance man, receives a call on his cell phone. The caller, a friend of his, says that “CNN was reporting that an airplane had crashed into the Pentagon,” Bush will later write. [Time, 12/31/2001; Bush, 2010, pp. 199-200]
Secret Service Says First Lady and Staff Cannot Leave Yet - Before going to the Caucus Room, Bush spent time in Kennedy’s office (see 9:16 a.m.-9:40 a.m. September 11, 2001). [National Journal, 8/31/2002; CNN, 9/11/2002] She now goes back there. Then, she will recall, she begins “moving quickly toward the stairs, to reach my car to return to the White House.” But suddenly, Ron Sprinkle, Bush’s lead Secret Service agent, turns toward the first lady and her staff and tells them they need to head immediately to the basement of the Russell Senate Office Building, Bush will recall. [Bush, 2010, pp. 200] Andi Ball, the first lady’s chief of staff, who is with Bush at this time, will give a slightly different account. She will say that as Bush and her staff are walking down the corridor, on their way to the cars that will take them to the White House, Bush’s Secret Service agents tell them, “[W]e can’t go right now.” The agents say they all “need to go back and wait a few minutes.” Ball will add: “Our agents thought another plane was coming toward Washington. The Capitol was being evacuated.” [Kessler, 2006, pp. 136] (The Russell Senate Office Building and the nearby Capitol building are evacuated at 9:48 a.m., apparently due to concerns that a plane is heading toward Capitol Hill (see 9:48 a.m. September 11, 2001). [Associated Press, 9/11/2001; Associated Press, 8/21/2002; CNN, 9/11/2006] )
First Lady and Entourage Go to Senator's Office - The group then takes off “at a run,” according to Bush. Gregg suggests they all go to his office, which is on a lower floor and is an interior room. Bush’s Secret Service agents then tell Meyers that they are waiting for the emergency response team to arrive. They say the team will take the first lady away but leave her staff behind. Overhearing this conversation, Bush turns back and says, “No, everyone is coming.” Bush and her entourage then reach Gregg’s office, where they will remain until the Secret Service takes them away to a “secure location” at around 10:10 a.m. (see (9:50 a.m.-10:00 a.m.) September 11, 2001, (Shortly After 10:00 a.m.) September 11, 2001, and (10:10 a.m.-10:55 a.m.) September 11, 2001). [National Journal, 8/31/2002; Bush, 2010, pp. 200]

Judd Gregg. [Source: US Congress]Laura Bush, the president’s wife, and her entourage stay in the office of Senator Judd Gregg (R-NH) as they wait for the Secret Service emergency response team to arrive and take them away from Capitol Hill. Bush and those with her in the Russell Senate Office Building headed to Gregg’s office after they learned of the attack on the Pentagon and Bush’s Secret Service agents told them to go to the basement (see (9:45 a.m.-9:50 a.m.) September 11, 2001). (Gregg’s office is on a lower floor of the building, though whether it is in the basement is unclear.)
First Lady Unable to Contact Daughters - From Gregg’s office, Bush tries calling her daughters, Barbara and Jenna, who are both at university. [Bush, 2010, pp. 200] She is unable to reach them at this time. According to journalist and author Christopher Andersen, she is told that “they had both already been hustled off to what the Secret Service called ‘secure locations.’” [Newsweek, 12/3/2001; Andersen, 2002, pp. 6]
First Lady and Senator Talk about Families - The first lady then sits with Gregg, who is a longtime Bush family friend, and, she will later recall, they talk “quietly about our families and our worries for them, and the overwhelming shock we both felt.” [New York Times, 10/4/2004; Bush, 2010, pp. 200] Senator Edward Kennedy (D-MA), who is also in Gregg’s office at this time, will recall, “We kept the television set off and simply talked for a while.” [Kennedy, 2009, pp. 492]
Reporters Cannot Travel with First Lady - Noelia Rodriguez, the first lady’s press secretary, is worried about the pool reporters who are with them. She will describe, “We put them all in a room,” but Bush’s Secret Service agents tell her, “We have to leave here and we can’t take [the pool reporters] with us.” Laurence McQuillan, of USA Today, reassures Rodriguez, telling her, “Don’t worry about us.” [National Journal, 8/31/2002] Bush remains in Gregg’s office until members of the Secret Service, including the emergency response team, collect her from there (see (Shortly After 10:00 a.m.) September 11, 2001). [Bush, 2010, pp. 200] She and her staff leave the Russell Senate Office Building at around 10:10 a.m., and are then driven to a “secure location” (see (10:10 a.m.-10:55 a.m.) September 11, 2001). [National Journal, 8/31/2002]

Lynne Cheney conferring with Dick Cheney in the early afternoon on 9/11. [Source: David Bohrer/ White House]According to the 9/11 Commission, the Secret Service logs Lynne Cheney’s arrival at the White House at 9:52 a.m. She joins her husband, Vice President Dick Cheney, in the tunnel leading to the Presidential Emergency Operations Center (PEOC) bunker below the White House, and then enters the PEOC alongside him. [9/11 Commission, 7/24/2004, pp. 40] She had been at her downtown office around the time the second tower was hit, at 9:03, when she was driven by the Secret Service to the White House. [Newsweek, 12/31/2001] Yet, in a brief interview with an activist group in 2007, Transportation Secretary Norman Mineta will claim that Lynne Cheney was already in the PEOC when he arrived there. [911truthseattle (.org), 6/26/2007] According to Mineta’s recollections, this was at around 9:20-9:27 (see (Between 9:20 a.m. and 9:27 a.m.) September 11, 2001). [MSNBC, 9/11/2002; 9/11 Commission, 5/23/2003] Lynne Cheney will sit in a corner of the PEOC, and write down notes on the various reports that are received this morning by the vice president. [Cheney, 9/11/2001; Newsweek, 12/31/2001]

Air Force One takes off and quickly gains altitude. One passenger later says, “It was like a rocket. For a good ten minutes, the plane was going almost straight up.” [CBS News, 9/11/2002] Once the plane reaches cruising altitude, it flies in circles. Journalists on board sense this because the television reception for a local station generally remains good. “Apparently Bush, Cheney, and the Secret Service argue over the safety of Bush coming back to Washington.” [Salon, 9/11/2001; Daily Telegraph, 12/16/2001] For much of the day Bush is plagued by connectivity problems in trying to call Cheney and others. He is forced to use an ordinary cell phone instead of his secure phone. [9/11 Commission, 6/17/2004]

The pilots that took off from Langley Air Force Base (see (9:25 a.m.-9:30 a.m.) September 11, 2001) hear a warning over radio that errant aircraft will be shot down, and receive an instruction from the Secret Service to protect the White House. [Spencer, 2008, pp. 222-223]
Pilots Learn of FAA Order - The three Langley fighter jets have now reached the Baltimore-Washington area. [Spencer, 2008, pp. 222] The pilots hear over their radios that the FAA has ordered all civilian aircraft to land. [New York Times, 10/16/2001] (The FAA issued this instruction at around 9:45 a.m. (see (9:45 a.m.) September 11, 2001). [US Congress. House. Committee On Transportation And Infrastructure, 9/21/2001; 9/11 Commission, 7/24/2004, pp. 29] )
Borgstrom Hears Shootdown Warning - The three pilots are all on different radio frequencies, but are able to communicate between themselves on their auxiliary frequency. According to author Lynn Spencer, one of them, Captain Craig Borgstrom, hears a message over the emergency radio frequency that is in response to the FAA’s recent order: “Attention all aircraft! Attention all aircraft! You are ordered to land at the nearest suitable airport. All aircraft must land immediately. Violators will be shot down.” The source of this message is unstated. [Filson, 2003, pp. 66; Spencer, 2008, pp. 222-223] (Author Leslie Filson will describe the Langley pilots hearing what is apparently a separate but similar message later on, some time after 10:42 a.m. (see 10:05 a.m.-11:05 a.m. September 11, 2001). [Filson, 2003, pp. 82] )
Instructed to Protect the White House - Around the time Borgstrom hears this, Major Dean Eckmann, the lead Langley pilot, is on the radio with the FAA’s Washington Center. A Secret Service agent has arrived there and wants to talk to him. [Filson, 2003, pp. 68; Spencer, 2008, pp. 222-223] Eckmann then receives a garbled message over his radio, which is difficult to make out. [New York Times, 11/15/2001] The message is, “Protect the house.” Eckmann will later recall, “I took it to mean protect the White House.” [Filson, 2003, pp. 68] He notifies the two other pilots—Borgstrom and Major Brad Derrig—of this message. He tells them, “I think I just talked to the Secret Service, but I’m not sure.” [New York Times, 11/15/2001]
Possible Shootdown Order? - According to Spencer, this message means that “Unknown to NEADS” (NORAD’s Northeast Air Defense Sector), Eckmann has been “given shootdown authority directly from the Secret Service, bypassing the military chain of command.” [Spencer, 2008, pp. 223] But Borgstrom and Derrig will later say they “never received explicit orders to fire on incoming planes perceived to be hostile.” [New York Times, 11/15/2001] Borgstrom radios NEADS weapons director Steve Citino and asks for specific instructions about what to do (see 10:07 a.m. September 11, 2001). [Spencer, 2008, pp. 223] According to the 9/11 Commission, NEADS will only learn that NORAD has been given clearance to shoot down threatening aircraft at 10:31 a.m., and even then it does not pass this order along to the fighter pilots under its command (see 10:31 a.m. September 11, 2001). [9/11 Commission, 7/24/2004, pp. 42-43]

Secret Service emergency response team officers patrolling the South Lawn of the White House. [Source: Associated Press]Laura Bush, the president’s wife, is escorted out of the Russell Senate Office Building in Washington, DC, by members of the Secret Service with their guns drawn, to be driven away to a secure location. [National Journal, 8/31/2002; Bush, 2010, pp. 200] People began evacuating from the Russell Senate Office Building and the nearby Capitol building at 9:48 a.m., apparently due to concerns that a plane was heading toward Capitol Hill (see 9:48 a.m. September 11, 2001). [Associated Press, 9/11/2001; Associated Press, 8/21/2002; CNN, 9/11/2006] While Bush and her staff were waiting for the Secret Service emergency response team to arrive and take them away from the Russell Office Building, they stayed in the office of Senator Judd Gregg (R-NH) (see (9:50 a.m.-10:00 a.m.) September 11, 2001).
Emergency Response Team Arrives with Guns Drawn - Secret Service agents collect the first lady from Gregg’s office at “[s]ometime after 10:00 a.m.,” Bush will later recall. [Bush, 2010, pp. 200] Bush usually travels with four Secret Service agents. [Kessler, 2006, pp. 136; Kessler, 2009, pp. 181] But her usual agents are now joined by “an additional Secret Service detail and an emergency response team, dressed in black tactical clothing like a SWAT force and moving with guns drawn.” As Bush is being hurried through the hallways, past panicked staffers leaving their offices, members of the emergency response team escorting her shout, “Get back!” and cover her every move with their guns. [Bush, 2010, pp. 200]
First Lady Escorted to Her Limousine - Noelia Rodriguez, the first lady’s press secretary, will recall that she and several other members of Bush’s staff reach Bush’s limousine before the first lady does. While they are waiting there, they chat excitedly, asking each other: “What could this be? Where are we going? What’s next?” But the driver instructs them to be quiet, saying, “Ladies, this is a time to pay attention.” “Just then,” Rodriguez will say, “what seemed like two dozen of these ninja guys surrounded the car—Secret Service agents all dressed in black. Mrs. Bush then got in the car.” [National Journal, 8/31/2002] Bush will describe, “We reached the underground entrance; the doors on the motorcade slammed shut, and we sped off.” [Bush, 2010, pp. 200]
Motorcade Delayed before Leaving Capitol Hill - However, Bush and those accompanying her reportedly face a delay as they are about to drive off. Ashleigh Adams, the first lady’s deputy press secretary, will describe, “At one point, we were all going to leave, and then Mrs. Bush got out of the motorcade and they [presumably members of the Secret Service] told us to stay in the staff van.” At this point, Adams will say, “Everyone was distraught” and they “didn’t know what was going on.” She will add: “We knew something was going on in DC, because we could see people running around. A lot of us were under the impression that there were car bombs going off throughout the city.” Bush and those accompanying her leave Capitol Hill at 10:10 a.m., according to Rodriguez. [National Journal, 8/31/2002] Bush’s Secret Service agents say they are going to take everyone to a secure location. This turns out to be the Secret Service headquarters in Washington (see (10:10 a.m.-10:55 a.m.) September 11, 2001). [Kessler, 2006, pp. 136]

An aircraft that is in Sarasota, Florida, in support of President Bush’s visit there takes off with people and equipment on board shortly after Air Force One leaves Sarasota, and will eventually make its way back to Washington, DC. [Marist Magazine, 10/2002] Air Force One took off from Sarasota-Bradenton International Airport with Bush on board at around 9:54 a.m. (see 9:54 a.m. September 11, 2001). [Washington Post, 1/27/2002; 9/11 Commission, 7/24/2004, pp. 39] Members of the president’s entourage who have stayed behind in Sarasota subsequently load the second aircraft with vehicles and other items. The aircraft would normally be used just to transport people back to Washington. But Lieutenant Colonel Thomas Herman, a senior presidential communications officer, will later recall that all of the presidential limousines “and a bunch of equipment we had which I can’t really discuss” are loaded onto it. The aircraft then takes off from the Sarasota airport “not too long after the president got airborne.” Those on the aircraft, as well as Herman, include members of the Secret Service and Major Paul Montanus, one of the president’s military aides. Herman will not say where the aircraft goes, or why, after it leaves Sarasota. “Obviously we were in the air for a reason, for any contingency,” he will say. “Basically we could have gone to any city or county or location in the United States, and landed and supported the president at that location.” Herman will add that the flight “became a special mission.” The aircraft will land at Andrews Air Force Base, just outside Washington, “about 15 minutes after the president,” according to Herman. [Marist Magazine, 10/2002] This would mean it lands at around 6:45 p.m. [Sammon, 2002, pp. 127; Rove, 2010, pp. 263]

Vice President Cheney and other leaders now in the White House bunker begin receiving reports from the Secret Service of a presumably hijacked aircraft heading toward Washington. The Secret Service is getting this information about Flight 93 through links to the FAA. However, they are looking at a projected path, not an actual radar return, so they do not realize that the plane crashes minutes later. [9/11 Commission, 6/17/2004]

According to the 9/11 Commission, the NMCC learns about the Flight 93 hijacking at this time. Since the FAA has not yet been patched in to the NMCC’s conference call, the news comes from the White House. The White House learned about it from the Secret Service, and the Secret Service learned about it from the FAA. NORAD apparently is still unaware. Four minutes later, a NORAD representative on the conference call states, “NORAD has no indication of a hijack heading to Washington, D.C., at this time.” [9/11 Commission, 6/17/2004]

Counterterrorism “tsar” Richard Clarke is told by White House Situation Room Deputy Director Ralph Seigler, “Secret Service reports a hostile aircraft ten minutes out.” Two minutes later, he is given an update: “Hostile aircraft eight minutes out.” In actual fact, when Flight 93 crashed at 10:06 a.m., it was still about 15 minutes away from Washington. Clarke is also told that there are 3,900 aircraft still in the air over the continental US (which is roughly accurate); four of those aircraft are believed to be piloted by terrorists (which is inaccurate by this time). Joint Chiefs of Staff Vice Chairman Richard Myers then reports: “We have three F-16s from Langley over the Pentagon. Andrews is launching fighters from the DC Air National Guard. We have fighters aloft from the Michigan Air National Guard, moving east toward a potential hostile over Pennsylvania. Six fighters from Tyndall and Ellington are en route to rendezvous with Air Force One over Florida. They will escort it to Barksdale.” [North American Aerospace Defense Command, 9/18/2001; Clarke, 2004, pp. 8-9] However, fighters do not meet up with Air Force One until about an hour later (see (11:29 a.m.) September 11, 2001). Franklin Miller, a senior national security official who is working alongside Clarke on 9/11, and another official who is also in the Situation Room, will later fail to recall hearing any warning that a plane could be only minutes away. [New York Times, 3/30/2004] The time of this incident is unstated, but the Michigan fighters are not diverted until after 10:06 a.m. (see (After 10:06 a.m.) September 11, 2001). If it takes place after 10:06 a.m., this would parallel similar warnings about Flight 93 after it has already crashed provided to Vice President Dick Cheney elsewhere in the White House (see (Between 10:10 a.m. and 10:15 a.m.) September 11, 2001).

Dick Cheney in the White House bunker, speaking to administration officials including (from left) Joshua Bolten, Karen Hughes, Mary Matalin (standing), Condoleezza Rice and I. Lewis ‘Scooter’ Libby. [Source: David Bohrer / White House] (click image to enlarge)The Secret Service, viewing projected path information about Flight 93, rather than actual radar returns, does not realize that Flight 93 has already crashed. Based on this erroneous information, a military aide tells Vice President Dick Cheney and others in the White House bunker that the plane is 80 miles away from Washington. Cheney is asked for authority to engage the plane, and he quickly provides it. The aide returns a few minutes later and says the plane is 60 miles out. Cheney again gives authorization to engage. A few minutes later and presumably after the flight has crashed or been shot down, deputy White House chief of staff Josh Bolten suggests Cheney contact President Bush to confirm the engage order. Bolten later tells the 9/11 Commission that he had not heard any prior discussion on the topic with Bush, and wanted to make sure Bush knew. Apparently, Cheney calls Bush and obtains confirmation (see 10:18 a.m.-10:20 a.m. September 11, 2001). [9/11 Commission, 6/17/2004] However, there is controversy over whether Bush approved a shootdown before this incident or whether Cheney gave himself the authority to make the decision on the spot. As Newsweek notes, it is a moot point in one sense, since the decision was made on false data and there is no plane to shoot down. [Newsweek, 6/20/2004]

Andi Ball. [Source: White House]Laura Bush, the president’s wife, and her entourage are driven from Capitol Hill to the Secret Service headquarters in Washington, DC, for their own security, but their journey is slowed by the heavy traffic. [Woodward, 2002, pp. 17; National Journal, 8/31/2002; Kessler, 2006, pp. 136; Bush, 2010, pp. 200-201] Bush has been at the Russell Senate Office Building in Washington, where she was originally scheduled to testify before a Senate committee. [CNN, 9/12/2001; Woodward, 2002, pp. 16-17] Her Secret Service agents have said they are going to take the first lady and her staff to a secure location. [Kessler, 2006, pp. 136] After the Secret Service emergency response team arrived for her, Bush was escorted out of the Russell Senate Office Building and to her limousine (see (Shortly After 10:00 a.m.) September 11, 2001). Bush and those accompanying her leave Capitol Hill at 10:10 a.m., according to Noelia Rodriguez, the first lady’s press secretary.
Agents with Guns Drawn Protect Motorcade - Secret Service agents protect Bush’s motorcade with their guns as it heads to the secure location. Ashleigh Adams, the first lady’s deputy press secretary, will later recall, “It felt like we were in a war, because the Secret Service was driving next to the motorcade and they were hanging out of the windows with their machine guns out.” She will add that she has “been around the agents” before, but has “never seen them with their guns.”
Motorcade Delayed by Traffic - However, the motorcade is slowed by the heavy traffic. Bush will describe, “Outside our convoy windows, the city streets were clogged with people evacuating their workplaces and trying to reach their own homes.” Rodriguez will say, “In the car, we seemed to be going in slow motion.” [National Journal, 8/31/2002; Bush, 2010, pp. 200] “The traffic was so bad that everything was stopped,” Andi Ball, Bush’s chief of staff, will recall. One of the Secret Service agents escorting Bush and her staff will later say a car sideswiped them during the journey.
Secure Location Is Secret Service Headquarters - The “secure location” that Bush and her staff are being taken to turns out to be the Secret Service headquarters. [Kessler, 2006, pp. 136] The Secret Service headquarters, according to journalist and author Ronald Kessler, is “an anonymous nine-story tan brick building on H Street at Ninth Street NW in Washington.” [Kessler, 2009, pp. 23] It is located a few blocks from the White House. After the Oklahoma City bombing in 1995 (see 8:35 a.m. - 9:02 a.m. April 19, 1995) it was reinforced to survive a large-scale blast. Bush and her entourage arrive there through an underground entrance. [Washington Post, 8/23/2009; Bush, 2010, pp. 200-201]
Journey Reportedly Takes 45 Minutes - The exact time they arrive at is unclear. According to Washington Post reporter Bob Woodward, “In the traffic jam from the Capitol, it took 45 minutes to get [Bush] to Secret Service headquarters.” This would mean the first lady arrives there at around 10:55 a.m. [Woodward, 2002, pp. 17] However, Bush will write that she watches the North Tower of the World Trade Center collapsing “live in front of my eyes,” on a screen at the headquarters. [Bush, 2010, pp. 201] If this is correct, she must arrive at the headquarters sometime before 10:28 a.m., when the North Tower comes down (see 10:28 a.m. September 11, 2001). [9/11 Commission, 7/24/2004, pp. 311] White House spokespeople will refuse to disclose where the first lady has been taken to, only saying she is at a “secure location.” [Associated Press, 9/11/2001; CNN, 9/12/2001; CNN, 9/11/2002]

David Wherley. [Source: US Air Force]Brigadier General David Wherley, the commander of the District of Columbia Air National Guard (DCANG), finally receives specific instructions from the Secret Service for his fighter jets to follow when they launch over Washington, and is told they can use “whatever force is necessary” to prevent another aircraft hitting a building. [9/11 Commission, 8/28/2003; Vogel, 2007, pp. 446; Spencer, 2008, pp. 218]
Instructions Received within 'Half-Hour' of Request - Wherley phoned the Secret Service’s White House Joint Operations Center after arriving at the headquarters of the DCANG’s 121st Fighter Squadron at Andrews Air Force Base, near Washington (see (Shortly After 9:39 a.m.) September 11, 2001). The agent he talked to requested that DCANG fighters be sent up over the capital, but Wherley asked for more specific instructions (see (9:45 a.m.) September 11, 2001). Secret Service agents at the White House have been working hard to get these. [Spencer, 2008, pp. 184-185, 218] According to the Washington Post, “within a half-hour,” Wherley receives “oral instructions from the White House giving the pilots extraordinary discretion to shoot down any threatening aircraft.” [Washington Post, 4/8/2002]
Jets May Use 'Whatever Force Is Necessary' - Wherley had been talking to Secret Service agent Kenneth Beauchamp, but these instructions are given to him by Becky Ediger, the deputy special agent in charge of the Presidential Protective Division, who now comes on the line. Ediger says the instructions have come directly from Vice President Dick Cheney. She tells Wherley: “We want you to intercept and turn away any airplane that attempts to fly within 20 miles of the Washington area. If you are not able to turn them away, use whatever force is necessary to keep them from hitting any buildings downtown.”
Wherley Wants to Talk to Military - Wherley asks if there is anybody in a uniform—i.e. from the military—with Ediger that he could talk to. Ediger alludes to a Navy captain who is busy with other things, but says no one from the military is available. Although the instructions he has been given are not in military terms, Wherley feels they are understandable enough. [Peabody Gazette-Bulletin, 2/12/2003; 9/11 Commission, 8/28/2003; Spencer, 2008, pp. 218] According to the 9/11 Commission, Wherley translates Ediger’s instructions in military terms to flying “weapons free,” meaning “the decision to shoot rests in the cockpit, or in this case in the cockpit of the lead pilot.” He will pass these instructions to the DCANG pilots that take off at 10:42 a.m. and after (see 10:42 a.m. September 11, 2001 and 11:11 a.m. September 11, 2001). [9/11 Commission, 7/24/2004, pp. 44]
Instructions Coming from Cheney - Wherley will later say that Ediger is “standing next to the vice president” during their call. [Filson, 2003, pp. 79] However, the 9/11 Commission will apparently state differently, saying a “Secret Service agent” (presumably Ediger) has “a phone in each ear, one connected to Wherley and the other to a fellow agent at the White House, relaying instructions that the White House agent said he was getting from the vice president.” [9/11 Commission, 7/24/2004, pp. 44]
White House Denies Cheney Involvement - In 2004, Secret Service officials will confirm that its agents’ actions relating to the DCANG on September 11 are ordered by Cheney. The agency will issue a statement, clarifying, “The Secret Service is not authorized to, nor did it, direct the activation or launch of Department of Defense aviation assets.” But two unnamed White House officials that are involved in the emergency response to the attacks will say the Secret Service acts on its own. An official speaking on behalf of Cheney will say he doesn’t know whether the vice president directed Secret Service agents to call the DCANG, and he would not be able to find out. [Wall Street Journal, 3/22/2004 ] The 9/11 Commission will state that both Cheney and President Bush “indicated to us they had not been aware that fighters had been scrambled out of Andrews, at the request of the Secret Service and outside the military chain of command.” [9/11 Commission, 7/24/2004, pp. 44]
Wherley Wants More Information - Wherley still has questions about the rules of engagement for his fighter jets, which will subsequently be answered by a Secret Service agent at the White House, possibly Ediger (see (Between 10:16 a.m. and 10:35 a.m.) September 11, 2001). [9/11 Commission, 8/28/2003]

Brigadier General David Wherley, the commander of the District of Columbia Air National Guard (DCANG), talks to a Secret Service agent at the White House regarding some questions he has about the rules of engagement for his fighter jets. [9/11 Commission, 8/28/2003] Wherley, who is at the headquarters of the DCANG’s 121st Fighter Squadron at Andrews Air Force Base, near Washington, has been talking over the phone with Becky Ediger, a senior Secret Service agent at the White House, and told his fighters can use “whatever force is necessary” to prevent an aircraft crashing into a building in the capital (see (10:15 a.m.) September 11, 2001). [Wall Street Journal, 3/22/2004 ; Vogel, 2007, pp. 445-446; Spencer, 2008, pp. 218]
Wherley Concerned about Rules of Engagement - As Wherley will later tell the 9/11 Commission, he still has “some questions about rules of engagement” that his jets are supposed to follow. He “finally” speaks with a Secret Service agent who answers his concerns. (From the account Wherley gives to the 9/11 Commission, it is unclear if this agent is Ediger, or someone else.) The agent confirms that DCANG fighters are free to engage aircraft if they cannot successfully be diverted. This seems clear enough to Wherley, and, like the previous instructions he received, he interprets it as flying “weapons free,” meaning the decision whether his jets shoot down a threatening aircraft rests with the lead pilot.
Agent Possibly Standing next to Cheney - Wherley will tell the 9/11 Commission that the agent he talks to at this time is “standing next to the vice president.” [9/11 Commission, 8/28/2003; 9/11 Commission, 7/24/2004, pp. 44] If correct, this would mean they are in the Presidential Emergency Operations Center (PEOC) below the White House, where Vice President Dick Cheney was evacuated to earlier on (see (9:10 a.m.) September 11, 2001). [ABC News, 9/14/2002; 9/11 Commission, 7/24/2004, pp. 39-40]

Brigadier General David Wherley, the commander of the District of Columbia Air National Guard (DCANG) at Andrews Air Force Base, near Washington, wants his fighter jets to intercept a suspicious aircraft coming down the Potomac River toward the capital, which is apparently thought to be Flight 93, although that plane has already crashed (see (10:06 a.m.) September 11, 2001). [Washington Post, 4/8/2002; Filson, 2003, pp. 79-81; 9/11 Commission, 8/28/2003]
Numerous Suspicious Aircraft - According to the Washington Post, the DCANG has learned there are “about a half-dozen suspicious aircraft in the air across the country, among them hijacked United Airlines Flight 93, on a path toward Washington.” Wherley will add: “Nobody knew it had crashed. We just knew there was an airplane out there that could be coming to Washington. We knew the threat was real.”
Fighters Launched due to False Report - The first three DCANG fighters to take off in response to the attacks are ordered to go after this alleged inbound aircraft. [Washington Post, 4/8/2002] Lieutenant Colonel Phil Thompson, the chief of safety for the DC Air National Guard, will later recall: “We had something coming down the Potomac at low altitude. Brigadier General Wherley is standing here, and we’ve got the tower with the Secret Service agent, and they want us to launch anything we’ve got. And the general said, ‘Do it.’” [Filson, 2003, pp. 81] DCANG pilot Billy Hutchison, who takes off at 10:38 a.m. (see (10:38 a.m.) September 11, 2001), will describe, “There was an aircraft coming down the Potomac that they needed me in the air for” that had to “be prevented from reaching the DC area.” He is told this aircraft is “coming from Pennsylvania.” [9/11 Commission, 2/27/2004] And pilot Marc Sasseville, who, along with Heather Penney Garcia, takes off at 10:42 a.m. (see 10:42 a.m. September 11, 2001), later says: “We all realized we were looking for an airliner—a big airplane. That was Flight 93; the track looked like it was headed toward DC at that time.” [Aviation Week and Space Technology, 9/9/2002; Vogel, 2007, pp. 446]
Incorrect Report Comes from Secret Service - According to Major David McNulty, the senior intelligence officer of the DCANG, his understanding is that “the information about the plane coming down the river” came from the Secret Service’s White House Joint Operations Center. [9/11 Commission, 3/11/2004 ] FAA personnel are also receiving similar information from the Secret Service. At 10:32, an FAA employee tells John White, a manager at the FAA’s Herndon Command Center, “Secret Service is reporting one unknown eight miles out, flying inbound.” Two minutes later, this employee says they are “[t]rying to tell [the] Secret Service about [Flight] 93,” because the Secret Service is “a little bit behind, still getting reports.” They then tell White, “Secret Service is saying the aircraft they are talking is coming up the Potomac right now.” [9/11 Commission, 11/4/2003] Fire and rescue workers are evacuated away from the Pentagon site around this time, in response to a report from the FBI of a hijacked aircraft flying toward Washington (see (10:15 a.m.-10:38 a.m.) September 11, 2001). This may be the same alleged plane that the DCANG and FAA learn of. [US Department of Health and Human Services, 7/2002, pp. A30; Fire Engineering, 11/2002]
Aircraft Supposedly a Helicopter - The incoming aircraft is apparently a false alarm. [9/11 Commission, 8/28/2003] After searching for it, Hutchison will be instructed to fly back toward Washington because, he will say, “the plane had been lost.” [9/11 Commission, 2/27/2004] According to a 9/11 Commission memorandum, “FAA tapes and transcripts” reveal the aircraft to be “an Army National Guard helicopter based out of Davison Field, Fort Belvoir, Virginia, which had become isolated in Maryland as events unfolded and which wanted to return to its home field.” [9/11 Commission, 3/11/2004 ]
Secret Service Thinks Plane Crashed at Camp David - However, at 10:36, the FAA employee relays that the “Secret Service is saying they believe United 93 hit Camp David.” Seconds later, they add that the Secret Service is “confirming that UA 93 did go into Camp David.” [9/11 Commission, 11/4/2003] Even President Bush is given an incorrect report of a plane going down near Camp David around this time (see (10:37 a.m.-11:09 a.m.) September 11, 2001). [Sammon, 2002, pp. 108] So this erroneous information may be what leads to Hutchison being informed that the aircraft he was sent after has been lost. [9/11 Commission, 2/27/2004]

A US Park Police helicopter that has been assisting in the response to the Pentagon attack has to respond to a sudden influx of reports of emergencies that are in fact false alarms. [US Naval Historical Center, 11/19/2001; Goldberg et al., 2007, pp. 164] The helicopter, with the call sign “Eagle II,” is one of two Park Police Aviation Unit helicopters that arrived at the Pentagon shortly after the attack there (see Shortly After 9:37 a.m. September 11, 2001). [NBC 4, 9/11/2003; Goldberg et al., 2007, pp. 161-162] After transporting two patients from the Pentagon to the Washington Hospital Center, Eagle II returned to the aviation unit’s hangar in Anacostia Park to pick up a Secret Service agent. [McDonnell, 2004, pp. 22 ] Sergeant Keith Bohn, the pilot of Eagle II, will later recall: “The Secret Service had some requests for us to check. Things like the White House perimeter, the downtown areas, the rooftops. There were a lot of things coming up.” Suddenly, the helicopter has to respond to a mass of reports of additional emergencies. According to Bohn, “All of a sudden, everything was just unbelievable—to check bridges for abandoned cars, which were believed to be packed with explosives.” Eagle II is then “running from one report of things to another report.” These reported emergencies turn out to be false alarms. According to Bohn, “Actually, in the city [of Washington, DC], nothing else, in essence, happened that day, but… lots of fear was running rampant.” Bohn will add, “We were chasing our tail and everyone else’s all around town from Memorial Bridge, 14th Street Bridge, the White House; the Capitol was involved in wanting some perimeter checks, doing all that.” [US Naval Historical Center, 11/19/2001; Goldberg et al., 2007, pp. 164] Numerous emergencies in the Washington area are being incorrectly reported around this time (see (Between 9:50-10:40 a.m.) September 11, 2001). [Broadcasting and Cable, 8/26/2002]

Vice President Cheney reportedly calls President Bush and tells him of a threat to Air Force One and that it will take 40-90 minutes to get a protective fighter escort in place. Later, many will express doubt about the existence of this threat. For instance, Representative Martin Meehan (D-MA) says, “I don’t buy the notion Air Force One was a target. That’s just PR, that’s just spin.” [Washington Times, 10/8/2002] A later account will call the threat “completely untrue,” and say Cheney probably made the story up. A well-informed, anonymous Washington official says, “It did two things for [Cheney]. It reinforced his argument that the president should stay out of town, and it gave George W. an excellent reason for doing so.” [Daily Telegraph, 12/16/2001] In 2004, the Wall Street Journal will investigate the alleged threat and report two differing accounts of this episode, one from White House spokesman Dan Bartlett, and the other from the office of Vice-President Cheney.
No Actual Threat - Bartlett will say there had not been any actual threat, but that word of a threat results from confusion in the White House bunker, as multiple conversations go on simultaneously. Many of these exchanges apparently relate to rumors that turn out to be false, such as reports of attacks on the president’s ranch in Texas and the State Department. Bartlett will say, “Somebody was using the word ‘angel,’ [a code word for Air Force One and] that got interpreted as a threat based on the word ‘angel.’”
Cheney's Account Changes - The vice president’s office will say it still could not rule out that a threat to Air Force One actually had been made. Cheney initially says word of the threat had been passed to him by Secret Service agents, but two former senior Secret Service agents on duty that day will deny their agency played any role in receiving or passing on the threat. An official in Cheney’s office will then say that Cheney was mistaken and that he had received word of the threat from “a uniformed military person” manning the underground bunker. Apparently, nobody knows the identity of this person. [Wall Street Journal, 3/22/2004 ]

A Secret Service agent at the White House calls the District of Columbia Air National Guard (DCANG) at Andrews Air Force Base, near Washington, and asks it to launch fighter jets immediately. According to author Lynn Spencer, a report has been received at the White House from the FAA “that there are three planes unaccounted for,” and the Secret Service has therefore determined “it needs fighters up now.” It calls the DCANG to request these jets. [Spencer, 2008, pp. 236] Apparently around the same time, the DCANG receives a call from someone else at the White House—presumably another Secret Service agent—declaring the Washington area “a free-fire zone.” Lieutenant Colonel Marc Sasseville, one of the DCANG pilots, will later comment, “That meant we were given authority to use force, if the situation required it, in defense of the nation’s capital, its property, and people.” [Aviation Week and Space Technology, 9/9/2002] Between 10:38 a.m. and 11:11 a.m., five DCANG fighter jets will take off from Andrews to defend Washington (see (10:38 a.m.) September 11, 2001, 10:42 a.m. September 11, 2001, and 11:11 a.m. September 11, 2001). [9/11 Commission, 2004; 9/11 Commission, 2/17/2004; Vogel, 2007, pp. 446] The Secret Service contacted the DCANG several times earlier on, requesting that it launch fighters (see (Shortly After 9:04 a.m.) September 11, 2001, (Shortly After 9:33 a.m.) September 11, 2001, and (Shortly After 9:35 a.m.) September 11, 2001). [Filson, 2003, pp. 78; 9/11 Commission, 7/24/2004, pp. 465] Brigadier General David Wherley, the commander of the DC Air National Guard, has been on the phone with Secret Service agents at the White House, who have told him his jets should “turn away any airplane that attempts to fly within 20 miles of the Washington area,” and the pilots can use “whatever force is necessary” to prevent another aircraft hitting a building (see (10:15 a.m.) September 11, 2001 and (Between 10:16 a.m. and 10:35 a.m.) September 11, 2001). [9/11 Commission, 8/28/2003; 9/11 Commission, 7/24/2004, pp. 44; Spencer, 2008, pp. 218]

The press incorrectly reports that an airliner has crashed on or near Camp David. [Daily Record (Baltimore), 9/12/2001; US Department of Transportation, 3/2002] Camp David is the presidential retreat, located about 70 miles north of Washington, DC, in the Catoctin Mountains of Maryland. [Federation of American Scientists, 10/2/2000; Associated Press, 7/30/2007] On Air Force One, at 10:37, White House chief of staff Andrew Card relays to the president the incorrect report of the crash. [Sammon, 2002, pp. 108] At around 11:09, CBS News reports that “a plane apparently has crashed at or near Camp David.” [Broadcasting and Cable, 8/26/2002] An early article by Forbes states, “There are reports of a fourth airliner [having] been brought down near Camp David… by US military fighters.” [Forbes, 9/11/2001] And an early report by the Northwestern Chronicle similarly states, “Air Force officials say an airliner has been forced down by F-16 fighter jets near Camp David.” [Northwestern Chronicle, 9/11/2001] Theresa Hahn, the catering manager for a restaurant in the Camp David area, hears the erroneous report. She subsequently describes, “Lots of fire trucks were on the road and no one can get up there.” But J. Mel Poole, the Catoctin Mountain Park superintendent, states there has been “no crash at Camp David.” [Daily Record (Baltimore), 9/12/2001] At some point, the FAA calls the military to confirm the crash, and is reassured that no crash occurred at Camp David. [Freni, 2003, pp. 42] The actual Flight 93 crash site is about 85 miles northwest of Camp David. [PBS, 9/11/2001] The Secret Service reportedly tells the White House that Flight 93 may have been on a course for Camp David. [Pittsburgh Channel, 9/11/2001] And, following a military briefing, Representative James Moran (D-VA) tells reporters that Flight 93 was apparently heading for Camp David. [Associated Press, 9/11/2001; Wall Street Journal, 9/12/2001] (However, the 9/11 Commission will later state that its intended target was either the White House or the Capitol building. [9/11 Commission, 7/24/2004, pp. 14] ) The source of the incorrect report of the Camp David crash is unclear. However, when the FAA’s Washington Center first informed NEADS that Flight 93 had crashed, at 10:15, it simply reported that it had gone down “somewhere up northeast of Camp David” (see 10:15 a.m. September 11, 2001), so this may have created some of the confusion. [Vanity Fair, 8/1/2006] There are also numerous false reports of terrorist attacks having taken place in Washington, DC around this time (see (Between 9:50-10:40 a.m.) September 11, 2001). Some commentators make the connection that the 9/11 attacks come 23 years after the signing of the Camp David accords—a peace agreement between Israel and Egypt—on September 17, 1978. [Forbes, 9/11/2001; Village Voice, 9/11/2001; Daily Record (Baltimore), 9/12/2001] WCBS reports, “[T]here is speculation that perhaps, perhaps, this may be in retaliation for those accords.” [Broadcasting and Cable, 8/26/2002]

The Secret Service reports that a United Airlines aircraft, Flight 182, is missing. Doug Davis, the special assistant for technical operations in air traffic services at FAA headquarters is talking over the phone with John White, a manager at the FAA’s Command Center in Herndon, Virginia. At 10:47 a.m., Davis informs White, “[United Airlines] 182, Secret Service is saying is missing.” Davis asks White to “find out for me” whether this is indeed the case. He adds that the flight is going from “Boston to Seattle.” [9/11 Commission, 11/4/2003] According to some accounts, Flight 182 is reported as missing at a later time. A Secret Service timeline of the morning’s events records the flight as being “unaccounted for” at 10:55 a.m. [Secret Service, 9/11/2001] And according to an FAA chronology, the plane is reported as being “unaccounted for” over an FAA teleconference at 11:40 a.m. [Federal Aviation Administration, 9/11/2001] Presumably Flight 182 is located at some later time, although further details of this missing aircraft are unstated.

The Driskill Hotel in Austin, Texas. [Source: The Driskill]Jenna Bush and Barbara Bush, President Bush’s 19-year-old twin daughters, arrive at “secure locations,” where they have been brought by their Secret Service agents. Barbara Bush, a student at Yale University, is taken to the Secret Service’s New Haven, Connecticut, office; Jenna Bush, a student at the University of Texas, is taken to a room at the Driskill Hotel in Austin. [Us Weekly, 10/15/2001; Woodward, 2002, pp. 17; Dish Magazine, 4/1/2002; Draper, 2007, pp. 141]
President's Daughters Asleep When Attacks Began - Jenna Bush was asleep in her dormitory room at the University of Texas when the terrorist attacks began, and learned of the catastrophic events when a Secret Service agent knocked on her door a few minutes after 9:00 a.m. Barbara Bush was also asleep when the attacks began, in her dormitory room at Yale. She heard what was happening on her clock radio, when the alarm woke her up at 9:00 a.m. “I found out the same way everybody else did,” she will later recall. “At first, we thought it was just an accident,” she will say. “Then, next door, there was another student sobbing, and that’s how we found out.” [Andersen, 2002, pp. 6; Bush, 2010, pp. 202; Winnipeg Free Press, 6/5/2010]
Concern that Bush Daughter's Presence Makes University a Target - There was concern that Barbara Bush’s presence at Yale could make the university a possible target for terrorists. Richard Levin, the university president, will say, “Our first concern was actually that Yale could potentially be a target because of President Bush’s daughter.” Therefore, he will say, “The first thing we did [in response to the attacks] was call the Secret Service.” He will add, “By the time we got in touch with the Secret Service, she was already evacuated from Yale.” [Yale Daily News, 9/9/2011] However, Barbara Bush is only “relocated” to the Secret Service’s New Haven office at 10:51 a.m., according to Washington Post reporter Bob Woodward. And Jenna Bush is only relocated to the Driskill Hotel minutes later, at 10:57 a.m. [Woodward, 2002, pp. 17]
Secret Service Must Keep President's Daughters 'out of Harm's Way' - As the president’s daughters are considered to be among the nation’s “most visible targets,” the Secret Service is responsible for protecting them. [US Department of the Treasury, 5/8/2001; Office of Management and Budget, 7/2001, pp. 82 ; United States Secret Service, 2002] The agency’s mission includes keeping the president’s children “in sight and out of harm’s way,” according to a book about the Secret Service by author Philip Melanson. [Melanson, 2002, pp. 273]

Pilot Mark Tillman in the cockpit of Air Force One. [Source: CBS News]Reporters accompanying President Bush on Air Force One notice their plane significantly increasing its altitude. [Salon, 9/11/2001; USA Today, 9/11/2001; Gilbert et al., 2002, pp. 148] According to Ann Compton of ABC Radio, who is on Air Force One, there is “a noticeable increase in the plane’s altitude” at this time. [Sylvester and Huffman, 2002, pp. 136] At 11:14 a.m., the reporters on the plane will be informed that they are flying at around 40,000 feet. [USA Today, 9/11/2001] Compton will later recall that around the time it increases its altitude, Air Force One is heading west, instead of flying toward Washington, DC. A Secret Service agent shakes his head and whispers to her, “We aren’t going home.” [Gilbert et al., 2002, pp. 148; Sylvester and Huffman, 2002, pp. 136] It is unclear if there is a specific reason for Air Force One’s increase in altitude. Around 20 minutes earlier, Colonel Mark Tillman, the plane’s pilot, was notified of a threat received by the White House indicating that Air Force One is a target (see 10:32 a.m. September 11, 2001), and shortly afterwards, air traffic control alerted him to a suspicious aircraft that was flying toward his plane (see (10:35 a.m.) September 11, 2001). [Sammon, 2002, pp. 106-107; CBS News, 9/11/2002; CBS News, 2/11/2009]

Laura Bush, the president’s wife, and her entourage arrive at the Secret Service headquarters in Washington, DC, where they will remain for much of the rest of the day, and where they make phone calls to their relatives and watch television coverage of the terrorist attacks. [Woodward, 2002, pp. 17; National Journal, 8/31/2002; Bush, 2010, pp. 201-203] Bush and her staff have been brought to the headquarters for their own security by members of the Secret Service. The building, located a few blocks from the White House, is strengthened to survive a large-scale blast. Bush and those accompanying her were driven there from the Russell Senate Office Building, on Capitol Hill (see (10:10 a.m.-10:55 a.m.) September 11, 2001). [Associated Press, 9/11/2001; Kessler, 2006, pp. 136; Bush, 2010, pp. 200-201] They are initially taken to the office of Brian Stafford, the Secret Service director, which is on an upper floor of the building. [Draper, 2007, pp. 143; Bush, 2010, pp. 201]
First Lady and Staff Call Their Families - Bush tells her staffers to call their families. Noelia Rodriguez, the first lady’s press secretary, will later recall, “Mrs. Bush told us, ‘Find phones, get hold of your families, and let them know you are okay.’” Bush calls her daughters, Jenna and Barbara, and her mother (see (Between 11:00 a.m. and 11:40 a.m.) September 11, 2001). [National Journal, 8/31/2002; Bush, 2010, pp. 202] She will also talk with President Bush while at the headquarters (see (Shortly Before 11:45 a.m.) September 11, 2001). [Bush, 2010, pp. 132; Bush, 2010, pp. 202-203]
First Lady Moved to Basement - After a time, the first lady and her staff are moved from the director’s office to the basement of the headquarters, apparently after they have made their phone calls. Ashleigh Adams, the first lady’s deputy press secretary, will recall, “[W]e took turns using the telephone and then we went to another floor where there was a large-screen TV.” Journalist and author Robert Draper will note that Bush’s Secret Service agents move the first lady after realizing that, in light of the day’s attacks, having her on an upper floor is “perhaps not such a hot idea.” [National Journal, 8/31/2002; Draper, 2007, pp. 143; Bush, 2010, pp. 201] In the basement, Bush and her staff go to the William Wood Conference Room. [Woodward, 2002, pp. 17] The windowless room has a large display screen across one wall, showing a constant TV feed. “For a while,” she will recall, Bush sits “in a small area off the conference room, silently watching the images on television.” According to Adams, “Mrs. Bush didn’t want the volume up, so we just sat there watching the TV like a silent movie.”
First Lady and Staff Lack a 'True Sense' of What Is Happening - Bush will describe the “chaos” regarding the attacks that she and those with her experience, writing: “It got so that we were living in five-minute increments, wondering if a new plane would emerge from the sky and hit a target. All of us in that basement conference room and many more in the Secret Service building were relying on rumors and on whatever news came from the announcers on television. When there were reports of more errant planes or other targets, it was almost impossible not to believe them.” According to Adams, “Because the TV was on, but we didn’t have volume, it was hard to have a true sense of what was going on.” Bush and her staff will remain in the conference room for several hours. [National Journal, 8/31/2002; Bush, 2010, pp. 201-203]

Curtis M. Bedke. [Source: US Air Force]Officials at Barksdale Air Force Base, near Shreveport, Louisiana, are informed that a large plane will be arriving unexpectedly at their base and will require security within the next 30 minutes, and they quickly deduce that the aircraft is Air Force One, the president’s plane, and start preparing for its arrival. [Associated Press, 10/2/2001; American History, 10/2006 ]
Officers Given List of Requirements for Air Force One - Colonel Anthony Imondi and Colonel Curtis Bedke of the 2nd Bomb Wing at Barksdale take a call from Air Force One in which they are given a list of requirements requested by the plane’s crew. These requirements include supplies intended to last for at least a day or two, as the president is currently uncertain of his final destination or how long he may need to remain airborne. On the list are, among other things, 150,000 pounds of fuel, 75 box lunches, 10 gallons of orange juice, bagels, muffins, and 25 pounds of bananas.
Commander Deduces Plane Is Air Force One - When Lieutenant General Thomas Keck, the commander of the 8th Air Force at Barksdale, learns of the request, he asks his staff, “Who the heck is this?” His personnel say they don’t know, as the plane would not identify itself except to say there were distinguished visitors on board and it was “Code Alpha,” which means top priority. The pilot of Air Force One, Colonel Mark Tillman, then informs the base that the distinguished visitors are four congressmen. However, Keck suspects the plane is more important and soon works out that it must be Air Force One, carrying the president. He then has just 20 minutes to prepare for the president’s arrival at Barksdale.
Base Prepares for Plane's Arrival - Keck orders his staff to prepare for receiving a large, inbound aircraft, although he and his colleagues try to keep the plane’s identity secret as much as possible. The order goes out for the requested supplies to be gathered from the dining facility on the base, the commissary, or from off-base stores. The base’s security forces, and fuels and maintenance personnel, are instructed to stand by to service the plane. Keck tells the base’s military police unit that the incoming plane will need a full-on security detail as soon as it stops on the runway. [2d Bomb Wing, 6/30/2002 ; American History, 10/2006 ]
Officer Told Air Force One Landing at Nearby Airport - Captain Russell Stilling, an operations officer with the 2nd Security Forces Squadron at the base, is initially told only that an “unidentified aircraft” is inbound. Four minutes later he is called by the Secret Service, which tells him the aircraft is in fact Air Force One, but says the plane will be arriving at Shreveport Regional Airport, not Barksdale Air Base, and asks him to assign extra security police. Stilling only realizes Air Force One is landing at Barksdale while he is still on the phone with the Secret Service and he glances at a camera focused on the base’s runways, which is showing the plane coming in to land. [Times-Picayune, 9/8/2002] Air Force One will land at Barksdale Air Force Base at 11:45 a.m. (see 11:45 a.m. September 11, 2001). [Time, 9/14/2001]

Local media outlets report the arrival of Air Force One, with President Bush on board, at Barksdale Air Force Base, near Shreveport, Louisiana (see 11:45 a.m. September 11, 2001), even though the president’s location is meant to be a secret. [Salon, 9/11/2001; Rove, 2010, pp. 258] White House press secretary Ari Fleischer has given instructions to the pool of reporters on Air Force One to prevent them revealing the president’s whereabouts. He told the reporters they could only say they were at “an unidentified location in the United States.” He also told them to refrain from using their cell phones, and to not even turn their phones on, because the signals from them might allow someone to identify their location. [Salon, 9/11/2001; USA Today, 9/11/2001; Sammon, 2002, pp. 110] Bush’s senior adviser, Karl Rove, who is traveling on Air Force One, will later recall, “The president’s whereabouts were a closely guarded secret, or at least we thought so.” However, Rove will describe, “Watching local Shreveport television on the final approach to Barksdale, we saw our plane appear, preparing to touch down with fighter escorts covering us.” Why a television crew is at Barksdale Air Force Base, and therefore able to film Air Force One landing there, is unclear. [Rove, 2010, pp. 258] Mark Rosenker, the director of the White House Military Office, who is traveling with the president on Air Force One, will suggest that the media “perhaps intercepted a message—whether it be by land line or whether it be by two-way radio on the ground—that we were on our way.” [White House, 8/29/2002] According to Rove, “An enterprising local TV news director had stationed a camera just off the base on the flight path.” Consequently, “Everyone now knew where the president was.” The Secret Service is alarmed, but, Rove will comment, “[I]t didn’t seem likely there was a terrorist cell operating in northwest Louisiana and armed with surface-to-air missiles.” [Rove, 2010, pp. 258] Shortly before Bush records a statement at the base, to be broadcast on television (see 12:36 p.m. September 11, 2001), Air Force personnel will inform the reporters traveling with the president that media outlets have reported that Air Force One has landed at Barksdale. The traveling White House staff will then rescind the instruction that the reporters cannot reveal their location. [Salon, 9/11/2001; USA Today, 9/11/2001]

President Bush at Barksdale Air Force Base, accompanied by Lieutenant General Thomas Keck. [Source: White House]President Bush is provided with a high level of security when he gets off Air Force One at Barksdale Air Force Base, near Shreveport, Louisiana, and is promptly driven to a conference center on the base from where he makes a brief phone call. [USA Today, 9/11/2001; Newseum et al., 2002, pp. 164; Rove, 2010, pp. 258-259] Air Force One landed at Barksdale at 11:45 a.m. and was immediately surrounded by Air Force personnel in full combat gear, with their rifles drawn (see 11:45 a.m. September 11, 2001). [USA Today, 9/11/2001; St. Petersburg Times, 7/4/2004] Bush remained on board while a retractable set of stairs was lowered for him to leave the plane by.
Reporters Updated on President's Actions - A dark blue Dodge Caravan now pulls up next to these stairs, and a Secret Service agent and two Air Force officers take positions at the bottom of the stairs. The Dodge then pulls away, perhaps 40 feet back from the plane, and is swept inside and outside with dogs. Some members of the president’s staff come down the stairs from the plane. White House press secretary Ari Fleischer approaches the pool of reporters who have been traveling on Air Force One and who are waiting under the plane’s left wing for the president to disembark. Fleischer gives them a brief update on the president’s actions during the flight and adds: “You will see [the president] disembark here shortly. He will head inside and that’s all I’m going to indicate at this moment. You will have additional information shortly.” Fleischer then answers several questions from the reporters.
President Gets off Plane and into Minivan - Bush then descends from Air Force One. [USA Today, 9/11/2001; Sammon, 2002, pp. 111] The Shreveport Secret Service office has been mobilized to oversee security arrangements while the president is at Barksdale. However, there is no presidential limousine waiting to drive Bush away from the plane. [Rove, 2010, pp. 258] Normally the president’s armored limousine would be flown in ahead of time on a military transport plane, but there has been no time to get it to Barksdale. [Sammon, 2002, pp. 112] Bush instead gets into the Dodge Caravan, which is being guarded by a Humvee with a .50-caliber machine gun on top. [Rove, 2010, pp. 258] White House chief of staff Andrew Card gets in with him. The media and some of Bush’s staff, including his senior adviser, Karl Rove, and his communications director, Dan Bartlett, get into an Air Force minibus. [USA Today, 9/11/2001; Sammon, 2002, pp. 112]
Bush Taken to Conference Center on Base - The Dodge then drives off at high speed. Bush will later recall that it “blasted off down the runway at what felt like 80 miles an hour. When the man behind the wheel started taking turns at that speed, I yelled, ‘Slow down, son, there are no terrorists on this base!’” [Bush, 2010, pp. 132] The Humvee pulls out behind the Dodge, and the airman manning the machine gun on top cocks his weapon and puts a live round in the chamber. The minibus carrying the reporters follows moments later. [Rove, 2010, pp. 258-259] The small motorcade drives to the Dougherty Conference Center, a two-story building on the base. At the stroke of noon, Bush and his aides enter the building. A car blocks the driveway and several armed soldiers stand guard while the president is inside. [USA Today, 9/11/2001; Sammon, 2002, pp. 112]
Bush Speaks to Vice President - Bush and his aides are met by Colonel Curtis Bedke, the commander of the 2nd Bomb Wing, and Lieutenant General Thomas Keck, the commander of the 8th Air Force, apparently as they are entering the conference center. [2d Bomb Wing, 6/30/2002 ; American History, 10/2006 ] Inside, Bush picks up a telephone and speaks briefly with Vice President Dick Cheney, who is at the White House. [Sammon, 2002, pp. 112] Bush tells Keck he needs to get to a secure phone. Keck says there is one in his office, but this is in a different building on the base. [American History, 10/2006 ] The pool of reporters waits in the parking lot outside the conference center for about 10 minutes while the president is inside. Bush and his staff finally come out at 12:11 p.m., to be taken to the 8th Air Force headquarters building (see (12:11 p.m.-1:20 p.m.) September 11, 2001). [USA Today, 9/11/2001; Sammon, 2002, pp. 112]

President Bush is taken to the headquarters of the 8th Air Force at Barksdale Air Force Base, Louisiana, from where he calls government officials in New York and Washington, DC, prepares and records a speech to the nation, and watches television coverage of the terrorist attacks. [Salon, 9/11/2001; Associated Press, 10/2/2001; American History, 10/2006 ] After landing at Barksdale (see 11:45 a.m. September 11, 2001), Bush was initially driven to a conference center on the base, where he made a brief phone call (see (11:55 a.m.) September 11, 2001). [USA Today, 9/11/2001; Newseum et al., 2002, pp. 164]
Bush Driven to 8th Air Force Headquarters - Bush emerges from there at 12:11 p.m. accompanied by his senior adviser, Karl Rove, his chief of staff, Andrew Card, his military aide, some other aides, and several Secret Service agents. [Sammon, 2002, pp. 112; American History, 10/2006 ] He is then driven to “Building 245” on the base—the headquarters of the 8th Air Force—in a small motorcade that also includes the pool of reporters who have been traveling with him on Air Force One. Inside the building, they all can see a sheet of paper that has been taped to a door, with words written in large black type, “Defcon Delta”—the highest possible state of military alert. [USA Today, 9/11/2001; Sammon, 2002, pp. 112] Bush and his staff go to the office of Lieutenant General Thomas Keck, the commander of the 8th Air Force, where they get to work responding to the attacks.
Bush Watches TV, Makes Phone Calls - Bush watches the latest developments on a television in Keck’s office. He sees for the first time the footage, shown on CNN, of the World Trade Center towers collapsing. He tells Keck, “I don’t know who this is, but we’re going to find out and we’re going to go after them, and we’re not just going to slap them on the wrist.” There is a secure phone in Keck’s office, and Bush uses it to talk with Vice President Dick Cheney at the White House (see (12:58 p.m.-1:25 p.m.) September 11, 2001), Defense Secretary Donald Rumsfeld at the Pentagon (see 1:02 p.m. September 11, 2001), and White House counselor Karen Hughes, who is also back in Washington. He also talks over the secure phone with New York City Mayor Rudolph Giuliani, New York Governor George Pataki, and New York Senator Charles Schumer. [Associated Press, 10/2/2001; Daily Telegraph, 12/16/2001; American History, 10/2006 ]
Bush Prepares Speech to the Nation - Bush and Card together draft a speech to the nation that the president is going to record at the base, according to the New Orleans Times-Picayune. [Times-Picayune, 9/8/2002] However, according to journalist and author Bill Sammon, the speech is drafted by Bush’s press secretary, Ari Fleischer, who is with the president at Barksdale, and edited by Hughes, back in Washington. [Sammon, 2002, pp. 113] Once the speech is ready, Keck escorts Bush to the building’s conference room to be filmed delivering it. [American History, 10/2006 ] The reporters traveling on Air Force One go to the conference room after entering the 8th Air Force headquarters building, and are there when Bush records his speech at 12:36 p.m. (see 12:36 p.m. September 11, 2001). [USA Today, 9/11/2001]
Bush Informed of Intelligence about Attacks - Keck remains at Bush’s side for the entire time the president is in the 8th Air Force headquarters building. He works intently, monitoring base security and keeping up to date with the latest information from the 8th Air Force Command. He and his team keep Bush and his aides informed about the intelligence coming in via Air Force channels about the morning’s attacks and ongoing events. After nearly two hours at Barksdale, Bush and his entourage prepare to leave the base. Keck will accompany the president as he is driven back to Air Force One. [American History, 10/2006 ]

President Bush records a speech at Barksdale Air Force Base. [Source: Win McNamee / Reuters]President Bush delivers a short speech to the nation in a windowless conference room at Barksdale Air Force Base, Louisiana, which is recorded and will be broadcast on television about half an hour later. [Time, 9/14/2001; Sammon, 2002, pp. 113-117] Since arriving at Barksdale (see 11:45 a.m. September 11, 2001), Bush has been spending time in the office of Lieutenant General Thomas Keck, the commander of the 8th Air Force (see (12:11 p.m.-1:20 p.m.) September 11, 2001). [American History, 10/2006 ] Bush will later recall that by 12:30 p.m., “it had been almost three hours since I had spoken to the country” (see 9:30 a.m. September 11, 2001) and he is “worried people would get the impression that the government was disengaged.” [Bush, 2010, pp. 133]
Bush Taken to Conference Room to Record Statement - A short statement to the nation has therefore been prepared for Bush to deliver. Keck escorts the president from his office to the conference room in the 8th Air Force headquarters building to record it. Bush is also accompanied to the room by his chief of staff, Andrew Card, his senior adviser, Karl Rove, his communications director, Dan Bartlett, his press secretary Ari Fleischer, and several Secret Service agents. [Sammon, 2002, pp. 113; American History, 10/2006 ] A hurried attempt has been made to prepare the room for the president’s speech. [9/11 Commission, 7/24/2004, pp. 325] Airmen have arranged three US flags behind the wooden lectern behind which Bush will speak, and have tried to add some lighting to brighten up the dark room. The reporters who have been traveling with the president on Air Force One went to the conference room after entering the 8th Air Force headquarters building, and are assembled there when Bush comes in. [USA Today, 9/11/2001; American History, 10/2006 ]
Tape of Speech Taken to Satellite Truck to Be Broadcast - Bush delivers his 219-word speech in precisely two minutes. [USA Today, 9/11/2001; Woodward, 2002, pp. 19] After doing so, he leaves the room without acknowledging, or taking any questions from, the reporters in the room. [USA Today, 9/11/2001; Newseum et al., 2002, pp. 165] Keck, who stays to watch Bush deliver the speech, then escorts the president back to his office. [American History, 10/2006 ] Master Sergeant Rich Del Haya, the officer in charge of the 8th Air Force public affairs office, is then called to the 8th Air Force headquarters building to collect the videotape of the speech. He runs out of the building with it, accompanied by a CBS network producer and reporter, and drives toward the base’s far north entrance. Gate officials contact a state trooper outside the base, who escorts the three to a satellite truck of the local CBS affiliate. [Times-Picayune, 9/8/2002] The recording of the president’s speech will be broadcast from the satellite truck at 1:04 p.m. (see 1:04 p.m. September 11, 2001). [Sammon, 2002, pp. 117]

President Bush spends most of his time at Barksdale Air Force Base arguing on the phone with Vice President Dick Cheney and others over where he should go next. The media are now starting to ask about the president’s whereabouts, and why he has not returned to Washington. “A few minutes before 1 p.m.,” Bush agrees to fly to Nebraska. As earlier, there are rumors of a “credible terrorist threat” to Air Force One that are said to prevent his return to Washington. [Daily Telegraph, 12/16/2001] In addition, there are reports of other unaccounted for planes that are seen as possible threats: two international flights and two domestic ones. A senior administration official will later comment, “That’s a potential of four missiles in the air, and we were concerned that if Air Force One landed in a predictable place, one of those planes could hit it on the ground.” [New York Times, 9/16/2001] At 1:25, Bush speaks with his chief of staff Andrew Card and the head of the Secret Service detail. He tells them: “I want to go back home ASAP. I don’t want whoever this is holding me outside of Washington.” But the Secret Service agent replies, “Our people say it’s too unsteady still,” and Card adds, “The right thing is to let the dust settle.” Bush acquiesces. [Sammon, 2002, pp. 119] In a book about the Secret Service, author Philip Melanson will later comment on the president’s failure to promptly return to Washington: “If the president appeared less than resolute at any point… it was the fault of agents who were overzealous in their desire to protect him, administration sources have offered.” Yet, “The Service, whose first duty that day or any other day is to protect the president, has never publicly pointed out that Bush could have overruled them at any time and ordered Air Force One to Washington, DC.” [Melanson, 2002, pp. 326]

Members of President Bush’s staff decide to remove any nonessential passengers traveling with the president on Air Force One when it leaves Barksdale Air Force Base, Louisiana, and determine that they will leave behind some congressmen, numerous White House staffers, and most of the journalists that have been accompanying them. [Sarasota Magazine, 9/19/2001; Sammon, 2002, pp. 118; Fleischer, 2005, pp. 145; Rove, 2010, pp. 259]
Reporters Traveling with President Reduced to Five - While the president’s staffers are preparing to leave Barksdale, Bush’s chief of staff Andrew Card pulls White House press secretary Ari Fleischer aside and tells him they need to reduce the number of people flying on the president’s plane. Usually, when the president flies, numerous personnel get to his destination ahead of him to prepare for his arrival, but at the present time, Bush’s support team is limited to those already on Air Force One. “Given the heightened sense of security,” Fleischer will later recall, “the Secret Service didn’t want the president to wait for the normal entourage to board the makeshift motorcade that would be assembled upon landing.” Card says the traveling White House staff is going to be reduced and the members of Congress on board will also be left behind at Barksdale, and he tells Fleischer to decrease the number of reporters flying with the president. Card wants the pool of reporters reduced from the current 13 to three, but agrees to Fleischer’s request to make it five. Fleischer decides the reporters that remain with them will be Ann Compton of ABC Radio, Sonya Ross of the Associated Press, Associated Press photographer Doug Mills, and a CBS cameraman and soundman. [Fleischer, 2005, pp. 145-146] White House assistant press secretary Gordon Johndroe passes on the bad news to the reporters. While they are waiting on a bus to be driven back to Air Force One, he comes on board and tells them there will only be five seats on the president’s plane for the media. [USA Today, 9/11/2001]
Reporters Angry at Being Left Behind - The reporters and nonessential personnel remaining at Barksdale Air Force Base will be standing on the tarmac and watching as Air Force One takes off from there, heading for its next destination (see 1:37 p.m. September 11, 2001). [National Journal, 5/3/2011] Some of the reporters will be angry at being left behind. As the president and his entourage are approaching the plane, Reuters correspondent Steve Holland will shout out to Fleischer, “Ari, what about us?” Another angry reporter will call out, “Who’s in charge here, the military or the civilians?” [White House, 8/8/2002; Fleischer, 2005, pp. 146]
'Skeleton Crew' Remaining on Air Force One - As well as the eight reporters, others removed from the plane include Representatives Adam Putnam (R-FL) and Dan Miller (R-FL), Bush’s senior education adviser Sandy Kress, Bush’s personal aide Blake Gottesman, and several Secret Service agents. [USA Today, 9/11/2001; Sarasota Magazine, 9/19/2001] Fleischer will recall that after the nonessential passengers have been left behind, those who continue on Air Force One are just “a skeleton crew.” [White House, 8/8/2002] Those remaining at Barksdale will be escorted to a building and stay there until another plane flies them from the base back to Washington, DC, later in the afternoon (see (3:30 p.m.) September 11, 2001). [Sarasota Magazine, 9/19/2001]

President Bush and Laura Bush with their dogs, Barney and Spot. [Source: White House]Laura Bush, the president’s wife, is told by her Secret Service agents to be prepared to leave Washington, DC, for several days, and members of her staff then go to the White House to fetch some of her belongings. [National Journal, 8/31/2002; Bush, 2010, pp. 203] Bush is at the Secret Service headquarters in Washington, where she was brought for her own safety (see (10:10 a.m.-10:55 a.m.) September 11, 2001 and (10:55 a.m.) September 11, 2001). [Kessler, 2006, pp. 136] At the headquarters, there is “a debate over what to do with [President Bush] and what to do with me,” the first lady will later recall. Her Secret Service agents tell her “to be prepared to leave Washington for several days at least.” To help her prepare, several members of her staff briefly return to the White House and collect some of her belongings. They are escorted there at about 1:30 p.m., according to Noelia Rodriguez, Bush’s press secretary. Sarah Moss, Bush’s assistant, collects some of the first lady’s clothes. John Meyers, Bush’s advance man, collects the Bush family dogs, Spot and Barney, and the family cat, India. While they are at the White House, the first lady’s staffers also collect their own purses and keys. The Secret Service agent with them instructs them: “Be fast. Run. Get your things.” The staffers then return to the Secret Service headquarters. However, Bush and those with her at the headquarters subsequently learn that the president will be returning to Washington today (see (4:00 p.m.) September 11, 2001 and (4:33 p.m.) September 11, 2001). It will therefore be decided that the first lady can stay in the capital. She will be taken to the White House at 6:30 p.m. (see 6:30 p.m. September 11, 2001). [National Journal, 8/31/2002; Bush, 2010, pp. 203]

Air Force One departs Barksdale Air Force Base. [Source: Reuters]Air Force One takes off from Barksdale Air Force Base in Louisiana to fly President Bush to Offutt Air Force Base in Nebraska. While Bush has been at Barksdale, base personnel have refueled Air Force One and restocked it with provisions for its continuing journey, on the basis that it may have to serve as the president’s flying command center for the foreseeable future. [Associated Press, 10/2/2001; 2d Bomb Wing, 6/30/2002 ; BBC, 9/1/2002]
Reduced Number of Passengers on Board - For security reasons, the number of people traveling on Air Force One has been reduced (see (1:00 p.m.) September 11, 2001). [Fleischer, 2005, pp. 145-146] Those continuing with the president include Bush’s chief of staff Andrew Card, his senior adviser Karl Rove, his communications director Dan Bartlett, White House press secretary Ari Fleischer, and assistant press secretary Gordon Johndroe. The number of Secret Service agents accompanying the president has been reduced, as has the number of reporters. The five remaining journalists are Ann Compton of ABC Radio, Sonya Ross of the Associated Press, Associated Press photographer Doug Mills, and a CBS cameraman and sound technician. [Salon, 9/11/2001; Associated Press, 9/12/2001]
President Given Thumbs-up by Airmen - Lieutenant General Thomas Keck, the commander of the 8th Air Force, has been at Bush’s side for most of his time at Barksdale, and accompanies the president as he is being driven across the base to Air Force One. The president passes a row of B-52 bombers and is given a thumbs-up by the planes’ crew members. Keck explains to Bush that this means the troops “are trained, they’re ready, and they’ll do whatever you want them to.” Military police salute and other Air Force crew members cheer the president as he passes them. [American History, 10/2006 ]
Fighter Escort Rejoins Air Force One - Air Force One is being guarded by soldiers with their guns drawn when Bush reaches it, and a pack of military dogs is patrolling the tarmac. [Sammon, 2002, pp. 117-118] After the plane takes off, two F-16 fighter jets pull up alongside it to provide an escort. [American History, 10/2006 ] These are presumably the same fighters, belonging to the 147th Fighter Wing of the Texas Air National Guard, that escorted Air Force One as it came in to land at Barksdale (see (11:29 a.m.) September 11, 2001). [Filson, 2003, pp. 87; Bombardier, 9/8/2006 ]
Destination Chosen Due to 'Continuity of Government' Plan - Bush’s destination, Offutt Air Force Base, is home to the US Strategic Command (Stratcom), which controls the nation’s nuclear weapons. [Associated Press, 9/11/2001; Woodward, 2002, pp. 19] Bush will later say the decision to head there was based on Offutt’s “secure housing space and reliable communications.” [Bush, 2010, pp. 133] The base’s secure teleconferencing equipment will allow the president to conduct a meeting of his National Security Council later in the afternoon (see (3:15 p.m.) September 11, 2001). [Sammon, 2002, pp. 119; Woodward, 2002, pp. 19, 26] According to the 9/11 Commission Report, Offutt has been chosen as the president’s next destination “because of its elaborate command and control facilities, and because it could accommodate overnight lodging for 50 persons. The Secret Service wanted a place where the president could spend several days, if necessary.” [9/11 Commission, 7/24/2004, pp. 325] But according to White House counterterrorism chief Richard Clarke, the decision to head to Offutt instead of back to Washington, DC, was due to a plan called “Continuity of Government.” This program, which dates back to the Reagan administration, originally planned to set up a new leadership for the US in the event of a nuclear war. It was activated for the first time shortly before 10:00 a.m. this morning (see (Between 9:45 a.m. and 9:56 a.m.) September 11, 2001). [Washington Post, 4/7/2004; ABC News, 4/25/2004]

A Boeing 757 takes off from Barksdale Air Force Base, Louisiana, to fly a group of reporters, congressmen, White House staffers, and Secret Service agents to Washington, DC. [Salon, 9/11/2001; Sarasota Magazine, 9/19/2001; Rove, 2010, pp. 259; National Journal, 5/3/2011] The group consists of individuals considered nonessential passengers that had been traveling on Air Force One, whom members of President Bush’s staff decided to leave behind when the president’s plane departed from Barksdale (see (1:00 p.m.) September 11, 2001). It includes eight reporters, two congressmen, numerous White House staffers, and several Secret Service agents. After Air Force One took off from the base earlier in the afternoon to fly the president to his next destination (see 1:37 p.m. September 11, 2001), these individuals were escorted to a building, where they remained until the plane arrived for them. [USA Today, 9/11/2001; Sarasota Magazine, 9/19/2001; Fleischer, 2005, pp. 145] Blake Gottesman, Bush’s personal assistant, who was among those left behind at Barksdale, was given the task of getting the group back to Washington. He has been able to commandeer a Boeing 757 from the Air Force’s Special Missions Fleet. [Rove, 2010, pp. 259] This plane was sent from Andrews Air Force Base, just outside Washington, to Barksdale. [Rochester Review, 9/2004] It is painted with the “United States of America” label, and has an office, a private cabin, and all-first class seats. It has in fact been used previously as Air Force One. [USA Today, 9/11/2001] About two hours after the president and his entourage left Barksdale, the plane takes off from the base with the group of former Air Force One passengers on board. [Newseum et al., 2002, pp. 165] It lands at Andrews Air Force Base around 5:00 p.m. [Sarasota Magazine, 9/19/2001; National Journal, 5/3/2011] Reuters correspondent Arshad Mohammed, who is on the plane, will later comment, “It’s sort of amazing that they got us back to DC that same day when planes were locked down all over the country.” [Newseum et al., 2002, pp. 165]

Brian Stafford. [Source: Publicity photo]President Bush reportedly had begun his video conference call with the National Security Council (see (3:15 p.m.) September 11, 2001) by announcing, “I’m coming back to the White House as soon as the plane is fueled. No discussion.” [Clarke, 2004, pp. 21] Toward the end of this meeting, around 4 p.m., Secret Service Director Brian Stafford tells Bush, “Our position is stay where you are. It’s not safe.” The Secret Service reportedly wants to keep the president where he is, at Offutt Air Force Base, overnight, and—according to some later accounts—indefinitely. To Stafford’s surprise, Bush ignores his advice and tells him, “I’m coming back.” Leaving the meeting, Bush tells his staff, “We’re going home.” [Daily Telegraph, 12/16/2001; Sammon, 2002, pp. 123; Woodward, 2002, pp. 28] Bush adviser Karl Rove later claims that, around this time, there are concerns that several planes still remain unaccounted for (see (4:00 p.m.) September 11, 2001).

Members of Laura Bush’s staff who are with the first lady at the Secret Service headquarters in Washington, DC, go to the White House and then head home. [National Journal, 8/31/2002] Most of Bush’s staffers are with the first lady at the Secret Service headquarters, having been with Bush for her scheduled appearance on Capitol Hill this morning. (Bush’s other staffers stayed behind at the White House.) [ABC, 9/18/2001 ] They were brought to the headquarters for their own safety (see (10:10 a.m.-10:55 a.m.) September 11, 2001 and (10:55 a.m.) September 11, 2001). [Kessler, 2006, pp. 136] Some of them briefly returned to the White House earlier in the afternoon, to collect some of Bush’s belongings (see (1:30 p.m.) September 11, 2001). Members of Bush’s staff now leave the Secret Service headquarters and go to the White House a final time. There, they have to show a Secret Service agent their IDs. “Then,” according to Noelia Rodriguez, the first lady’s press secretary, “it was time to go home.” The first lady will head back to the White House at 6:30 p.m. (see 6:30 p.m. September 11, 2001). [National Journal, 8/31/2002; Bush, 2010, pp. 203]

Laura Bush, the president’s wife, is driven, by members of the Secret Service, to the White House from the Secret Service headquarters in Washington, DC, and is then escorted down to the Presidential Emergency Operations Center (PEOC) below the White House. [Bush, 2010, pp. 203-204] Bush was brought to the Secret Service headquarters this morning for her own safety (see (10:10 a.m.-10:55 a.m.) September 11, 2001 and (10:55 a.m.) September 11, 2001). [Woodward, 2002, pp. 17; Kessler, 2006, pp. 136]
First Lady Reassured that No More Attacks Will Occur - There, she spent much of the afternoon “like most other Americans, glued to the television,” according to Us Weekly magazine. Bush was, however, “perhaps more at ease than the average American because her [Secret Service] agents were receiving news before it was reported on television.” Bush will later recall: “[A]fter some time, we started hearing from our agents that most of the planes [in US airspace] had been accounted for, fairly early in the day, I think, before they really started announcing it on television. So at some point we started feeling reassured that [a terrorist attack] wasn’t going to happen again that day.” After Bush and those with her learned that the president would be returning to Washington today (see (4:00 p.m.) September 11, 2001 and (4:33 p.m.) September 11, 2001), Bush’s Secret Service agents decided that the first lady could go back to the White House.
First Lady Arrives at White House - At 6.30 p.m., she will recall, Bush gets into a Secret Service motorcade and is driven to the White House by Dave Saunders, one of her agents. [CNN, 9/11/2001; Us Weekly, 10/15/2001; Kessler, 2006, pp. 136; Bush, 2010, pp. 203] It is a short journey, as the Secret Service headquarters is just a few blocks from the White House. [Washington Post, 8/23/2009] Bush is driven along the deserted streets and then her vehicle goes at full throttle through the gate of the White House. She notices “[h]eavily armed men in black” swarming over the White House grounds. She then gets out of the vehicle, preceded by her Secret Service agents.
First Lady Taken to Underground Conference Room - Bush is “hustled inside” the White House, she will recall, and taken “downstairs through a pair of big steel doors that closed behind me with a loud hiss, forming an airtight seal.” She then walks along the hallway below the White House to the PEOC, and is taken into the conference room adjacent to the PEOC’s “nerve center.” Those already in the room include National Security Adviser Condoleezza Rice, White House counselor Karen Hughes, and deputy White House chief of staff Josh Bolten. Vice President Dick Cheney and his wife, Lynne Cheney, are also there. Lynne Cheney comes over and hugs the first lady. She then whispers into the first lady’s ear, “The plane that hit the Pentagon circled the White House first” (see 9:34 a.m.- 9:37 a.m. September 11, 2001). This information, Bush will comment, causes a “shiver” to “vibrate down [her] spine.” [Bush, 2010, pp. 203-204] President Bush will join the first lady in the PEOC at 7:10 p.m., after he arrives at the White House (see 7:10 p.m. September 11, 2001). [Bush, 2010, pp. 137-138; Bush, 2010, pp. 204-205] Staffers who were with the first lady at the Secret Service headquarters went to the White House and then headed home at around 4:30 p.m. (see (4:30 p.m.) September 11, 2001). [National Journal, 8/31/2002]

After meeting with a small group of his key advisers in the Presidential Emergency Operations Center (PEOC) below the White House (see (9:00 p.m.-10:00 p.m.) September 11, 2001), President Bush is heading for the elevator to go back upstairs, when he is stopped by a Secret Service agent. The agent tells him, “You’ll be sleeping down here tonight.” Bush says no. When the agent tries to argue about it, Bush repeats, “No, I’m not going to.” He later says his reasons for refusing the Secret Service agent’s instruction are, firstly, “the bed [in the PEOC] looked unappetizing. Secondly, it was a little stale in there. And I needed sleep.” The agent acquiesces, but warns, “If we have any threats, we will come and get you.” Bush then heads up to his bedroom. [Newsweek, 12/3/2001; Sammon, 2002, pp. 133-134] But, shortly after going to bed, the president and first lady will be rushed down to the PEOC due to a false alarm over an approaching plane (see 11:08 p.m. September 11, 2001).

White House Press Secretary Ari Fleischer explains that President Bush went to Nebraska because “[t]here was real and credible information that the White House and Air Force One were targets.” The next day, William Safire of the New York Times writes, and Bush’s political strategist, Karl Rove, confirms, that the Secret Service believed “‘Air Force One may be next,’ and there was an ‘inside’ threat which ‘may have broken the secret codes [i.e., showing a knowledge of presidential procedures].’” [New York Times, 9/13/2001 ] By September 27, Fleischer begins to backpedal on the claim that there were specific threats against Air Force One and/or the president, and news stories flatly contradict it. [Washington Post, 9/27/2001] A well-informed, anonymous Washington official says, “It did two things for [Cheney]. It reinforced his argument that the president should stay out of town, and it gave George W. an excellent reason for doing so.” [Daily Telegraph, 12/16/2001] By 2004, a Bush spokesperson says there was no threat, but Cheney continues to maintain that there may have been. Cheney also claims the Secret Service passed him word of the threat, but two Secret Service agents working that day deny their agency played any role in receiving or passing on such a threat. The threat was allegedly based on the use of the word “Angel,” the code word for Air Force One, but Secret Service agents later note that the code word was not an official secret, but a radio shorthand designation that had been made public well before 2001. [Wall Street Journal, 3/22/2004 ]

On this day, Zeljko E., a Kosovar Serb, enters a Hamburg, Germany, police station and says he wants to turn himself in. He tells the police that he has robbed a business and stolen piles of paper written in Arabic, with the hopes of selling them. A friend of his told him that they relate to the 9/11 attacks. The 44 pounds of papers are translated and they prove to be a “treasure trove.” The documents come from Mamoun Darkazanli’s files, which were not in Darkazanli’s apartment when police raided it two days after 9/11. “It makes for a great story. A petty thief pilfers files containing critical information about the largest terrorist attack in history and dutifully turns them over to the police. [But German] agents do not buy this story for a minute; they suspect that some other Secret Service was trying to find a way of getting evidence into [their] hands. The question is, whose Secret Service?” Some German investigators later suggest that the CIA was responsible; there are also reports that the FBI illegally monitored Darkazanli after 9/11. [Der Spiegel (Hamburg), 10/27/2001; Der Spiegel, 2002, pp. 166-67; Chicago Tribune, 11/17/2002]

A New York Times article theorizes that diesel fuel tanks were responsible for the collapse of Building 7 of the WTC. It collapsed at 5:20 p.m. on 9/11, even though it was farther away from the Twin Towers than many other buildings that remained standing (see (5:20 p.m.) September 11, 2001). It was the first time a steel-reinforced high-rise in the US had ever collapsed in a fire. One of the fuel tanks had been installed in 1999 (see June 8, 1999) as part of a new “Command Center” for Mayor Rudolph Giuliani. [New York Times, 3/2/2002; Dow Jones Business News, 9/10/2002] However, in interviews, several Fire Department officers who were on the scene say they were not aware of any combustible liquid pool fires in WTC 7. [Fire Engineering, 9/2002] And, according to the National Institute of Standards and Technology (NIST), between 11:30 a.m. and 2:30 p.m. on 9/11, “No diesel smells [were] reported from the exterior, stairwells, or lobby areas” of WTC 7. [National Institute of Standards and Technology, 6/2004, pp. L-22 ] Curiously, given all the Wall Street scandals later in the year, Building 7 housed the SEC files related to numerous Wall Street investigations, as well as other federal investigative files. All the files for approximately 3,000 to 4,000 SEC cases were destroyed. Some were backed up in other places, but many were not, especially those classified as confidential. [New York Law Journal, 9/17/2001] Lost files include documents that could show the relationship between Citigroup and the WorldCom bankruptcy. [Street, 8/9/2002] The Equal Employment Opportunity Commission estimates over 10,000 cases will be affected. [New York Law Journal, 9/14/2001] The Secret Service had its largest field office, with more than 200 employees, in WTC 7 and also lost investigative files. Says one agent: “All the evidence that we stored at 7 World Trade, in all our cases, went down with the building.” [Tech TV, 7/23/2002] The IRS and Department of Defense were also tenants, along with the CIA, which, it has been revealed, had a secret office in Building 7. [CNN, 11/4/2001; New York Times, 11/4/2001; Federal Emergency Management Agency, 5/1/2002, pp. 5-2; New York Magazine, 3/20/2006] A few days later, the head of the WTC collapse investigation says he “would possibly consider examining” the collapse of Building 7, but by this time all the rubble has already been removed and destroyed. [US Congress, 3/6/2002]