Extended interview: F-16 pilots recall mission to intercept Flight 93 on Sept. 11, 2001

hi I'm Nora odonnell as we Mark 22 years since the deadliest terror attack on American soil we remember those lives lost the families no longer whole and the heroes who put their lives on the line to help others including Two fighter pilots here in the Washington DC area we first brought you their story two years ago but it is still widely unknown and it's one we think everyone should hear we've included in this Extended Cut air traffic control audio that covers the airspace over the Eastern Seaboard as a reminder of the confusion as everything unfolded that Tuesday morning that's when Mark sasville call sign SAS and Heather peny call sign lucky took off after the World Trade Center was hit with one sole mission to protect the nation's capital no matter what it took American Airlines emergency line please State your emergency hey this is Ned American Airlines calling I am monitoring a call in which flight 11 the flight attendant is advising our reps that the pilot everyone's been stabed we got hit by surprise uh we contacted Air Traffic Control they are going to handle this as a confirmed hijacking and we weren't going to be caught on the ground watching America get hit again weapon Ser F hi Boston Senate tmu we have a a problem here we have a hijack aircraft headed towards new New York and and we need you guys to we need someone to scramble some f-16s or something up there to help us out is this is this real world or exercise no this is non exercise manest so and if you in a SC no we have several situations go going on here it's escalating big big time and we need to get the military involved with this well what's going on just get me somebody who has the authority to get military in air now well thank you guys both for doing this um I think as much as we all know about 911 and reflecting back your story is one um that many people don't know about let's start 20 years ago what were you both doing when you heard about the first strike against America General it was a normal Tuesday morning we had just come back from a big deployment out to Las Vegas where we had a lot of training uh to do and we were very successful um we had a normal scheduling meeting and in the middle of that is when things start to to unfold Anda all of us by surprise uh before you know it the phones are ringing and we're we're talking to the White House jock we're talking to the Secret Service uh trying to just really understand what's happening and um one thing led to another before uh we we got too far down the road we were just trying to uh get in the air as soon as we could to make sure another airplane didn't hit its Target fundamentally Heather describe where you were when you first heard about the World Trade Center I was sitting in the scheduling meeting with SAS and some of the other Pilots that were part of of the senior leadership in the Squadron that day so there was SAS uh Dan raisen Kane was there it was Mark Drifter Valentine's first day um September 11th we had uh Phil dog Thompson was our supervisor of flying so we were we were working on what was going how we were going to fly that that week who was available who had check rides that month it was just normal Administration and David chunks Kahan one of our enlisted troops knocks on the door and opens up the door and says an airplane just flew into the World Trade Center and I remember thinking well how could that have happened it was a spectacularly clear blue day and I don't know about you but I think most of us assumed that it was a small airplane that was like a a small general aviation Cessna and everyone knows those airplanes just bounce off of building so they don't really cause damage so I recall a few inappropriate jokes but it wasn't until he came back and said a second aircraft hit the second World Trade Center and it was on purpose and that was when we all got up to the bar and saw the images that everyone else that morning saw that was when we really knew that the nation was under attack I remember when the second plane hit my immediately thought was we're at War immediately thought that another one just hit the building [Music] wow the whole building just came apart this is not an accident I think we thought the same thing and in my mind my instinct was we needed to react we've got to get up into the air with whatever we have but this is December 7th 1941 so many years later and we cannot let another airplane hit its Target if if they are coming for here and so you know not too long after that the Pentagon is hit um we were all in a reaction mode here in the wing it was a it's a complete Wing effort to get the airplanes ready to start to pull missiles out and to get some kind of capability up in the air well I told the SD so far we need to get those Fighters screwed over Manhattan because we don't know how many guys are out of B could be two could be more I think once we got past that initial actions phase if you will it started to sink in that we were going to have a long-standing security commitment for many years no idea that it would uh take as long as it did but so you were thinking we got to get up in the air when did the orders come down so we never got any official tasking we were asked uh by the White House jock if there was anything that we could get up into the air and so we were at that time our Squadron our wing was not part of NORAD we were not part of that structure task to defend America so when they indicated that what turned out to be fight 93 was coming down the river as as we talked about it um that indicated to us there may be more coming we need to do something and so that became essentially our unofficial tasking and uh we did what we needed to do Heather describe what was your understanding about when the White House called and what they wanted you to do we knew immediately as soon as we saw the images that we needed to protect and defend but as general sasville said we were not an alert Squadron we didn't have any missiles and we weren't part of the command and control chain we how could we get Authority everyone in the Squadron everyone in the wing began immediately to take action I remember our intelligence officer David nuts MCN making phone calls to Airline reservations desks to try to find out who was you know who was still Airborne who was what aircraft were taking off what airliners were doing he was trying to build us a picture of what was going on within the air space when we finally got the call from the White House our mission to protect and defend was obvious even though at that point in time we didn't have missiles on board we needed to do everything we possibly could do to protect any further attack from reaching our nation's capital the White House I came from Boston well we're going to turn and burn and Crank It Up all right here we go this what we're going to do here east of the white house right now so describe that I mean I just kind of like take me to that moment you know was it was it let's go get up the White House just called like how is it communicated to you get in the planes like H describe that for me General so essentially it was uh uh uh Phil dog Thompson uh was standing behind the duty desk uh talking uh uh to the Secret Service and and that was the demand signal was there may be more coming so that that's all we really needed he called the wing Commander the wing Commander came down uh we uh ran into a quick uh briefing to assess the threat figure out what we needed to do and uh and lucky and I were the first ones to take off and and and we just went down grabbed our flight flight gear and and uh got in the airplanes Lieutenant Colonel Denman uh the maintenance officer at the time was out there pulling pins uh and we jumped in the airplanes and took off without wasting any time uh it it just happened so quickly uh because of the severity of the issue we knew we didn't have time to spare when were you told that you could shoot down a plane if it didn't respond that came a little bit later uh once we were airborne all that sorted out the vice president as you know and and we all know at this point uh made a declaration and so it took a while for that to get down uh through uh the wing Commander here and so uh once we were Airborne we understood what the rules of engagement were and that was really part of the concern is in the in the fog of War at the time in the confusion uh we needed to be very careful that we didn't make a bad situation worse but you're scrambling to get the jet set up in the air what did you understand about the Rules of Engagement Heather we understood what the threat was we were looking for a rogue airliner flying low that was not communicating with air traffic control go for 06 traffic is 11:00 and 5 miles Northbound fast moving type and altitude unknown are you the traffic do you know what kind it is can you see looks like a 757 sir a 757 Can you estimate his altitude it looks like he's a CO altitude right now sir go for 86 thank you so we had a very good idea contextually of what would comprise a hostile Target as general sasville said the indications were that there was an aircraft coming in from the Northwest low down the pomac river and so that was the initial Target that we were looking for and we would have to do whatever it took to prevent it from reaching DC after SAS took us out sanitized the airspace far enough to make sure that there was no threat on that axis and and then brought us back to DC I remember you working with pic air traffic control and teaching them how to become Air Battle Man managers because there was an incredible response of of Medics of of police helicopters of of military airlift so even though when we took off the air space was dead calm when we came back and S set up a counterrotating combat Air Patrol all sorts of aircraft and helicopters began to get airborne and we had to distort out who was a good guy who was a Medevac who was uh you know official government who was just an innocent individual who had no idea what had gone on and who potentially could be a threat and the air traffic control the controllers down in the pomac tron the radar system that manages all the airspace around DC they did a fantastic job I mean General how long did pre-flight checks usually take it's usually a 20 minute program 15 to 20 minutes nice and calm and and making sure that everything's organized where it needs to be properly fueled prop proper tire pressure oxygen pressure and the like and how much time did you have on 9911 um I got right in the cockpit we and that's part of the team effort that lucky is talking about is it was a team effort and and the maintainers do a great job we it's a second check when we jump in so we both trusted our maintainers that's the special bond that pilots and crew chiefs have and uh and we both jumped in and and took off right away in fact Heather I read you were you were saying pull the blocks what you mean you were moving you guys were moving and pulling stuff out of the plane to get up as quickly as possible absolutely you know jumping up into the jet as general sasville said I mean normally it would take up to 20 minutes and we didn't have GP s back then clearly we didn't have 20 minutes and I had actually never been trained on how to scramble an aircraft how to scramble an F-16 and in order to be able to do that you had to actually nowadays we call it Hawk Hawking a jet there are systems that you you sort of preset so that we can take off and go really quickly but I'd never been trained on any of that the Jets clearly had not already been set up for that and so I had to kind of make up my own procedures for scrambling you didn't have all the instruments on when I jumped up in the jet my main concern was what's the minimum that I need to do to make this jet airworthy to fly checking the engine checking the flight control but I had no navigation system I had no radar um none of the systems that had the time to go through through their normal checks just hoping the inflight line thing worked and and your f-16s weren't armed with missiles why not well that we we never did that we never since we weren't part of the alert Enterprise um It's actually kind of dangerous to have live missiles loaded all the time so uh we had them available but they weren't assembled we don't store them together right that's a huge Hazard so they weren't assembled let alone brought forward here to the flight line let alone uh loaded up on the airplanes that happened about an hour after we took off and so raisen an iore had uh had missiles on their airplanes by the time they took off I mean if you remember after the fall of the Soviet Union the nation wanted a peace dividend and they wanted to to Really draw down the entire military so they cut the Air Force in half and so all of the alert units that used to ring our nation's borders to protect us from Soviet nuclear bombs s had been reduced to only five alert units for the entire nation and we were not one of them that's why we didn't have armed missiles on the aircraft and why we weren't part of NORAD why we had such challenges getting the authorization to launch was because of how small the Air Force had become and the guard suffered the same and post 911 though now there are armed f 16's ready to go absolutely since 911 we've had a 247 365 air defense commitment we call it airspace control alert now but we are Lock Stock and Barrel part of that uh chain of command part of that that Enterprise and it makes you wonder why we weren't set up that way before 911 if you two were flying f-16s that weren't armed how were you going to take down Flight 93 so you'll be happy to know when I think the Amer public will have be happy to know that we don't train to take down airliners we never have I had known I had practiced and during the Cold War how to attack large airplanes bombers U our enemies bombers and so I was a little bit familiar with how that might go but you're right we didn't have any missiles and we didn't have combat loads of bullets we had training rounds and so as we're running out to the airplane you know the thought of occurred to us we do need to kind of understand how we're going to do that and so we she and I lucky and I had a game plan on how we might approach that but the fundamental premise is we were going to have to hit the airplane and and disable it somehow uh either get the flight controls or the propulsion system or or some part of the airplane that would make it alter its course and not hit its Target a kamakazi mission we had no missiles our only was going to be to Ram The Airliner sir I remember you would take the cockpit to aim at the terrorists and I would take the tail and you said that we did as as we're running out to the airplane and so when he said that to you what did you think of course it was obvious it was so clear what needed to be done neither of us had any second thoughts we didn't have time to think of it we it was pure reaction mode is pure adrenaline and uh thankfully we had enough training to safely get airborne uh work together as a team to to find the airplane and thankfully uh it wasn't there we we never saw it uh but we knew that there is a potential that there might be more airplanes coming there might be a second or third wave that we needed to be ready for and so for that small part of time we just needed to have some kind of capability to prevent those targets from being head what was your understanding I mean did you did you have the understanding that flight 93 was headed to the White House or to the US capital okay United 93 go ahead is 29 miles out of 29 minutes out of Washington DC 29 minutes out of Washington DC and tracking towards it this is the one who revers cars in Ohio well we had we had seen we saw the Pentagon on fire if there was another airplane there only certain value targets inside of the District of Colombia they're all government related and all high value targets that if they had been hit would have probably changed the course of history you were going to ram the cockpit you were going to ram the tail that's not something you survive no a suicide mission is not something you survive I mean as the military we don't send our service members on suicide missions but it was clear what needed to be done that morning and although it wasn't until much later that I made the correlation for myself that this was flight 93 we knew that there was an airliner coming in low from the Northwest and we also believed that there were potentially up to three unaccounted for aircraft based off of the work that that our intelligence officer David mcnolty had done so we had to be ready we knew that Dan Kane and Brandon rasmason were back at the Squadron and if they needed to they could scramble just as quickly but I remember you saying raisin you and iore wait until you get missiles so protecting our nation's capital from an incoming airliner from an attack from a terrorist was what we need to do we'd already seen what they had done in New York we'd saw what they had done with the Pentagon we flew over we passed through the smoke what else would there be but but our nation's leadership the vice president had given the the order to shoot down a a commercial airline did he know that you were unarmed I president has cleared vice president has cleared us to intercept track shoot them down if they do not respond first on our CC so the vice president gave a weapons free order um I think was the term that was used at the time I don't think the that anybody really had a great picture of what was happening at the time and so I I want you know it's important to know that nobody asked us to do this nobody in the chain of command directed us to take this approach this is something that we saw uh this is the scenario that we saw and and we knew what needed to be done it's also important to note that our unit lives here this is our home so not only is this a nation's capital but we have friends we have families here are Deep Roots as a guard unit and it Frank Al a little bit of a a personal angle on defending our own turf as well so um it was it was a very difficult position that uh we were all put in that day and and thankfully like I said we didn't make matters worse it was not an order through the chain of command it was your call to Ram the plane we didn't have any other choice and we weren't going to be caught on the ground watching America get hit again wasn't going to happen no question in your mind that was the right thing to do not a question and the only thing you could do we didn't have any choice yeah absolutely describe what it was like flying over the Pentagon that was on fire so after we drove up the river didn't see anything on the radar we're looking low turned back around and flew over the Pentagon and and one of the most Vivid memories I have is looking down seeing the fire smelling the smoke and the fumes coming through the cockpit and being completely nauseous and it wasn't the smoke that was making me nauseous it was the thought that we got hit by surprise we were attacked successfully attacked and we couldn't do anything about it that's what got to me what was your thought Heather I recall how white and black the smoke was against the clear clear blue sky and how it just barely drifted because of winds were so light out of the Southwest but really what I was focused on was trying to be a good wingman and do what we needed to get done so I remember the physical Sensations I remember the smell coming through the ECS the the but I really didn't have any emotion it was so very surreal and Washington is go for 06 go for 06 guys that aircraft is down he in our 12:00 position uh looks like it's just to the north west of the Airfield at this time sir go for 86 thank you desend maintain 2000 okay we're down to 2000 and uh this should go for 06 it looks like that aircraft crash into the Pentagon sir you knew that the world trade tower had been and the World Trade Center had been hit but did you know know from command that the Pentagon had been hit or did you see it for the first time we didn't see it we heard about it you had heard about it and then you saw it and then we saw it saw and you know like anything when you hear something and then you see it in person it's a yeah we were that that whole first sorty certainly and into the second sorty we were just operating on adrenaline and in reacting mode not not really thinking about future moves and uh and what was about to happen and what would unfold in a strategic sense uh for decades to come it was it was all let's make sure that we get the situation under control to the best that we can were you when you were in the air what were you doing to try and find flight 93 so when we took off and SAS turned us to the Northwest I floated out to a wide position to his North and we stayed low because we needed to be able to have a visual Lookout uh across the Horizon and if we were too high looking down there was a chance that the aircraft could get visually cluttered as well as have our radar be cluttered as well so it was a combination of a visual Lookout and then also a radar Lookout trying to capture any kind of return contact for the aircraft of course we never found anything we we were our our normal tactic is to stay together as a two ship and so we drove up as far as we could uh we stayed together and then it became apparent to me that this might not be the best tactic so we split up and knowing knowing that some of the airplanes had taken off out of the Northeast that might be an attack Vector so one of us look to the Northeast one of us to look to the northwest again looking outside and and looking on the radar to see if anything was coming our way Heather your father was a United pilot at the same time essentially flying a similar route were you worried that he could be on the cockpit of one of those planes up in the air my father never crossed my mind that was not something that I was even thinking about this what we were about to do was not about me what we needed to do was about the mission about protecting our nation when did you learn that flight 93 had crashed in Pennsylvania after we landed so when we're flying we only have two radios and you're talking to air traffic control and you're talking to your your squadron or or your your flight mate uh and so you really don't have a lot of information when you're flying around if somebody doesn't tell you so there's no way to get updates different story 20 years on with the technology that we have we you know we have different means of communicating and and different ways of displaying information uh but we didn't get the rest of the story until we landed after that first sorty so how long were you up in the air on that first sorty until we ran out of gas that's normally about an hour and a half two hours so that whole time you were looking for Flight 93 or any other aircraft anything that's pointed towards Wards Washington DC looks like it intends to run into something right so you know the the altitude the angle anything that was coming towards us uh we were going to take a very hard look at and how did you make sure that there wasn't a disaster where you took down a plane that was not a danger so what was amazing was how SAS taught our air traffic control how to essentially be speak fighter pilot speak Air Force so once you brought us back and you set up a counter rotating cap between the two of us so that someone was always looking towards the northwest or towards the Northeast we were only talking at that point in time our only information was from Air Traffic Control whose job normally is to sequence airliners in predetermined rots keep them separated but now we needed to have them help us facilitate intercepts provide us information on who is who and what's what so we can filter out the good guys from the unknowns and from the bad guys what headed toward where Washington okay so your a and I just wanted to give you a heads up okay go ahead the last known lat long that we had primary target only was 4038 North 07403 West on american1 and so I remember you telling uh pomac okay so there's this nav it's a navigational beacon on National Reagan airports called DCA now I know that that's I know it's called DCA but let's just call it Bullseye for now and if you see a contact that's to the east which is a 090 on the compass and it's 20 mil and it's 3,000 ft I want you to say Bullseye 090 for 203,000 and like that the air traffic controllers immediately adapted and so pretty soon they were telling us just proactively hey we've got a Medevac flight this is their Bullseye this is what they're squawking this is where they came from here's where they're going and so we could see that contact on our Radars and then say okay we know that that's a friendly and continue looking for what was unknown and if we saw something that they hadn't told us about we'd let them know using the same Bullseye language and then they could clarify oh I forgot to tell you that's a sheriff's helicopter or they could say we don't know who that guy is and then as the cap Commander SAS would then give me the authority to go check it out and take a look at whoever that was and so the question about who's who becomes very important sometimes Air Traffic Control knew who they were sometimes they didn't the ones that they couldn't identify are the ones that lucky and I would go and and take a look at but the scenario of of if that is an unknown and it looks like they are coming towards us and we will need to do something is uh is an ethical and moral question that we were both wrestling with at the time because if you do need to Ram it or take action uh that would be a very heavy weighty decision to make on the Fly not knowing if it was really intended for a certain Target how many lives would be um taken in the attack let alone taking down the airplane so um very very difficult scenario to work through in your mind at 500 knots thankfully we didn't have to do any of that 20 years later when you look back at that decision that you made what do you think in the short term I think anybody in our position would have done the same thing that's what we do right that's we defend the nation we defend America I think that day would have would have been the same uh I I'm happy that we've come a long way in the past 20 years the National Guard specifically is a much more operational Force where we are better trained uh our equipment is very much like what the active duty has and so I'm confident that if a similar scenario were to happen again albeit in a different domain let's say I think our our ability to respond in just as successful a manner um is much improved Heather I understand later that day you escorted Air Force One and President Bush back home was that a sense of relief escorting President Bush was was an honor it was also anticlimactic uh at that point in time I think the scenario had had calmed down enough we had uh aircraft that were were armed at that point in time we also had um additional resources from from NORAD so there was an awax aircraft we had a tanker there were additional Fighters that were airborne and so as an it was an honor to be able to to bring President Bush back home to Andrew Air Force Base but definitely did not have the significance of our first mission 20 years later how often do you think about that day 911 in some ways the legacy of 9911 is always with me when I think about the mission that we didn't have to do because the passengers on flight 93 did I also want to give you head heads of Washington go ahead United 93 have you got information on that yet yeah he's down he's down yes when did he land because he did not land oh he's down yeah somewhere up Northeast of Camp David clearly not only does our nation owe so much to those Heroes but SAS and I owe Our Lives to them as well and they made a choice that they shouldn't have they should not have had to have make they shouldn't have had to have made the choice to sacrifice their lives but that's also why when I think of 9/11 instead of being overcome by the trauma and the horror and the tragedy I'm actually overcome by hope because of the character and the bravery and the service to all of us that they demonstrated that day and the other Heroes of 911 the First Responders and you know neighbors that that opened up their homes to strangers that this is what it means to be an American and we see that today with with Americans opening up their homes to strangers right that the best of who we are was demonstrated on that day and that's part of what I hope to live through my daily choices and to honor their legacy and their gift to us so in some ways living my life as normally as possible is the biggest way that we can say that the terrorist did not win that we are still who we are going to be and we are going to live our lives as normally as possible and at the same time hopefully with that kind of awareness and mindfulness of being our better angels I think about it every day I work in the Pentagon I drive by the 9/11 Memorial every day the those on flight 93 that paid the ultimate price actively engaged they knew what they were doing those are the real heroes those who perished in the airplanes inside the Pentagon inside the towers those are the real heroes I think as traumatic an event as that was looking back on it in the long run in the long Arc of time we will still Prevail we will preserve our values and we won't be deterred there's nothing in a in a traumatic event like that or anything else that our enemies will throw at us that will slow us down well General and Heather thank you so much for sharing your story with us thank you and thanks for your time your service yeah thank you thank you it's quite a story

Channel: CBS Evening News

Views: 2,957,775

Keywords: video, cbs, news, pilots, terrorist attack, September 11, flight 93, new york city, air traffic control, eastern seaboard, world trade center

Id: 3H1JHVI7kCo

Length: 37min 48sec (2268 seconds)

Published: Sat Sep 09 2023