A City with Scars Unhealed

By: Andrew Nowel, Editor-In-Chief

Last week, The Griffin published an article that discussed the attacks of Sep. 11, 2001 and left out the impact on Washington, D.C. We resolve this issue, raised by readers of The Griffin, this week as one of the biggest impacts of 9/11 happened in the capital of the United States.

At 9:37 a.m. on the morning of 9/11, a plane crashed into the Pentagon, killing 184 people. Passengers on American Airlines Flight 77 experienced a normal takeoff from Dulles International Airport in Virginia with the destination of sunny Los Angeles in mind. However, the day would quickly turn dark as the plane turned around and headed straight for

Washington, D.C.

While over eastern Kentucky, five hijackers took control of Flight 77 and turned the aircraft toward the nation’s capital. With the events happening in New York around the same time, Ronald Reagan Washington National Airport was already on high alert, and no communication from Flight 77 caused panic in the control tower. A message was relayed to the Secret Service Operations Center minutes before the plane flew over the city limits.

Traveling over 500 miles per hour, Flight 77 rammed into the western side of the Pentagon. 184 people were killed: 125 inside the building and 59 passengers and crew of Flight 77. A day in New York that will never be forgotten, but a day in the nation’s capital that, no matter what side you were on politically, saw the horror of an extreme terrorist attack.

The immediate response of the United States federal government was to enact the Homeland Security Act, creating a department that ensured September 11th would never happen again. For regular people living in and around the Washington D.C. area, they saw how impactful an attack that no one saw coming had on the capital. “Tragically, many of us that have served at the Pentagon have succumbed to 9/11-related illnesses. In fact, as of today, 33 FBI employees have died from 9/11-related illnesses. That attack continues to live on, unfortunately,” said retired FBI official John Adams.

For those who weren’t alive during the 9/11 attacks, that day still makes Daeshaun Williams stop and look around the city he grew up in. “My mom, at the time, was working in Virginia for AT&T while my older sister, Carol, was in high school, and when everything was happening in New York, my mom left work and took my sister home. My sister rode the bus every day, so that made it a bigger deal,” said Williams. With the attention of 9/11 on New York every year, Williams and his classmates never truly knew the impact of their own city until they watched a mini documentary of what really happened inside Flight 77. “I’m not a person that cries, but watching that video brought me to tears. It’s something I don’t want to watch, but it’ll always be a memory I have on September 11th for the rest of my life,” said Williams.

On a day when the world did indeed stop turning, the 2,977 victims will never be forgotten in New York, Pennsylvania or Washington D.C. Just like last week, I end with a simple question: where were you when the world stopped turning?